In the absence of the BBC’s Director General, who was indisposed, the chairman got Sir Sydney Ryden’s permission to bring the head of external services (who was the ranking executive) into the meeting.
Sir Sydney produced a map that one of the MI6 cartographers had prepared overnight. It showed the city of Frankfurt, and the autobahn north which led through Alsfeld and Bad Hersfeld, and the convoy route on the small side road off the autobahn. It showed too the present-day border, with its barbed wire, man traps, minefields, searchlights and machine-gun posts.
‘Director Janecke and Director Thorns of the Reichsbank were the two men who handled all the gold in Nazi Germany,’ said Sir Sydney Ryden. ‘I have here some of the documents which show the shipments made to the Kaiseroda mineshaft at Merkers during those final weeks of the war. You see the signatures.’
The two BBC men looked at the map and the border of East Germany which encompassed the tiny town of Merkers.
‘This is the document from the Reichswirtschaftsministerium which assigned space in certain selected mines for the protection of such treasures as they considered most valuable,’ said Sir Sydney passing it across the desk.
SECRET
List of Money, Gold, Bullion, Found in Salt-Mine Cave,
Merkers (H-6850) Germany, 8 April 1945
Gold Reichsmarks, bags 446
Austrian crowns, bags 271
Turkish pounds, bags 73
Dutch gold, bags 514
Italian gold, bags 62
Austrian coins (miscellaneous), bags 3 (nos. 2, 15, 96)
British coins (miscellaneous), bags 3 (nos. 12, 17, 15)
Gold bars, bullion 8198
American $20 gold pieces, bags 711 (25,000 dollars per bag)
Miscellaneous coins, bags 37
Gold francs, bags 80 (10,000 francs per bag)
Miscellaneous money and coin, bag no. 1
Italian gold coins, bags 5 (20,000 per bag)
British gold pounds, bags 280
Foreign notes, miscellaneous, bags 80
Reichmarks
1000 Mark notes, bags 130 650,000,000 Marks
100 Mark notes, bags 1650 1,650,000,000 Marks
50 Mark notes, bags 600 300,000 Marks
20 Mark notes, bags 500 100,000 Marks
5 Mark notes, boxes 800 60,000 Marks
____________________
2,300,460,000 Marks
Gold bar, 1
Silver bars, 20
Silver plate, boxes 63 and bags 55
Gold, 138 pieces in bags 49
Gold, miscellaneous pieces, bag 1
Gold, French francs, bags 635
Swiss gold, bags 55
Crated gold bullion, boxes 53
Crated gold bullion, long boxes 2
Valuable coins, bags 9
Coins (not marked), bags 5
Turkish gold coins, bag 1
Mixed gold coins, bag 1
American dollars, bag 1 (12,470 dollars)
Austrian gold (marked GA ‘V’), bags 13
Miscellaneous gold of various countries, bags 6
Danish gold coins, bags 32
Platinum bars, bag 1 containing 6 bars
Roubles, bags 4
Silver bars, bags 40
Gold bullion, bags 11
British pounds, bag 1
Documents (metal boxes marked FHQu) 82
The two BBC officials studied the documents and looked at the map. Soon they exchanged significant glances and one of them asked, ‘You’d not want the full list of gold and valuables made public, Sir Sydney?’
The DG gave one of his cheerless smiles. ‘I wouldn’t like to define exactly our priorities.’
This evasive reply was enough to convince them that the Russians had been deprived of their rightful share of the treasure from a mine which became part of the Russian zone. Now, believing that they understood the full implications of Sir Sydney’s mission, they were fully ready to help. The producer of the documentary would be informed that there was litigation threatened by an unspecified complainant. Photocopies of all relevant material made ostensibly for the legal department would actually be sent to Sir Sydney Ryden’s home address within twenty-four hours.
The DG expressed his gratitude and was pleased he had not had to mention his visit to the DPP’s office. It was always better to handle these things at the very top, where the people concerned knew where their duty lay.
By eleven a.m. the following day, Sir Sydney had personally read all the material the BBC delivered to his office.
‘Just a lot of bilge,’ said Sir Sydney. Fatigue muted the relief and delight he might otherwise have shown. ‘A boring little script about the US army finding the bullion in the mine; the documents and archives are scarcely mentioned. Interviews with some high-ranking officers who were nowhere near the mine, and some US army signal corps photographs of the sacks of gold.’ He looked up at Boyd Stuart. ‘I had a sleepless night for nothing, Stuart.’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Stuart. ‘In fact, the research office is collecting all references to the Merkers mine-worldwide in all languages.’
‘Are you trying to tell me that we have this damned TV programme material already on record?’
‘Not quite all of it, sir. Research picked it up from their routine scrutiny of police permission for filming. The BBC wants to send a camera crew to get footage of the Foreign Office exterior and interior, for the beginning of their documentary. We asked the FO to request a copy of the treatment before giving permission. They would have got a copy of the script too, as soon as it was completed. That was to be a condition of giving the BBC the permits.’
‘Oh, well,’ said Sir Sydney philosophically. ‘I suppose it’s better that we catch it twice, and find it harmless, than miss it altogether and have a disaster on our hands.’
‘Precisely, sir. Perhaps you underestimate the organization you have yourself created.’
‘Don’t butter me up, Stuart. I can’t abide it.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘How is the interrogation of young Stein going?’
‘He doesn’t seem to know very much, sir. His father probably doesn’t confide in him a great deal.’
The DG nodded. Such paternal secretiveness came as no surprise. He hadn’t discovered the names of his father’s clubs until the old man was almost on his deathbed. What man did confide in his son, he wondered. ‘Nothing at all, eh?’
‘Inference, sir. I think we can rule out this house in which Colonel Pitman lives. Stein says his father told him he’d moved the documents out of there some time ago, and I believe that. Stein senior has a protective attitude towards Colonel Pitman. I think he’d remove such documents simply to make it safer for the colonel.’
‘It sounds extraordinary to me,’ admitted the DG, who could not imagine any of the young men in his department adopting such a protective attitude towards him.
‘I believe it, sir,’ said Stuart. ‘Wherever the documents are, I think that the Pitman house can be eliminated.’
He looked Stuart up and down. ‘Has something happened?’
‘We have a positive identification on the photo, Director.’
‘Start at the beginning,’ said the DG. He sat down on the sofa, stifling a sigh, to convey to Stuart the complexities of his job.
‘The photograph of three men that was found in the safe belonging to Franz Wever,’ said Stuart. ‘It was taken in wartime. One of the men was Franz Wever himself, the second man was Max Breslow. Now we have identified the third person in the photo.’
‘And…?’
‘His name is Wilhelm Hans Kleiber. He made quite a name for himself during the war. We have references to him from the Berlin documents centre. He’s also on RFSS microfilm series T- 175 in the Washington National Archives, and we found him in the Hoover Institution document collection at Stanford University. He was born in a village near Konigsberg, East Prussia. Kleiber joined the army in 1938, became an Abwehr officer and then the SS took him into the RSHA as they took over all the intelligence services. He was taken into the Gehlen organization when it got going again after the war.’