Archaeologist Nick Bellantoni is in the middle of an international dispute over whether a bullet-pierced skull fragment found by the Russians in a German bunker in Berlin in the final days of World War II belongs to Adolf Hitler.
Bellantoni, who was flown to Germany and Moscow in April as part of a new History Channel series, says the skull fragment belongs to a woman between 20 and 40 years old, not to a 56-year-old man, as Hitler was in 1945.
The archaeologist’s conclusion has provoked a strong reaction from various parts of the world.
Russian and Ukrainian freelance videographers plan to interview Bellantoni and his colleagues at the University of Connecticut, where he is an associate professor, to learn about the techniques Bellantoni and two colleagues used during their analysis of the fragment, which is housed in the Russian State Archive in Moscow.
The archaeologist said he was permitted one hour to examine the skull fragment, some records, and a blood-stained couch where Hitler reportedly shot himself after taking a cyanide pill.
But now, according to British news reports, the Russian government is disputing that Bellantoni even visited their archive.
According to a story on the Telegraph’s Web site, Vladimir Kozlov — deputy director of the Russian State Archive — told a Russian news agency that there is no record that Bellantoni visited the facility.
“None of the directors or people who grant permission for this kind of thing know this name,” Kozlov was quoted as saying.
On Tuesday, a representative from the History Channel said in a e-mail that the outlet received permission for the visit from the department head of the State Archive of the Russian Federation.
“We have documentation of this access including a historian who accompanied our forensic expert; a contract which allowed us free access to Russian documents pertaining to the death of Adolf Hitler and the subsequent investigations, including a receipt for the location fee (for filming within the archive),” the e-mail states.
Nick Bellantoni appeared on ‘Hitler’s Escape’, the first episode of the History Channel’s new series ‘MysteryQuest’.
He said his visit — part of a six-day trip — is indisputable. “I was definitely there. I’m on camera there,” he said.
Bellantoni said he collected small bone chips that had previously fallen off the skull fragment. He also dug in an area in Germany where the Soviets were said to have buried Hitler, searching for evidence such as cremated bones. The Soviets, who reportedly buried and exhumed Hitler’s body eight or nine times, cremated him in 1970 and scattered his ashes in a brook, archaeologist Bellantoni said.
The general belief is that Hitler took a cyanide pill and then shot himself, dying with his 33-year-old wife, Eva Braun, on April 30, 1945, to escape being captured by the Soviets as they closed in on Berlin.
Bellantoni said he found several inconsistencies between that claim and the skull fragment.
According to one account, Hitler supposedly shot himself in the right temple. But the recovered skull fragment has an exit wound in the back, which means that the person was shot in the face, mouth or under the chin, Bellantoni said.
Also, Bellantoni said the skull fragment is too small for a man Hitler’s size, about 5 feet 8 and 180 pounds. The skull is also very smooth, which is typically seen in the case of the skull belonging to a women.
And as people age, jigsaw-puzzle-like lines across their skulls grow closer together until they’re barely detectable. The lines on the recovered skull fragment are “wide open”, he said.
Bellantoni said DNA evidence conclusively showed that the skull belonged to a woman. He said he doesn’t believe it was Braun’s because there are no reports that she shot herself or was shot.
“Many people died in that area in 1945,” he said.
Bellantoni said his conclusion — which he hopes to document in a scientific paper — proves only that the skull was not Hitler’s, not that the Nazi leader did not commit suicide in the bunker.
“Hitler had a definite fear of being captured,” Bellantoni said. “He did not even want his body found because he was afraid they were going to mutilate him like they did Mussolini.”
The History Channel’s show has renewed interest in the events leading up to Hitler’s death.
“Now I’m getting e-mails from all over the world — people telling me they have artifacts from Hitler ... They think Hitler’s in a nursing home in upstate New York,” he said. “We have to look at the legitimacy of some of these leads and see where it takes us.”
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