Evening star., 1946-11-24
Part II
By Herman P. Hevenor, III

By Herman P. Hevenor, III
~ ITALIANS generally appeared
highly appreciatives Of every
opportunity to cooperate In
making our program to restore
their war-scattered archives . gen.
uine success. Only shortcoming was
that neither Italians nor Allies
could protect and salvage everything
Of value. There was no way to save
these people and their possessions
from the destruction they had visited
upon themselves.
The French. Dutch and Belgians1
were infinitely more fortunate. The
Allies were able to sweep across
France, Belgium, Holland and Lux
embourg in less than four months
without inflicting serious damage to
cities and shrines. War damage
being inversely proportional to the
speed of military operations, few
buildings Of outstanding value were
destroyed. even in the Normandy
Brittany areas where resistance was
strongest.
When Germany capitulated, year
after D day, May 8. 1945, the damage
and destruction to the German cities
was so ruinous that very little was
left to be repaired, and the repair
materials, civilian population and
labor required for the work was nom
existent. Necessarily, the emphasis
of the Allied program shifted to
locating German art repositories
and carrying on the work of identify
ing, cataloguing, and repairing their
collections. Because loot taken from
the European countries was removed
to Germany en- masse, the last phase
OF the program was enacted almost
entirely within the borders Of Ger
many and Austria.
First Big Cache of Art
Found in Iron Mine
The first of the great German
repositories of art collections was
found In an iron mine in Huttenweg
at Seigen, stored in q brick-lined
tunnel which had been divided into
II bays by enormous racks for paint
ings. The bays were located by
entering another tunnel Y Of a mile
from the repository. One entrance
was used exclusively during the war
as an air-raid shelter for civilians
Of Seigen.
The repository was heated by an
elaborate system operated from a
nearby factory. During the last two
weeks of the offensive against Seigen,
the factory was destroyed, and the
population was crowded into the
mine. The humidity was so high
that water dripped everywhere and
by the time the Allied troops located
the repository, most of the 400 paint
ings, so unpacked pieces of sculpture
and rs cases Of art works from Sci
gen, Aachen, Essen. Cologne, Metz,
Bonn, Wuppertal and Munster were
badly damaged.
First things seen upon entering
the repository were the 18th century
sculptured wooden doors from st.
Maria i'm Kapitol in Cologne, and
10 boxes from the Beethoven Mu-
scum in Bonn, including the manu-
script of Beethoven's Sixth Sym
phony."
American troops discovered an
other important German reposi-
tory in salt mine at Bernterode
In the Hartz Mountains, west Of
Kassel. The mine had. been used
by the Germans since 1885 as a
munitions plant and storage dump
for about 100000 tons Of ammuni-
ton as well as other military stores.
French employees related that Ger
man officers had cleared the civilian
populace from the area in mid
March, 1945, and that German
troops worked in great secrecy
bringing objects Of presumably great
value into the mine. Later, the
same offlcer officially sealed the en-
trance.
Four Enormous Caskets
Found in Center of Room
Allied troops observed that
masonry wall had been built into
the main corridor only short dis
tance from the elevator shaft. The
mortar was fresh. The men made
an opening in the new wall and
tunneled their way through S feet
Of masonry to a frame lattice door
which was padlocked inside. They
broke through the door and entered
q room filled with paintings, boxes,
tapestries and brilliant banners. The
contents Of the room were grouped
around four enormous caskets, one
of which was decorated with a
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