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Golden Opportunity · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
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  Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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  Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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  Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Every year, millions of people are reported missing
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  Speaker 1: around the world. Some only disappear for a short time
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  Speaker 1: and come home safely, while others may never come home
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  Speaker 1: at all. For their loved ones, the time they are
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  Speaker 1: away is harrowing and stressful. Just ask John Perry. In
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  Speaker 1: sixteen sixty, Perry was working as a man servant for
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  Speaker 1: a gentleman named William Harrison. Harrison and his wife lived
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  Speaker 1: in Chipping Campton, a town in England just a few
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  Speaker 1: miles south of Shakespeare's birthplace, Stratford upon Avon. Harrison was
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  Speaker 1: an older fellow around seventy or so, and he liked
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  Speaker 1: to go on long walks to a neighboring village. One
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  Speaker 1: day in August of that year, Harrison set off on
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  Speaker 1: one of his two mile walks into town. Hours passed by,
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  Speaker 1: and when it was time for him to come home.
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  Speaker 1: Harrison was nowhere to be found. This was very unlike him,
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  Speaker 1: so his wife asked Mr. Perry to go look for
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  Speaker 1: her husband, and Perry did as he was told, venturing
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  Speaker 1: out to search for the man when he also failed
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  Speaker 1: to return to the house. Several hours later, Mrs Harrison
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  Speaker 1: asked her own son, Edward, to search for them both.
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  Speaker 1: Eventually Edward found John Perry, but Mr Harrison was still missing.
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  Speaker 1: The two men kept walking until they reached the town
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  Speaker 1: of Ebrington. Mr Harrison had been on his way there
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  Speaker 1: to speak with a tenant of his when he disappeared.
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  Speaker 1: According to that tenant, his landlord had indeed stopped by
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  Speaker 1: the not before, but hadn't been seen since. Edward and
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  Speaker 1: John continued their search around the other towns where the
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  Speaker 1: elder Harrison might have conducted business, but no one had
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  Speaker 1: seen Hyde nor hair of him in days. The two
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  Speaker 1: men eventually called it quits and started on their journey
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  Speaker 1: back home. Not long after, though, they got word of
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  Speaker 1: some items found along the road that had belonged to
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  Speaker 1: mister Harrison. Those items were a bad sign too. A
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  Speaker 1: bloody shirts and neck band had been recovered, as well
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  Speaker 1: as a hat that had been cut with something sharp.
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  Speaker 1: Based on the evidence, it appeared as though William Harrison
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  Speaker 1: had been attacked, but there was nobody to be found.
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  Speaker 1: John Perry suddenly became the prime suspect, as he had
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  Speaker 1: been the last person to have seen William Harrison before
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  Speaker 1: his disappearance, and Mr Perry didn't hold anything back. He
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  Speaker 1: quickly confessed in knowing who had murdered his master. In fact,
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  Speaker 1: it was his mother Joan and his brother Richard who
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  Speaker 1: were the culprits. They had wanted the man's money, and
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  Speaker 1: poor John Perry had gotten caught in the crossfires. No
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  Speaker 1: matter how often they deny the claims, Perry was adamant
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  Speaker 1: that his family was responsible for Mr Harrison's death and
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  Speaker 1: had hidden the body by dumping it in a nearby
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  Speaker 1: mill pond. Unfortunately, that accusation didn't hold up. Authorities dredged
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  Speaker 1: the pond and came up empty. William Harrison's body was
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  Speaker 1: still missing, and without a body, they couldn't be tried
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  Speaker 1: for murder, but all the Perry's, including John, were charged
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  Speaker 1: with premeditated robbery. During the trial, John came forward with
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  Speaker 1: even more evidence of his family's misdeeds. He had been
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  Speaker 1: the one who suggested they steal from his master in
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  Speaker 1: the first place. His brother had also stolen a large
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  Speaker 1: sum from Mr Harrison one year earlier, so they were
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  Speaker 1: familiar with his home as well as his comings and goings.
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  Speaker 1: In the end, the entire Perry family pled guilty, but
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  Speaker 1: they were pardoned under a recent law meant to benefit
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  Speaker 1: offenders of non murderous crimes. After a full year went
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  Speaker 1: by without a sign of William Harrison's body, though, the
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  Speaker 1: Perry's were brought back and tried for or his murder,
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  Speaker 1: and this time their previous guilty pleas worked against them.
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  Speaker 1: Now they had prior records and the jury was ready
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  Speaker 1: to deliver a verdict one year in the making. A
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  Speaker 1: short while later, all three of them were found guilty
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  Speaker 1: of the murder of William Harrison and hanged for their crimes.
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  Speaker 1: Everything was quiet for another year until sixteen sixty two,
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  Speaker 1: that is, when a ship from Portugal docked in England,
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  Speaker 1: and on board that ship was a man with a
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  Speaker 1: wild story. He'd been taken from his hometown at knife
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  Speaker 1: point by smugglers who had beaten him, stripped him of
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  Speaker 1: his clothes, and sold him into slavery to the Ottoman Empire.
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  Speaker 1: For almost two years he served a cruel master. But
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  Speaker 1: when that master died, the man made his escape. He
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  Speaker 1: stuck aboard a ship and made his way back home
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  Speaker 1: to England. And who was that man? The missing Gentleman
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  Speaker 1: William Harrison. During World War two, the Jewish people were
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  Speaker 1: stripped of everything, their property, their identities, and in most cases,
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  Speaker 1: their lives. Their homes were raided by Nazi forces and
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  Speaker 1: whatever valuables they might have owned were confiscated. Family heirlooms, silverware, jewelry,
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  Speaker 1: all of it was taken and stored away in German coffers.
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  Speaker 1: Banks in German occupied territories were also subjected to having
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  Speaker 1: their assets ceased, and much of the stolen loot was
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  Speaker 1: stashed in the reichs Bank in Berlin. As the war
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  Speaker 1: raged and certain areas grew less secure, some assets were
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  Speaker 1: moved into the bank's branches throughout Germany, but by February
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  Speaker 1: of the Nazi banking system was essentially no more. Bombings
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  Speaker 1: had destroyed the main branches, as well as the printing
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  Speaker 1: presses they used to make the money. When it became
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  Speaker 1: clear that their gold reserves were at risk of being
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  Speaker 1: lost or captured, the Nazis had it all shipped out
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  Speaker 1: and stored in underground bunkers. The Allies may have been
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  Speaker 1: closing in, but Germany still had an a stuff as
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  Speaker 1: sleeve in the form of its seemingly endless supply of gold.
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  Speaker 1: American and British forces knew that if they didn't repossess
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  Speaker 1: all of it, Germany could keep the war going indefinitely,
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  Speaker 1: or worse, try to start another war. Later in nineteen
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  Speaker 1: forty one, the United States and Great Britain formed a
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  Speaker 1: joint task force to locate the hidden Nazi assets. The
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  Speaker 1: idea was to send everything to humanitarian organizations prepared to
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  Speaker 1: reunite each item with its original owner. In early April
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  Speaker 1: of nineteen forty five, General George Patton's Third Army had
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  Speaker 1: crossed the Rhine River and marched straight through Germany to
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  Speaker 1: the town of Murkers. It was a town that resided
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  Speaker 1: almost dead center in the middle of the country, and
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  Speaker 1: it was a hotbed for access activity. Once they've taken control,
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  Speaker 1: Allied soldiers started interviewing displaced French persons who had been
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  Speaker 1: captured and brought there to perform manual labor for the Nazis.
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  Speaker 1: Two women who had been walking down the street were
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  Speaker 1: stopped by MPs from the ninetieth Infantry. The soldiers asked
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  Speaker 1: them what they knew. The women, it turns out, knew
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  Speaker 1: quite a lot. They'd heard rumors about a large shipment
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  Speaker 1: of gold recently sent out of Berlin. It had allegedly
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  Speaker 1: been smuggled into a potassium mine right there in town.
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  Speaker 1: This information lined up with what others in town had
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  Speaker 1: already told the soldiers. The following day, the same two
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  Speaker 1: French women were on their way to a nearby village.
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  Speaker 1: After being stopped again, one of the women explained how
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  Speaker 1: she was pregnant and on her way to visit a
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  Speaker 1: midwife in the town. She and her companion were driven
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  Speaker 1: back to Mrkers, but on the way, the driver noticed
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  Speaker 1: a particular sight, an entrance to a mine. He asked
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  Speaker 1: them about it, and they repeated their story from the
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  Speaker 1: day before, how she and many other displaced persons had
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  Speaker 1: been tasked with storying a massive shipment of Nazi gold inside,
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  Speaker 1: and not just gold, but works of art as well.
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  Speaker 1: This information worked its way up the chain of command.
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  Speaker 1: A tank Italian was called in to secure the mind's entrance.
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  Speaker 1: The soldiers stepped inside and took an elevator over two
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  Speaker 1: thousand feet down. Once they reached the bottom, they were
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  Speaker 1: surprised by over five hundred bags of German currency lining
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  Speaker 1: the walls. But they kept walking the length of a
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  Speaker 1: tunnel until they reached a steel door, the kind found
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  Speaker 1: protecting most bank vaults. It was impenetrable. They phoned General Patton,
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  Speaker 1: who ordered them to blast it open. All it took
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  Speaker 1: was half a stick of dynamite to blow a hole
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  Speaker 1: in the surrounding brick wall. Once inside, the men saw
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  Speaker 1: what had been so well protected. Over seven thousand bags
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  Speaker 1: of gold, bullion and paper currency million francs, as well
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  Speaker 1: as mark's silver and platinum bars, and even gold fillings
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  Speaker 1: that had been stolen from victims of the concentration camps,
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  Speaker 1: and of course priceless works of art. Millions of dollars
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  Speaker 1: in assets were recovered that day. Oddly enough, much of
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  Speaker 1: it was brought right back to where it had all started,
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  Speaker 1: the reichs Bunk. The Frankfurt branch had been commandeered by
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  Speaker 1: the Allies to use as a storage facility while everything
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  Speaker 1: was cataloged. Unfortunately, the records on the disbursement of the
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  Speaker 1: gold disappeared shortly after the war, and it languished unclaimed
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  Speaker 1: for decades, but then in a group of countries came
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  Speaker 1: together to donate the remaining loot to a Nazi persecution
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  Speaker 1: Relief fund, which would benefit Holocaust survivors and their families,
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  Speaker 1: and in the process finally giving a fifty year old
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  Speaker 1: debt a chance to be repaid. I hope you've enjoyed
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  Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for
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  Speaker 1: free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show
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  Speaker 1: by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created
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  Speaker 1: by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works.
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  Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
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  Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show and you can
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  Speaker 1: learn all about it. Were at the World of Lore
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  Speaker 1: dot com and until next time, stay curious. Yeah h