- [Announcer] This channel is part of the History Hit network. Stick around to find out more. - [Narrator] Ever since the
end of the Second World War, there have been rumors of hidden treasure. The fabled Nazi gold. (water splashing) The rumors lure treasure hunters. They can find fame, adventure,
and perhaps, wealth. (dramatic music) - It has a romantic feel to it, and an adventurous feel to it, and it takes hold of you. - [Narrator] In 2015, there
was a rumor to top them all. The Nazi gold train. (train chuffing) It was said to have
disappeared without a trace in the final months of the
Second World War in Europe. Had the train now been
discovered in Poland? (dramatic music) It all began in the summer of 2015. Walbrzych is a city in
Lower Silesia, Poland. It was there, near the line to Wroclaw that the gold train was said to be hidden. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Could an
international sensation lie buried here? Poland's top protector of
monuments had no doubts. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] That statement
really fired people up. Conjecture became almost definite fact. Gold train fever broke out. The buried train was said to
lie underneath an embankment right beside the tracks. It was great fun for the holidays, especially for the hordes of sightseers. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) - It has all the elements
of a good thriller, you know, 'cause it's adventure. It's got gold, hidden trains, Nazis. - [Narrator] The gold
train story was ideal for the silly season. But at the 65 kilometer
marker in Walbrzych, journalists from all over
the world waited and watched, to see if there was something more. The area was sealed off and
guarded around the clock. Even the Polish Minister for Culture permitted herself to dream. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] The Nazis plundered
museums, art collections, and art dealers all over Europe. The most brazen plunderer of them all was Hitler's deputy, Hermann Goring. (suspenseful music) He said that he planned
to do plenty of looting, even of items that were out
of fashion, and so he did. The pick of the history of
European art decorated Carinhall, his country house on the
Schorfheide heath near Berlin. Goring constantly vied with
his warlord, Adolf Hitler, another great art thief who
stole works for a huge museum that he had in mind for
his native city of Linz. In May, 1945, American
troops seized a whole train full of art treasures in
Hitler's retreat, Berchtesgaden. It was just part of Goering's
booty, and only a small part of what the Nazis had plundered overall. (dramatic music) American experts began a systematic search for the looted art, and they found it. Five million items, of which
four million had been stolen or extorted from their owners. The haul was worth billions, and some of it has not
been found to this day. One example is the legendary Amber Room from the Catherine Palace
near Saint Petersburg. It was priceless. The palace now has an exact replica in the original location, but where is the real Amber Room? - What we definitely know
about the Amber Room, is that the Germans
captured the Amber Room in the outskirts of Leningrad in 1941. They brought the Amber
Room into Konigsberg, and there, in '44, in
late '44, Autumn '44, it disappeared. So we know that, in August
1944 there was a heavy air raid on Konigsberg by the Royal Air Force, and there's rumor that it was destroyed, the Amber Room, in this specific attack. Others said no, it was saved. It was not in the castle any more, and it was evacuated to
western parts of the Reich. - [Narrator] Was the Amber Room destroyed? Or was it transported further west? Theories abound, more than
about any other Nazi treasure. It's a story without an ending. - Well, it certainly is never-ending, because it's been going
on for the past 70 years. That's the first thing. Second thing is, even in the 40 years that I had an interest in this area, I could say that probably I've
come across, I don't know, between 15 and 20 different scenarios, where it's been found, or
nearly found, shall we say? - [Narrator] Add to them,
the latest scenario. The Amber Room was on a train. A train that ended up in Lower Silesia. Possibly here, near the railway line at the 65 kilometer marker in Walbrzych. (dramatic music) - You can even write a
book about the search for the Amber Room. It's such a whole story, and of course, everything is possible. I mean, we have to see
that, in 1945, in the Reich, there was chaos, and
it's very, very difficult to exclude a specific
option or specific solution that just doesn't exist. It's very difficult,
but on the other hand, it's very interesting to
see that, since the 1940s, nothing had been found. I mean, in 1940 the Allies
found a lot of treasures, be it gold, be it art, or
whatever you want, name it. But after that time,
nothing had been found, and even after the German reunification, when hundreds of new treasure hunters searched in the tunnels of the former GDR, nothing was found bigger
than the rusty steel helmet. - [Narrator] Immediately
after the Allied victory in May 1945, American
specialists began looking for the stolen treasures. For Nazi gold. (suspenseful music) - The American forces were
spending a lot of time looking for gold that
had been stashed there by Wehrmacht and SS troops. Some of it was found in mountains. Some of it had been put in lakes. Some of it had been hidden in farms and many, many places. - [Narrator] Few people
are as well-informed on Nazi treasures as
British author Ian Sayer. He is probably the only private individual who has laid his hands on
Nazi gold in recent decades. He discovered it not in
some dark hiding place, but in a safe deposit box in a bank. - Well, I got in touch with
the American State Department and suggested they start investigating a bank account in Munich. It did take them 13 years,
but at the end of that, they did find two bars of
gold that had, shall we say, disappeared, in inverted commas, and had disappeared since 1945. - [Narrator] This was not the only case. For example, in 1945, a
train full of treasures stolen by the SS from Hungarian Jews was seized by the U.S. Army in Austria. This really was a gold train. It carried 52 boxes of gold and diamonds, 1,560 boxes of silver, the gold and cash reserves of a bank, and many paintings. A large part of the treasure disappeared after the Americans seized it. It took 60 years for the U.S. government to reach a settlement. (dramatic music) Not everyone who came across
such treasure proved honest. The temptation was certainly great, given the value of the plunder. Today, it seems highly
likely that almost all of the documented holdings of Nazi gold were recovered soon after the war. But who can be sure? - Personally, I think I could say that there may be a small amount
of Nazi gold to be found. This would probably be gold
that was hidden by people that died before they could get to it. Otherwise, you'll appreciate
that, if you hide Nazi gold, and you don't die under
unforeseen circumstances, you'd probably want to
convert it into something like cars, houses, and
various other things, so there might still be some there. - [Narrator] But could
there be hundreds of tons buried beneath this railway line? The treasure hunter Andreas
Richter would be pleased. He and his partner would
get a 10% finder's fee. In September 2015 they
released a statement prepared by their lawyer. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Richter
and Koper would not say much more than that. Nor would they make public
whatever evidence they had of their supposed find. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] They said that
they had found the train with a device like this. A frequency-modulated
continuous wave radar system. In other words, ground radar. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] The technology
has several advantages. Private individuals can afford it, and the testing method is simple. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Like a number
of academic experts, Andreas Overholz was cautious about the reliability of 3D imaging. (suspenseful music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Richter and
Koper were not the only ones in Walbrzych who dreamt
of finding the gold train. The retired miner Tadeo Slovikosky had spent half his life under its spell. He acquired wartime German
maps, and even without geo-radar he concluded that the train
lay hidden in the very spot where Richter and Koper said it was. According to Slovikosky,
a German railway official gave him a crucial tip decades ago. And that tip convinced him
that the train was there. (suspenseful music) One of the many people interested in the location of the
train is Christel Focken. She advises the Walbrzych city
council and has been trying to solve the region's
underground puzzles for 15 years. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Christel
works with satellite images that clearly show up any
irregularities in the terrain. From the images, she concluded
that the railway track once ran between the suspected
location of the gold train and the most important
building in Walbrzych. Furstenstein Castle, now known by its Polish name, Zamek Ksiaz. In 1943, the castle was
requisitioned for conversion into a regional headquarters for Hitler. Codenamed Riese, or giant, it was one of 20 Fuhrer headquarters located all over Europe. (suspenseful music) - Nobody asked the question about money. Is it, does it make any sense. It was Hitler's decision. Somehow he was a traveler emperor, like in the medieval times, if you want. Hitler did not lead the armed forces and
politics from the capital, which is the normal way, how it was done. Remember the cabin rooms
in London, or other things, in (indistinct), and so far and so forth. But he led the war and the Third Reich from various headquarters. So this is the reason why we
have so many headquarters, big headquarters, with a lot
of bunkers, tunnels, whatever, in all of Europe. (suspenseful music) - [Narrator] These lift
shafts descend 50 meters from the castle into the
depths of the mountain. (suspenseful music) At the bottom, there is a
labyrinth of corridors and rooms. (suspenseful music continues) On the next level down, is an
extensive network of tunnels. (suspenseful music continues) They were to house the logistics
of the Fuhrer headquarters. But in some places, the tunnels
end in rubble and debris. What lies behind it? (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] What secrets does
Zamek Ksiaz still conceal? Might the closed-off portion
of the tunnel complex contain a rail link to the outside? Or even a full railway station,
as Christel Focken suspects? (speaking in foreign language) (dramatic music) - [Narrator] Hitler's
Sonderzug, his special train. At times during the war, it was his most important
means of transport. And it was more than that. - The Fuhrer's train
was especially designed for moving headquarter, if you want. And this is very much a design from the early stage of the war. Hitler used it massively in
'39 in Poland, and also 1940. And in this idea that the
leader has to be close to the front, and is not
very far away in the capital and goes to the opera and whatever, but he, in a way, has
to share the experience and has to be close to his headquarters. And because it's a modern moving war, he has to use a moving
headquarter, if you want. (ominous music) - [Narrator] Always ready to depart. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] So could there
have been a service center for Hitler's train here, where the gold train is said to be? One thing is certain. Hitler's train itself
is definitely not here. - We know that it was based in a tunnel in Templehof Airfield,
and it was then moved out of the capital, out
of Berlin, to Austria, and it was blown up at
Zell am See in Austria. Single cars of the train
have survived in other places and were used by the Federal
Republic of Germany and others, but the whole train
ended, this is very sure, ended in Zell am See in May 1945. - [Narrator] In late
September 2015 the Polish army took over the suspected
location of the gold train. Sappers moved in, looking
for booby traps, mines, or unexploded bombs. (suspenseful music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Piotr Koper,
one of the two hopeful gold train hunters, was disappointed. He thought that searching
to the depth of a meter was nowhere near enough. All they would find would be earth. (ominous music) Koper and Richter believed
that their geo-radar modeling had identified a train like this. A German armored train of the kind used to patrol railway lines during the war. Some of these trains are
still missing to this day. Would one now be found in Walbrzych? - Of course it's possible that
somebody brought the train, shortly before Breslau
was totally surrounded by the Red Army,
encircled by the Red Army, out of Breslau, to protect the
railway tracks and whatever, so this is possible. We don't know it. It's not for sure, but
it's still an opportunity. (explosions booming) - [Narrator] Mobile gun turrets. These armored trains
were built in Breslau. - Some of these trains
survived and they had guns, anti-aircraft guns, anti-tank guns, and obviously we know for
sure that one of these trains ended up in Breslau, and
was, because of his guns, was used against the Red Army. (explosions booming) - [Narrator] At the end of January 1945, the Red Army was preparing
its assault on Silesia. It was closing the ring
around the Silesian capital, Breslau, known today as Wroclaw. A railway line ran from
the capital to Walbrzych, then known by its German
name of Waldenburg. On that line, not far from Waldenburg, 15-year-old Gotthardt Welz saw something one night in January. He's never forgotten it. (suspenseful music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] What did
Gotthardt Welz see that night? Was it a train transporting tanks? Or was it an armored train, like the one said to
lie hidden in Walbrzych? - The problem with eyewitnesses is not that they deliberately are lying and tell you any false stories, but, you know, we know how
the human memory works. And the human memory always
fits pieces and bits together from the past and from very recent times. I saw a train and I'm
still really believing it, so therefore, it's the
memory of an eyewitnesses only pushes us in a direction, and we have to verify. Now, we double-check it, if
this can really be the case. (suspenseful music) - [Narrator] In January
1945 the fate of Breslau hung in the balance. The Nazis declared the city a fortress, despite its obvious lack of defenses. Gauleiter Karl Hanke demanded
all-out resistance to the end. Overturned trams were supposed
to hold back the tanks of the Red Army, the most
powerful land force in the world. By mid-February, the Red Army had cut Breslau off completely. (explosions booming) (gunshots popping) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] In the name of self-defense, Breslau committed suicide. Buildings were blown up so that Red Army soldiers
couldn't occupy them. (explosion booming) Gauleiter Hanke had a corridor blasted through the center of
the city to build an airstrip. (suspenseful music) (explosion booming) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] While they were
strafed by low-flying planes. (speaking in foreign language) (airplane engines droning) (bombs whistling) (explosions booming) - [Narrator] Pointless deaths. The airstrip was only ever used once, by Hanke himself. On the 6th of May, 1945, he
disappeared from Breslau. - It's a sad part of the
story, to put it that way. That this agitator, who always
delivered these hate speeches and never-give-up speeches,
and presented himself as a core of the defense. This Gauleiter tried to escape and obviously made it out of Breslau. This is what we know for sure. That he made it out of Breslau,
and then he disappeared. - [Narrator] Did Hanke make plans for after Germany's defeat? Did he have valuables taken out of Breslau before it was cut off? Works of art, gold? He had the authority. But this is another angle that has treasure hunters speculating. (dramatic music) After the war, Polish
intelligence interrogated a former Breslau policeman, who had remained in Poland
instead of fleeing to Germany, as most other Germans did. Herbert Klose testified,
after at first denying it, that at the end of the war, the SS and the police had
amassed a horde of gold in the Breslau police headquarters. The gold came mainly
from the city's banks, and it was stored in
dozens of large boxes. He only found out later
what the boxes had held. (suspenseful music) The so-called Breslau gold
treasure has never been found. Could this be another piece
in the gold train puzzle? (train whistle blowing) Or is it only a persistent rumor? (train chuffng) - Rumors start sort of ... Did you see that train? What train? Oh, that armored train. And it grows like topsy, it
sort of gets bigger and bigger and bigger and larger, and more valuable. And of course then, there's the sort of well, there are tunnels in there, and you can't get to them any more. They blew the entrances up so ... Well, do you think that any of
those trains are still there? Well, they could be. And do you think those
trains could have treasure? Well, why else would they blow them up? And suddenly, you've got this
sort of question and answer thing going on, with people saying, "Well, that's right. "That could have happened,
this could have happened." Suddenly, all of that is not
conjecture any more, it's fact. - [Narrator] Walbrzych, November 2015. Once the Polish army had
declared the area safe, geophysicists from the Krakow
University of Technology examined it closely. "Look over there," said Tadeo Slovikosky, the first treasure hunter. "The points for the train
were in that depression, "about a hundred meters along." This is what supposedly happened. The train turned off from the main line and entered the tunnel. (explosion booming) The tunnel entrance was
then blown up to seal it. But did it happen? Light would soon be shed. (suspenseful music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] An object
as large as a train, undiscovered for over 70 years,
would be a real sensation. But why did no one mention
this operation back in 1945? - You've got a train driver. You've got Wehrmacht officers, you've got people looking
after the treasure, so everybody comes out, okay? Before they dynamite it. And nobody says anything. At the end of the day,
seven decades later, all the others have said nothing and one person has said, "Well
look, I just wanna tell you "where it is now, before I die." Is it feasible? My answer
to that would be not at all. (dramatic music) - [Narrator] Besides, there
were more logical places to hide a train. A few kilometers south of
Walbrzych is the Ox Head tunnel. Located well outside the
city, it was intended to be a shelter for Hitler's special train. (dramatic music) Behind that, at the former Schilofenbraun military railway station, there is a 200-square-kilometer area full of underground puzzles. Here, in the Owl Mountains, the Nazis built gigantic tunnel systems, as part of the Riese Fuhrer
headquarters project. - Riese is, first of all, headquarter, and headquarters for Hitler,
so is a lot of tunnels, bunkers and facilities for Hitler himself, but also for his staff. His political staff, and
for the whole armed forces, so it's a huge complex. But there's a plus. So on top of this, as an add-on, was the idea of the relocation
of the German industry below ground level. So because of the Allied air attacks, became worse and worse and worse, there was a decision that key industries should be relocated into tunnels. - [Narrator] For in the
last years of the war, the Luftwaffe was less and less capable of countering the Allied bomber offensive. During the day, the Americans
systematically destroyed German industry, while at night, the British laid waste to Germany's major cities. Virtually all of them went up in flames in the last years of the war. (explosions booming) In mid-1943, a huge construction
project got underway. Hundreds of German armaments companies were moved into bomb-proof
underground galleries, like these in Schwazz in Tyrol. Today, these places are monuments
to homicidal megalomania. Then, they were top-priority
sites for building jet fighters and long-range missiles. Advanced new weapons that
were supposed to turn the tide of the war back in Germany's favor. (rocket engines roaring) The production and
development of the rockets were part of the ever-growing empire of Heinrich Himmler's SS. (ominous music) Most of the rocket assembly
was done by slave laborers from concentration camps, such as these in the Mittelbau-Dora
underground factory in Thuringia. (ominous music continues) A bomb-proof bunker complex was also built for Himmler himself and
the other SS leaders, near Hallien in Austria. Himmler would never use it. (ominous music continues) (dramatic music) The power of Heinrich Himmler and the SS rested primarily on the
unlimited supply of slave labor from the concentrations camps. The laborers who built
the tunnel complexes were worked to death. They were replaced by new
laborers from the camps. It was called annihilation through labor. (ominous music) In the Owl Mountains of Lower Silesia, the tunnel systems were never finished. Sometimes it's not clear what
the tunnels were even for. (ominous music continues) - The Germans digged
tunnels like voles there, so there are so many installations and the problem is we
don't have a final report from the Germans. So it would have been really brilliant to have a report from May 1945, one day before the Red
Army entered the complex. We have this number of tunnels
and they should be used for this and that and we have
that kind of installation. Yet we don't have that. The only thing we have for sure
is a report by Albert Speer. - [Narrator] As early as 1944,
Albert Speer reported using 257,000 cubic meters of concrete and carving out 213,000
cubic meters of tunnels. Figures that far exceed
what is known about today. - There's always a policy. You make a policy within
the system with your reports to present yourself in
the best possible light. Or the second option is that a
lot of tunnels were destroyed by the Germans or by the
Russians, we don't know. Or even by the Poles. So we just don't know that, and very little is open to the public. - [Narrator] We know of
half a dozen tunnel systems south of Walbrzych, but are there more? No one is willing to rule it out. It's quite possible, even probable, that the Owl Mountains still have a few more surprises in store. Tunnel entrances that have
been filled in or blasted shut are being discovered all the time. Christel Focken alone reported four suspected tunnel sites late in 2015. (suspenseful music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] She has recruited
two cavers from Munich, Andreas Willer and Norbert Huntz. - [Radio] Frequency mode. - [Narrator] They are
well-equipped and very experienced. (electronic beeping) (speaking in foreign language) (device warbling) (suspenseful music) - [Narrator] Down they
go, into a Nazi underworld that has been sealed off for 70 years. The purpose of the
complex is still unknown. Andreas cautiously checks the site. (suspenseful music continues) But there seems to be no way in. And then his gas monitor beeps. (device warbling) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Methane is
produced in tunnels like this when the timber supports rot. (speaking in foreign language) (ominous music) - [Narrator] A foolhardy treasure hunter plunged to his death in the region as recently as September 2015. The sealed off tunnels
of the Riese project still hold many secrets. The most mysterious part
is the Osowka complex. (ominous music continues) From the surface, a
shaft descends 50 meters into the depths. (ominous music continues) (speaking in foreign language) (ominous music continues) - [Narrator] A secret document
from the last days of the war states that weapons and
ammunition were to be stored here for a strong point. It is therefore quite possible that this was where the reported
Walbrzych train was heading, and that the train transported
only weapons, not gold. The Director of the
Osowka complex estimates that only half of it has been explored. (suspenseful music) What is hidden in the inaccessible areas? Many of the tunnel roofs are as high as the ceiling of a cathedral. There is enough space to
accommodate large equipment or even whole trains. (speaking in foreign language) (ominous music) - [Narrator] Plans for what? Mr. Lazanowski, the
director of the museum, has a remarkable hypothesis. (speaking in foreign language) (ominous music) - [Narrator] After Germany's surrender, the Soviets evidently
searched here for just that. Installations associated
with German atomic research. Decade later, the
physicist Georgy Flyorov, one of the fathers of
the Soviet atomic bomb, mentioned help from German scientists during a private conversation. (suspenseful music) But what did the Soviets find at Osowka? That is still uncertain. These foundations on the
surface of the complex are particularly remarkable. So far, no one has been
able to explain them. (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] So the cargo
on the Walbrzych train, if the train ever existed,
could have been high technology, rather than gold or weapons. The Soviets clearly
expected to find materials for German atomic research. However, Russian files that
could throw light on this are not yet available. - We don't know for sure
what kind of installations, what kind of research was done in at least part of the
tunnels of the Riese complex. But it's very likely that the Russians, very soon after the first
soldiers arrived there, had scientific and academic comity and tried to get everything and bring it back to the Soviet Union. But this part of the
story can only be told if you have Russian documents, but we don't have access
to these sources yet. So it's still history to
be told in the future. - [Narrator] Walbrzych,
the 15th of December, 2015. The mayor has called a press
conference on the gold train. The city has probably never
seen so many camera teams. Today is to be the moment of truth. (tense music) For the first time, Piotr
Koper and Andreas Richter will publicly present the
results of their geo-radar tests. Professor Madej from Krakow
University of Technology will then discuss the
findings of his working group. Richter and Koper display
a 3D computer model that they have superimposed on
an aerial photo of the site. They remain convinced
that it probably shows a hidden armored train. It shows regular rectangular structures. But then it's Professor Madej's turn. (speaking foreign language) - [Narrator] With scientific thoroughness, he presents the test methods that he and his working group used, and the results they reached. He devotes a great deal of
time to the magnetometer tests that he and his colleagues conducted. - [Narrator] He makes it exciting. Finally, he leaves the conclusion to a journalist in the room. (speaking in foreign language) (crowd murmuring) (speaking in foreign language) - [Narrator] Richter
and Koper's expressions speak for themselves. Is this the end of the
Walbrzych gold train? The crucial point is the scientists could not detect enough metal in the hill for a train to be inside it. (speaking in foreign language) (tense music) - [Narrator] And that's it. There is a handshake for Piotr Koper, as if after a tennis match. But who is right? Koper and Richter are
not about to give up. (speaking in foreign language) (dramatic music) - [Narrator] Is it really
worth spending so much money searching for a train
that may not even exist? At least, not here? - They are of good conscience, I'm sure. Now, there may be something there, okay? It's possible that
there's something there, but I think that they
will be very disappointed with what they find. Things like German army helmets or gloves or supplies or things that have rusted. I mean, you see, or maybe a knife or a gun or something like that. Those are the sort of things
that they might come across. - [Narrator] But even if
that proves to be the case, there are still many
undiscovered sealed tunnels in the region, where the train could be. (dramatic music) - Finally I'd just like to say, there will always be stolen Nazi treasure awaiting discovery at
the end of the rainbow. - [Narrator] The story of
the Silesian gold train is not over yet. (dramatic music)
