by Norman Ohler
His reputation went beyond the boundaries of the city, and in the spring of 1936 his phone rang in the consulting room, even though he had categorically forbidden his nurses to disturb him during surgery hours. But this was no ordinary phone call. It was from the “Brown House,” Party headquarters in Munich: a certain Schaub on the line, introducing himself as Hitler’s adjutant and informing him that Heinrich Hoffmann, the “Official Reich Photographer of the NSDAP,” was suffering from a delicate illness. It was the Party’s wish that Morell, as a prominent specialist in sexually transmitted diseases who was well known for his confidentiality, should take on the case. They didn’t want to consult a Munich doctor for such a discreet matter. The Führer, in person, had sent a plane for him, which was waiting at a Berlin airport, Schaub added.
While Morell couldn’t stand surprises, he also couldn’t turn down an invitation like that. Once he arrived in Munich, he was put up at state expense in the grand Regina-Palast-Hotel, treated the pyelonephritis that Hoffmann had contracted as a result of gonorrhea—“the clap”—and was invited with his wife to take a trip to Venice by his influential patient by way of thanks.
Back in Munich the Hoffmanns gave a dinner in their villa in the elegant district of Bogenhausen with the Morells present. There was spaghetti with nutmeg, tomato sauce on the side, green salad—the favorite dish of Adolf Hitler, who was, as this evening, often a guest at Hoffmann’s house. The Nazi leader had been closely connected with the photographer since the 1920s, when Hoffmann had made considerable contributions to the rise of National Socialism. Hoffmann, who owned the copyright for important photographs of the dictator, published large numbers of picture books called things like Hitler as No One Knows Him or A Nation Honors Its Führer and sold them by the millions. There was also another, more personal reason that linked the two men: Hitler’s lover, Eva Braun, had previously worked as an assistant for Hoffmann, who had introduced the two in his Munich photographic shop in 1929.
Hitler, who had heard a great many good things about the jovial Morell, thanked him before dinner for treating his old comrade, and regretted not having met the doctor before; perhaps then his chauffeur, who had died of meningitis a few months earlier, would have still been alive. Morell reacted nervously to the compliment and barely spoke during the spaghetti dinner. The constantly sweating doctor with the full face and the thick round glasses on his potato nose knew that in higher circles he was not considered socially acceptable. His only chance of acceptance lay in his injections, so he pricked up his ears when Hitler, in the course of the evening, talked almost in passing about severe stomach and intestinal pains that had been tormenting him for years. Morell hastily mentioned an unusual treatment that might prove successful. Hitler looked at him quizzically—and invited Morell and his wife to further consultations at the Berghof, his mountain retreat in the Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden.
There, a few days later, during a private conversation, the dictator frankly admitted to Morell that his health was now so poor that he could barely perform any action. That was, he claimed, due to the bad treatment given to him by his previous doctors, who couldn’t come up with anything but starving him. Then if there happened to be an abundant dinner on the program, which was often the case, he immediately suffered from unspeakable bloating and itchy eczema on both legs, so that he had to walk with bandages around his feet and couldn’t wear boots.
Morell immediately thought he recognized the cause of Hitler’s complaints and diagnosed abnormal bacterial flora, causing poor digestion. He recommended the preparation Mutaflor, developed by his friend the Freiburg doctor and bacteriologist Professor Alfred Nissle: a strain of bacteria that had originally been taken from the intestinal flora of a non-commissioned officer who had, unlike many of his comrades, survived the war in the Balkans without stomach problems. The bacteria are kept in capsules, alive, and they take root in the intestine, flourish, and replace all the other strains that might lead to illnesses.42 This genuinely effective concept convinced Hitler, for whom even processes within the body could represent a battle for Lebensraum, or “living space.” Extravagantly, he promised to donate to Morell a house if Mutaflor actually did cure him, and appointed the doctor as his personal physician.
When Morell told his wife about his new position, Hanni was less than enthusiastic. She commented that they didn’t need it and referred to his thriving practice on Kurfürstendamm. Perhaps she already sensed that she would rarely get to see her husband from now on, because a very unusual relationship would form between Hitler and his personal physician.
Injection Cocktail for Patient A
He alone is responsible for the inexplicable, the mystery and myth of our people.
—Joseph Goebbels43
The dictator always hated being touched by other people and refused treatment from doctors if they inquired too invasively into the causes of his ailments. He could never trust a specialist who knew more about him than he did himself. Good old general practitioner Morell, with his cozy harmless air, gave him a sense of security from the very beginning. Morell had no intention of questioning Hitler to genuinely find the root of his health problems. The penetration of the needle was enough for him; it was a substitute for serious medical treatment. If the head of state was to function, and demanded to be made immediately symptom-free, whatever his complaints, Morell hesitated no more than he would when treating an actress at the Metropol Theater, but instead prepared a 20 percent Merck glucose solution or a vitamin injection. Immediate removal of symptoms was the motto, followed not only by the bohemian circles of Berlin but also by “Patient A,” as he appeared in Morell’s books.
Hitler was delighted by the speed with which his condition improved—usually while the needle was still in his vein. His personal doctor’s argument convinced him: for the Führer, with all the tasks he had to perform, his energy consumption was so high that you couldn’t wait until a substance found its way into the blood in tablet form via the digestive system. For Hitler it made sense: “Morell wants to give me a big iodine injection as well as a heart, liver, chalk and vitamin injection. He learned in the tropics that medicine must be injected into the veins.”44
The busy ruler lived in constant fear of not being able to function properly, that he wouldn’t be able to do everything he needed to do, and that he wouldn’t be able to perform due to illness. Since he believed no one else was capable of carrying out his duties, from 1937 Morell’s unconventional methods of treatment quickly gained in importance. Several injections a day were soon the norm. Hitler became used to his skin being punctured, and having what was assumed to be a potent substance flowing into his veins. Each time it happened he felt instantly better. The fine stainless steel needle that conjured up “immediate recovery” was fully in line with his nature: his situation required constant mental alertness, physical vitality, and hands-on decisiveness. Neuroses and other psychological inhibitions had to be switched off at all times, as if by the push of a button, and he himself needed to be permanently refreshed.
Soon his new physician seldom left the patient’s side, and Hanni Morell’s fears came true: her husband had no time for his practice anymore. A locum physician had to be installed at Kurfürstendamm, and Morell later claimed, oscillating between pride and fatalism, that he was the only person who had seen Hitler every day, or at least every second day, since 1936.
Before every big speech the Reich Chancellor now allowed himself a “power injection” in order to work at the peak of his capabilities. Colds, which could have kept him from appearing in public, were ruled out from the start by intravenous vitamin supplements. To be able to hold his arm up for as long as possible when doing the Nazi salute, Hitler trained with chest expanders and also allowed his body to snack on glucose and vitamins. The glucose, administered intravenously, gave the brain a blast of energy after twenty seconds, while the combined vitamins allowed Hitler to address his troops or the people wearing a thin Brownshirt uniform even on cold days without sh
owing signs of physical weakness. When he suddenly lost his voice before a speech in Innsbruck in 1937, Morell quickly alleviated the nuisance with an injection.
At first Hitler’s digestive problems improved as well, and so the promised estate for the personal physician was given to Morell, on Berlin’s exclusive Schwanenwerder Island, next door to the propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels. The elegant villa, surrounded by a hand-forged iron fence, at 24–26 Inselstrasse,* wasn’t a complete gift: the Morells had to buy it themselves, for 338,000 reichsmarks, although they did receive an interest-free loan of 200,000 reichsmarks from Hitler that was later converted into a fee for treatment. The new home didn’t just bring advantages to the celebrity doctor, who had now been elevated to the highest social stratum. Morell had to employ domestic servants and a gardener, and his basic expenses soared, even though he wasn’t automatically earning more. But now there was no turning back. He enjoyed his new lifestyle too much, as well as his immediate proximity to power.
Hitler had also become more than used to the doctor, brushing aside any criticism of the man who many people in the hard-fought-for inner circles found less than appetizing: Morell wasn’t there to be sniffed at, Hitler professed, he was there to keep him healthy. To give the former society doctor a hint of seriousness, Hitler awarded him an honorary professorship in 1938.
Volkswagen—Volksdrogen
The first years in Morell’s treatment developed into an extremely successful period for Hitler, who was cured of his intestinal cramps and, always dosed up on vitamins, was healthy and agile. His popularity grew unstintingly, chiefly due to the fact that the German economy was enjoying a boom. Economic independence became a fixed point in Nazi politics: it would produce a higher standard of living but also meant that war was inevitable. The plans for expansion were already in the desk drawers.
The First World War had made it clear that Germany had too few natural raw materials for armed conflict with its neighbors and so artificial ones had to be created: synthetic gasoline produced from coal as well as “Buna” (synthetic rubber) were at the center of the development of IG Farben, which had gone on growing in power within the Nazi state and had consolidated its position as a global player in the chemical industry.45 Its board described itself as the “Council of the Gods.” Under Hermann Göring’s tutelage, the economy was to become independent from all imported materials that could be produced in Germany itself. Of course, that also included drugs. While the Nazis’ war on drugs brought down the consumption of heroin and cocaine, the development of synthetic stimulants was accelerated and led to a new blossoming within the pharmaceutical companies. The workforces of Merck in Darmstadt, Bayer in the Rhineland, and Boehringer in Ingelheim grew and wages rose.
Expansion was also on the cards at Temmler. The head pharmacist, Dr. Fritz Hauschild,* had heard how the Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936 had been influenced by a substance called Benzedrine, a successful amphetamine from the United States—and still a legal doping product at the time. At Temmler all development resources were now pooled in that direction, since the company was convinced that a performance-enhancing substance was a perfect fit for an age in which everyone was talking about new beginnings. Hauschild turned to the work of Japanese researchers who had synthesized an extremely stimulating molecule called N-methylamphetamine as early as 1887, and crystallized it in its pure form in 1919.* The drug was developed out of ephedrine, a natural substance that clears the bronchia, stimulates the heart, and inhibits the appetite. In the folk medicine of Europe, America, and Asia, ephedrine had been known for a long time as a component of the ephedra plant and was also used in so-called Mormon tea.
The molecular structure of Pervitin.
Hauschild perfected the product and in autumn 1937 he found a new method of synthesizing methamphetamine.46 A short time later, on October 31, 1937, the Temmler factory patented the first German methylamphetamine, which put American Benzedrine very much in its shadow. Its trademark: Pervitin.47
The molecular structure of this pioneering material is similar to adrenalin and so it passes easily through the blood and into the brain. Unlike adrenalin, however, methamphetamine does not cause sudden rises in blood pressure but works more gently and lasts longer. The effect occurs because the drug tickles out the messenger substances dopamine and noradrenaline from the nerve cells of the brain and pours them into synaptic gaps. This puts the brain cells in excited communication with each other and a kind of chain reaction takes place. A neuronal firework explodes and a biochemical machine gun starts firing an uninterrupted sequence of thoughts. All of a sudden the consumer feels wide awake and experiences an increase in energy; the senses are intensified to the extreme. One feels livelier, energized to the tips of one’s hair and fingers. Self-confidence rises, there is a subjectively perceived acceleration of thought processes, a sense of euphoria, and a feeling of lightness and freshness. A state of emergency is experienced, as when one faces a sudden danger, a time when an organism mobilizes all its forces—even though there is no danger. An artificial kick.
The sugar-coating room at Temmler.
Methamphetamine does not only pour neurotransmitters into the gaps but also blocks their reabsorption. For this reason the effects are long-lasting, often more than twelve hours, a length of time that can damage the nerve cells at higher doses as the intracellular energy supply is drawn into sympathy. The neurons run hot and brain chatter can’t be turned off. Nerve cells give up and die off irrevocably. This can lead to a deterioration in the ability to find words, in attention and concentration, and a general depletion in the brain where memory, emotions, and the reward system are concerned. The lack of stimulation once the effect fades away is a sign of empty hormone stores, which have to fill up again over the course of several weeks. In the meantime fewer neurotransmitters are available: the consequences can include a lack of drive, depression, joylessness, and cognitive disturbances.
Although such possible side-effects have been investigated by now, further in-depth research was put on the back burner at the time because Temmler was overeager, bursting with pride over their new product. The company smelled a roaring trade and contacted one of the most successful PR agencies in Berlin to commission an advertising campaign the likes of which Germany had never seen. Their publicity model was the marketing strategy for another rather stimulating product, produced by none other than the Coca-Cola Company, which—with the catchy slogan “ice cold”—had enjoyed enormous success with their brown brew.
In the first weeks and months of 1938, when Pervitin was beginning to go from strength to strength, posters appeared on advertising pillars, the outsides of trams, and on the buses and local and underground trains of Berlin. In a modern, minimalist style they mentioned only the trademark and referred to its medical indications: weakness of circulation, low energy, depression. It also showed the orange and blue Pervitin tube, the characteristic packaging with curved lettering. At the same time—another trick by this branch of business—all the doctors in Berlin received a letter from Temmler saying bluntly that the company’s aim was to persuade the doctors personally: what people like themselves they also like to recommend to others. The envelope included free pills containing 3 milligrams of active ingredient as well as a franked postcard to be returned: “Dear Doctor, Your experiences with Pervitin, even if they were less than favorable, are valuable to us in helping to limit the field of indication. So we would be very grateful to you for a message on this card.”48 A substance in its test phase. Just like the old dealer’s trick: the first dose is free.
Representatives of Temmler visited large-scale practices, hospitals, and university clinics all over the country; delivered lectures; and distributed this new confidence- and alertness-boosting drug. The company’s own account said, “Reawakening joy in the despondent is one of the most valuable gifts that this new medication can give to patients.” Even “frigidity in women can easily be influenced with Pervitin tablets. The treatment technique is as simple as
can be imagined: four half-tablets every day long before bedtime ten days a month for three months. This will achieve excellent results by increasing women’s libido and sexual power.”49 On the patient information leaflet it also said that the substance compensated for the withdrawal effects of alcohol, cocaine, and even opiates. It was marketed as a kind of counter-drug to replace all drugs, particularly illegal ones. The consumption of this substance was sanctioned. Methamphetamine was regarded as a kind of panacea.
The substance was also claimed to have a system-stabilizing component: “We live in an energy-tense time that demands higher performance and greater obligations from us than any time before,” a senior hospital doctor wrote. The pill, produced under industrial laboratory conditions in consistently pure quality, was supposed to help counteract inadequate performance and “integrate shirkers, malingerers, defeatists, and whiners” into the labor process.50 The Tübingen pharmacologist Felix Haffner even suggested the prescription of Pervitin as a “supreme commandment” as it amounted to “the last effort on behalf of the whole”: a kind of “chemical order.”51
Germans, however, didn’t need an order to take the buzzy substance. The hunger for powerful brain-food was already there. Consumption wasn’t decreed from above and it wasn’t top-down, as you might have expected in a dictatorship; it was entirely bottom up.52 This so-called speedamin landed like a bomb, spread like a virus, sold like sliced bread, and was soon as much of a fixture as a cup of coffee. “Pervitin became a sensation,” one psychologist reported. “It soon gained acceptance in a very wide range of circles; students used it as a survival strategy for the exertions of exams; telephone switchboard operators and nurses swallowed it to get through the night shift, and people doing difficult physical or mental labor used it to improve their performance.”53