The Reichs Commissar for the Ukraine has stored the works of art and paintings shipped in from Kiev and Charkow, in the following storage places in East Prussia:
1. Domain Bichau bei Wehlau.
2. Manor House Wildenhoff (Owner Count Schwerin).
Concerned are 65 chests whose contents will be given completely in the enclosure. There is as yet no inventory of some further 20 chests, 57 folios and one role of engravings. There are a great many of the oldest icons, works of famous masters of the German, Dutch and Italian schools of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, as well as works of the best Russian artists of the 18th and 19th centuries. On the whole, the contents include the most valuable works of the known Ukrainian art possession, which in themselves represent a value of many millions after a cursory appraisal. Beyond that they have a high ethical and cultural-political meaning as the only collections of this sort in the German orbit with international repute with which the Reich wishes to carry out a collaboration at present or in the future.
In accordance with the ordinance of the Reichs Chancellery of 18 Nov. 1940—Rk. 15 666 B (enclosure 2) it appears necessary to submit a list of the contents to the Fuehrer. I request your signature on the proposed list which is enclosed.
2. Disseminate immediately.
(Copies for signature were presented in pencil to Ministry and Chancellery of party on 15 Sept. 1944.)
Sv. 9/15
German Reichs Ministry for the Occupied Regions of the East
Director of Group P 4
P 894a/44
Berlin, 14 Sept. 1944
Prinz Louis Ferdinand-str. 2
Phone: 16 45 61
Received: Bau 14.9.44