Piece
Transferred to T 2/209
Catalogue reference: IND 1/12652
Transferred to T 2/209
Item
Detailed Interrogation Report No 3 by the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the OSS...
Catalogue reference: T 209/29/2
What’s it about?
This record is about the Detailed Interrogation Report No 3 by the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the OSS... dating from 1945 in the series British Committee on the Preservation and Restitution of Works of Art, Archives and.... It is held at The National Archives, Kew.
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Full description and record details
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Reference (The unique identifier to the record described, used to order and refer to it)
- T 209/29/2
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Date (When the record was created)
- 1945
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Description (What the record is about)
- <p>Detailed Interrogation Report No 3 by the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the OSS on Robert Scholz, divided into four sections, dated 15 August 1945. Part I includes an overview of Scholz's life and career first as a painter and later as art critic for <emph render="italic">Die Deutsche Zeitung</emph> and from 1934 for the <emph render="italic">Voelkische Beobachter</emph>. Member of the NSDAP since 1935, Scholz became Kunstreferent in the Party Kulturgemeinde first and from 1937 in the Amt Reichsleiter Rosenberg. Editor of the magazine <emph render="italic">Kunst im Deutschen Reich</emph>, he became director of the Moritzburg Museum in Halle in 1939. Part II provides a detailed account of Scholz's activity in the ERR as director since 1940 of the Amt Bildende Kunst [Office for Pictorial Art] within the Rosenberg Hauptamt Kunstpflege [Office of Art Administration]. As Rosenberg's personal adviser on art matters, he directed from Berlin the operations of the professional art historians attached to the ERR's Amt Westen in Paris. Scholz claimed he led efforts to terminate ERR operations in France as early as 1941, 'after the majority of important art confiscations had been effected. In this he was opposed vigorously and constantly by D R K von Behr, Director of the art staff in Paris' and who simultaneously supervised 'the large-scale looting of Jewish house-furnishings [...] formalized as the so-called M-Aktion'. After von Behr's ousting, his stature within the ERR increased, although according to his account he never travelled to Holland on ERR business and made only one trip to Brussels in 1943 on his way to Paris. In Brussels he examined the art objects which the Treuhandgesellschaft, a German organisation for the safekeeping of enemy property in Belgium, 'had appropriated at an earlier date' in order to determine their eventual transfer to the ERR. On the whole, 'Scholz was responsible not only for the scientific recording of all art objects confiscated by the ERR and for their shipment to Germany, but for the maintenance of the various deposits within Greater Germany to which the confiscated material was brought'. Part III provides a summary of the interrogation report by stating that 'Scholz must be regarded as having occupied a leading and influential position in the Rosenberg organization. [...] All the evidence at hand would indicate that he was a burning protagonist of National Socialist cultural ideology, and that he participated actively in the "struggle against Jews, Freemasons and enemies of the Reich". Under interrogation, he has sought to convey the impression that he was personally responsible only for the orderly cataloguing and "safekeeping" [...] of the works of art confiscated by a branch of the Rosenberg office which he in no way controlled. Detailed interrogation, however, has developed the following points: a. that Scholz was at all times empowered to control the assignment of personnel to, and removal from, the special art staff of the Einsatzstab; b. that he took an active, possibly the leading part, in the preparation and execution of the 28 exchanges of confiscated paintings which the Einsatzstab conducted with various individuals; and that he ordered and directed the compilation of a list of confiscated Impressionist paintings, which were to be made available for exchange or sale by the ERR; c. that he represented Rosenberg directly in relations with the Reichschancellery, other Party organizations and the German military, where questions of broad policy related to art matters were involved'. With regard to French modern painting, 'Scholz is considered [...] to have sponsored the commercial exploitation for Germany of such material as was "unsuitable" ideologically for importation into the Reich. Under interrogation, Scholz attempted frequently to defend the "legality" of the Einsatzstab confiscations [...] and that the activity of the Einsatzstab had been salutary in preventing the "wanton" destruction and loss of a substantial portion of the cultural heritage of Europe.' Furthermore, 'it is believed that the motivation for Scholz's activity with the Einsatzstab was essentially ideological rather than material, and that he derived no financial profit from the confiscations effected with his knowledge and under his direction'. Part IV provides recommendations for action with regard to Scholz, by pointing out that 'aside from Alfred Rosenberg himself, Scholz is the highest-ranking former official of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg presently in Allied custody. Von Behr, unquestionably the leading sponsor of organized looting in France, is dead by suicide; and Gerhard Utikal, director of the Einsatzstab throughout the greater part of its activity, has not been found. Under the circumstances, Scholz must be held personally responsible, with Rosenberg, for the implementation of all art confiscations undertaken by the Einsatzstab. It is the recommendation of this unit that he be tried as a war criminal, and that the severity of charges brought against him be determined by the extent to which complicity in this organized looting operation is judged to have been criminal'. </p>
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Held by (Who holds the record)
- The National Archives, Kew
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Legal status (A note as to whether the record being described is a Public Record or not)
- Public Record(s)
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Language (The language of the record)
- English
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Closure status (Whether the record is ‘open’ (available to the public) or ‘closed’ (not available due to a legal exemption))
- Open Document, Open Description
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Record URL
- https://beta.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/id/C11645678/
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Series information
T 209
British Committee on the Preservation and Restitution of Works of Art, Archives and...
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Detailed Interrogation Report No 3 by the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the OSS...
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