Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Will Treasure Hunters Solve Mystery of Lost Nazi ‘Gold Train’ Once and for All?

Polish and German treasure hunters have started digging at a site in southwest Poland where they believe a Nazi-era train rumored to have gone missing is hidden – despite the skepticism of experts.

Andreas Koper and Piotr Richter said last year they had located the train buried underground. According to local legend, it was carrying looted jewels and guns and disappeared into a tunnel ahead of advancing Soviet Red Army forces in 1945, towards the end of World War Two.

They secured the permissions needed to begin digging despite a study by AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow concluding that a train is unlikely to be buried in the location the two amateur explorers have specified.

On Tuesday, the pair led a team of explorers in excavations at three separate sites inside a fenced-off area in the district of Walbrzych.

“We have to find a railway track, probably the entrance to a railway tunnel and, if the tunnel exists, there should be a train there,” Andrzej Galik, a spokesman for the treasure hunters, told Polish media.

“What do we expect? To unveil a sort of time capsule, something from that era, from the period of World War Two … We are hoping to be successful.”

Galik said ground-penetrating radar examinations were “very promising.” The team is expected to announce findings in coming days.

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.

In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.

At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.

Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly. 

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.