The Hesse Heist: The WWII Treasures Stolen From Kronberg Castle | Wartime Crime | Timeline

access to hundreds more exclusive history documentaries by downloading the history hit app this channel is part of the history hit Network Germany 1945 in defeat Adolf Hitler has left a Nazi state in Ruins Germany is now in the hands of Allied occupation forces flooding in to take control this creates a great deal of fluidity and opportunity for criminals amid the chaos an opportunity of a lifetime is discovered hidden in a castle once home to an ancient Royal Dynasty it was people in the military thinking this is a quick way to make a buck unlocking the Castle's Secrets will lead to an international game of Espionage Royal conspiracy and one of the crimes of the century it was gigantic it was huge thank you [Music] March 29 1945 following the collapse of Nazi Germany George Patton's third U.S army rolls into Frankfurt taking control of the city the city of course was decimated by Allied bombing there was a lack of power lack of water or lack of any kind of resources despite the devastation Frankfurt is a strategically important city in the heart of Germany U.S command decides to make it their base of operations [Music] it was the natural place for an American Administration Eisenhower establishes his headquarters in the IG farben Factory there and it becomes a real node of the American administration of occupied Germany situation in Germany is desperate the entire National infrastructure has been destroyed and all levels of government have collapsed while Frankfurt is in no position to support its citizens it now has to host the thousands of American troops and staff that flood into the city we are bringing in a lot of personnel to manage all the kind of logistics that are required to reconstruct Germany to feed Germany to lead the hunt for Nazis as a result you begin bringing in more and more personnel living conditions are harsh nearly all buildings have been demolished by Allied bombers and cold crowded army tents are the main source of accommodation fuel supplies and medical supplies were virtually unobtainable any inhabitable building was quite the commodity American officers searching for more comfortable lodgings finally strike gold a few miles north of Frankfurt they discover Kronberg Castle a 19th century Palace that has been Untouched by the war built by The Dowager Empress Victoria Widow of Emperor Frederick III of Germany and the eldest daughter of Queen Victoria of Britain the castle is owned by an aristocratic family known as the house of Hesser Castle is the seat of this dynasty of Hesse which is one of the most you know senior esteemed dynasties in Germany there was an opulent castle that had over a hundred rooms in it and it was quickly commandeered to become a U.S Officers Club they appropriated the castle and kicked everybody out settled there to have fun and live in this very opulent home it's basically a giant party and if you have someone who knows how to throw a party and they did it's going to be a very popular place to congregate the military renames the castle the Kronberg Castle Country Club and Han's day-to-day management of its staff and stores over to Captain Kathleen Nash Kathleen Nash was a 42 year old divorcee who was looking for adventure in her life and so she signed up in the military and lied about her age in order to do so she loved 10 years off her age speaking herself 32 left her kids in her civilian life she had been the assistant manager to the Phoenix Country Club and so consequently when they suggested that she manage the Officers Club it was a perfect fit she knew how to manage employees and she had 30 German servants working under her regularly through lunch Club some of the regulars included major David Watson and Colonel Jack Durant he was stationed in the Frankfurt area and was assigned to converg Jack Durant was a lawyer in his civilian life and he was also in an unhappy marriage back in the States together with major David Watson Durant spends most of his spare time drinking in the Officers Club the pair strike up a firm friendship with Nash whose personal chemistry with Durant leads to a full-blown affair discover the past with exclusive history documentaries and ad-free podcasts presented by world-renowned historians all from history hit watch them on your smart TV or on the go with your mobile device download the app now to explore everything from the wonders of ancient Pompeii and the Mystery of the princes in the tower to the life of Anne Berlin and D-Day sign up via the link in the description foreign inside the castle the three friends find themselves living in a level of luxury Beyond imagination luxury that soon catches the attention of visiting troops kronberg's lavish Furnishings proved to be a Temptation too great for U.S officers to ignore and many begin to quietly loot the Castle's Treasures often seen as taking souvenirs or keepsakes looting was nonetheless discouraged Kathleen Nash certainly discouraged it within the Cronenberg Castle she in fact had a couple of employees that acted as German guards at the entrance to the castle who routinely would check people coming in and out one of the things that commends her to superiors is how she runs cronberg Castle it's an officer's Club it has rooms and she turns in officers who stay in the rooms for stealing soap or stealing little knickknacks it must be said that a lot of these officers were trying to steal a lot more than soap I mean they were coming in and they'd see a Persian rug on the floor and they'd roll it up and try to walk out with it and she'd say what are you doing that belongs to the offices club and they go no this is just you know this is just booty of War [Music] the practice of occupying troops taking property for themselves strikes at the heart of Allied plans for post-war Germany German law vanished with the fall of the Nazi State and it is up to the Victorious powers to fight crime maintain order and prevent the nation from sliding into Anarchy but there is no single Authority governing the country France Britain the United States and the Soviet Union have divided Germany into four zones of occupation and the behavior of the different military forces varies wildly every zone is different the Soviets treat the Eastern Zone with extraordinary brutality they take Vengeance on the Germans for the crimes of the war and they take everything of value out they literally dismantle factories and they bring the factories back piece by piece into the Soviet Union and set them up there in contrast to the Soviets the Western allies are Keen to avoid the mistakes of the past when punishing Germany after World War One led to the rise of Adolf Hitler they also plan to put the Nazi leadership on trial as criminals a process that would lack all credibility if they failed to apply the rule of law to their own troops first in the American Zone General Eisenhower is intent on leading by example and enforces a strict code of justice in the western Zone there's this feeling that the way to buy a long-term peace is not to brutalize the Vanquish but to rather build them up the idea was it was temporary yes the Allies won the war but the Americans and the British and the French were not going to take over Germany or what would become West Germany and run it they wanted West Germany to be a bulwark against communism in this context the attempts at looting and petty theft from Kronberg Castle are a serious matter and Kathleen Nash's right to be concerned General later President Eisenhower made several widely publicized speeches about the fact that property was to be turned over to the authorities and it was not to be kept by individuals that that would be in fact a war crime in and of itself The Taking of private property was an issue and it was very hard to police As Time wears on Kathleen Nash's attitude towards property theft at kromberg starts to relax when she finds a large collection of Fine Wine in the castle basement she dismisses any concerns over theft and serves it in the club bar I mean obviously if you're going to be appropriating a castle to be your Officer's Club you want to check to see what's hiding and they were able to find The Wine Cellar that had been hidden which was about sixteen hundred bottles of really good wine certainly the American officers knew that when they found the wine they weren't supposed to take it they did this with full knowledge that they were doing something not right but I guess they thought that well it's wine you know we might as well drink it after only a few months Kathleen Nash had depleted the wine and The Wine Cellar for the U.S officers [Music] with her supplies of alcohol exhausted Nash tasks Corporal Roy Carlton was scouring the castle for more while searching a lower basement Carlton discovers two suspicious wives couple of electrical wires going into the wall occupying forces had encountered this before where as they would come into a place they would find that the residents had hidden valuables behind fake walls and so they knew what to look for wires running into this wall with no outlet and so he says there must be a set of a compartment back there so they knocked down the wall on what they discover is 1600 bottles more of Priceless wine although they don't know it yet the valuable wine is only the beginning what they find next will reveal the secrets of a 700 year old Dynasty and change the lives of three U.S officers forever November 1945 and the aftermath of World War II Germany is in chaos in the American zone of occupation General Eisenhower's strict command attempts to restore order and enforce the rule of law but a few miles north of Frankfurt U.S officers Captain Kathleen Nash and Corporal Roy Carlton are in the basement of Kronberg castle and out of sight of their superiors the castle belongs to an ancient German Dynasty and while searching its basement Nash and Carlton stumble across a hidden room their attention is drawn to the floor they found in the cellar concrete recently placed concrete they break through with pickaxes [Music] foreign they find this box what do we do she says leave it to me Kathleen Nash faces the decision of her life what she does with the Box will determine not only her future but that of post-war Europe as well they took it up to her room and just opened it up and it was like an Aladdin's cave [Music] sapphires Ruby Ruby emeralds hundreds of loose diamonds diamonds and platinum settings gold settings silver settings one bracelet that had over 400 diamonds on the bracelet itself watches and rings and gold coins and rare coins and rare books today they'd be worth in the area of 50 million dollars [Music] I'm sure their eyes were wide and like ooh you know what can we do with this having stumbled across one of the most valuable collections of jewels in all of Europe Nash shares the discovery with her lover Colonel Jack Durant and his friend major David Watson the trio now stand at a Crossroads as they consider what to do with their find the proper procedure was to report any property to U.S headquarters where they could properly inventory it for release back to the original owner at a later date this policy is particularly strict in the case of items of jewelry which are given special status as objects of Art but despite Eisenhower's explicit orders that private properties to be respected during the heat of War army officers do not always apply the letter of the law keeping up American troop morale has been allowing a fair amount of looting so that's why you see all these guys coming back with German flags and German pistols and German daggers and this and that the other thing because they allowed a lot of this stuff so as not to impact morale aware that soldiers often keep items taken from the enemy Watson suggests that Duran contact headquarters to make further inquiries Durant being the Army lawyer calls over and says uh what's what's the rule on procreating you know German property the people in the legal department they have a pretty loose definition they don't know that he's dealing with a Hessian crown jewels and they go well if it belonged to some Nazi Big Shot you know you can take it so he feels like he's covered Nash remains unsure of what to do and Durant uses all his charm to persuade her that there's no reason why they shouldn't simply keep the jewels he argued that by the time they were to catch up with him they would be civilians consequently they would be unapproachable by a military court and he reasoned that only a military Court would have jurisdiction over a crime committed on foreign soil he thought therefore this was something that they could run the clock out and he'd get away with certainly he had no morals there was nothing in him even as a trained lawyer saying this is the wrong thing to do he grew up in the depression their eyes grew wide they saw being able to have a comfortable life in the United States after the war so she Durant and Watson hashed this scheme that they are going to smuggle these 2.5 million 50 million dollars today worth of crown jewels out of Germany home to the states and live happily ever after once they have them it made the decision to get rid of them they didn't know what to do they were not experienced So eventually it was going to catch up with them ignorant of the true gravity of their decision there will be no turning back for Kathleen Nash and her accomplices while they know that smuggling their horde home to America won't be easy they have no idea that their theft will embroil them in an international game of politics and espionage had they known who buried the jewels and why they might have made very different choices [Music] what's up November 1945 Frankfurt Germany behind a false wall in Kronberg Castle U.S military officers Kathleen Nash Jack Durant David Watson make the discovery of a lifetime the crown jewels of the House of Hesser one of Germany's most esteemed dynasties what they don't know is the story of how the jewels came to be hidden beneath the castle a story that begins roughly a year earlier as Nazi Germany was nearing its final days [Music] as the Allied aerial bombardment of Germany intensifies in 1944 and you now have these daylight raids by the Americans these nighttime raids by the Brits and they're pounding all the German cities including Frankfurt online the dukel family of Hessel decides we better secure our crown jewels they had left them in a bank in Frankfurt in a vault they'd seen Banks get leveled by bombing so they said this is no longer safe in the very bottom of the castle they dug a hole and they put all this under there believing that once they covered it with concrete even if the castle were to be destroyed during the war they would one day be able to come back and at least excavate that and retrieve their riches [Music] riches that have been gathered over nearly a thousand years during which the house of Hessa Rose to become one of Europe's most powerful families the Hess family is part of a German Dynasty they rule Germany from the 12th century all the way through the end of World War One the different stages Dynasty had every intention of returning after the war and taking up this inheritance the current head of the House of Hessa is 49 year old Prince Philip Von hessen Prince Philip Von hessen is in charge of the house from 1940 to 1980. he is the grandson of Frederick III the German Emperor he is the great grandson of Queen Victoria he is also the son-in-law to Victor Emmanuel III of Italy he's a close cousin of the Duke of Edinburgh the guy who's currently married to Queen Elizabeth II to say he has Royal Blood as a gross understatement as one of Germany's oldest and most prestigious families the hessen dynasty has had to survive the unprecedented political turmoil that racked Germany during the interwar years a period in which the wealth and privilege of the aristocracy is under threat across Europe feeling in Europe in the 1920s that industrialization had just created this dead end socialist and communist parties were getting stronger and stronger the numbers didn't look good I mean they were going to either Through The Ballot Box or through Revolution going to overthrow old liberal capitalist Europe and Aristocrats like Philip of hessen were particularly alarmed because they just had the experience of the Russian Revolution where the Bolsheviks take over in petrograd and they slay the Czar and they slay the Nobles and they create this quote-unquote classless society which is essentially a society of the working class in Germany the monarchy to which Philip had belonged has been replaced by a republic but by the 1930s the government is on the brink of collapse mass unemployment and hyperinflation sees extreme political groups on both the left and right take to the streets [Music] privilege being nephews of a former Kaiser they watch their entire country dissolve and be destroyed yes they still had wealth but they were like everybody else while Germany descends into chaos Philip is introduced to a new political ideology that promises to restore order to the nations of Europe Philippines goes down to Italy to visit with his wife the daughter of the Italian King Watches from a front row seat the rise of Benito Mussolini and Applause what Muslims do Mussolini the fascists they're doing an end run around this socialization communization of Europe by saying no the workers should align with nationalism with a strong National regime that will uphold capitalism but we'll fight for Italian interests we'll fight for the worker as well and he says well this is the only way to square the circle of your sort of modern politics and economics and so he's a natural adherent of Hitler when Hitler comes to power he sees Hitler as Germany's Mussolini members of the Von Hassan family were among the first to join the Nazi party the Nazi party gave the impression that the monarchy would be restored like many German Aristocrats at the period they disdain Hitler for his common Origins for his boorish manners but they applaud Hitler for finding a way out of his dead end he's somebody who's going to bring all classes the working classes The Peasant classes the middle classes the aristocratic classes together into this kind of national Community they saw also that national socialism would bring Germany to the front again because Hitler's idea was to use a modern expression Germany first and Prince Philip likes them in October of 1930 Prince Philip ends up meeting Hitler they quickly become friends he is also good friends with Gary to Hitler he becomes his personal Envoy to Mussolini himself and he would be able to be used to be able to take part in keeping Italy with Mussolini in with Germany Prince Philip Von hessen isn't alone in his Devotion to the Nazis his twin brother Wolfgang and youngest brother Richard joined the sa the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi party his other brother Prince Christoph Von hessen is in the SS not only does Prince Philip early on endorse Hitler and give Hitler a whole new kind of legitimacy but he's rewarded by the Nazis for this devotion by being made over president of Hessa Nassau this is this Nazi province in Western Germany and there he serves as a loyal Nazi Governor but he also does really heinous acts for example he takes a big Research Hospital in his jurisdiction and he gives it to Hitler as part of the euthanasia program Adama was an insane asylum where the sane were murdered 35 000 were exterminated in this Hospital given to Hitler by Prince Philip people are executed under the euthanasia program but The Cordial relationship between the aristocrats and the Nazis doesn't last in May of 1943 Prince Philip falls out of favor with Hitler Hitler has made a decree that formerly the support that he had actually wanted from princes he's had a change in attitude and no longer wants their support Hitler is increasingly isolated increasingly alone increasingly paranoid and he begins to see these princely families as being potentially dangerous so he essentially turns against them in July of 1943 matters are complicated even further when Philip's father-in-law Victor Emmanuel III has Mussolini arrested Mussolini ousted by King Victor this was the first break in the axis this makes Hitler come to the conclusion that Philip and his family are complicit in the downfall of Mussolini and of course after Italy turned and Mussolini was killed he was of no longer any use and both he and his wife paid for that he is sent to a German concentration camp now he's given the same rations as the guards he's given the right to where his civilian clothing has given better facilities but he's kept in the camp nonetheless and then after the war when he's released he's treated with extreme suspicion by the Allied authorities because of his decision to endorse Hitler in the early days and add that degree of legitimacy to the Nazi movement the alliance between the aristocracy and fascism has failed and Philip's dream of restoring the power and Prestige of German nobility is in tatters and in the end they discovered that Hitler was never interested in that it didn't save their country in the end Germany got divided war of Europe fell to Communism and they had to rebuild Germany once again [Music] by November 1945 when Kathleen Nash discovers the Hessa Jewels Philip has been liberated from a German concentration camp but before he can return to the family home at cromberg Castle he is arrested for his Nazi connections and held in detention by American forces meanwhile International intelligence agencies begin to suspect that Kronberg Castle Harbors a greater secret than simply the location of the family fortune a secret that if stumbled upon by Nash Durant and Watson would Shake European ability to its core Frankfurt 1945. Captain Kathleen Nash Colonel Jack Durant and major David Watson have discovered 50 million dollars worth of jewels belonging to the aristocratic House of Hesser hidden in the basement of Kronberg Castle having resolved to keep their find the trio is now confronted with the job of smuggling the jewels out of Germany trying to get anything so ostentatious out of the country would have been an extremely difficult task because basically you're trying to get it through customs and Customs is looking specifically for these kinds of items they first of all went to Switzerland to try to sell the jewels and that was not successful it's not likely that they were completely aware of what they had in their possession major Watson ends up selling what turns out to be a literally Priceless Faberge Egg for four hundred and thirty dollars thwarted in their first attempts to sell the jewels Nash and Durant devise a new plan one they believe will make their crime undetectable we take all these Tiaras and crowns and brooches and everything else because they're too bulky and they'll attract too much attention so they pry all of the precious stones The Sapphires rubies emeralds diamonds out of all the centers in doing so they decrease the value exponentially of the artifacts themselves but nonetheless what they wind up with are raw gemstones that they could mail to friends and in fact that's exactly what they did Durant has a brother in Falls Church Virginia and he's getting deliveries of rubies and sapphires in just letter envelopes and Nash ends up sending jewels to her sister in Wisconsin or they were housed in her sister's attic for quite a while then they take all the settings the Platinum the gold the silver and they go to Jewelers in Switzerland in neutral Switzerland Basel Zurich Baron and they sell the gold and the silver and the Platinum although successful with their first shipments the thieves grow concerned about the possibility of detection they decide to look for other means of smuggling The Horde major Watson had contacts in Ireland where he'd been based before moving to Frankfurt so he made numerous trips to Ireland and tried to sell them in pawn shops and Jewelers in Ireland in England meanwhile Durant makes use of an old flame in the Diplomatic service Durant takes a large cachet of the jewels while he's in London to his former secretary Martha orwig who is now working for the UN and she has diplomatic immunity with diplomatic immunity she can travel back and forth through customs without her luggage being inspected so she actually agrees to carry some of the gems back for him as well they mailed stuff they fed stuff in Europe they brought stuff over in diplomatic pouches or Army pouches that were classified and they brought back a lot by all accounts they brought back nearly all of it with almost the entire horde safely out of Germany the thieves turned their attention to covering their tracks Katie actually tried to leave the military faster because if she were civilian she couldn't be tried in a military Court they just have to get out of the army and they have to become civilians February 1946 Kathleen Nash is about to leave Kronberg Castle her military service almost complete when an unwelcome visitor appears Princess Sofia of the House of Hess returns looking for them because she's about to get married it's going to be a royal wedding it's tradition that in a royal wedding you wear the Royal jewels she originally spoke to Katie Nash and Katie Nash kind of like tried to put her off like uh oh and it has discovered then that they are gone before an investigation can begin Nash's tour ends and she's demobilized out of Europe on arrival back in the States she immediately applies for a discharge from the Army meanwhile Colonel Jack Durant is dispatched to Washington D.C but not before he has himself designated as an official Courier this allows him to travel with luggage exempt from inspection as soon as Durant lands he buys a new car for one thousand four hundred dollars in cash and heads to Chicago to Rendezvous with Nash but in Germany Princess Sofia reports the theft to U.S authorities and the Nets starts closing in is reported to investigators who quickly start questioning some of the folks that worked at the U.S Officers Club and they report back saying the last time we saw them they were in the hands of Jack Durant and David Watson and Kathleen Nash that put them hot on their Trail in a desperate bid to you know keep them in the Army long enough to connect the dots and arrest them and recover these Jewels if they were still to be recovered the Army issues Hip Pocket orders when someone is about to be discharged you can give them these orders that you carry on in your pocket that give you seven more months to report to a new assignment the clock is ticking and the couple are on the Run believing they only have to lay low for seven months before escaping prosecution Nash and Durant make a desperate bid to cash in part of the Hessa jewelry horde in Chicago they attempt to sell a hundred loose diamonds but the deal falls through when Durant can't produce a customs receipt Jewelers don't want to buy a hundred loose diamonds without a custom certificate saying you know where what the Providence was so one of these Jewelers turns them into the authorities Jewelers are honest they don't want to have you know uh hot Goods U.S customs seize the diamonds and join the chase National Durant flee Chicago burying the remaining gems outside Durant's brother's home in Virginia find Katie in Chicago she'd slip out and have an Airline reservation but she'd actually take the train believing it will prevent them from testifying against each other Durant and Nash decide to marry they went on an extravagant honeymoon she was wearing that has jewels and they were certainly spending flagrantly that should have been a hint to somebody but something was wrong with only one day left before Nash's hit pocket orders expire the couple is arrested in a downtown Chicago hotel where they've been hiding out when they questioned Nash they hook up to the polygraph test a lie detector test she fails miserably she confessed immediately that she had taken them and she actually gave her sister the secret code that they had to tell you say yes you could tell the police that these are where the jewels are they interrogate Durant and he eventually just confesses [Music] still on active duty in Germany David Watson is arrested along with Nash and Durant and the story breaks around the globe sensationalized in the press and discussed in the U.S Senate the world wants to know whether it is too late for the jewels to be recovered and what fate will befall the thieves [Music] June 1946 after weeks on the run three U.S officers are arrested by military police for the theft of the Hesser crown jewels but now that Colonel Jack Durant Captain Kathleen Nash and major David Watson have confessed to their part in one of the biggest Crimes of the century their fate and the fate of the stolen treasure needs to be decided the news of this theft turns into a media sensation it's addressing several issues and consequently it Garner's International attention got even more attention because of the family connections because Sophie's younger brother Philip was marrying princess Elizabeth now of course Queen Elizabeth so there was that connection as well the interest of the British crown first surfaced while Nash was in charge of Kronberg Castle an official Envoy from Buckingham Palace had arrived at the castle supposedly to retrieve Royal correspondence dating from the reign of Queen Victoria agreements were made to take things out of Kronberg legally meaning the letters of Queen Victoria's daughter to her mother the request came from General Eisenhower Anna regions were made with the British and the Americans and this was all done legally and officially but the official Envoy is joined by notorious spy Anthony blunt refused entry by Nash blunt breaks into the castle and is believed to have retrieved two boxes of sensitive papers papers implicating Edward Duke of Windsor the former king of Britain in a plot to collaborate with the Nazis Edward is cousin to the hessen princes and like his relatives had been greatly impressed by Adolf Hitler the boxes and their contents disappeared Allied intelligence was deeply interested in the house of Hesser not least because of its ties to the Duke of Winter the Duke of Windsor who had formally abdicated the crown in England in order to marry Wallace Simpson the American divorcee visited Hitler in 1937. he seemed to be overly enthusiastic as he and Simpson both engaged in a full-on Nazi salute he ended up residing in Lisbon and when Churchill got word of rumors that he had become pro-nazi he recalls him to England immediately under threat of court-martial should he not return the feeling was that there was something there and it's assumed that they found a lot and that blunt did remove documents in fact it's been very difficult to find any real correspondence between the German princes and the Duke of Windsor in the British archives in private Holdings anywhere they've been pretty thoroughly combed over and purged because of the noxiousness of this and the fact that this is something that nobody really wants to confess that here you have the Duke of Windsor formerly King Edward VII corresponding with German princes possibly colluding in a German takeover of Britain an installation of a fascist nazi type regime if you're a far-sighted British or American statesman you have to be very concerned about this because of course one of Hitler's plans is to defeat Britain and put the Duke of Windsor on the throne as a puppet King I don't think Nash was looking for documents Nash was looking for good wines and jewelry but there were people like Anthony blunt that were there looking for the correspondence no one knows whether Nash Durant and Watson ever discovered evidence of a plot between the Nazi State and the Duke of Windsor but documents relating to the activities of the British royal family during the 30s and 40s remain classified until 2037. in August 1945 Winston Churchill wrote to the new prime minister Clement Atlee stating I earnestly trust that it may be possible to destroy all traces of these German intrigues a year later in the summer of 1946 Nash Durant and Watson will stand trial in a landmark case in the effort to reconstruct Germany and establish the rule of law because the US was the occupying Force it was important to show that the U.S would respect its own rules the Allied occupation authorities being very respectful of the German past and of German history and not wanting to leave the impression that they were Thugs and looters we're very careful to try to have a clean hands Administration the U.S military wanted to demonstrate to the world publicly that they will put anyone who has committed a crime on trial even if they are a U.S citizen even if they are a member of the U.S military doing so so publicly in the American Zone in Germany was an instance where they could do that this was an important case to prove that the American occupation was just and was fair and so they had to make an example of these days Grant Nash and Watson are flown back to Germany in 1946 to stand trial separately for the theft of the jewels and they're confronted with the theft of the jewels which was witnessed by other people they're asked to explain where they went in Hudson Wisconsin Colonel and Mrs Duran supposedly scrambled eggs with royal German table service and then skipped out as police closed in meanwhile they've got Jewelers in Chicago who they've approached and tried to sell stuff to who've reported them to the authorities and so there's an increasing pool of people that can point at them and say these people stole these jewels and are trying to dispose of these Jewels their main contention in terms of a defense is that at the time of the arrest they were civilians and therefore outside of military jurisdiction and shouldn't be allowed to have to stand trial at all but the argument isn't successful all three had been captured and formally arrested before their pocket orders expired if only by a few hours they also believe that it's questionable that a crime is even committed if you are stealing property from someone who is a committed Nazi the prosecution was successfully able to say no you don't take property that doesn't belong to you and you had no right to take and we did not authorize this further they have the very simple defense of everybody was doing it it was simply a matter that people were bringing back souvenirs and trophies and why in the world were they being singled out there was General looting but I think what we're concerned with here is the Looting of objects of higher value the theft of German property by the occupying forces was widespread but not on the scale in 1947 the trials conclude and the three receive their sentences major David Watson is given three years in prison now he only serves four months apparently had some powerful connections that enabled him to get out of prison early they sentenced Jack Durant to 15 years of hard labor since he was the highest ranking official he however is out within six years Kathleen Nash on the other hand is sentenced to five years and is regarded as a very difficult prisoner and serves the entire five years [Music] eventually it was decided in 1951 after the trials were over what was found was to be returned to the family only about half of the stuff was ever recovered but the value of all these pieces had been reduced by something like 90 percent because all the Damage Done prying them out of their settings the thought that these beautiful Jewels are gone because of greed it's very sad Julie our works of art now she's finally released from prison in 1952 a year ahead of her husband they end up re-establishing their marriage they had been married potentially two of her prosecution so that they wouldn't have to testify against each other but by the same token they really did have a romantic relationship and they end up staying married up until her death in 1972. Nash Durant and Watson's mistake was to underestimate the significance of the hessen crown jewels it was a theft just too large to ignore that was an embarrassment for the United States it was sad for a family of course we focus on the personalities of some members of the family because of what they did but what they did was not relevant to the jewel Heist for Nash Durant and Watson three people who had survived the depression the war had offered an opportunity for a new life and their discovery of the hessen jewels meant a chance to finally live the American dream but what happened to the rest of the horde remains a mystery to this day the vast majority of the jewels have not been recovered there's this urban legend that half of it is in jars hidden in Falls Church Virginia where Duran hit a lot of this stuff when he saw that the law enforcement was closing in an interesting factoid about that is he had a brother who received a lot of the stones that he sent through the mail the Brotherhood led a very poor and modest life left in a state worth a million dollars so somewhere lies tens of millions of dollars worth of Hessian crown jewels in the countryside of Virginia [Music]

Channel: Timeline - World History Documentaries

Views: 152,536

Keywords: Ad-free, Castle architecture, Castle history, Castle takeover, Conspiracy, Disgraced soldiers, Documentary series, Exclusive podcasts, German treasures, Historical evidence, Historical podcasts, Jewel heist, Kronberg, Military intelligence, Military secrets, Occupation, Post-war Europe, Timeline - World History Documentaries, Treasure heist, US Air Force, US-German cultural exchange

Id: 11HYDm-IVr0

Length: 44min 32sec (2672 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 25 2023