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Die Spuren der „Sicherstellung und Rückführung forstwissenschaftlicher Sammlungen aus Warschau und Posen“ 1939 und 1940 in der SLUB Dresden

Abstract

With the occupation of Poland by German troops in the fall of 1939, Nazi German authorities began to seize Polish cultural assets on a large scale, with academic institutions participating in this process. In this context, the article at hand focuses on the confiscation of Polish forestry science collections in 1939/40. The focus lies on the holdings of the Warsaw Szkoła Główna Gospodarstwa Wiejskiego (SGGW), the General Directorate of State Forests, and the Faculty of Forestry at the University of Poznań. With the cooperation of German forestry colleges – in particular those in Tharandt and Eberswalde – these holdings were systematically cataloged and transferred to Germany. Based on previously little-known files from the Tharandt University of Forestry, the case study reconstructs the sequence of events, the actors, and the ideological background of these measures. Particular emphasis is placed on the roles of Professor Kurt Mantel and his colleague Heinz Hoinkes, who were involved in the cataloging and relocation of Polish holdings in Warsaw on behalf of the German authorities. At the same time, contemporary Polish reports documenting the extent of looting and destruction are consulted. After the end of WWII, a systematic return of the stolen objects began in Tharandt, which was largely completed by the early 1950s. Nevertheless, provenance research has revealed that the holdings of the SLUB Dresden still contain volumes that arrived from Poland in 1940. Both concretely and symbolically, these volumes stand for the long-suppressed history of the systematic takeover of scientific and technical equipment. In the spirit of Walter Benjamin, this text is intended as a memorial that reveals the hidden traces of history and gives voice to the forgotten.