U.S. returns looted art to Germany
The United States returned three paintings stolen at the end of World War II to the mayor of the western German town that owned them.
U.S. Ambassador William Timken Jr. handed over the 19th century works by Heinrich Burkel to the mayor of Pirmasens Friday in Berlin.
Officials say the three paintings, now valued at $125,000, were among works believed stolen on March 22, 1945, as U.S. forces pushed into Germany. They were recovered after they turned up in an auction in the U.S. last year.
Pirmasens Mayor Bernhard Matheis invited Timken to his town for next year’s opening of a new building housing Burkel’s work. “It’s an extraordinarily big day for Pirmasens,” said Matheis. “These are very important paintings for our collection.”
The museum moved the paintings to a school in 1942 to protect them from Allied bombing. On Sept. 19, 1945, the museum reported that about 50 paintings stored in the school’s air-raid shelter had been lost “during the arrival of the American troops” six months earlier.
Robert Wittman, an FBI agent who helped return the works, said it was impossible to say whether U.S. soldiers took the artwork.
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