All language subtitles for americas_book_of_secrets_s04e05_the_hunt_for_hitlers_relics

A historic quest designed to achieve
ultimate power for a murderous dictator.

Hitler knew that to own this was to
grant you great power and invincibility.

It's almost a crazy true version of the
Da Vinci Code or something out of

Indiana Jones.

Priceless works of art and sacred
religious relics, stolen and stockpiled.

for a planned thousand -year -long
empire.

There were these magical objects out
there that if you controlled them, you

would actually control the destiny of
the world.

During World War II, Adolf Hitler and
the Nazis confiscated everything from

art and relics to mystical objects that
they believed would give them

supernatural powers.

Although many of these treasures were
ultimately returned to their rightful

owners, others have mysteriously gone
missing.

Where are they today?

There are those who believe that the
answers can be found in America's book

secrets.

Munich, Germany.

February 28, 2012.

While executing a search warrant in the
apartment of a 79 -year -old Cornelius

Gurlitt, police make a remarkable
discovery.

A secret treasure trove of more than 1
,400 master works of art.

The investigation that followed uncovers
evidence that the art was stolen from

Jewish families and collectors by
Gurlitt's father, Hildebrand.

who worked as an art dealer for Adolf
Hitler during World War II.

Hildebrand Gerlitz, who, in spite of
being half Jewish, was probably the

primary agent for Hitler in acquiring
the art that he wanted to acquire.

His son Cornelius grows up, oddly, never
registers, doesn't pay taxes, isn't in

the social security system, has no
apparent job.

But it turns out he's got an enormous
collection of art through his father and

what his father had acquired and left
behind. And that's the tip of the

because he's got in Salzburg a farmhouse
which has another pile and another

pile. The art in this secret collection
represents just a small fraction of what

was stolen by the Nazis throughout the
1930s and 40s.

It has been estimated...

that the Nazis looted about 20 % of all
of the art in Europe. They

just took it. It became theirs.

In places like Amsterdam, Paris, in
Poland, wherever the Nazis occupied,

would just take what they wanted.

In July 1940, during World War II...

Adolf Hitler appointed Alfred Rosenberg,
a high -ranking Nazi official, to lead

the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg,
or the ERR.

It was an organization dedicated to the
confiscation of fine art and objects of

great value.

Alfred Rosenberg is tasked with putting
together a force which accompanies the

German armies wherever they conquer and
in a systematic way plunders.

Cultural property.

Hitler saw himself as the world monarch
and that Germany was the center of the

world.

Hitler had dreams of a world museum in
Lund, in Austria, nearby where he was

born. And this was to be an entire city,
one giant museum.

And so to fill the galleries of that
museum, he wanted the world's artwork.

he went out, sent his men out to get it.

And those that didn't willingly give it
up were forced to give it up or were

killed.

However, the Nazis weren't only
interested in stealing works of art.

coveted religious and mystical relics.

Hitler's militarist goals are well
known.

But his mystical objectives are little
known and little understood. And one of

those is searching for holy artifacts,
which somehow or another are to give

their possessors these superpowers.

Powers at the heart of the Nazi regime,
the lust for power. I think some were

assuming that there were these magical
objects out there that somehow if you

controlled them, you would actually
control the destiny of the world.

I'm Rick Himmler.

One of Hitler's top lieutenants was
obsessed with finding what the Nazis

believed to be the ultimate Christian
relic, the cup described in the Bible as

the one Jesus drank from during the Last
Supper, also known as the

Holy Grail.

There was the idea that this would have
been a cup which, because it had held

the wine, and that wine would have been
the blood of Christ.

Gripe in the imaginations to a power to
heal, a power to give eternal life.

Certainly, the idea of having the Holy
Grail would mean that you had the

ultimate power. You were invincible.

And Himmler wanted all sorts of symbols
of religious power.

He wanted to hand them over to his
Fuhrer.

In 1934, Himmler met with a young German
writer named Otto Rahn.

who had been researching possible
locations for where the true grail may

ended up.

Ron believed that it had once been
possessed by the Cathars, a secretive

sect of Christians based in southern
France during the 12th century.

The Cathars were persecuted by the
Vatican, by the Catholic Church, and

the Inquisition, all the Cathars were
put to death.

One of the most interesting aspects of
the Cathars is the secret treasure they

were said to possess.

It was never really identified what that
treasure was, only that the Vatican

wanted it and sent soldiers to get it
and didn't get it.

Otto Rahn believed that was the Holy
Grail.

Himmler agreed to fund Rahn's research
and also personally led expeditions to

the Pyrenees Mountains in northern Spain
in search.

of the Grail. It's almost like a crazy
true version of the Da Vinci Code or

something out of Indiana Jones.

Because this story, as it becomes baked
and cooked in this sort of Nazi machine,

ends up sending troops throughout the
world in search of the Holy Grail.

Because Himmler thought that the Nazis
were on the cusp of finding the Holy

Grail, he purchased Wibelsberg Castle.

a 17th century fortress located in
Buran, Germany.

Himmler chose this site as the place
where the Grail was to be locked away

safekeeping.

He also used the castle as a key meeting
place for the Schutzstaffel, or SS, the

primary security and surveillance force
of the Nazi party.

Heinrich Himmler wanted to create the
SS, the Schutzstaffel, a kind of secret

society within the Nazi party. Only
certain people got in.

There were all kinds of ceremonies. You
got your death's head ring.

You got all of this regalia. You were
special.

And if you have a cult, it has to have a
center. So he picked this castle,

Wewelsburg.

In the north tower of Wewelsburg Castle,
there is a circular room with a mosaic

of a black sun on the floor.

Himmler and the members of the SS
referred to it as...

The hall of supreme SS leaders.

It was here that they reportedly
performed pagan rituals.

The black sun is a symbol that
represented a power of the universe that

Nazis felt their ritualistic practices
could tap into for the success of their

military campaigns.

Beneath the room sits a crypt.

where the cremated remains of SS
generals were to be entombed.

In the center of the crypt is a
mysterious sunken circle, the purpose of

remains a subject of debate.

Many people say it housed an internal
flame, a thousand -year flame.

Others, however, say this was where the
grail was to be planted once it was

obtained. Himmler believed that he was
going to plant it there in the castle

it would emanate its power throughout
the Third Reich.

Himmler's search for the Holy Grail
would prove to be only one aspect of

Hitler's bizarre agenda to acquire not
only mystical powers, but also to

history. The Nazis had come to believe
that their very origins were actually

divine, and it led to a new worldwide
quest.

to find the proof.

Berlin, Germany, July 1st, 1935.

Heinrich Himmler approved the creation
of the Annenerbe, a new institute within

the Nazi government.

Its purpose is to conduct historical
research and archaeological excavations.

with the goal of proving that the German
people descended from a master race.

In 1935, the Ananaraba has all these
research branches that are developed,

in the humanities initially, to look
into mythology, anthropology, that kind

thing, and most of it is ideologically
driven, politicized, influenced by pagan

ideas or occult ideas, including the
idea that the Aryans were the superior

race. and it was Nordic Aryan who had
this great civilization in prehistory,

that there was a flood or a cataclysm,
and it destroyed the civilization, but

the people who survived created the kind
of modern Aryan race.

And so you have these amateurish Nazi
leaders who have these bizarre ideas,

which are not based in science. I mean,
it's all based on faith and mythology.

The Ahnenerbe itself was an organization
to try to investigate Aryan ancestry,

the heritage of the Aryans. In fact,
Hitler thought that all of the major

civilizations, such as the Mesopotamian
civilization, the Egyptian civilization,

the Greeks, the Romans, that these were
all founded by Aryans who had come from

northern Europe and had migrated into
those areas.

The Aryans were the Nazis' version of
supermen.

The Nazis were always seeking
superpowers. They wanted some for

In order to be the master race,
basically they rewrote history.

And underlying it all, they wanted the
glorious golden past as they saw it to

come back in all its glory.

Basically they made all this up. There's
no precedent in history for 99 % of

what the Nazis believed and what the
Nazis practiced.

Theirs was an ideology and a creed that
was grounded

in hate, absurdity, irrationalism,
contempt for

normal thought.

But if you create a belief, belief
becomes imbued

with you to such an extent that it
becomes your reality.

What they were constantly looking for
was some sort of power symbolism in

things.

And the belief here, of course, is that
somehow or another, if you can harken

back to this time in ancient Germanic,
ancient Aryan history, you can tap

into those supposed superpowers that
these beings had.

Based off research conducted by the
Ananeba, Himmler became convinced.

that descendants of the ancient Aryans
could be found, not only in Europe, but

also in Asia.

Himmler thought that there was a huge
Aryan influx into the area of Tibet.

had been a huge influx of Aryans in
North India in ancient times, and so

was hoping to track that in Tibet as
well.

In April of 1938, just over a year
before the outbreak of World War II,

Himmler dispatched a team of researchers
to Tibet.

They were seeking confirmation for their
beliefs in Tibet. They hoped that there

were still Aryans left alive in Tibet,
and that would have lent enormous

credence to what they were telling the
German population.

There were five or six principal
scientists, anthropologists,

biologists who were there, led by a
fellow by the name of Ernst Schaefer.

Ernst Schaefer was a renowned hunter and
zoologist in the 1930s. He was also a

member of the SS, making him the ideal
person to lead the Ananirba's expedition

to Tibet.

Schaefer guided the team's 50 -mule
caravan on an arduous, year -long trek

through the region.

They wanted to study the Tibetans. They
measured their heads, they measured

their skulls, they measured distances
between different parts of their skulls.

So they looked all over Tibet for the
Aryans, and they never found any.

Although Schaefer and his team were
unable to find any biological evidence

Aryans in Tibet,

They did discover an ancient artifact
which they believed provided the link

between Tibet and Germany that Himmler
was looking for.

When the Nazis were in Tibet, they came
across a statue that was nicknamed the

Iron Man.

A statue of a bearded Buddha, weighs 22
pounds, and it has a swastika

on the side.

What's so very fascinating about the
Iron Man artifact is that it shows what

looks like a Caucasian or Aryan person
with a beard.

And they thought that this was proof
positive that the Tibetan people had

ancestors of the Aryan race.

And they brought back this artifact to
show others in the Anunnerbe society and

the upper echelon of the Third Reich.

And they claimed that indeed they had
found root traces to this

Aryan race in Central Asia.

It's not like it was precursor of the
Nazis.

Actually, the swastika is an ancient
Asian symbol for good,

for the good that is life, the wheel of
life.

But actually what the Nazis did when
they took over that symbol and made it

theirs was they...

flipped it.

They had a very specific agenda.

Whatever was priceless, whatever was
wonderful, they would take.

The Nazis' quest for ancient and
mystical artifacts was insatiable. They

believed it would bring them not only
great wealth, but absolute power.

And soon, they would start a war that
would rage across the world and provide

endless opportunities.

to steal even more.

September 1st, 1939.

The German army invades Poland and in
five short weeks forces the Polish army

surrender.

Over the next four years, Germany goes
on to defeat and occupy more than 20

countries, including the Netherlands,
Belgium, France, and Greece.

But Hitler built the German war machine
to do more than just conquer foreign

lands. He also used it to help him steal
treasure and artwork throughout Europe.

Months before the start of the war, the
Nazis made plans to establish a secret

bunker beneath the town of Nuremberg,
Germany, to hide the valuable plunder.

Himmler himself had ordered the
construction of a secret bunker under

Castle. And so designs were made to
reconfigure a beer cellar, which

was entered to an alley, Blacksmith's
Alley. And so it was referred to as a

Blacksmith's Alley bunker.

Right behind the red door, there's a
special place.

We call World War II Art Bunker today.

It's an old former beer cellar. Once cut
into the rock because they wanted beer

to be stored in cold temperatures.

And during World War II, this old former
beer cellar was converted into a

special air raid shelter for artwork.

The beer cellar was connected to a vast
network of underground chambers that had

been constructed centuries earlier,
which provided the Nazis with ample

store their stolen loot.

So they've dug these old tunnels 700
years ago. There are 25 ,000

square meters of fellers underneath the
old town of Nuremberg. That's the size

of four football fields.

This was the place of very important
pieces of art from churches and museums

stolen by the Nazis from countries they
had occupied.

Containers were installed in here where
artwork was.

stored in climatized cells with heating,
power generation, and so on.

Thousands of works of art would
ultimately be held in this secret

But there was one treasure hidden among
them that Hitler valued above all

others, the crown jewels of the Holy
Roman Empire.

Hitler was forming what he called the
Third Reich, which means the Third

The First Empire was the Holy Roman
Empire.

which had ceased when Napoleon had
conquered vast swaths of Germany in

The Second Empire was the Bismarck
Empire that was created in 1871 and

until World War I.

So it was creating the Third Reich.

So he wanted to show continuity with the
earlier empire.

In 1938, Germany annexed Austria.

Hitler then ordered that the nation's
crown jewels be taken from Hofburg

in Vienna, where they had been stored
since 1800.

We don't have any first -person accounts
of what Hitler did when he first got

the relics.

But according to the stories, Hitler was
said to have visited the royal treasury

in the hopper.

And that night, allegedly, he got to
handle these crown jewels himself.

And he tried on the crown and he held
the scepter. And this is clearly

he'd been dreaming about since his
teenage years as an artist in Vienna.

Hitler wanted to resuscitate a German
empire, Third Reich.

What better way of doing that than
taking the imperial treasures and

them to Nuremberg, the symbolic capital
of Nazism, because that's where they did

all their rallies, and having the
treasures be part of the Third Reich.

The Nazis redesigned the Blacksmith
Alley bunker along high -tech lines

as the secret hiding place for the crown
jewels.

The Nazis built special humidifiers, air
conditioning, and the air purification

system. It had its own generators.

It had its own special food supply,
bunkhouse, and two -foot -thick vault

So this is where the crown jewels were
kept.

The Austrian crown jewels date back to
the 11th century and were used in the

coronation ceremonies of numerous Holy
Roman emperors.

The most notable pieces include the
imperial crown, scepter, orb, sword,

and an object that many believed to
actually be one of the most cherished

in all of Christianity.

The Spear of Destiny.

The Spear of Destiny is believed to have
been the spearhead which was used to

pierce Jesus while he was being
crucified.

That a legend grew up around this
artifact that whomever possessed the

Lance, the Spear of Destiny, held the
destiny of the world in their hands.

For centuries,

Much lore and legend had arisen around
the Spear of Destiny.

Because its tip had supposedly touched
the blood of Jesus, the Son of God, many

were convinced that it possessed
otherworldly powers.

One of the most well -known incidents
involving the Spear took place on April

14, 1561.

Townspeople of Nuremberg...

woke up to a sort of otherworldly sight.
Across the horizon in the sky were all

of these sunbursts, blasts.

And in the midst of it all were these
strange flying objects.

One of these objects looked like an
actual spear of destiny.

Many people have looked for explanations
of this over the years. You had an

entire city, hundreds, thousands of
people perhaps, waking up to this.

otherworldly vision in the skies above
them.

For the Nazis, historical reports of
what looked like a massive spear of

in the sky served to validate their
belief that not only did the spear hold

incredible power, but that the relic
taken from Austria was genuine.

Because of this, its location in
Nuremberg was a closely guarded secret.

But as the war progressed, the Allied
forces became aware of the Nazi looting,

and they vowed to recover everything
that had been stolen.

The idea of finding where this art was
became something of great interest to

Eisenhower. They saw retrieving art and
returning it whence it had come as a

means of restoring the order that the
Nazis had reduced to chaos.

Thwarting the Nazis' efforts to spread
their murderous and twisted ideology was

considered a task of paramount
importance.

But just as important was recovering and
returning the many treasures that had

been stolen and hidden throughout
Europe.

To accomplish this would require an
elite team, unlike any ever assembled in

history.

June, 1943.

It is the height of World War II.

As the United States forms the
Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives

group of experts from the art world,
including curators, scholars, and

librarians.

Their mission is to find where the Nazis
have hidden their plunder of stolen

European artwork and other cultural
treasures and return them to their

owners.

The unit consists of more than 300 men
and women, most of whom are volunteers,

and the team is collectively referred to
as the Monuments Men.

The Allies put this group together, and
they moved with our troops.

They had to figure out where stuff was.

They had to inquire from people where it
was.

and get the works of art back to the
countries of origin.

Their task was not only difficult, it
was often very dangerous.

Two of the Mayimist men were actually
killed in action because they were

with the army. They were very brave men
and women.

A unit also was assigned to the Air
Force to try to let the bomber pilots

what not to drop.

Trying to steer away from destroying the
churches, the archives in those

churches, the fine art.

June 6, 1944.

D -Day.

Allied troops land on the beaches of
Normandy, France, in an effort to push

German army out of French territory.

The tide of the war is turning, and
Hitler's defeat is becoming more and

inevitable.

By the spring of 1945, the Allies
advance into Germany itself, and the

Monuments Men are on the front lines,
searching for places where the Nazis had

stashed all of their ill -gotten gains.

In March, they catch an unexpected break
when Army Captain and Monuments Man,

Robert Posey, visits a local dentist in
the small German city of Trier.

Robert Posey goes to a dentist.

Why the dentist does this, I don't know,
but he says, you know, you should speak

to my son -in -law.

He's involved with art.

So he speaks to the son -in -law, who it
turns out had helped the Nazis do what?

Gather and hide an unbelievably huge
volume of paintings, sculptures,

altarpieces, you name it, in a salt mine
in Altensee.

Altensee is a small town in central
Austria.

less than 500 miles from Kriya.

But fierce combat kept the monument's
men from investigating the salt mine for

two months.

When they were finally able to search
it, they found 7 ,000 pieces of art deep

inside the labyrinth of tunnels.

The enormous kash that was found in the
Altanzeh salt mine included just

about anything you could think of, of
value that would be either in a church

in a home of wealth.

For example, the beautiful little
Madonna by Michelangelo called the

Madonna.

Hitler stored a huge amount of art, but
these were very close to destroyed in

that mine toward the end of the war
because Hitler gave what was called a

order to try to destroy everything of
value before the Allies got their hands

it.

The Nazis who were in charge of the mine
brought in big bombs to blow up the

mine, but the people who were living
there for hundreds of years worked in

salt mines and did not want to see them
blown up, and actually were able to

remove the two bombs that were taken in.

The art found in Al -Dante in the salt
mine.

I like to think of it as fate because
it's the counterpart to the Nazi idea

of... the supernatural, the mystical. So
it's not just luck, it's fate that it

was found.

One of the masterpieces that was
retrieved from the Althusser Salt Mine

15th century Christian painting called
the Ghent Altarpiece. The Ghent

Altarpiece was the most important piece
of artwork in all of Europe that the

Monuments Men were assigned to find.

It's 12 panels.

and it's the very first important oil
painting.

Pretty much every great European leader
wanted to have it in their collection.

People were fascinated by it. It was a
beautiful work of art. It had symbolic

significance.

The Nazis may have stolen the Ghent
Altarpiece not only because it was a

priceless work of art, but also because
they believed the painting contained an

encoded map.

that would reveal where sacred Christian
relics were hidden.

The Ganz Altarpiece held what many
people consider is a roadmap

of Catholic mysticism, that all the
important symbols of Christianity

are hidden, embedded in this altarpiece,
including the Holy

Grail, which is the centerpiece.

You have a lamb that's been pierced and
blood is flowing into the Holy Grail

underneath it.

And the idea is that maybe the Annenerbe
could study the mysticism in this

painting and go out and find those
artifacts. So this lent itself perfectly

the whole Nazi mythology.

The Ghent Altarpiece was a particular
obsession of Hitler because of the

mystical lamp and its connotations for
the Holy Grail.

With Hitler, you could argue that he
didn't even believe in God, yet he

certainly saw himself as God, and part
of the intrigue for a work like the

Ghent Altarpiece, with all of its
symbolic imagery.

was that it was part of his interest in
acquiring what would make him more

godlike.

In the final weeks of the war, as the
Red Army and Allied forces closed in on

Berlin, the Monuments Men continued to
discover caches of priceless treasure.

They were also closing in on the relics
they and General Patton considered the

most critical to recover.

Spring, 1945.

In the final days of World War II, the
Monuments Men scour Europe to recover

priceless works of art and sacred relics
stolen by the Nazis.

It is a race against the clock, since
Hitler has ordered his troops to destroy

these valuable items rather than allow
them to fall into the hands of the

Allies.

With Germany close to defeat, Many fear
that the Nazis will wipe out thousands

of cultural treasures before they can be
found.

But the Monuments Men are aided in their
efforts by a powerful ally, General

George S. Patton.

Patton was a very talented general, but
he was more than that. He was a mystic.

Being a mystic, one of the things that
totally bowled him over was the legend

the so -called sphere of destiny.

And he knew that to own this or to
possess it would grant you great

power and invincibility and also a kind
of sacred knowledge.

General Patton in particular wanted to
assure that the spear did not remain in

German hands because he also worried
that it would enhance the aura around

the Nazis.

Patton believed in the superpowers
invested in this artifact.

And so he is looking for somebody to try
and reclaim the Spear of Destiny.

As it turns out, there was a soldier in
Patton's Third Army who was ideally

suited to search for the Spear of
Destiny, Lieutenant Walter Horn.

Walter Horn was born and raised in
Heidelberg, Germany.

He studied art history and knew four or
five languages.

And he hated the Nazis and made no bones
about it. He got into trouble with the

SS eventually, fled to Italy, escaped
out of Italy to Greenwich Village, New

York, and eventually landed at Berkeley
in California.

And then, bang, all of a sudden, because
of Pearl Harbor, the U .S. is at war

and he finds himself headed back to
Germany.

And it's really like the universe has
sent Walter Horn to try and reclaim

relics.

He spoke fluent German. He also spoke
fluent French and Italian.

So he was very, very useful to the
Allies as they swept through Europe.

And he actually was given leave to
interrogate.

German prisoners of war to find out
clues or even if they knew where the

treasures were hidden.

Walter Horn happened to interview a
prisoner from the Battle of the Bulge.

this soldier started telling this
fantastic story about a giant bank vault

hidden in a bunker underneath the
Nuremberg Castle.

and what was contained in that vault
were the crown jewels of the Holy Roman

Empire. And so long as word didn't get
out, you might keep these treasures

forever, and nobody would ever find
them.

Horn sent the information concerning the
location of the Spear of Destiny up the

chain of command, and General Patton
dispatched an infantry unit to

As the Allies are going into Nuremberg,
this unit specifically is sent to secure

the bunker.

And they do, and they get into the
bunker, only there are two crates in

vault that are actually empty, and one
crate that's missing entirely.

The spear is there, as well as many
other accoutrements of the crown jewels,

the Holy Crown, the scepter, the gold
apple.

and two of the swords are missing.

American troops recovered the Spear of
Destiny, which was their main objective.

But the disappearance of other key
pieces of the crown jewels presented a

mystery.

Once again, General Patton turned to
Walter Horn, who was now officially a

member of the Monuments Men.

After months of investigation,

Horn discovered what had happened to the
missing crown jewels.

Horn eventually discovered that these
artifacts, they were transported to

another bunker and hidden in the ceiling
of that bunker. And Horn was able to

expose that and get it back.

But more important is Horn understood in
a way that a lot of the Allied

generals didn't, was that this was all
part of a plan to create a forthright.

And the Nazis, they knew at this point
that the Third Reich was fallen, and so

they were laying the groundwork for
another one, and part of that groundwork

preserving these crown jewels.

If it remained with Germans, they could
then show it to

others as a totem of the power of their

cause. We wouldn't have this material if
we did not have so much power.

And someday, maybe the Germans would
tell their children or grandchildren, we

will rise again.

Thanks to the efforts of Walter Horn,
the crown jewels were eventually

to Hofburg Palace in Vienna, where they
remain today.

But there's one curious aspect of this
story that continues to inspire debate.

The Monuments Men would recover the
Spear of Destiny on April 30th, 1945.

At approximately 3 .30 p .m. on the same
day, Adolf Hitler shot himself in his

bunker in Berlin.

There are those who believe that
Hitler's death on the same day he lost

Spear of Destiny was no mere
coincidence, and that the mysterious

claim at least one more very prominent
victim.

Berlin, Germany.

May 8, 1945.

German Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel
signs the German Instrument of

ending the war in Europe.

Mass celebrations are held around the
world as millions of people rejoice in

defeat of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

But for United States General George S.
Patton, Victory over Germany was

important, not only because it ended the
bloodshed, but also because the Allies

were able to recover a mystical artifact
that the Nazis had stolen, the Spear of

Destiny. Patton was fascinated with the
Spear of Destiny. So when they

discovered it in Nuremberg, he was very
quick to take possession of it.

General Eisenhower.

with suspicious that Patton might keep
the lance for himself.

And it was a very realistic fear, I
think.

Patton's obsession with the Spear of
Destiny rivaled that of the Nazis.

And, according to legend, this fixation
may have cost him his life.

General Patton was very intrigued to get
the Spear of Destiny. And indeed, he

did have it in his possession.

And the story goes, yes, you have power
when you have it, but if it goes out of

your possession, you die, and you die
very quickly.

And actually, he died shortly after it
went out of his possession in a freak

road accident.

Curiously, both General Patton and Adolf
Hitler died soon after the Spear of

Destiny fell out of their possession.

For some...

the timing of their deaths can be
explained by nothing more than sheer

coincidence.

But for others, it suggests that the
legends about the Spear of Destiny and

power may be true.

When they say that truth is stranger
than fiction, it certainly is in this

One of the first acts that Eisenhower
did after Patton died was to see that

crown jewels were packed up.

and returned to Austria and safely put
back in the royal treasury in Hofburg.

While the crown jewels of the Holy Roman
Empire and the Spear of Destiny may

have been the most significant artifacts
recovered by the Monuments Men, their

work carried on long after the war
ended.

In fact, members of the Monuments Men
continued to search for stolen treasures

until 1951.

The untold story of the aftermath of
World War II is how many of these

artifacts, how many of these treasures
really went missing. And they went

missing because of the sticky fingers of
American soldiers, of Germans looking

to fund their lives after the war.

As time goes on, we can get deeper into
telling the truth of actually what

happened and what was known, because the
story yet to be explored.

Art that is still missing could be
hidden somewhere. It could be in private

collections. It could be in Swiss
vaults.

We have no idea where they are.

The Monuments Men were credited with
recovering more than a half a million

relics. paintings, and artifacts, and
returning them to their rightful owners.

But to this day, more than 100 ,000
items are still reported as missing.

Who might have them?

And where could they be?

For now, the answers remain hidden in
the pages of America's Book of

Secrets.