Some stolen 10th Mountain Division artifacts from World War II found

The 10th Mountain Division Living History Group says their trailer was stolen in Englewood on April 13. It was full of tens of thousands of dollars worth of authentic WWII artifacts and memorabilia the group uses to preserve and share the history of the military skiers and mountaineers who trained in Colorado during World War II.

They feared the priceless items were gone forever, but this week, they had good news to share: police had found the trailer containing about half of the stolen items.

On Saturday, the 10th Mountain Division Living History Group unloaded the recovered items in Littleton, taking inventory of treasures thought to be lost.

"There's four left out of the 50 that we had so somebody's got the other 45," said David Little, president of the 10th Mountain Division Living History Group, said of a set of grenade launcher sights.

"It took us about 40-plus years to put all this stuff together and overnight some thieves just thought it was a great idea to steal our trailer. They have no understanding of the value of it and the historical value and the Colorado history behind it," said Michael Voelkelt, member of the 10th Mountain Division Living History Group.

After weeks of waiting, Little got the call he'd been praying for.

"The Englewood Police recovered the trailer for us and recovered about half the contents. Luckily some of the things that are gonna be hard to replace were recovered. Our tents, our camouflage nets, those sorts of things, but there's a lot of the ancillary equipment that was in the trailer that is now gone and gone for good we think," said Little.

The group is still missing many irreplaceable artifacts.

"Original army tables and chairs, we lost our field kitchen, our cook stove, we lost several pairs of military skis," said Little.

As for the culprits? No arrests have been made yet. Englewood police are still investigating and can't say how the items were found.

But Little says the keen eyes of a news viewer played a key role. He's hoping more items will be spotted.

"Keep an eye out for these things turning up at a local garage sale or online or someone selling them off locally," said Little.

The group is also asking for donations of authentic WWII items. Money the group has raised through an online fundraiser will be used to try to replace the lost items and upgrade the group's security.

"Replacements are something we're looking for and these are original WWII artifacts so they're not gonna be things that we can just go out and casually pick up at the local surplus store," said Little.

Little says what was recovered is enough for the group to continue on with their mission.

"We're here to keep the history of the 10th Mountain Division alive," said Voelkelt.

The group has plans to hold a Memorial Day event in Leadville with a former 10th Mountain Division commanding general.