20. Hans-Otto Meissner, So schnell schlägt Deutschlands Herz (Giessen, 1951), pp. 100f. On Meissner’s biography, see Thomas Keil, “Die postkoloniale deutsche Literatur in Namibia (1920–2000),” (dissertation, University of Stuttgart, 2003), pp. 405ff.
21. Meissner, So schnell schlägt Deutschlands Herz, pp. 100f.
22. See Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, pp. 392f. See also Leni Riefenstahl, Memoiren (Cologne, 2000 [1st ed., Munich 1987], p. 181.
23. See Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, p. 372. Goebbels, who does not mention the first meeting between his girlfriend and Hitler, describes an evening in Munich together with Magda Quandt and Hitler as early as April 4, 1931 (diary entry of April 4, 1931, in Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, Teil I, vol. 2/I, p. 378). In the opinion of Magda Goebbels’s biographer, Anja Klabunde, however, the first meeting between Hitler and Quandt was accidental, and Klabunde dates the event to “a few weeks after Geli’s death,” i.e., after Sept. 18, 1931. See Anja Klabunde, Magda Goebbels: Annäherung an ein Leben (Munich, 1999), pp. 148ff. Also see Joachimsthaler, Hitlers Liste, p. 375.
24. See Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, p. 392.
25. In fact, Günther Quandt is said to have met with Hitler at Hotel Kaiserhof on the same day when Quandt’s ex-wife tried to make contact with the Nazi leader; Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, pp. 373ff.). Goebbels, on the other hand, first noted on Sept. 12 1931: “Nauseating: Herr Günther Quandt was with the leader. Struck all sorts of poses and showed off, of course” (Goebbels, diary entry, September 12 1931, in Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, Teil I, vol. 2/II, p. 97.)
26. See Rüdiger Jungbluth, Die Quandts: Ihr leiser Aufstieg zur mächtigsten Wirtschaftsdynastie Deutschlands (Frankfurt am Main, 2002), pp. 108ff. See also Reuth, Goebbels, p. 197.
27. See Heusler, Das Braune Haus, pp. 81ff.; Thamer, Der Nationalsozialismus, pp. 58f. See also Hagen Schulze, “Democratic Prussia in Weimar Germany, 1919–1933,” in Modern Prussian History 1830–1947, ed. Philip G. Dwyer (Harlow, England, 2001), pp. 211–229.
28. See Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, vol. 1, p. 126.
29. Auguste Behrend, “Meine Tochter Magda Goebbels,” Schwäbische Illustrierte, March 1, 1952. See also Reuth, Goebbels, p. 197; Klabunde, Magda Goebbels, pp. 123f. On Magda Goebbels, see in addition Curt Riess, Joseph Goebbels: Eine Biographie (Baden-Baden, 1950); Hans-Otto Meissner, Magda Goebbels: Ein Lebensbild (Munich, 1978); Erich Ebermayer and Hans Roos, Gefährtin des Teufels: Leben und Tod der Magda Goebbels (Hamburg, 1952); Guido Knopp and Peter Hartl, “Magda Goebbels—Die Gefolgsfrau,” in Knopp, Hitlers Frauen, pp. 85–147; Anna Maria Sigmund, “Magda Goebbels: Die erste Dame des Dritten Reichs,” in her Die Frauen der Nazis, pp. 111–150.
30. Speer, quoted in Fest, Die unbeantwortbaren Fragen (Hamburg, 2006), pp. 196f.
31. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, p. 146.
32. See Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, p. 116; Klabunde, Magda Goebbels, p. 104. On Arlosoroff, see Golda Meir, My Life (New York, 1975), p. 144.
33. See Jungbluth, Die Quandts, pp. 49 and 52.
34. Thamer, Der Nationalsozialismus, pp. 66ff.
35. See Goebbels, Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, Teil I, vol. II/2, p. 24, according to which Magda Quandt and Viktoria von Dirksen accompanied him. Eva and Gretl Braun as well as Henriette Hoffmann were apparently also present at this event. Friedrich Karl Freiherr von Eberstein, the future Munich police chief, stated that Hitler had sent him to Weimar, where he met Eva Braun for the first time: Eberstein, “Women Around Hitler,” in “Adolf Hitler: A Composite Picture,” Headquarters Military Intelligence Service USA, OI Special Report 36, April 2 1947, documentation “Adolph Hitler 1944–1953,” vol. 4, p. 694, F135/4, IfZ, Munich.
36. See “Bayreuth, Picknick Sommer 1931 [Bayreuth, Summer Picnic, 1931],” in Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive, hoff-7060, BSB Munich. Brigitte Hamann does not mention Hitler’s presence at the 1931 festival in her Winifred Wagner oder Hitlers Bayreuth (Munich, 2002), pp. 209f., and mention of the event is likewise missing from Goebbels’s diaries.
37. Hermann Göring’s statement quoted in Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, p. 376.
38. See Johannes Hürter, Wilhelm Groener: Reichswehrminister am Ende der Weimarer Republik 1928–1932 (Munich, 1993), pp. 315f.
39. See “Braunschweig, SA-Aufmarsch vom 17./18. Oktober 1931,” in Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive, hoff-7094, BSB Munich.
40. See Carlos Widmann, “Magda Goebbels: Die Karriere einer Opportunistin im Führerstaat,” in “Hitlers langer Schatten: Die Gegenwart der Vergangenheit,” Der Spiegel, September 24, 2001; also Klabunde, Magda Goebbels, p. 159, which claims: “But what she wanted most of all was power.” Klabunde refers here to Meissner, Magda Goebbels, p. 119.
41. See Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, pp. 126f.
42. Goebbels, diary entry, August 26, 1931, in Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, Teil I, vol. II/2, p. 85. And see Below, Als Hitlers Adjutant, p. 178. See also Riefenstahl, Memoiren, p. 201, where Riefenstahl claims that Magda Goebbels admitted to her that she had “fallen for the Führer” and divorced Günther Quandt for that reason.
43. Goebbels, diary entry, September 14, 1931, previously cited, p. 98.
44. Wagener, Hitler aus nächster Nähe, p. 377.
45. See “Besuch von Magda Goebbels im Teehaus auf dem Kehlstein (Obersalzberg) am 21. Oktober 1938,” in Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive, hoff-272, BSB Munich.
46. See Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, p. 248; Sven Felix Kellerhoff, Mythos Führerbunker: Hitlers letzter Unterschlupf (Berlin, 2006), p. 82. Kellerhoff claims that Magda Goebbels tried to “exclude” Eva Braun “even from her own domain on the Obersalzberg.” See also Ulrike Grunewald, “Eva Braun und Magda Goebbels,” in her Rivalinnen (Cologne, 2006), pp. 191–236.
47. See Alfred Kube, Pour le mérite und Hakenkreuz: Hermann Göring im Dritten Reich, 2nd ed. (Munich, 1987), p. 202.
48. See Emmy Göring’s invitation of Ilse Hess to a “musical Advent’s tea,” or “garden tea,” in Rudolf Hess Papers, J 1211 (–) 1993/300, vol. 5, file 80, Swiss Federal Archives, Bern.
49. Emmy Göring, An der Seite meines Mannes: Begebenheiten und Bekenntnisse, 4th ed. (Coburg, 1996), p. 57.
50. Ibid., pp. 148 and 209.
51. Ibid., pp. 66 and 72ff. Cf. Anna Maria Sigmund, “Emmy Göring: Die ‹Hohe Frau›,” in her Die Frauen der Nazis, pp. 97ff. Emmy Göring does not deny that she knew about the concentration camps, but she claims to have believed that they were for the “political reeducation” of “Jews” and “Communists.” Only after the war, she says, did she learn about the crimes there and wondered “if Hitler himself even knew exactly what Himmler was doing at Auschwitz.” Margarete Speer makes the exact same argument: see Sereny, Albert Speer, p. 195.
52. Ilse Hess, Gefangener des Friedens: Neue Briefe aus Spandau (Leoni am Starnberger See, 1965 [1st ed., 1955]), p. 14.
53. Ibid., pp. 26 and 33.
54. Ibid., pp. 18f. and 54.
55. Ibid., pp. 35ff. and 44. See also Rudolf Hess, letter to Klara and Fritz Hess, Munich, September 14, 1920, in Hess, Briefe 1908–1933, p. 264. Rudolf Hess joined the NSDAP on July 1, 1920. See Anna Maria Sigmund, “Ilse Hess: Die Frau des ‘Führer-Stellvertreters,’ ” in her Die Frauen der Nazis, pp. 737f.
56. Ilse Pröhl to Frau Barchewitz, Munich, February 28, 1921 (carbon copy), in Rudolf Hess Papers, J 1211 (–) 1993/300, vol. 2, file 15, BA Bern. See also in this regard Hitler’s speech titled “Warum sind wir Antisemiten? [Why Are We Anti-Semites?]” of August 13, 1920, in Adolf Hitler, Sämtliche Aufzeichnungen 1905–1924, ed. Eberhard Jäckel with Axel Kuhn (Stuttgart, 1980), p. 185.
57. Quoted from Othmar Plöckinger, Geschichte eines Buches: Adolf Hitlers “Mein Kampf” 1922–1945 (Munich, 2006), p. 54.
58. See ibid., pp. 72, 124f. and 151f.
59. Ilse Hess to Heinrich Himmler, n.p., December 9 [1933] (carbon copy), in Rudolf Hess Papers, J 1211 (–) 1993/300, vol. 7, file 98, Swiss Fe
deral Archives, Bern.
60. Eva Braun to Ilse Hess, Obersalzberg, undated [January 2] (handwritten original), in Rudolf Hess Papers, J 1211 (–) 1993/300, vol. 2, file 25, Swiss Federal Archives, Bern.
61. Ilse Hess to Hans Grimm, n. p., November 1, 1943 [must be an error for 1944] (carbon copy), in Rudolf Hess Papers, J 1211 (–) 1993/300, vol. 6, file 84, Swiss Federal Archives, Bern.
62. See Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, p. 248.
63. See Joseph Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei: Eine historische Darstellung in Tagebuchblättern (Vom 1. Januar 1932 bis zum 1. Mai 1933), 21st ed. (Munich, 1937), pp. 255–271.
64. Anni Winter, Interrogation by Capt. O. N. Norden, Munich, November 6, 1945, in Donovan Nuremberg Trials Collection, vol. 4, subdivision 8/Hitler, Section 8.02, Cornell Law Library, Cornell University.
65. See Thamer, Der Nationalsozialismus, pp. 106ff; Kershaw, Hitler 1889–1936, pp. 441f.
66. See Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, p. 258; Gun, Eva Braun, p. 96. Hitler apparently gave her her “first jewels” from him on this day: “a matching ring, earrings, and bracelet.”
67. See Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, pp. 264ff.
68. See ibid., pp. 269f.
69. Rudolf Hess to Ilse Hess, Berlin, January 31, 1933, in Hess, Briefe 1908–1933, p. 425.
70. See Kershaw, Hitler 1889–1936, pp. 433f and 613f. Cf. Fest, Hitler, p. 352.
71. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, p. 34.
72. See Beierl, Geschichte des Kehlsteins, p. 7. See also Fest, Hitler, p. 353.
73. See the public placard for the Reichstag election of 3/5/1933, district and parliamentary electoral nominations, Upper Bavaria/Swabia electoral district.
74. David Clay Large, Hitlers München: Aufstieg und Fall der Hauptstadt der Bewegung (Munich, 2001 [1st ed., 1998]), p. 299.
75. Tony van Eyck, “Adolf Hitler spricht zu einer Schauspielerin: ‘Der echte Künstler kommt von selbst zu uns,’ ” n.p., March 21, 1933, in Ernst Hanfstaengl Papers, Ana 405, box 27, file for Jan.–June 1933, BSB Munich.
76. See Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, p. 264. See also Ernst K. Bramsted, Goebbels und die nationalsozialistische Propaganda 1925–1945 (Frankfurt, 1971), pp. 288f.; Fritz Redlich, Hitler: Diagnose des destruktiven Propheten (Vienna, 2002), p. 92.
77. See Kellerhoff, Hitlers Berlin, pp. 107f. Kellerhoff says there that Berlin was “Hitler’s most important stage.”
78. See Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, pp. 280ff.
79. Ibid., p. 289. Extensive information on the topic may be found in Kershaw, Hitler 1889–1936, pp. 472f.
80. For the debate about Hitler’s leadership style and his personal position of power within the Nazi state, see Gerhard Hirschfeld and Lothar Kettenacker, eds., Der “Führerstaat”: Mythos und Realität; Studien zur Struktur und Politik des Dritten Reiches, Veröffentlichungen des Deutschen Historischen Instituts London, vol. 8, (Stuttgart, 1981). Ian Kershaw says about Hitler in this context: “He took the key decisions; he alone determined the timing. But little else was Hitler’s own work” (Hitler 1889–1936, p. 542). On Hitler’s style of governing see also Ian Kershaw, Der NS-Staat: Geschichtsinterpretationen und Kontroversen im Überblick, rev. and expanded ed. (Reinbek, 1994), pp. 112–147.
81. Gesetz zur Wiederherstellung des Berufsbeamtentums, April 7, 1933, Reichsgesetzblatt 1933 I, pp. 175–177, in documentArchiv.de, at http://www.documentArchiv.de/ns/beamtenges.html.
82. Kershaw, Hitler 1889–1936, pp. 470 and 535.
83. See Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, pp. 292ff.
84. Otto Dietrich, 12 Jahre mit Hitler (Munich, 1955), pp. 149f. See also Thamer, Der Nationalsozialismus, p. 184.
85. Goebbels, Vom Kaiserhof zur Reichskanzlei, p. 301. See Thamer, Der Nationalsozialismus, pp. 231ff. See also Kershaw, Der Hitler-Mythos, pp. 53ff.
86. See Rolf Düsterberg, Hanns Johst—“Der Barde der SS”: Karriere eines deutschen Dichters (Paderborn, 2004).
87. Joseph Goebbels, “Unser Hitler,” radio broadcast of April 20, 1933, in Goebbels, Signale der neuen Zeit: 25 ausgewählte Reden (Munich, 1934), pp. 141 and 149.
88. Kershaw, Hitler 1889–1936, p. 485.
89. See Friedrich Sieburg, Napoleon: Die hundert Tage, 9th ed. (Stuttgart, 1964), p. 95, where the author compares Napoleon’s relationship with France to a relationship with a lover, and analyzes the lover’s status in this context. What is missing, he says, are “natural bonds,” since the lover is “there for exceptional cases.”
90. See Gun, Eva Braun, p. 95; Sigmund, Die Frauen der Nazis, p. 248.
91. See “Hitlers Urlaub 20.–22. April 1934,” in Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive, hoff-10486, BSB Munich.
92. Johanna Wolf had already worked for Dietrich Eckart. See Adolf Hitler, Monologe im Führerhauptquartier 1941–1944: Die Aufzeichnungen Heinrich Heims, ed. Werner Jochmann (Hamburg, 1980), p. 465.
93. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, pp. 46–47. In contrast, Nerin E. Gun claims that Hitler, “always mindful of appearances,” did not have Eva Braun spend nights in Haus Wachenfeld; instead, she stayed at first at the Hotel Post or the Berchtesgadener Hof (“according to the evidence of the manageress of one of these hotels,” Gun writes), and later at the Platterhof, a mountain inn (Gun, Eva Braun, pp. 101–102).
94. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, pp. 46f.
95. Ibid., pp. 59ff. See also Fest, Die unbeantwortbaren Fragen, p. 59.
96. Zentralkommando d. Kriegsgefangenenlager Nr. 32/DI-21, 2. Juli 1945, Sonderhaftzentrale “ASHCAN.” Detailed report on the interrogation of Dr. Karl Brandt: Answers to the Questionnaire. Ref.: SHAEF Interrogation Documents from June 15, 1945, in Rep. 502, KV-Anklage, Umdrucke deutsch, NO-331, State Archives, Nuremberg.
97. This seems to be confirmed as well by the Heinrich Hoffmann photographs dated 1934, according to which Eva Braun stayed on the Obersalzberg on both April 20–22 and in August–September, 1934, along with Heinrich and Erna Hoffmann, the adjutant Wilhelm Brückner and his girlfriend Sofie Stork, Reich Press Chief Otto Dietrich, and others. See Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive, hoff-49683, BSB Munich.
98. See Johannes Fried, “Erinnerung im Kreuzverhör: Kollektives Gedächtnis, Albert Speer und die Erkenntnis erinnerter Vergangenheit,” in the Festschrift for Lothar Gall, Historie und Leben. Der Historiker als Wissenschaftler und Zeitgenosse, ed. Dieter Hein et al. (Munich, 2006), pp. 343ff. See also Matthias Schmidt, Albert Speer: Das Ende eines Mythos; Speers wahre Rolle im Dritten Reich (Bern and Munich, 1982), pp. 21ff.
99. Heinrich Breloer, Unterwegs zur Familie Speer: Begegnungen, Gespräche, Interviews (Berlin, 2005), pp. 115f.
100. Albert Speer to Rudolf Wolters, n.p., July 6, 1975 (carbon copy), in Albert Speer Papers, N1340/76, BA Koblenz.
101. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, p. 32.
102. Albert Speer, quoted in Fest, Die unbeantwortbaren Fragen, p. 196. See also Speer, Inside the Third Reich, pp. 32–33.
103. See Speer, Inside the Third Reich, p. 31: “I had found my Mephistopheles.” This reference to the devil from Goethe’s Faust emphasizes the image Speer likes to present of Hitler’s superiority—Hitler representing the root of all evil as a “destroyer” and “liar” (the etymology of the word “Mephistopheles”).
104. Joachim Fest, meanwhile, doubts the value of Speer’s testimony with respect to the nature of the relationship between Hitler and Braun; see his Die unbeantwortbaren Fragen, pp. 60f.
105. “Besprechung zwischen Herrn Albrecht und Frl. Schroeder, früher Sekretärin von Hitler,” Berchtesgaden, May 22, 1945, in MA 1298/10, microfilm, Various Documents, DJ-13 (David Irving), IfZ Munich.
106. See Schroeder, Er war mein Chef, pp. 213f. See also Julius Schaub, In Hitlers Schatten: Erinnerungen und Aufzeichnungen des persönlichen Adjutanten und Vertrauten Julius Schaub 1925–1945, ed. Olaf Rose (Stegen am Ammersee, 2005).
107. See David Irving, “Notes on an Interview of Johannes Göhler at his home, Stuttgart-Nord,
Feuerbacher Weg 125, from 12:30 to 4 pm, 27 March 1971,” in ZS 2244 (Johannes Göhler), IfZ Munich. See also Schroeder, Er war mein Chef, p. 216.
108. David Irving, interview with “a certain Frau Gö” on November 4, 1973 (entry under the date of May 12, 1975), in David Irving Collection, ED 100/44, IfZ Munich.
109. Eva Braun to Gretl Fegelein, Berlin, April 23, 1945, in Gun, Eva Braun, pp. 253–254. On April 30, 1945, Eva Braun gave Hanna Reitsch, the pilot who had flown General Robert Ritter from Greim to Hitler in Berlin and had stayed for a week in the bunker, a last letter to her sister Gretl. The whereabouts and content of the letter are unknown. (Anna Maria Sigmund, “Hanna Reitsch: Sie flog für das Dritte Reich,” in her Die Frauen der Nazis, pp. 559ff.)
110. Gun, Eva Braun, pp. 289–290; Schroeder, Er war mein Chef, p. 216; Wolfgang Benz and Barbara Distel, Der Ort des Terrors: Geschichte der nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslager, vol. 2, Frühe Lager, Dachau, Emslandlager (Munich, 2005), pp. 324ff. See likewise the statements of SS-Hauptsturmführer Erwin Haufler questioned by American officers in the Bad Aiblingen camp, December 27, 1945, and of SS-Hauptsturmführer Franz Konrad, questioned in Zell am See on January 6–8, 1946, in David Irving Collection, “Adolph Hitler 1944–1953,” vol. 2, F 135/2, IfZ Munich.
111. See Speer, Albert Speer. Die Kransberg-Protokolle 1945: Seine ersten Aussagen und Aufzeichnungen (Juni–September), (Munich, 2003), p. 31.
112. See Gun, Eva Braun, p. 82. The letter, Ilse Fucke-Michels to Nerin E. Gun, Munich, April 8, 1967, is reproduced in the German edition, Eva Braun-Hitler: Leben und Schicksal (Velbert, 1968), pp. 67 and 69. Gun claims that Eva Braun kept “a more intimate diary later,” which, “bound in green leather,” was locked in the “armored safe at the bunker” when she left the Berghof in 1945. See also Joachimsthaler, Hitlers Liste, pp. 443ff.
113. Werner Maser, Adolf Hitler: Legende, Mythos, Wirklichkeit, 6th ed., expanded (with Eva Braun’s Diary), (Munich and Esslingen, 1974), pp. 236 and 325ff. The original of the diary-fragment is located at the National Archives of the United States, in Washington, DC.
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