DR. SAUTER: As far as I know, it had “Reichsbank Frankfurt” on it. For that reason we assumed that the film was taken at Frankfurt, and the Prosecution confirmed that.
MR. DODD: I don’t like to interrupt but I think we should be careful about this statement. There have been two mistakes of some slight importance already. We didn’t show the film twice before this Tribunal and that bag doesn’t bear the legend “Frankfurt.” It simply says “Reichsbank.” And it was the Schacht film that was shown twice here, because it moved rather quickly.
DR. SAUTER: Witness, will you continue with your reply to the question. I can put it in this way: Did the Reichsbank keep gold articles and the like in such sacks?
PUHL: If I understand you correctly, you are asking this: When valuables were deposited with us, were they deposited in open sacks? Is that correct?
DR. SAUTER: I do not know what procedure you had.
PUHL: We at any rate had closed deposits, as the name implies. Of course, it may be a sack which is closed; that is quite possible.
DR. SAUTER: So far as I saw in banks at Munich, the things which were deposited there in increased measure during the war were without exception deposited in closed boxes or cases and the like, so that generally the bank did not know at all what was contained in the cases or boxes. Did you in the Reichsbank follow a different procedure?
PUHL: No, it was exactly the same. And the noticeable thing about this sack, as has been said, is the label “Reichsbank.” Obviously it is a sack belonging to us and not to any private person.
DR. SAUTER: Then you too, if I may repeat this to avoid any doubt, you too kept in a closed container the valuables, which had been deposited as “closed deposits.”
PUHL: Yes.