- Wreck from German World War Two was found at the bottom of Baltic Sea.
- Military vehicles, porcelain and many crates with unknown contents were discovered.
Polish divers say they have found the wreck of a German World War Two ship which may help solve a decades-old mystery – the whereabouts of the Amber Room, an ornate chamber from a tsarist palace in Russia that was looted by the Nazis, says an article published in Reuters.
The Past Whereabouts
The Amber room, decorated with amber and gold was a part of the Catherine Palace near St Petersburg, but was last seen in Koenigsberg, then a Baltic port city in Germany but now the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
From Koenigsberg the Karlsruhe steamer set sail in 1945 with a heavy cargo, before being sunk by Soviet warplanes off the coast of Poland. Since then the Amber room remained undiscovered.
The Present Findings
Divers from the Baltictech group claim to have found the wreck of the Karlsruhe.
“We have been looking for the wreckage since last year when we realised there could be the most interesting, undiscovered story lying at the bottom of the Baltic Sea,” diver Tomasz Stachura said in a statement.
“It is practically intact. In its holds, we discovered military vehicles, porcelain and many crates with contents still unknown,” he further added.
The Great Escape
The Karlsruhe took part in Operation Hannibal, one of the largest sea evacuations in history. More than one million German troops and civilians from East Prussia escaped the Soviet advance towards the end of World War Two.
Documentation suggests the boat left Koenigsberg in a hurry, with a large cargo and 1,083 people on board.
“All this, put together, stimulates the human imagination. Finding the German steamer and the crates with contents as yet unknown resting on the bottom of the Baltic Sea may be significant for the whole story,” said diver Tomasz Zwara.
The Legendary Russian Room
The Amber Room was constructed in Prussia and then given to Tsar Peter the Great of Russia in 1716 as a present. The then, Eighth wonder of world was adorned for its amber panels backed with gold, mirrors and other semi-precious stones.
The Germans dismantled it and took it to Koenigsberg during the war where it disappeared during Allied bombing raids on the city. Many believe it was destroyed. Russian craftsmen have constructed a replica Amber Room in the Catherine Palace.
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Source: Reuters
