70 Years Later, A WW2 Secret Leads To Amazing Discovery In Old Family Home

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70 Years Later, A WW2 Secret Leads To Amazing Discovery In Old Family Home

Daily Mail

Rudi Schlattener made a surprising call to the Czechoslovakian village of Libouch in 2015. He told local officials that he had lived in the village as a child in the well preserved wooden villa that Libouch now used as a kindergarten classroom. As fun as it is to hear about the past from those who actually lived it, Schlattener wasn't calling just to catch up on the times.

Daily Mail

He wanted to finally reveal the location of the treasure that had been hidden 70 years ago by his family, and he wanted to help identify it.

Daily Mail

At the age of 13, Rudi and his family were forced to flee Czechoslovakia. As ethnic Germans they were the target of fear and resentment, they along with hundreds of thousands of others were forced to leave over their ancestral heritage. Rudi's family was lucky, they were sent to West-Germany as opposed to Soviet controlled East-Germany.

alchetron.com

When the Schlatteners were forced to flee, they had to leave the lion's share of their personal family belongings behind. Before leaving everything they had, Rudi's father left behind a secret that only he knew about.

Years after landing in West-Germany, Rudi's father revealed the secret that he had kept for so long. He had hidden almost everything the family had owned in the attic of their family home.

Daily Mail

Rudi returned to the home with officials from the village in order to show the true depth of their secret treasure. He followed his father's instructions, tapping on the wooden walls until he found the hollow cavity - he pulled the release string to reveal the hidden attic within the attic.

Daily Mail

The family's old possessions were still all there, wrapped up and packaged in more than 100 individual parcels. Rudi's father knew that they couldn't bring their stuff with them so he hid it all in hopes that they could one day return and get back what was rightfully theirs. Everything you can imagine was hidden up there; skis, hats and clothes, paintings, family keepsakes, even children's toys.

Little Things

A museum employee says that though the treasure trove isn't worth "millions" it has a huge historical value to the region. Just the fact that all of these things were able to survive hidden away for 70 years is priceless.

Rudi wasn't able to claim any of these items that had belonged to his family. A WW2-era law dictates that all these items belonged to the Czech state and must be placed in a museum.

"My father built the villa in 1928 and 1929," he said.

"He always thought that one day we would return and get it back."

Do you have any family treasures that have remained secret for decades?