NEWS,., L ■ . ■ . 7A
THE BATTALION Friday, December 12, 2003
Reparations sought in Nazi-era train looting
Dan Z. Johnson • KRT CAMPUS
agda Katona is shown in this undated childhood photo, taken prior to World War II. She and her
usband, Andrew, hope to be part of a class action suit against the U.S. government for failing to pro-
“d their valuables on the "Gold Train," which fell into the possession of American forces at the end of
e war.
By Jeff Shields
KRT CAMPUS
PHILADELPHIA — In spring of 1945, as
teAllies were marching to victory in Europe,
lagda Katona was riding a boxcar away
rom Auschwitz, on a journey through Eastern
iurope toward her hometown in Hungary.
About the same time, another train was
teaming in the opposite direction, out of
lungary, away from the advancing Russian
rmy. That train — later called the “Gold
’rain” — was laden with precious valuables
tie Nazis had stolen from an estimated
25,000 Hungarian Jews.
The loot, loaded into 46 rail cars by the
iungarian Nazi government, was staggering.
)n board were more than five tons of gold,
rom gold bars to gold teeth broken out of
tieir owners' mouths; nearly 700 pounds of
liamonds and pearls; more than 1,250 paint-
ligs; 5,000 Persian and Oriental rugs; and
nore than 1,500 cases of silverware.
I The Gold Train, or 29 cars of it, fell into
ie hands of the U.S. Army in mid-May 1945
i Austria, and the treasure ended up in a
alzburg warehouse. According to estimates,
le treasure would be worth $1 billion today,
he plunder and auction of those goods
emain one of the dark passages of World War
[.according to a U.S. commission that inves-
gated the case.
■ This week, U.S. Sen. Aden Specter, R-Pa.,
will ask the Senate Judiciary Committee to
ftonduct hearings into the government's
Refusal to recognize claims of the Hungarian
Holocaust survivors _ the first such claims
filed against the United States.
"I think we've come to a point now where
we should have a Judiciary oversight hear
ing," said Specter, who is a member of the
committee.
Specter is the first Republican to join the
growing clamor in Congress over the Gold
Train. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., has accused
the U.S. Justice Department of foot-dragging,
and 14 minority members of the House
Judiciary Committee have called for hearings
by that panel.
The Gold Train is an "unexplained depar
ture" from U.S. policy of returning property to
Holocaust victims, according to a 1999 draft
report from the Presidential Advisory
Commission on Holocaust Assets in the
United States.
In May 2001, a group of Hungarian
Holocaust survivors filed suit in U.S. District
Coud in Miami, seeking a maximum payment
of $10,000 each. Their attorneys have gath
ered a list of more than 2,800 people who
have contacted the lawyers as potential mem
bers of a class action.
The list includes Magda Katona, now 83,
along with her husband, Andrew Katona, 80.
The couple emigrated from Hungary in 1956,
arrived in the United States in 1958, and
became citizens. They now live in Bala
Cynwyd, Pa.
The Katonas and others from throughout
the United States and Canada are asking the
United States to take responsibility for the
loss of the valuables that belonged to
Hungarian Jews. They point out that the
United States has insisted on Holocaust repa
rations from the Swiss, Germans and others.
"The Americans kept telling everybody
that they should be responsible, but then when
it comes to themselves, it's a different story,"
said Gabor Somjen, 72, a Hungarian
Holocaust survivor now living in Morris
County, N.J., with his wife, Agnes, who is a
named plaintiff in the federal lawsuit.
Magda Katona was 23 when she accom
panied her mother to the bank in April 1944
to "deposit" earrings, necklaces, bracelets,
and rings, under order of the Hungarian
Nazi Arrowcross Party. All Hungarian Jews
| were forced to put their gold, silver and
other precious items in banks and abandon
their homes.
Between May 15 and July 9, 1944, more
than 437,000 Hungarian Jews were deported
to Auschwitz-Birkenau, and more than
550,000 were murdered in the course of the
Holocaust. Magda Katona lost her parents.
Andrew Katona's mother and much of his
family on his father's side were killed.
Far away from the Holocaust and content
in her retirement, Magda Katona told her
story stoically, but when she was done, she
announced, "I won't sleep tonight."
After the war, while people such as the
Katonas were staggering back to their homes
to rebuild their lives, high-ranking U.S. mili
tary officers in Europe were dipping into the
Gold Train.
Since the filing of the lawsuit, plaintiffs
have obtained documents criticizing the U.S.
actions, including a letter from the Army's
fine arts officer in Austria, Evelyn Tucker,
who was sent home in 1946 after complaining
about the handling of the Gold Train.
"From then until October 1947 the negli
gence of this explosive situation was hardly
short of being criminal," Tucker wrote in a
1949 letter to an Army official, included in an
amended complaint filed this month. "There
was no control then on what American offi
cers sent home and there is very little now."
Though the French returned to Hungary
portions of the Gold Train's loot that it had
intercepted, the United States ignored repeat
ed pleas to do so.
Instead, major parts of the cache were put
up for auction in 1948 in New York to support
war-relief efforts. A detailed inventory of
those items has been made available online at
www.hagens-berman.com, the Web site of the
Seattle-based law firm that is leading the liti
gation.
The Justice Department and the Army
have declined to comment, citing the suit. But
in a Sept. 17 letter to U.S. Sen. Rick
Santomm, R-Pa., _ who forwarded a letter
from the Katonas _ Assistant Attorney
General Peter D. Keisler said, "I can assure
you that the Department is committed to
working with the plaintiffs on these sensitive
matters in order to reach a full and fair resolu
tion of their claims."
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