Investigation into books and journals transferred from the former Luftkriegsakademie Gatow to TU Berlin university library in 1945 in order to establish whether any are Nazi-looted property

In November 1945, British occupying forces handed over approx, 10,000 volumesbooks, brochures and journalsof primarily scientific and technical literature to the library of the Technische Hochschule Berlin (Technische Universität Berlin since April 1946). This stock came from the premises of the former Luftkriegsakademie (aerial warfare academy) in Berlin-Gatow. The aim of the project was to locate these volumes in the TU librarys present-day holdings and examine them in order to determine whether any were Nazi-looted property. The research results were to be made accessible online at the end of the project.

It soon became clear that a large number of these volumes could no longer be found in the library. Eventually, 2,118 volumes were accounted for which, apart from the Polish volumes named below, can be attributed to the libraries stored on the site of the former Luftkriegsakademie in Berlin-Gatow. Of these 2,118 volumes, 342 were suspected of being Nazi-confiscated property. For a further 442, an answer to this question cannot be determined at present. The remaining 1,334 volumes are almost certainly legal acquisitions.

Leaving aside the Soviet and British troops/occupying forces who occupied the site in Berlin-Gatow at the end of the war and in summer 1945, the previous owners of the books, brochures and journals were the libraries of the Luftkriegsakademie in Berlin-Gatow, of the Deutsche Akademie der Luftfahrtforschung and of the Reichsamt für Wetterdienst, and occasionally also private individuals with a connection to the Luftkriegsakademie in Berlin-Gatow. Some of the literature examined can be traced even further back in its history of origin. One of the notable first owners is the library of the seaplane testing unit in Warnemünde, which stopped collecting at the end of the First World War and was taken over entirely, or to a large extent, by the Luftkriegsakademie library in 1935. In addition, the Luftkriegsakademie library also received older military literature from other libraries that had been closed after the First World War, whose holdings were collected in the Deutsche Heeresbücherei (German armed forces library). It added to its journal series through institutional previous owners, proven or suspected to be procured via the Reich Exchange Office.

The works suspected of being Nazi-confiscated literature mainly belonged to Belgian and French military libraries, or were acquired in other ways in Belgium, France and the Netherlands. Two journal volumes come from the library of the Academy of Sciences in Kiev.

20 volumes from Polish military libraries were also discovered during the research. These were very probably stolen in Poland and distributed to the German Army Weapons Agency and the Army Gas Protection Laboratories in Spandau, before ending up in the TH/TU Berlin after the war.