Goering lost train?

[Anthony beam]

I’m looking for some help identifying an item I found.
I’ve come across what is believed to be one of Hermann Goering’s lost trains from his personal collection. It was sold through an auction house in California years ago and has been in storage ever since. I was told it was owned by a private collector and that it was brought to the u.s. during the occupation of Germany. I just recently purchased it.
Any info would be greatly appreciated. Ive attached a few photos of the item. It is extremely heavy and approximately 45” in length. It’s been denazified.

[Gwar]

Hermann Goering, Reichsmarschall and Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, owned a large country estate North East of Berlin called Carinhall. Built in 1933, it was named after Goering's first wife Carin. It was at Carinhall where Goering kept his toy trains. There were two huge model railway layouts, one was in the attic and the other one was in the basement. Goering's attic layout had an overhead airplane system which could “bomb” trains below by dropping little wooden bombs at the push of a button. He would put on a show for his guests by timing the train below, and the plane above, such that when the little wooden bomb was released it would land on the train. Goering was very proud of his model trains. He loved to entertain guests and he would take them to the attic or basement to show off his model railway layouts. Most of the trains were made by the German manufacturer Märklin. They were typical of the model railways of the 1930s, "O" gauge, 20 volt and made of tinplate. The basement layout was larger than the attic layout and became much more developed with elevated rails. The two train sets together covered 400 square meters (4,305 square feet). It's thought that the basement layout was designed by two Marklin employees, who spent some time at Carinhall. Electrical modifications were made by the electrical engineering company Siemens & Halske. To prevent Carinhall from falling into the hands of the advancing Red Army, Goering ordered the compound to be dynamited, on 28 April 1945, by a Luftwaffe demolition squad. The art treasures were evacuated beforehand to Berchtesgaden. It's not clear what happened to the train sets. Only the monumental entrance gates, a few foundation structures, and decorative stones remain from the building. Museums in the area have a few old rusty trains which are said to have been found at the site of the destroyed Carinhall. Visitors to the site have reported that train parts lay scattered in the dirt around the area but nothing substantial has been found.

Considering how fond Goering was of his model railway, it seems unlikely that he would have left it all there when the place was dynamited. It's much more likely that most of it was hidden away somewhere and has not yet been found. Credit: British Guardian

[Gwar]

Check to see if your train is manufactured by the Marklin Co. and if it's in the 'O' gauge, G

[Larry C]

Well that seals its for me ....Now I know why Goring was such a waste of space. He was just a big do nothing once he became ReichsMarshall.
Too much time spent on his own Vanity.

Great Reference and Documentation G .
I can not comment on the train item itself...but surely there will be those who see this thread that are train collectors and will be able to comment further on it.

Regards Larry

[Anthony beam]

The train wasn’t made by marklin, the story I got was it made by Henschel and sohns, it is G gauge at least, about 75 lbs and 45” long. The pic with the two trains shows the scale, the small one is O gauge. I read in an article published by marklin he had several custom built engines that were not production pieces. None of those have surfaced yet either...

[sweersz]

Check to see if the train cars have airplanes in them.

[Adravor]

Whoever it belonged too, it is most definitly a beautiful piece. I think the question which may hold the most results is, if Trains of the same model where produced - period or non period. If its an one-of-a-kind piece, the chances it was actually Goerings are high. If there are other examples, its an Question impossible to answer.

[Anthony beam]

There are no cars just the engine and tender

[Anthony beam]

Have spent hours looking for another, nothing found. I’ve been a train collector for 25 years and have seen nothing like it....

[MAP]

In the end I guess it come down to provenance. Unfortunately, without it anything to document or strong circumstantial evidence to these being Goring there really is nothing to substantiate these stories.

Keep digging though. Maybe something will turn up.

But a very cool train none the less

And as usual GWAR as usual comes through with photos and background info!!

I would however like to add a little bit to this. In the Dec 20 edition of the International Military Collector Magazine published by B&D, there is an article written by Dietrich Maerz called "A Golden Jubilee Gift Discoverd!" While the article is about about a particular gift ( a jeweled Stein) given to Goring on his 50th birthday, there was a nice photo and paragraph about Goring and his love of model trains.

I'll quote it below

"Jan 12, 1943, was the 50th birthday of Reichmarschall Goring, and of course the second most powerful man of the Third Reich received a lot of gifts. Besides Goring's more visible and mundane hobbies, such as hunting and obtaining orders and medals, it is lesser known that he also was an avid model railroader and that the attic of his hunting retreat Carinhall housed a large layout with Marklin rail material and running stock. For his 50th birthday the competition of Marklin, the company Trix, presented another layout to the Reichsmarschall, The photo below shows the proud new owner operating the switchboard on his birthday"

Sorry but I can not upload the photo but apparently it is on the Bundsarchive website. the Trix train set appears to be mid sized trains on a table top display - Looks to be the size of a very large pool table (the trains themselves are around the same size in the last photo in GWAR's post)