The Amber Room was assembled in Russia's Catherine Palace near St Petersburg and stood there for three centuries, but it was dismantled by German troops during their ill-fated invasion of the USSR. Stachura had said that initial observations of the wreck had revealed several 'non-military crates' as well as what appears to be the remains of 'picture frames and rotting canvases'. Historian Piotr Michalik said: 'The ship was very heavily loaded with 360 tonnes and two minesweepers protected it, so there could have been valuable cargo on board.' Stachura said before the dives there is 'a one to two per cent chance that the room is actually in the numerous locked boxes that we saw during the last dive with robots'. 'If the Germans were to take the Amber Chamber across the Baltic Sea, then the Karlsruhe steamer was their last chance.'ĭivers first used dive robots with cameras to explore the wreck, located 289ft below the surface, and discovered numerous locked cargo boxes on the ship. The ship is not to be confused with the Karlsruhe which was also recently discovered off the coast of Norway, which was sunk in 1940.Įxpedition leader Tomek Stachura previously told MailOnline: 'It was in Koenigsberg that the Amber Chamber was seen for the last time. On its final voyage, the ship departed from Koenigsberg and was protected by two minesweeping ships, suggesting there was a large, valuable cargo on board. The divers suspected that the Karlsruhe may contain the lost treasure. Towards the end of the war, as Hitler's defeat loomed, the Karlsruhe was used to evacuate Germans in what was called Operation Hannibal from what was then the city of Koenigsberg in East Prussia.Īccording to the ship's official cargo documents, there were 360 tonnes of goods on board and 1,083 refugees. The discovery brings an end to months of speculation after the 196-foot ship was first discovered in September 2020, lying off the coast of Ustka in northwest Poland.
Pictured: The wreath that was thrown into the water bearing the flags of Germany, Poland and Russia to commemorate the lives lost on board the ship when it sank in 1954
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