When New Jersey mechanic Zenop Tuncer took delivery of a $180,000 Mercedes 320 that he purchased for a client, he thought he had been ripped off. What was described as a two door convertible arrived as a four door with no roof.
Still, Tuncer called Mercedes to order parts. And when he gave them the VIN number, a flurry of activity started. Tuncer told The New York Times that Mercedes said the car previously belonged to Hitler.
Yes, that Hitler.
But how could that be? How could a car that belonged to one of the worst people in the world be in New Jersey? And more importantly, did the car actually belong to Hitler?
Hitler was frequently seen in a Mercedes 770, which was the top-of-the-line car made by Mercedes during Hitler's time. However, the Nazis did purchase eight of these 320 four door convertibles for high ranking generals. So it turns out that Mercedes was quite wrong.
The man who Tuncer bought the car for, Fred Daibes, is not of the belief that this car belonged to Hitler himself. Daibes said that this car was smuggled to America by a Naval Officer and then kept in his basement.
And while Hitler didn't own it, it doesn't mean that he didn't go for a ride in it at some point.
What we do know is that the car is almost definitely not the one that was involved in the assassination attempt on Nazi General Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich.
Period photo from the Deutsches Bundesarchiv.