Hunt for Gold Train

In mid december 1944, a freight train left the station in the Hungarian capital, Budapest, with 42 heavily laden wagons behind it. The carriages hid kilos of gold and other valuable items which were stole from the Jewish population in Hungary. The persecution of the Hungary's Jewish minority increased immediately after Germany's invasion in March, 1944.

The cargo included, 10 - 45 kg boxes of gold, 100 kg box of gold coins, 32 boxes of gold watches, 3000 oriental rugs, eight boxes of diamonds.

The destination of the train was somewhere in the Alps. But neither the train nor its valuable cargo ever reached its destination.

The train's first stop was Zirc, around 120 kms from the capital Budapest, where the soldiers added more cargo from the nearby Obanya astle, which had become the largest site outside of Budapest for string objects confiscated from Jews.

In may, 1945, train was stopped by allied troops in the Austrian town of Werfen.

On 27th December, the train arrived at Brennbergbanya, a mining settlement in Hungary near the border with Austria, where the train waited for 3 months. During this time, the gold, art and gemstone disappeared from the train.

The train started to move again on 30th March, 1945 as Budapest was lost to Soviet. The night after 30th march, Toldi and his family and few trusted employees left the train. Toldi took the most valuable items with him. He tried to escape to Switzerland. And the train continued west into Austria.

In mid - May, the train had reached Werfen, a town 56 kms south east of Salzburg.

The Nazis saw themselves as the natural protectors of Europe's cultural history.

No one knew where the treasure was. Even now, almost 75 years after the end of World War 2, the valuables still haven't been located.

The only man, who could reveal the fate, Hungarian official Arpad Toldi, who was responsible in bringing the gold train to safety is no longer alive.

In Poland, Jews were demonstrably robbed of all their valuables, loaded onto a train and transported deep into old mining shafts on the Owl Mountains in south - western Poland. Elderly locals supposedly seen the gold train run into Owl Mountains never to be seen again.

Poland's deputy culture minister Piotr Zuchowski states, "I am 90% sure that the train was in the underground tunnels."

Some of the ground penetrating radars (GPR) used and in september 2015, revealed a new tunnel.

Timeline from 1943 to 1951

A special unit hunted lost art, in 1943, is given the task of finding and saving the art treasures stolen. The men become known as The Monuments Men.

June 1943 - US President Franklin D Roosevelt founds the organisation that becomes The Monumental Men (MM)

July 1944 - The MM help save cultural treasures in Camposanto, a historic monument in Pisa, Italy during an Allied bombing the city.

April 1945 - At the Merkers Kieselbach mine in Thuringia in central Germany, the MM salvage gold bars worth over 200 millio dollars, sacks of foreign currency and works of art including the bus of Egyptian queen Nefertiti.

Mid April 1945 - The MM recovered one of Poland's national treasures, the woodcut 15th century Veit Stoss altarpiece from Krakow. The Nazis stole the 13 metre high altar in 1941.

May 1945 -

• The MM find the Hohenzollern dynasty's crown jewels and other treasures fro Monbijou castle hidden in the Bernterode salt mine in Central Germany.

• More than 6000 paintings are discovered in the Altaussee salt mine's 137 tunnels in Austria, including Michelangelo's masterpiece Madonna of Bruges.

• In Hitler's summer home in Bechtesgaden in southern Germany, the MM find more than 1000 paintings and sculptures.

1951 - The MM team is disbanded having recovered over 5 millions works of art.