Letter to Seyss-Inquart requesting assistance in the transfer of a library collection (on Marxism) from Amsterdam to Germany

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Authors

Alfred Rosenberg (Commissioner for Ideological Training; Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories)

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Alfred Rosenberg

Baltic German architect, Nazi politician and ideologue (1893-1946)

Image of Alfred Rosenberg
  • Born: 1893-01-12 (Tallinn)
  • Died: 1946-10-16 (Nuremberg)
  • Country of citizenship: Nazi Germany; Russian Empire; Weimar Republic
  • Occupation: administrator; architect; journalist; opinion journalist
  • Member of political party: German Workers' Party; Nazi Party
  • Member of: Corps Rubonia; Militant League for German Culture; Thule Society
  • Participant in: Beer Hall Putsch; International Military Tribunal (role: defendant)
  • Military rank: Obergruppenführer

Date: 11 September 1944

Literal Title: Subject: Removal of the library of the social institute of Amsterdam

Defendants: Alfred Rosenberg, Arthur Seyss-Inquart

Total Pages: 1

Language of Text: English

Source of Text: Nazi conspiracy and aggression (Office of United States Chief of Counsel for Prosecution of Axis Criminality. Washington, D.C. : U.S. Government Printing Office, 1946.)

Evidence Code: PS-091

HLSL Item No.: 453211

Notes:The author is not stated in the document; Rosenberg is identified in the Blue Set, vol. 24, p. 279. A copy of PS 91 was entered for judicial notice; this copy was apparently not entered against Seyss-Inquart.

Trial Issue

Art and cultural treasures, plundering of (Rosenberg; Linz project) (IMT)

Document Summary

Staff Evidence Analyses

PS-91: Letter from Rosenberg to Seyes Inquart re seizure of a library in Amsterdam

11 Sept 1944 R/U/K 2500/44
To the Reich's commissar for the Netherlands Reich's minister Dr. Seyss-Inquart
Subject: Removal of the library of the social institute of Amsterdam
Dear esteemed Party Member Dr. Seyss-Inquart!
The development of the military situation in the West has caused me to instruct my special purpose staff in Amsterdam, to remove the library of the social institute there, to the Reich by the quickest way. However, great difficulties have arisen to that effect due to the proximity of the front lines. I have therefore put at the disposal of the Chief of my main work division Netherlands, SS Major Schmidt-Staehler, the special purpose chief Gum-mert with full powers for the execution of this task. Since this library is mainly composed of a unique collection of the writings of the European Marxism, it is therefore irreplaceable for our ideological-political struggles.
I request therefore sincerely from you to be of assistance to my deputies Schmidt-Staehler and Gummert, with your authority as Reich's commissar for the Netherlands, in case the difficulties arising by the removal of the library cannot be surmounted by them.