The Rape of Europa

by Lynn H. Nicholas

  At the same time, General Lucius Clay, the newly appointed Deputy Military Governor of Germany, had been involved in other, more frustrating negotiations in which the machinery of the Allied Control Council, the presumed governing body for all Germany, was to be determined, and in which the Soviet Union had so far outsmarted the Americans, who had wrongly assumed that the team spirit of the combat period would carry over into postwar arrangements. In various proclamations on June 5, Eisenhower and Soviet Marshal Zhukhov had formally dissolved the national government of Germany and given themselves supreme power. They had also stated that the occupying powers must agree unanimously on any matters affecting Germany as a whole, but that if such agreement could not be reached, each Zone Commander could decide matters for his own zone without reference to the others. Organization of the Control Council was postponed until after the Summit; thus there was no central authority which could limit or even criticize the actions of the Zone Commanders once the armies had withdrawn behind their assigned boundaries.

  In retrospect the task facing Clay in July 1945 seems impossible. The numbers of refugees, freed forced laborers, displaced persons of every nationality, and homeless Germans roaming the countryside increased daily. Food and fuel supplies remained pathetically inadequate; transportation and communications were wrecked. Clay saw everywhere “human suffering beyond reason.” And there was the huge American combat force to be fed, supplied, and redeployed to the Asian theater of operations. The custody of millions of works of art was but one of Clay’s awesome responsibilities in this terrible limbo.

  As soon as the Russians had grudgingly granted permission, the British and Americans began to converge on the wasteland that was Berlin to set up their Military Governments and prepare for the Potsdam Conference. The heads of state assembled on July 15. Truman came without Morgenthau, who had resigned in protest after not being invited. As the Conference progressed, Clay conferred with Stimson, McCloy, Pauley, Hilldring, and others. He told Stimson that the United States was the custodian of “the greatest single collection of art in the world.”31 With him he had a proposal for dealing with this “collection” from which it is clear that Clay wished, as much as possible, to rid himself of the problem of caring for the mountains of art the Army had unwittingly acquired. The works were divided into three categories:

  Class A, consisting of works of art taken from the countries overrun by Germany readily identifiable as publicly owned, and works of art taken from private owners in the overrun countries by seizure and without compensation.

  Class B, consisting of works of art taken from private collectors in the overrun countries for which some compensation is alleged to have been made to the owners.

  Class C, consisting of works of art placed in the U.S. Zone by Germany for safekeeping which are bona fide property of the German nation.32

  His suggestions for the disposition of these works were based both on the physical situation in Germany as of July 17 and on the recommendations of the Monuments men and reparations adviser Pauley. Since “neither expert personnel nor satisfactory facilities are available in the U.S. Zone to properly safeguard and handle these priceless works of art,” the memo stated, Class A and B works should be returned to the countries from which they were taken. For the Class B works “receipts may be taken so that the return of compensation made by the Germans may be settled at a later date, perhaps as a charge against reparations payments.” Then came the bombshell that suggested that Class C works “might well be returned to the U.S. to be inventoried, identified, and cared for by our leading museums.” Clay recommended that they “be placed on exhibit in the U.S., but that an announcement be made to the public, to include the German people, that these works of art will be held in trusteeship for return to the German nation when it has re-earned its right to be considered as a nation.”

  On July 17 there was a general discussion at Stimson’s Potsdam lodgings which lasted for over an hour, “consisting mostly of the topic of captured art in US Army hands.”33 General Clay stated that he hoped to get approval for his plan. Stimson “agreed in general with this policy,” as did Secretary of State James Byrnes. They did not need much convincing. By now all those present at Potsdam had seen the hideous condition of bombed-out Berlin; they had also seen trains on sidings with top-heavy loads of loot preparing to leave for the Soviet Union. Clay met with President Truman on July 18 and immediately received “informal approval” for his art-evacuation plan.

  None of the MFAA people had seen Clay’s memo. John Nicholas Brown, theoretically Cultural Adviser to Eisenhower, only arrived in Berlin on the day Clay received Truman’s approval, where he “held himself available in case there should be a call from the Big Three Conference.”34 Meanwhile, he accompanied the local MFAA contingent on inspection tours of the city. The closest he ever got to Eisenhower in his tour of duty was as a member of the audience at the flag-raising ceremony at the new American headquarters in Berlin, performed in the presence of President Truman on July 22. On the twenty-sixth he wrote home that a Colonel Reid “had looked for me … on being summoned to the Conference Area. He hoped to take me with him.”35 But Brown, not notified in time, had gone off to look at a large statue of a lion claimed by the Danish government, and missed his chance.

  The first news of the Clay memo came to the Monuments men at headquarters in Frankfurt on July 29. Mason Hammond wrote immediately to Calvin Hathaway in Berlin that he had heard that “General Clay talked to President Truman about restitution of works of art and persuaded him … to take German works to the United States to hold in custody and show to the U.S. populace.” Upon inquiry it appeared that “the thing had come from General Clay with the request that there be no circulation or release until after the conference.”36 Mason Hammond disobeyed this order and told Hathaway to try to find out discreetly “whose bright idea it is to ship German art out to the U.S.”37 He also made a secret copy of the memo and had it brought to the attention of Eisenhower’s Political Adviser Robert Murphy. Meanwhile, the document had reached Pauley and his colleague William Clayton, an Assistant Secretary of State concerned with Economic Affairs. They approved the idea, except for one thing: they did not wish to state that the Class C works of art would be returned to the German people, but rather that “their eventual disposition will be subject to future Allied decision.”38 This not only was apparently approved by the Secretary of State (who failed to consult Clay), but was transmitted verbatim in letters to Foreign Ministers Molotov of the USSR and Bevin of Britain.

  John Nicholas Brown did not see the offending memo until his return to Frankfurt from Berlin on August 1. Furious, he wrote to Hathaway that it was “very upsetting, for so much of the document savoured of the language we had been using, but with a reverse English at the end…. Well, we shall see…. My first reaction was that I should make this a cause and request my immediate return to the US.”39 Clay, for different reasons, was no less angry. On August 2 he cabled Washington that the lack of a

  public statement of future intent with reference to German Art… is of course in conflict with informal approval of President. … I am apprehensive that removal of German Art without statement of future intent to return would not be acclaimed by public at large. … I am not sure that Clayton and Pauley’s letter gave cognizance to President’s informal approval of trustees holding of German Art… therefore request further instructions.40

  Clay was quite right to say that this policy would not be “acclaimed.” But the negative reaction was to any removal of objects from Germany at all. Brown sent him a strong protest indicating his outrage at not being consulted and—in contrast to his earlier reports, written before the opening of the Collecting Points—asserted that there were now indeed satisfactory facilities and adequate personnel to care for the works of art. He pointed out that much of what the Americans held belonged to institutions in other zones and that transporting works of art across the Atlantic was as dangerous as leaving them in Germany. But his main obj
ections were moral: taking Germany’s heritage “under the questionable legal fiction of ‘trusteeship’ seems to the writer, and to his associates in the MFAA Branch, not only immoral but hypocritical” and would be regarded with “distrust and disfavor by our Allies.” He felt that it would “indeed be humiliating” to have the German propaganda that portrayed MFAA activities as looting turn out to be true, and suggested that the cream of the German collections be sent to the United States and the formerly occupied countries in a series of loan exhibitions while the German museums were being reconstituted, and not “as taken by some quasi-legal act of war.”41 To his wife he fumed that:

  I have been very much chagrined that there was decided while I was sitting in Berlin a policy which I have advised against ever since I came over here. There is obviously no need for an adviser if his advice is not even asked. … I must say that I leave this tour of duty with the feeling of failure in the accomplishment of my mission, a sad state of affairs and a depressing state of mind.42

  His bitterness would be somewhat assuaged in a final meeting with Clay during which the general revealed to him in confidence that the promise to return the works to Germany in the future had the backing of President Truman himself.

  Responding to Clay’s objections, Secretary of State Byrnes cabled Pauley that the United States “should set a high standard of conduct in this respect.” The works of art should be “safeguarded,” but it must be clear that they “will eventually be returned intact, except for such levies as may be made upon them to replace looted artistic or cultural property which has been destroyed or irreparably damaged.”43 This demi-retreat was too late. Stiff objections to the removals had been received from both Britain and, hypocritically, Molotov of the USSR. Byrnes and Pauley, forced to back down, softened their language in a letter notifying the Roberts Commission that “this government fully intends to return all art objects of bona fide ownership as soon as conditions ensuring their proper safekeeping have been restored.”44 This letter guaranteed the return of longtime state-owned treasures, but it left a large loophole in the matter of items legally acquired from individuals, or bought in the neutral nations by the Nazi collectors.

  The Roberts Commission, angry at not having been consulted, was riven by the controversy. Their latest emissary to Germany, John Walker, had not heard of the Clay proposal until he had arrived in London on August 14 on his way home and was shown an undated copy by a Clayton assistant.45 Dinsmoor and Francis Henry Taylor were delighted that the German works were coming to the United States, feeling that it was “proper that the American people should have an opportunity to see these collections,” and Taylor passionately declared that he “would interpose no objections to whatever decision the Government might make regarding the use of cultural objects for reparations purposes … the American people had earned the right in this war to such compensation if they chose to take it.” Informed by the OSS Art Looting office in London that Woolley “deplored the implications” of the proposed removals, Taylor brushed aside the British objections; the British, he felt, should follow the American example. He was not worried about propaganda: “I believe that we must have the courage to take our own good counsel and act in the best interests of a nation which has lavished its blood and treasure upon an ingrate Europe twice in a single generation.”46 After “reading the documents and letters between high authorities,” he was confident that Truman and Byrnes would keep their word, noting that the Army’s inability to guarantee continued high-class personnel in Germany made transfer of the objects to the United States “obvious.”

  Others did not quite agree. Sumner Crosby was so furious that he wrote a passionate letter of resignation, later withdrawn to be sure, and Roberts Commission secretary Charles Sawyer, suspicious of Pauley’s motives, noted prophetically that “the physical presence of these objects in the country would lead to strong pressure to retain at least some of them under some pretext or another.”47

  David Finley, director of the National Gallery, had another worry: the Army had requested that the evacuated works be stored in his museum, an enormous and expensive responsibility. For this he needed approval from the highest-ranking member of the Gallery’s board of trustees, Chief Justice Harlan Stone, who was on vacation in New Hampshire. Finley travelled through the night to see Stone. The Chief Justice felt that “if the government asks us to take care of these paintings, we must do it. It is a duty which we could not escape if we wanted to, and certainly we do not want to.” Finley, mission accomplished, did not even stay for lunch, and returned immediately to Washington.48 The Gallery’s responsibility was officially confirmed by a letter from Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson on September 14 which also informed Finley that Clay had “been asked to supply information regarding the storage space needed … so shipments can commence in the very near future.” The State Department was quite aware of the marginal propriety of this arrangement. The whole project was to be kept secret, Acheson cabled to Murphy in Germany, until an announcement could be synchronized with that which “will have to be made in Washington in the near future to counter rumors and anticipated criticism concerning action.”49

  The MFAA contingent in Germany was not officially privy to these high-level arrangements. Indeed, they felt sure that nothing would ever come of the project given the shortage of transportation in Germany and the vast quantity of German-owned art. They were, therefore, horrified to receive a request from the War Department asking for estimates of how much storage space would be needed to house the entire German patrimony. Mason Hammond immediately cabled John Nicholas Brown, who had returned to the United States in late August, to say that the “matter of which you disapprove is being pressed—suggest you make inquiries at once and at top.”50 In Germany, Hammond raised such a fuss that he was given an interview with General Clay, to whom he gave three “good reasons” for not carrying out the plan: “one, that of moral grounds; one that it was a severe criticism of U.S. control; and one that it was practically very difficult to do.”51 Clay did not budge, however, and the announcement of the plan was set for September 17.

  But the Army had begun to be nervous. In Washington, Hilldring of the Civil Affairs Division wrote to the Roberts Commission that “certain technical experts” had said it would be more dangerous to move the pictures than to leave them in Germany, and asked for advice. This doubt had been planted in the good general’s mind by RC secretary Charles Sawyer, who opposed the operation and who had told the CAD that “the Department of State was also beginning to have doubts as to the wisdom of the Potsdam decision.”

  It was also far from clear just how much would need to be moved. The first estimates concerning storage were not encouraging: about thirty thousand square feet would be needed to house the German-owned objects already in the Collecting Points, and there were 677 known repositories in the U.S. Zone which had not yet been investigated. In the meantime, John Nicholas Brown’s memo disagreeing with Clay had arrived in Washington and was sent to Assistant Secretary of War McCloy, who was also rumored to be doubtful. This was followed by a visit from Brown himself. McCloy cabled Clay “for your up to date estimate … after consulting the experts at your disposal there,” adding that “if there is a real need for this action we should take the risk of any unfavorable comment.” He assumed that “there would be some process of selection whereby only the really perishable articles would be shipped.”

  There is no evidence that Clay consulted anyone before replying irritably,

  It is true that conditions here for storage of German art are improving, however, the same people who do not approve of removal of German art objects to the US urged early and immediate action on return of objects to liberated areas on grounds our facilities were entirely inadequate to protect these pieces. … It was their concern … that developed my concern for the preservation of German art objects.

  He had, he said, never contemplated the return of less valuable objects. He also believed that “the American public
is entitled to see these art objects until they can be returned to their proper places in Germany.” In clear reference to the Russians and the French, he rejected the advisability of returning objects to other zones “if we desire to preserve them for the German people.” He concluded by saying that he did not “feel strongly about the final decision” but that “it will not be helpful to us here if such recommendations are changed because of the views of subordinates who have returned home.”52 Still, Hilldring postponed the announcement of the operation until the whole problem could be discussed by the experts on the Roberts Commission at their next meeting.