SEYSS-INQUART: Yes. Not for myself, but for the purposes that I described yesterday.
M. DEBENEST: Yes. You also stated yesterday that you had placed in safekeeping a large number of works of art, particularly pictures. What was your purpose in doing this?
SEYSS-INQUART: Many works of art I secured only in the sense that when the decree about confiscation of enemy and Jewish property came out, they were secured and liquidated. I bought perhaps three or four pictures which, as I mentioned, were to be presented as gifts to the Museum of Art History in Vienna.
M. DEBENEST: No, no, I asked you for what purpose you placed these works of art in safety.
SEYSS-INQUART: The confiscation of Jewish and enemy property had, as its primary purpose, sequestration; but in time it became clear that these art treasures were being bought by the Reich. These three or four pictures I purchased with the immediate purpose of giving them to certain Reich institutions, the Museum of Art History in Vienna, for instance.
M. DEBENEST: But there was not only Jewish property there.
SEYSS-INQUART: I said enemy property as well, but that was not enemy property in general, but only in cases where a specially hostile attitude towards the Reich was proved. Such property was confiscated also.
M. DEBENEST: Very well. That is what you wrote in a document which has already been submitted to the Tribunal, and which you certainly know. It is Document F-824, submitted under Number RF-1344. You know that document. It is a letter which came from you and is addressed to Dr. Lammers. This letter concerns the acquisition of pictures, which was done for the Führer. In Paragraph 3 of this document, in the French text, you write as follows:
“From the list which had been submitted to me I deduce that in this manner a comparatively large number of valuable pictures has been secured which the Führer was able to acquire at prices which, according to investigations which I have made in the country, must be described as extraordinarily low.”
Then you add that Rembrandt’s self-portrait had been found again, thanks to Mühlmann.