OPERATION BERNHARD COUNTERFEIT NOTES RECOVERED FROM LAKE TOPLITZ TO BE SOLD

A rare set of fake bank notes Hitler had printed in a bid to ruin the British economy during World War Two are expected to fetch £2,000 at auction.

Hitler hoped the £134million of counterfeit notes he produced in 'Operation Bernhard' would force a huge hike in inflation and spark a cash crisis if introduced to wartime Britain.

He ordered millions of the notes, in £5, £10, £20 and £50 denominations to be printed in 1942. Four bank notes recovered from Lake Toplitz in Austria will be auctioned next month.

The £5, £10, £20 and £50 notes will go under the hammer at Mullock's auctioneers at Ludlow Racecourse, Shropshire on August 18. Nazi spies had been ordered to smuggle the cash into Britain and flood the economy with the fake money. But Hitler's plan was foiled when British spies got wind of the idea and intercepted the shipment of the notes.

At the war's end the mint notes still in Germany were dumped in Lake Toplitz together with the printing plates made to produce them after 'Operation Bernhard' was abandoned with just a handful of notes having made it into British circulation. But they were enough for the Bank of England to withdraw all banknotes of £5 and over from circulation after it had designed and printed a new set of paper money.

To read the complete article, see: Counterf-Hitler: Examples from the £134million in dodgy bank notes Adolf hoped would ruin the British economy expected to fetch £2,000 at auction (www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2014016/Adolf-Hitlers-fake-British
-bank-notes-expected-fetch-2k-auction.html)

Wayne Homren, Editor

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