In a 1950 report, Václav Nosek, the Interior Minister, reported a total gain of more than 81 billion Kčs from the sale of confiscated property in the Czech lands.93 This sum, though only a fraction of the total value of confiscated property, had been extremely difficult for the Fund for National Renewal (FNO) to procure. The FNO was the state organ designed to collect the finances generated by the confiscation and sale of non-agricultural German property. The government planned to use the proceeds from confiscated property for a variety of purposes including the repair of war damages, the compensation of victims, the partial payment of official settlement expenses and the postwar currency reform.94 This last-named became the primary function for profit from the sale of confiscated property and was one of the many ways that the expropriation of German assets benefited society at large and not just settlers in the borderlands.
93 Sekr. zn. 1540/taj.-1950. “Problémy osídlení a hospodářské výsledky FNO v Praze a v Bratislavě.” NA, f. MV-T,
k.196 sign.280. This sum involves only the money under the FNO’s jurisdiction, which one official estimated at one third of the total amount of all confiscated German property. The remaining parts were under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Agriculture or became involved in nationalizied industry. There was a separate FNO office in Bratislava. Its gain from confiscated property was nearly 550 million crowns.
While the state gained in various ways through the expropriation of Sudeten German property, it failed to control its distribution and sale through the FNO. Despite its important postwar tasks, the Fund for National Renewal ran counter to the interests of settlers and borderland national committees, and therefore drew criticism and protests. Settlers saw the FNO as an obstacle to the promises of cheap wares; for national committees, it became a constant intrusion into their affairs.
Presidential Decree 108, which officially confiscated Sudeten German property, also created the Fund for National Renewal on October 25, 1945. The FNO suffered from two administrative weaknesses that hindered its effective operation. First, the FNO was established as a branch of the Settlement Office. This meant that the Central Committee for Interior Settlement, the supervisory committee of the OÚ, controlled the policies regarding Sudeten German property.95 In practice, this almost always meant that confiscated property was utilized to promote
settlement by offering expropriated assets to settlers at low cost, rather than attempting to make large profits from the sale of this property. Settlement officials made this the basis of “settlement politics,” and Communist leaders, in particular, sought political advantages through such
policies. Secondly, the FNO had to work through national committees in order to accomplish its agenda. The process of confiscating and redistributing German property was, from a technical and legal standpoint, a long one; it would have required too many employees to establish a separate office. Therefore, the Fund had to rely on the ability and willingness of national
committees to adhere to the state’s wishes, which they often refused to do. Together the interests of settlement officials and national committees, both under Communist leadership, worked
95 Jech and Kaplan, Dekrety, 2: 850-1, 879. For more on the exact agenda of the FNO see: Předpisy, 1:37-39; For
against the idea of high state profits from confiscated property. Instead, this property served as an inducement to bring settlers to the borderlands and opened an avenue for political support.
One of the first central attempts to regulate the use of confiscated German personal property came in the summer of 1945. On June 22, 1945 the Provincial National Committee in Prague issued instructions regarding the sale of Germans’ personal belongings. This was prior to the establishment of the OÚ and the FNO, when the three provincial national committees functioned primarily as policy makers for district and local national committees. These guidelines for selling movable property were straightforward and mentioned, among other things, that more valuable items should not be sold and that final accounting reports for all sales should be sent on to the district national committees in a timely fashion.96 Such instructions allowed local national committees to meet the demands of settlers for ownership of things like furniture and clothing. From 1945 to 1948, settlers continually pressured national committees to make local Sudeten Germans’ property cheaply available. The clamor for goods became particularly important in the context of ongoing looting and other property abuses. Those settlers who had come to the
borderlands in order to find permanent accommodations and employment often felt robbed by the illegal actions of gold diggers.
Official permission to sell Germans’ personal belongings in the fall of 1945, however, did little to unify national committees’ approach to confiscated property. National committees sometimes sold outright or loaned much of the Germans’ movable property, such as furniture, dishware, clothing, and other personal items, to settlers. In some cases, national administrators did not have to pay anything for the furnishings in confiscated apartments.97 However, Prague
96 Oběžník, III-3c-12/9-1945, ZNV Prague. SOkA Česká Lípa, f. MěNV Česká Lípa, k.105 evidenční čislo (ev.č.)
42.
97 SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Chomutov, k.1274 inv.č. 1468; SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Chomutov, k.1288, i.1482;
officials wanted more accountability and more income. National committees were not necessarily acting in spite of higher officials, but felt obligated to act in the interests of early settlers. For instance, the District National Committee in Česká Lípa streamlined the procedures for the allocation of confiscated personal belongings in July 1945, and listed textile goods—in short supply among new arrivals—as one of the first items for distribution. Therefore, when the Local National Committee in Česká Lípa issued instructions for the collection of German clothing on October 10, 1945, which included instructions permitting settlers to keep necessary clothing or linens for household members, it seemed to meet with the spirit of the ONV’s earlier ruling. In the interim, however, the Provincial National Committee in Prague changed the policy concerning the distribution of such items and despite several notices the local national committee appeared unaware of the new regulations and continued its old practices. Once the district
national committee directly notified the MNV to rescind its instructions, it readily complied.98 The central government stepped up its efforts to control the sale of seized German assets as national committees continued their uneven practices. In October 1945, just prior to the creation of the FNO, the Finance Ministry ordered a freeze on the further sale of confiscated German property and condemned national committees’ present practices. The order noted that most of the goods were sold “for disproportional, many even blatantly low prices [and] that the earnings from the sale of this property are treated in an uncontrolled or even uncontrollable manner.”99 This was, in fact, the case. National committees in the borderlands did little to ensure proper accounting of German property. For example, auditors for the FNO looking back through early records for the town of Cukmantl (present day Zlaté Hory) noted:
The first entry about the sale of movable goods appears on September 14, [1945]… Records are illegible [or] without data, so that it is impossible to
98 SOkA Česká Lípa, f. MNV Česká Lípa, k.105 ev.č.42 inv.č. 533.
distinguish earnings from 1945/46 and later. Entries in the treasury books are incomplete and much of the confiscated property is not likely assessed or reported. Entries were found for donations to schools, convents and even individuals… Today’s MNV functionaries are unable to confirm whether
movable confiscated property or valuables were correctly taken to the warehouse or carried off elsewhere. The sale of confiscated property from the warehouse was carried out like this. Personal belongings were given out to applicants along with an order to pay the amount at the bank. Therefore, up to the present a great part of the distributed goods is still not paid for.100
During 1945, many borderland national committees operated without a coherent set of instructions from higher authorities. The pace of the expulsion and settlement ensured that national committees largely ignored formalities concerning property transfers. Thus, much of the property that passed through the national committees’ hands did not provide the income that the central government had expected.
Following the creation of the Fund for National Renewal in October 1945, the OÚ reinstituted the freeze on unsanctioned sales of confiscated property and called for its orderly registration as the first step in the confiscation and allocation proceedings.101 It subsequently issued orders permitting the sale of certain Sudeten German possessions from national
committees’ warehouses. However, the official sale of confiscated personal goods to individuals in the borderlands, also known as Action A, began only in May 1947 and even then dragged on in many cases to the 1950s.102 There were several reasons for the delays. The Settlement Office and the FNO spent much of their time and energy ensuring that national committees properly registered seized German assets prior to their sale. This process involved the cooperation of central and local officials as well as the willingness of individuals to report German property in
100 Audit of MNV Zlaté Hory (Cukmantl), 10 September 1949. SOkA Jeseník, f. MNV Zlaté Hory (Cukmantl), k.37
inv.č.155 II.
101 845/45, OÚ, 29 October 1945. Předpisy, 2:143-145.
102 These regulations concern the general sale of movable goods by national committees to local individuals. The
first, 1192-III from 9 July 1946, concerns the addendum to 1213 OÚ from 29 April 1946. See Předpisy, 1:75-79; Ibid, 2:279-280. The main selling action involved the announcements 2141/46 and 2142/46 OÚ, both from 3 December 1946. Ibid., 1:111-117.
their possession. Settlers had to fill out detailed forms about every object in their home. One settler, for instance, complained that he did not have the time for such work: “I work up to eighteen hours daily, I am unable to worry about [cataloging the ‘junk’ in the storage room] for the time being… I already worked three weeks on this list, so I am up to my ears in work.”103 National committees had to establish commissions to report on a house-by-house basis the status of confiscated belongings and then provide an estimate for its sale. Such tasks not only
consumed much of the settlers’ time, but also gave them the impression that they were working for Prague.
The official freeze on the sale of Germans’ belongings from October 1945 until May 1947 did not prevent national committees from continuing to distribute their possessions. It took time for central directives to reach national committees and be enforced. For example, despite several directives and circulars from higher officials noting the freeze on personal property, the MNV in Jablonec continued to allocate German movable property. In early 1946, it even complained that it had contacted the FNO about the distribution of personal belongings, without success.104 Such sentiment reflected impatience as well as confusion, rather than neglect. The OÚ and FNO produced a mountain of instructions, orders, directives and addendums covering the use and allocation of confiscated property that many national committees had difficulty navigating. For instance, after freezing the sale of movable goods in late 1945, the Settlement Office, in April 1946, permitted the sale of confiscated personal goods from national committees’ warehouses, where some of the movable German property was stored, but only to local businesses for resale to the public. It changed this provision in July when an addendum to the April instructions noted that sales could be made directly to individuals, but that those with “priority” (i.e. returning
103 Popis a soupis zařízení bytu, 6 August 1945. SOkA Chomutov, f. MNV Vejprty, k.26 inv.č.25. 104 Zapisy ze schůzí MSK, 11 April 1946. SOkA Jablonec, f. MěNV Jablonec, kn.1, inv.č.1.
soldiers, those who suffered Nazi persecution, those with large families and others) should have first access to these goods. Such instructions made it difficult for national committees to
maintain coherent policies, especially when local settlers pressured them to make available confiscated wares. While some national committees followed such procedures, others overlooked them and continued to operate by earlier provisions.
At the same time that central officials forbade the further sale of confiscated property and requested its proper registration, they also demanded that national committees account for their earnings from such sales. The Finance Ministry issued a circular in late 1945 that directed national committees to deposit their earnings from the sale of confiscated property into a central account.105 Throughout 1946, the Settlement Office and FNO continued to press national committees to explain their disposition of German property and report the income they gained from it. Few national committees responded. The reports of those that did showed that national committees had used the money to cover a variety of expenses and that almost none had sent in their proceeds.106 In reaction, the Settlement Office and Fund for National Renewal issued new accounting instructions requesting that deposits and forms be delivered by the end of January 1947.107 In late 1946 meetings about the new accounting procedures, a central FNO official made
it clear to regional OÚ officials that it would take great efforts to get national committees to comply. He urged them: “Remind national committees personally and by correspondence at every opportunity that their accounting will be reviewed and that silence or overlooking this accounting is in reality the concealment of other’s entrusted money which remains at local or district committees and is defined for higher, [more] lawful purposes, than local budgetary
105 48.988/45-IV/5, Ministry of Finance, 12 October 1945. SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Vejprty, k.19 inv.č.104. 106 SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Vejprty, k.22-23 inv.č.106.
107 This concerns the Final accounting (Celkové vyúčtování) forms for 1945 and 1946 carried out in connection with
Výhlaška 2145/46 (The delivery of money from the sale of confiscated goods) from the OÚ, 9 December 1946.
needs.” He also warned that audits would be carried out in cases where proceeds were low and expenditures were high. FNO officials hoped that accounting reports would provide a better picture of how national committees had previously handled expropriated assets.108
Despite the new regulations, the stonewalling continued. In May 1947, Osidlování noted that only 23 percent of borderland communities had sent in their accounting reports on the sales of Sudeten German assets, of which 12 percent claimed that they had no such property at all.109 Just as with the previous attempt to have national committees supply information about the
distribution of confiscated property, few complied. For those that did, their detailed accounting reports showed that national committees used the money from the sale of confiscated goods in order to meet local needs. Just as the FNO official had foreseen, many national committees reported that they had almost no profits from confiscation provisions; others had large
expenditures. The MNV in Cukmantl, for instance, charged the FNO for the salaries of several employees who were not directly concerned with the management of movable property, so that wages were extremely disproportionate to earnings.110 In other cases, national committees blamed the revolutionary period for the loss of movable German property. In the section
requesting information about whom or which official body confiscated property from Germans, Red Army soldiers and Czech military officials topped many of the national committees’ lists. Other national committees pointed to former members who had not kept proper records or who had made off with seized goods.111 These claims were no doubt justified in certain cases and gained credence from the “gold digger” image associated with the borderlands. However, in
108Meeting of regional settlement leaders, 22 November 1946. ZA Opava, f. Osidlovací úřad a FNO, oblastní
úřadovna Opava 1945-51, k.12 s.I/1 inv.č.20.
109 Karel Moudry, “Nejnaléhavější úkoly Fondu národní obnovy,” Osidlování, 10 May 1947.
110 Report to the MNV Council on accounting, 31 January 1949. SOkA Jeseník, f. MNV Zlaté Hory (Cukmantl),
k.37 inv.č.155 II.
111 See for example, Report from MNV Bečov, 16 January 1948. SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Chomutov, k.1288
many cases, national committees remained unresponsive to calls for accounting because they felt entitled to the gains made from early confiscation and distribution procedures. No matter how they responded, national committees continued to resist the FNO’s effort to account for their division of Sudeten German property.
Accounting reports and revisions did provide some evidence of what happened to
confiscated property, but they did not bring the FNO any closer to reaping monetary gains from it. Instead, local officials continued to defend themselves from the increasing demands of Prague officials. In late 1947, in response to national committees’ continued failure to report, the OÚ and FNO threatened to cut off their budget distributions.112 This threat did not produce a
monetary windfall, but rather more excuses and further silence. For example, by July 1948, only 11 of 89 communities had submitted a final accounting report in the district of Chomutov.113 Other forms of resistance were more overt. In late 1948, the ONV in Jablonec circulated a petition to liquidate the Settlement Office and Fund for National Renewal. It claimed that the Fund’s purpose to collect all of the proceeds from confiscated property and to use them to support currency reform did not meet with the needs of borderland inhabitants. It also suggested that the FNO likely used a significant part of its income to pay for its own high expenses, “which are clear from a mere visit to its headquarters in Prague.”114
112 VII-3-9000/11-1947, ZNV Prague, 15 December 1947. SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Chomutov, k.1288 inv.č.1482.
See also Staněk, Odsun Němců, 354. In late 1947 accounting results remained disappointing: from 11,938 communities only 5,538 had even submitted their accounting reports.
113 SOkA Chomutov, f. ONV Chomutov, k.1288 i.1482. Only 40 percent had reported throughout the Czech lands.
See also, Zpráva OÚ and FNO v Praze o dosavadních hospodářských výsledcích činnosti, 15 October 1948. NA, f. 23, a.j. 329. At the time of the report 43 percent of national committees had not responded and 19 percent denied having any proceeds to report.
114 This proposal was widely distributed and can be found in many different collections. See for instance, SOkA
Chomutov, f. ONV Vejprty, k.23 inv.č.108. According to an amended report of the FNO’s finances to the end of 1948 its administrative expenses were less than two percent of its income. See Zpráva osidlovacího úřadu a fondu národní obnovy v Praze o hospodářských výsledcích činnosti fondu národní obnovy v Praze – dodatečná zpráva, 10 February 1948. NA, f. 23, a.j. 329.
While the Jablonec proposal did not lead to the FNO’s immediate closure, attempts to collect money from national committees for property that had already been distributed began to wane. The Communist seizure of power in early 1948 altered the political landscape, but did little to bring dilatory national committees to account. Instead, the Communist state enacted legislation to forgive the debts of national committees to the FNO and began dismantling the office.115 Although the Communists had at times been vocal critics of the FNO, the decision to forgive national committees’ debts had little to do with political motives; national committees simply lacked the money to pay. They ran high budgetary deficits from day one and in the borderlands had heavy additional expenses related to the transfer and settlement.
The conflict over paying proceeds from the sale of confiscated property reflected several aspects of confiscation politics. First, this conflict revealed the extent of the disorganization in