by Ian Kershaw
97. See Karl Epting, Generation der Mitte, Bonn, 1953, 169. For the emphasis on the ‘national community’ (Volksgemeinschaft) in Nazi ideology, see Bernd Stöver, Volksgemeinschaft im Dritten Reich, Düsseldorf, 1993, ch.2.
98. Merkl, 12.
99. Merkl, 32–3, 453, 522–3.
100. The lack of ideological reflection among ‘old fighters’ of the NSDAP and among SA men is emphasized by Christoph Schmidt, ‘Zu den Motiven “alter Kämpfer” in der NSDAP’, in Detlev Peukert and Jürgen Reulecke (eds.), Die Reihen fast geschlossen, Wuppertal, 1981, 21–43, here 32–4; and Conan Fischer, Stormtroopers. A Social, Economic, and Ideological Analysis 1925–35, London, 1983, ch.6.
101. See Noakes, Nazi Party, 162–82; Orlow, i.193; Tyrell, Führer, 310.
102. Zdenek Zofka, Die Ausbreitung des Nationalsozialismus auf dem Lande, Munich, 1979, 89–90, 96, 105–16, 154, 341–50; Baranowski, Sanctity, 150off. An over-emphasis on economic rationality as the determinant of Nazi support, as in William Brustein, The Logic of Evil. The Social Origins of the Nazi Party 1925–1933, New Haven/London, 1996, nevertheless produces a distorted perspective.
103. Falter et al., Wahlen, 41, 44.
104. Falter et al., Wahlen, 108.
105. TBJG, I.1, 522 (I April 1930)
106. TBJG, I.1, 600 (9 September 1930)
107. Monologe, 170. In a speech on 20 August, he had mentioned the figure of 50 and 100 seats, but only to emphasize that no one could know how the election would turn out, and that the important thing was the continuation of the struggle as soon as it was over (RSA, III/3, 359). According to Hanfstaengl, Hitler was privately expecting between thirty and forty seats (Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 207).
108. TBJG, I.1, 603 (15–16 September 1930).
109. TBJG, I.1, 603 (16 September 1930); Monologe, 170.
110. Falter et al., Wahlen, 44; Broszat, Machtergreifung, 112–13.
111. Jürgen W. Falter, Hitlers Wähler, Munich, 1991, 111, 365, and see the detailed analysis of Nazi voter support in ch.5.
112. Falter et al., Wahlen, 44; Falter, Hitlers Wähler, 81–101, 365. See also Jürgen W. Falter, ‘The National Socialist Mobilisation of New Voters’, in Childers, Formation, 202–31.
113. Falter et al., Wahlen, 71–2.
114. Falter, Hitlers Wähler, 287.
115. Falter, Hitlers Wähler, 143–6.
116. Winkler, Weimar, 3 89; Jürgen W. Falter, ‘Unemployment and the Radicalisation of the German Electorate 1928–1933: An Aggregate Data Analysis with Special Emphasis on the Rise of National Socialism’, in Peter D. Stachura (ed.), Unemployment and the Great Depression in Weimar Germany, London, 1986, 187–208.
117. Falter, Hitlers Wähler 287–9; Childers, Nazi Voter, esp. 268, where he describes the NSDAP as ‘a unique phenomenon in German electoral politics, a catchall party of protest’.
118. See, esp., the studies of Mühlberger and Kater mentioned in n.3 to this chapter.
119. Mühlberger, 206–7.
120. Broszat, ‘Struktur’, 61.
121. Hambrecht, 307–8.
122. See the studies of Koshar, Heilbronner, and Zofka referred to in ch.8 n.307, and above n.102.
123. Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 318.
124. Scholdt, 488.
125. Weigand von Miltenberg (= Herbert Blank), Adolf Hitler–Wilhelm III, Berlin, 1931, 7; Fabry, 30; Schreiber, Hitler. Interpretationen, 44 n.64.
126. Miltenberg (= Blank), 7.
127. See Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 323; Heinrich August Winkler, Der Weg in die Katastrophe. Arbeiter und Arbeiterbewegung in der Weimarer Republik 1930 bis 1933, Berlin/Bonn, 1987, ch.2, pt.3, 207ff; Gerhard Schulz, Von Brüning zu Hitler. Der Wandel des politischen Systems in Deutschland 1930–1933, Berlin/New York, 1992, 202–7.
128. Cit. Winkler, Der Weg in die Katastrophe, 209.
129. Scholdt, 480–81.
130. Scholdt, 494.
131. Winkler, Weimar, 391: TBJG, I.1, 620 (19 October 1930).
132. Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 325; and see Fabry, 39–40.
133. RSA , III/3, 452/68, and 454 n.1; RSA, IV/1, 3–9.
134. RSA, III/3, 452 n.4; Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 322–3. The article appeared in the Daily Mail on 24 September 1930 and in German the following day in the VB.
135. RSA, III/3, 452 n.2, cit. Daily Mail, 27 September 1930.
136. E.g., RSA, III/3, 177 (2 May 1930), 320 (10 August 1930), 338 (15 August 1930), 359 (20 August 1930).
137. Reconstruction of his speech in RSA, III/3, 434–51; Peter Bucher, Der Reichswehrprozeß. Der Hochverrat der Ulmer Reichswehroffiziere 1929–30, Boppard am Rhein, 1967, 237–80; and see Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 328–36; Frank, 83–6. For personal details of those indicted, see RSA, III/3, 450 n.86.
138. RSA, III/3, 439.
139. RSA, III/3, 441.
140. RSA, III/3, 441.
141. RSA, III/3, 442.
142. RSA, III/3, 445. Hitler made plain that, for him, the state was merely a means to an end (Bucher, 275).
143. Bucher, 296–8.
144. Richard Scheringer, Das große Los. Unter Soldaten, Bauern und Rebellen, Hamburg, 1959, 236. Scheringer later became a Communist supporter.
145. TBJG, I.1, 608 (26 September 1930).
146. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 213–16. In fact, during the Depression even luxury suites at the Kaiserhof dropped sharply in price. A surviving bill shows the cost of Hitler and his entourage for a stay of three days in 1931, including meals and service, at a modest 650.86 Reich Marks (Turner, German Big Business, 155).
147. Frank, 86.
148. Goebbels thought the Leipzig trial had won ‘enormous sympathy’ for the Nazis (TBJG, I.1, 609 (27 September 1930)). See also Reuth, 176.
149. Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 340–42; Heinrich Brüning, Memoiren 1918–1934, dtv edn, 2 vols., Munich, 1972, i.2ooff.; Winkler, Weimar, 394.
150. Above from Brüning, i.203–7 (quotation, 207); see also Krebs, 140: Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 342; Winkler, Weimar, 393.
151. Brüning, i.207.
152. Krebs, 141.
153. TBJG, I.1, 614 (6 October 1930): ‘Es bleibt bei unserer Opposition. Gottlob’ (‘Our opposition remains, thank God’).
154. RSA, III/3, 430.
155. Friedrich Franz von Unruh, Der National-sozialismus, Frankfurt am Main, 1931, 17. See also Broszat, Der Nationalsozialismus, 43–4.
156. Bessel, ‘Myth’, 27.
157. Broszat, ‘Struktur’, 69–70.
158. On the high membership fluctuation within the NSDAP, see Hans Mommsen, ‘National Socialism: Continuity and Change’, in Walter Laqueur (ed.), Fascism: A Reader’s Guide, Harmondsworth, 1979, 151–92, here 163; and Hans Mommsen, ‘Die ΝSDAΡ als faschistische Partei’, in Richard Saage (ed.), Das Scheitern diktatorischer Legitimationsmuster und die Zukunftsfähigkeit der Demokratie, Berlin, 1995, 257–71, here 265.
159. Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 319, cit. Frankfurter Zeitung, 15 September 1930.
160. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 218.
161. Wagener, 24.
162. Wagener, 59, 73, 83–4.
163. Wagener, 128.
164. Tyrell, Führer, 348.
165. Wagener, 128. See former Leutnant Scheringer’s recollection of a meeting with Hitler in 1930: ‘Listening to him, I had the firm impression that the man believes what he says, as simple as the slogans are. He is suspended in his thinking three metres above the ground. He doesn’t speak; he preaches… He is incapable of a clear political analysis however powerful his talent as an agitator might be’ (Scheringer, 242).
166. Wagener, 59.
167. Wagener, 84.
168. Wagener, 96.
169. Wagener, 98. According to Wagener, there were ten rooms, on two floors. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 231, speaks of a ‘nine-room apartment’. Schroeder, 153, like Wagener, spoke of a double-apartment. Lüdecke, 454, describes the ‘luxurious, modern flat’ as comprising ‘eight or nine beautiful large rooms covering the entire second floor’.
170. Wagener, 98.
&nbs
p; 171. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 223; TBJG, I.1, 578 (20 July 1930); Hoffmann, 49–50.
172. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 182; Hoffmann, 70.
173. Wagener, 127.
174. Hitler’s self-perceived infallibility left a striking impression on Albert Krebs in a speech Hitler made to party leaders in Munich (Krebs, 138–40). According to Krebs, the speech was made at the end of June 1930. This must be a mistake. Hitler held no speech in Munich in June 1930. Moreover, Krebs refers to a visit, before the speech, to the newly completed ‘Brown House’. The contract for the purchase of what would become the party headquarters was signed on 26 May 1930. But major rebuilding to the former ‘Barlow-Palais’ took place before it was occupied by a number of central party offices on 1 January 1931 (RSA, III/3, 209 n.17; IV/1, 206–18).
175. Wagener, 127–8.
176. Wagener, 119–20.
177. Wagener, 128.
178. Frank, 93.
179. Frank, 91–2. Wagener, 107, refers to the ban on smoking in Hitler’s room. From the date indicated, early summer 1930, this presumably refers to the party headquarters in Schellingstraße, before the move to the Brown House took place.
180. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 223.
181. Frank, 93–4.
182. Wagener, 72.
183. See Wagener, 111–12 (Wagener’s economic proposals).
184. See Tyrell, Führer, 311 for the suggestion that Hitler’s self-belief was even now less pronounced than the image he presented to others – a possibility, but an unprovable assertion.
185. See the repeated references in Wagener, e.g., 43, 48, 56, 96–7, 111–12.
186. Wagener reported that Hitler stopped eating meat only after Geli Raubal’s death (Wagener, 362). This contrasts with Hanfstaengl’s less dramatic explanation, that Hitler gradually began to cut out meat (and alcohol) after putting on weight in Landsberg, until it turned into a dogma (Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 164). The health reasons adduced by Krebs would accord better with such an explanation, though it is possible that the trauma following his niece’s death led to Hitler’s final turn to complete vegetarianism.
187. Krebs, 136–7.
188. Wagener, 72; and see 127 for similar comments by Wagener and Gregor Strasser.
189. Wagener, 301.
190. Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 346; Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 108–9.
191. See OSAF-Stellvertreter Süd Schneidhuber’s remarks in Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 106.
192. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 102–4.
193. TBJG, I.1, 596–7 (1 September 1930).
194. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 104; RSA, III/3, 377–81.
195. Tyrell, Führer, 338; Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 106.
196. Tyrell, Führer, 314; Wagener, 60–62. Hitler’s personal aversion to smoking had, of course, no bearing on his party’s readiness to benefit from its contact with cigarette firms.
197. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 107.
198. RSA, IV/1, 183; Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 108–10.
199. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 110– 11.
200. RSA, IV/1, 200.
201. RSA, IV/1, 229–30. What the legal route to power would mean had again been explicitly stated, this time by Goebbels, in a speech to the Reichstag on 5 February: ‘According to the constitution we are only bound to the legality of the way, not the legality of the goal. We want to take power legally. But what we once do with this power when we have it, that’s our business’ (Deuerlein, Aufstieg, 347). The ‘Third Reich’, which Hitler mentioned, today synonymous with the period of Nazi rule, derived originally from the apocalyptic notions of the twelfth-century mystic Joachim of Fiore, who had seen three ages – of the Father, the Son, and coming age of the Holy Spirit. The term had been made popular in more recent times by the book of that title published in 1923 by the neo-conservative Arthur Moeller van den Bruck, advocating a new state – the third great Reich to succeed those of the Holy Roman Empire and of Bismarck – to replace the detested Weimar democracy. Hitler famously declared in 1933 that ‘the Third Reich’ would last for 1,000 years. But already in 1939 the press was instructed to avoid usage of the term (Benz, Graml and Weiß, Enzyklopädie des Nationalsozialismus, 435).
202. In practice, Communists accounted for close on two-thirds of the arrests made under the decree (Winkler, Weimar, 401). For Hitler’s response to the decree, see RSA, IV/1, 236–8. A uniform ban on the SA had already been attempted the previous year (Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 100).
203. TBJG, I.2, 41 (30 March 1931).
204. RSA, IV/I, 236–8.
205. TBJG, I.2, 42 (31 March 1931).
206. TBJG, I.2, 42–3 (2 April 1931);Tb Reuth, ii.575 n.25, cit. Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, 2 April 1931; RSA, IV/1, 248 n.2; Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 111.
207. RSA, IV/1, 246–8.
208. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 111.
209. RSA, IV/1, 248–59.
210. RSA, IV/1, 251.
211. RSA, IV/1, 256.
212. RSA, IV/1, 258.
213. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, III.
214. RSA, IV/1, 26o.
215. TBJG, I.2, 44 (4 April 1931)
216. RSA, IV/1, 263–4; TBJG, I.2, 44 (4 April 1931).
217. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 111.
218. The term ‘politics of hooliganism’ was coined with reference to the SA by Richard Bessel, Political Violence and the Rise of Nazism. The Storm Troopers in Eastern Germany 1925–1934, New Haven/London, 1984. 152.
219. Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone, 97–8; Broszat, ‘Struktur’, 61. And see Bessel, Political Violence, 33–45, for the social structure in eastern regions.
220. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 243; Wagener, 98.
221. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 183–4; Toland, 204, 236.
222. Heiden, Hitler, 347–9.
223. Hoffmann, 147–8.
224. Hoffmann, 161. For Hitler’s first meeting with her, see Gun, Eva Braun-Hitler, 46. Gun suggests (55) that the relationship was a sexual one after the first months of 1932, but that Eva’s infatuation for Hitler was not reciprocated. According to Fritz Wiedemann, Hitler casually commented – though conceivably for effect – around this time that being a bachelor had its uses, ‘and as far as love goes, I keep a girl for myself in Munich’ (Und für die Liebe halte ich mir eben in München ein Mädchen) (Gun, 57). On Eva Braun see also Henriette von Schirach, Der Preis der Herrlichkeit. Erlebte Zeitgeschichte, Munich/Berlin, 1975, 23–5.
225. Based on conversations with Anni Winter, housekeeper in Hitler’s apartment, his later secretary, Christa Schroeder, was convinced that he had had no sexual relations with Geli (Schroeder, 153). She was, however, guessing – like everyone else.
226. Heiden, Führer, 304.
227. Strasser, Hitler und ich, 74–5, hinted strongly at.perverted sexual practices inflicted by Hitler on his niece. In an interview for the American OSS on 13 May 1943 he was explicit (NA, Hitler Source Book, 918–19). See also Toland, 252; Hayman, 145; Lewis, The Secret Life of Adolf Hitler, 10, 136. This account (132–46) attributes sado-masochistic practices to Hitler, based on speculation and unreliable evidence, and concludes that the SS had Geli shot to prevent a scandal arising from her pregnancy by a Jewish student.
228. Heiden, Hitler, 352; Heiden, Der Führer, 304–6; Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 234–5. And see Hayman, 154.
229. Hoffmann, 148–9; B.v. Schirach, 106; Henriette von Schirach, 205. Hitler even took her in July 1930, along with Goebbels, to Oberammergau to see the Passion Play (TBJG, I.1, 578 (20 July 1930)).
230. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 236.
231. Hoffmann, 151–2.
232. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 232–3.
233. Hoffmann, 150; Β.v. Schirach, 107.
234. Hanfstaengl, 15Jahre, 233. Hayman, 139–48, interprets the phrase to mean that Hitler demanded sexually perverted acts of his niece.
235. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 242; Hoffmann, 151. Bridget
Hitler, the first wife of Hitler’s half-brother, Alois, related the story, allegedly told to her son, William Patrick, by Alois’ second wife, Maimee (The Memoirs of Bridget Hitler, London, 1979, 70–77). These ‘memoirs’ (which include the tall story of Hitler’s alleged stay in Liverpool in 1912) are notoriously unreliable. Lewis, 145, has a variant – based on an interview with a former SS officer in 1975 – of Geli discovering that she was bearing the child of a Jewish student in Munich and wanting to go to Vienna for an abortion. He takes this as the motive for the SS to kill Geli. According to Hans Frank’s version, the relationship was with a young officer (Frank, 97).
236. Schroeder, 154, 296 n.34, 364–6 nn.280–82.
237. RSA, IV/2, 109 n.1, cit. MP, 22 September 1931; Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 239, 242.
238. In the Münchener Post article of 22 September 1931 (RSA, IV/2, 109 n.1).
239. Hayman, 164, 166.
240. RSA, IV/2, 109–10.
241. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 238; Hoffmann, 152; B.v. Schirach, 108.
242. Hoffmann, 152–3, for a dramatized version; Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 238. See also, for Geli’s relationship with Hitler, and on her suicide, with some inaccuracies, Gun, 17–28. The conflicting evidence is closely assessed by Hayman, 160–201, who strongly hints at Hitler’s direct complicity in his niece’s death. He refers to the speeding offence on 174.
243. Frank, 97; Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 239.
244. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 239. Heiden, Der Führer, 307–8, speculated, on the basis of reported allegations by Geli’s mother, Angela Raubal, exonerating Hitler from blame and claiming even that he had intended to marry Geli, that Himmler had been responsible.
245. A point made by Toland, 255. The police doctor certified that the cause of death was suicide, and that she had died during the evening of 18 September 1931 (Hayman, 164).
246. Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 239, 241; Wagener, 358–9; Hayman, 162–3.
247. The above based on Frank, 97–8; Hoffmann, 156–9 (a highly embellished account); Hanfstaengl, 15 Jahre, 240; Heiden, Der Führer, 307; RSA, IV/2, 110 n.5.
248. Text of the speech in RSA, IV/2, 111–15. For Hitler’s reception in Hamburg, Frank, 98.