OMMERE, Netherlands – Within the spring of 1945, a couple of weeks earlier than the Netherlands was liberated from its Nazi occupiers, 5 German troopers buried 4 ammunition bins filled with gold, jewellery and watches in a wooded space of a quiet Dutch nation village.
Nazi troopers had collected the possibly multi-million greenback valuables from the streets after they had been blown out of a financial institution vault in an explosion within the metropolis of Arnhem in late summer season 1944, paperwork present.
What the boys who buried the loot in all probability did not know was that considered one of their companions, a person named Helmut Sonder, was mendacity within the bushes with a struggle wound, watching the scene and remembering it.
Sonder then drew a meticulous map displaying precisely the place (subsequent to 3 poplars) and the way deep (between 50 and 70 centimeters) the treasure was buried.
Not a lot is thought concerning the destiny of the person who drew the map, however the doc ended up within the Dutch Nationwide Archives in The Hague.
It was launched this month as a part of the archives’ annual “promotional day,” together with hundreds of paperwork which might be not labeled.
The discharge of the map has spurred a brand new seek for the crates of gold and jewellery and raised the profile of the small city omer -with 751 inhabitants- as one of many few locations on the planet the place a identified Nazi treasure might be hidden.
“We’re on the map,” stated Klaas Tammes, a former mayor of the municipality to which Ommeren belongs.
“That was good.”
Others share his pleasure however specific a way of frustration at individuals coming from throughout the nation to dig up the village, an hour’s drive south-east of Amsterdam.
Dozens of individuals have include shovels and steel detectors, and one man even introduced a dowsing rod, in line with Tammes, who lives on the farm the place the treasure could also be buried.
A photograph circulating amongst neighbors exhibits one other man buried waist-deep subsequent to a regional highway.
The thriller has intrigued native residents and attracted a number of consideration within the Dutch and worldwide media, however their most important query stays unanswered:
Is the loot nonetheless there?
“I’ve my doubts,” says Joke Honders, a neighborhood historian who works on the Ommeren Regional Museum and lives within the subsequent village.
However she added that after consulting a historic atlas and the hand-drawn map, she thinks she is aware of the place the treasure could be, a spot nobody she is aware of has but sought.
When requested for extra particulars, he replied:
“I cannot inform you!”
It isn’t totally clear what would occur to the treasure if somebody discovered it.
Honders stated he had little interest in retaining the contents of the bins ought to he discover them.
“It isn’t concerning the treasure itself,” he stated.
“The whole lot is stolen; there’s an excessive amount of negativity hooked up to it.”
Discovering the treasure within the space might be a harmful job, stated Sebastiaan Hoogenberg, an beginner steel detector who runs a canal youtube the place he talks concerning the objects he finds within the Netherlands.
There are unexploded WWII period bombs on the bottom.
On its web site, the Ommeren metropolis council urged fortune seekers to remain away, as digging for treasure is just not truly allowed.
After the map was launched, town council acquired many messages from individuals who claimed to know the precise location and supplied to disclose it for cash, stated Birgit van Aken-Quint, a metropolis council spokeswoman.
Since then, the scenario has calmed down, he stated, and about 5 individuals have utilized permission fromI am in search of the treasure
In accordance with Nationwide Archives paperwork, rumors concerning the treasure started amongst Dutch troopers stationed in Germany in 1946.
A post-war authorities company tasked with finding and managing stolen items came upon in December 1946 and ordered official searches of the realm.
The primary search in January 1947 was unsuccessful as a result of the bottom was frozen.
The second try a couple of weeks later failed as a consequence of a faulty steel detector, because the paperwork present.
For the third search in the summertime of 1947, the authorities introduced Sonder, the previous soldier who drew the map, again from Germany to the Netherlands to find out the precise location, the paperwork present.
They discovered nothing.
After a fourth and remaining try in August 1947, officers concluded that the treasure was in all probability not there, the paperwork present.
Ommeren residents stated that they had by no means heard of the treasure.
“It was a complete shock,” Tammes stated.
“This story was unknown right here.”
“We got here throughout this map accidentally,” stated Annet Waalkens, a researcher on the Nationwide Archives, which has lots of of hundreds of maps in its assortment.
“By the point we noticed it, we had already discovered our personal treasure.”
And provides:
“It is good that a piece of paper may cause yellowingr such feelings”.
Sonder could have made all of it up, however Dutch search officers thought it unlikely, the paperwork present.
One other concept is that a number of state searchers secretly discovered it.
And one other speculation, which some think about the most certainly, is that one of many Nazi troopers who hid the treasure got here again and dug it up himself.
No speculation has been confirmed, and it’s unclear if Sonder continues to be alive.
It isn’t the primary time the city, which is especially quiet within the winter with out the bikers and campers who flock to the realm in the summertime, has been the topic of archaeological pleasure.
In 2016, three prospectors discovered a treasure of 31 Roman gold cash.
Not all have joined within the enthusiasm for the doable Nazi treasure.
“I feel it is going to cross,” stated Dicky Briene, 76, who has lived in the identical home in Ommeren for 54 years and stated he hadn’t seen any guests with shovels or steel detectors.
“And it in all probability will not be something.”
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