Posted on 06/04/2015 9:03:28 AM PDT by nickcarraway
As the German army was in retreat at the end of 1944 and the country starved, Hitler stashed away his precious liquor, where it lay hidden for 76 years - until now.
When restauranteur Silvio Stelzer bought a villa on the grounds of the splendid Wasserschloss Moritzburg estate in Saxony, the old seat of the royal family of Saxony, he knew he was moving into a place rich with history.
What he probably didn’t expect was to find quite such a wealth of historical treasure when renovating his grounds.
But Bild reported on Thursday that the well-known chef, who has opened a restaurant in the villa, found Hitler’s champagne and cognac collection in an underground chamber in the extensive gardens.
It's a surprising find for one of history's most famous diet obsessives - the Nazi dictator was a vegetarian, teetotal and a non-smoker.
A ledger found in the house shows how Hitler struck a deal with Prince Ernst Heinrich von Sachsen, who owned the palace at the time.
“At the end of 1944 Hitler had his wine cellar and delicatessens delivered into this underground labyrinth because the airstrikes had made Berlin unsafe,” Stelzer told Bild.
Soldiers delivered the dictator’s treasure, packed in hundreds of boxes on several trucks. Inside were salami, cheese, chocolate, cigarettes and other rare goodies.
“The prince received a special package full of delicacies from the Führer in return.
"None of the food is left. After May 8th 1945 the Russian troops plundered everything,” said Stelzer.
The chef added that he still doesn’t know what he will do with the discovered treasure.
Stelzer was unavailable for comment when The Local reached out to him.
News of the find adds to a spate of Hitler-related artifacts turning up in recent weeks, including bronze horses that once stood outside the Reich Chancellery found on the German black market and underwear alleged to have belonged to Hitler's mistress Eva Braun.
More envious of the power than the money.
Next to a collection of Hillary’s books.
You’d think anyone named “Hitler” would change their name.
Hitler: non-smoking, teatotalling vegetarian with spectacular flatulence.
Hitler did not drink very much.
But you don’t need to drink to understand the value of quality wine and liqueur. Hitler understood money.
Remember the movie Schindler’s list? At the end of the movie as Schindler was releasing his workers, he supplied them with an ample supply of vodka. He knew they (the Jews) wouldn’t drink it. But he also knew they could use it as currency especially when dealing with the Russians.
Many of them, including Patrick, did in fact change their name.
Retreating Germans deliberately left massive stockpiles of alcohol behind in the hopes that advancing Russian troops would drink themselves into a stupor. The opposite happened. Much of the (well-deserved) brutality the Russians inflicted on soldiers and civilians alike during their march into Germany was attributed to drunkenness.
First thing I'd do would be to check the radiation count of the liquid. Anything still growing shortly after the Trinity test would start absorbing freshly made nuclear material.
The book "The Billionaire's Vinegar" recounts the fraud in "vintage" wine, including the then "newly discovered" stash of Thomas Jefferson wine he ordered, but never made it out of France.
Now that I think about it, the "original" forager was a German, a some time music producer, that kept "finding" caches of pre-phylloxea wine, spurring a couple of decades of fraud.
Nothing. In Germany the book rights are owned by the government of Bavaria and they have refused to print or sell any copies. However, the German copywrite runs out next year and the book goes into the public domain. So in 2016 any publisher can print it, sell it, and keep all the profits.
That's what the U.S. publisher did. Houghton Mifflin had the rights to the book before World War 2. But there was a legal wrangle with two other publishers who released versions, and by the time that was sorted out in the courts the war had started and all financial dealings with Germany were frozen. Legal rights to the book were then the property of the U.S. government and between 1939 and 1979 the government made about $160,000 in royalties, all of which were turned over to the War Claims Fund which paid damages to, among other people, U.S. POWs. In 1979 Houghton Mifflin bought the rights back from the government and then could sell the book and keep everything. Their profits by 2000 could have been as high as $750,000 but in that year U.S. News and World Report wrote a story on how much Houghton Mifflin had made and the publisher said they were donating all past and future profits from the book to charity.
“Retreating Germans deliberately left massive stockpiles of alcohol behind...”
I was referring to conquering armies leaving alcohol untouched. Such as Company B.
That stuff was gold, and Hitler could use it for guests and VIP.
Anyone in WWII would have coveted such wealth and power, even if they were non-smokers and meat eaters themselves.
I don’t know why anyone would want to even buy the book.
Even if you were curious about it, you could sign it out of the library. Nearly every library carries it.
Although I have never read it, by all accounts it is rather dull tract and not worth the time it would take to get through it. Although Hitler had a charismatic speaking style, his book is extremely dull and boring in comparison.
“You’d think anyone named “Hitler” would change their name.”
I went to school with Richard Speck’s nephews. One of them was Richard also. He kept his name.
Neo-Nazis. White supremacists. There's a niche market for it.
Even if you were curious about it, you could sign it out of the library. Nearly every library carries it.
Heck it's available online so you don't even have to go to the library.
I used to know a woman whose last name was Manson. She was no relation to Charles, but she got nasty crank phone calls and such. There’s no way I would keep an infamous last name like Hitler or Manson!
“But he also knew they could use it as currency especially when dealing with the Russians.”
Very true. I have a few hundred mini-bottles of various types of booze. In the case of a need for trade, I figure those will actually be easier to move than gold!
;-)
In Hillary’s excuse for a mind money = power and power = money.
I was just thinking of Richard Speck. With the “all ‘Caitlyn’, all the time” propaganda, it’s not easy not to remember “Speck’s Pecs”.
Mr. Hilter (Python take) knew the value of good spirits. It was powerful currency.
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