Hitler and the Habsburgs
Page 27
78. road to Mayerling shortly before his tragic death.: Kürenberg, 280.
78. “the replacement doesn’t like me either.”: Remak, 139. Franz Ferdinand was famous, some might say infamous, for his dark humor.
79. bomb, the injuries, or the near assassination.: Ibid.
79. “they throw bombs at me. It is an outrage!”: Cassels, 178.
79. “All right, you can go on.”: Ibid., 251. Rebecca West wrote in her book Black Lamb and Grey Falcon of meeting a man, who as a boy, had been at the reception for Franz Ferdinand at the Sarajevo City Hall. He told her, “We could not take our eyes off the Archduke… we were all Silent… we all felt awkward, because we knew that when he went out he would certainly be killed. No, it was not a matter of being told… we knew if one man had thrown a bomb, another man would throw another bomb, and another after that if he should fail. I tell you it gave a very strange feeling to the assembly,” pp. 332–333.
79. “most illustrious visit with utmost enthusiasm.”: Ibid.
79. “over the failure of the attack.”: Ibid.
80. “Live for the children.”: Ibid.
80. “Excellent sale of both horses.”: Ibid.
80. “order which I myself could not maintain.”: Pauli, 288. Istvan Tisza, Hungary’s Prime Minister, also saw God’s hand in the Archduke’s assassination and was himself assassinated four years later.
81. fallen beneath the bullets of Slavic fanatics.: Hitler, Mein Kampf, 158–159.
81. “Now will you consent to my marriage proposal?”: Gady, Franz-Stefan. “The Scandalous Affair That Started World War I,” The National Interest, A Quarterly Journal of International Affairs and Diplomacy, May–June 2014.
81. “victim to the brutal hands of a murderer.”: Pauli, 288.
81. who left at once for Chlumetz.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
81. “Our childhoods were over.”: Ibid. Members of the Nostitz-Rieneck and Hohenberg family tell slightly different versions of the traumatic hours following the assassination of their great-grandparents. This may reflect the confusion, shock, and pain of the events. They agree the children were told conflicting stories of what had happened to their parents in Sarajevo and did not learn about their deaths until the following day.
82. to tell them of their parents’ deaths.: Ibid.
82. “Mama would have lost her mind.”: Ibid.
82. the parents reach beyond the grave.: Brook-Shepherd, 253.
82. with regard to the position of the children.: Pope-Hennessy, James. Queen Mary 1867–1953, 483, Knopf, New York, 1960.
83. “has caused quite a stir in Germany.”: Ziegler, Phillip. King Edward VIII, 42, Knopf, New York, 1991. Even when young Edward, Prince of Wales, seemed to identify with his German heritage as much, if not more, than his English ancestry.
83. “it’s a great deal less worry.”: Aronson, Theo. Crowns in Conflict, 101, Salem Publishers, Manchester, 1986. Wilhelm came to genuinely like and trust Franz Ferdinand.
83. reached out to them in any way.: Hohenberg, Prince Gerhard.
83. but those, too, had disappeared.: Pauli, 289. This was confirmed with a conversation I had with H.R.I.H. Archduke Christian Habsburg in Washington, DC, on October 21, 2011.
83. “event has solved a very difficult problem.”: Penfield, Frederick Courtland. United States Ambassador to Austria-Hungary, United States Department of State Papers Relating to the Foreign Affairs of the United States, June 30, 1914, National Archives Microfilm Publications, Microfilm No 695, Supplement 2, 1917, The World War.
84. We are all in such utter misery.: Daisy, Princess of Pless. What I Left Unsaid, 145, Cassel & Company, London, 1936. Younger members of the aristocracy and others from their generation like Kurt Schuschnigg had a more favorable view of Franz Ferdinand than did older traditionalists.
84. and allowed it to happen.: McMeekin, Sean. July 1914: Countdown to War, Basic Books, 28, New York, 2014.
84. children of Vienna silently paid their respects.: Brook-Shepherd, 264.
84. coffins in the Hofburg Palace’s Imperial Chapel.: Ibid.
85. and Crown Prince Rudolph’s widow, Stephanie.: Artstetten Museum, May 18, 2011. Banners from the flowers are kept on display at Artstetten.
85. subterranean elements in Franz Joseph’s government.: Pauli, 273.
85. “To Our Last Best Hope, In Loyal Devotion.”: Beatty, 190.
85. not recognized as a Habsburg by the court.: Lafore, Laurence. The Long Fuse: An Interpretation of the Origins of the World War, 208, J.B. Lippincott, 1965.
85. haunted him for the rest of his life.: Pauli, 294.
86. “And how were the maneuvers?”: Remak, Joachim. Sarajevo: The Story of a Political Murder, 265, Criterion, New York, 1959.
86. immovably established until Franz Joseph’s death.: Windisch-Grätz, Prince Ludwig. My Memoir, 49–50, Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1924.
86. and engulf them in world catastrophe.: Czernin, 49.
86. “whose course could no longer be arrested.”: Hitler, 159.
86. and sweep away the mongrel Habsburg Empire.: Ibid., 162. Franz Joseph viewed his “mongrel Habsburg Empire” differently than Adolf Hitler. Yet each man recognized the unique role it played in Europe. The Emperor wrote, “The Austro-Hungarian Monarchy is not a fanciful work of art, but an absolute necessity for the present and future existence of her peoples. It is a refuge for those nations of central Europe which, without a common home, would have a deplorable existence and be tossed about by all their more powerful neighbors; whereas as long as they are joined together, they themselves constitute an imposing power,” p. 440, Kürenberg.
87. “it would break into a thousand fragments.”: Hitler, 159.
CHAPTER NINE
A KIND OF DULL CATALEPTIC STATE
89. The next man will have to be a man of war.: Pless, 146–147.
89. “drift on in a kind of dull cataleptic trance.”: Churchill, Winston. The World Crisis 1911–1914, 192, Thornton Butterworth Limited, London, 1923.
89. Franz Joseph reluctantly declared war on Serbia.: Nostitz-Rieneck interview.
89. “not place himself on the side of regicides.”: Alexander, H.R.H. Prince Regent. Serbia’s Part in the War Vol.1: The Rampart Against Pan-Germanism, 122, Simpkin, Marshall & Hamilton, London, 1918.
90. better, or change for the worse?: Beatty, 184.
90. “thousands and thousands of men to their deaths.”: Mager, Hugo. Elizabeth: Grand Duchess of Russia, 269, Carroll & Graf Publishers, New York, 1998.
90. “but it fulfills all its functions.”: Cowles, Virginia. The Last Tsar, 70, Putnam, New York, 1977.
90. “being permitted to live at this time.”: Hitler, 161.
90. everything else receded to shallow nothingness.: Ibid., 150.
91. Money quickly became a problem.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta.
91. but received no funds to support them.: Ibid.
91. “can be no question of payment.”: Time Magazine. Yugoslavia: Embalmments, March 29, 1920.
91. obligated to assist his children?: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
92. the financial security of her orphaned grandchildren.: Hohenberg, Prince Gerhard.
92. “Wouldn’t it be better to give them property?”: Nostitz-Rieneck. Archduke Karl and the Hohenbergs’ grandmother Archduchess Maria-Theresa were the lone members of the Habsburg family and court to safeguard the interest of Franz Ferdinand’s royal orphans.
92. Styrian-mountain land to the Hohenberg children.: Ibid.
92. “a matter of secondary interest.”: Alexander, 122.
92. “would have had me shot after Lemberg.”: Sondhaus, Lawrence. Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf: Architect of the Apocalypse, 168, Humanities Press, Boston, 2000. Shortly after Hitler’s armies invaded Russia in the Second World War, he praised von Hotzendorf as “the most intelligent commander of the First World War.”
93. “and we chose the most terrible
.”: Czernin, 33.
93. and unnecessary war in modern times.”: Kiegard, Karl von. “Frederick Wilhelm Exclusive Interview with the United Press,” United Press International, November 20, 1914.
93. looking death straight in the eye.: Hauner, 121. Hitler relished his time in the army, and found the adrenalin rush of combat frightening, but exhilarating. While Hitler fought in the German army on the western front, his childhood friend and former Vienna roommate August Kubizek fought in the Austrian army on the eastern front. Rudolph Häusler, his former Munich roommate, also fought in Franz Joseph’s army.
93. sacrifices being made on distant battlefields.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
94. “pray for our parents and for us.”: King, Greg, and Sue Woolmans. The Assassination of the Archduke: Sarajevo 1914 and the Romance That Changed the World, St. Martin’s Press, 257, New York, 2013.
94. her final gift to the children of Bosnia.: Nicoll, Leo S.J., and Anton Puntigam S.J. Leven un Wirken eines Jesuisen in Bosnien, 102, Dissertation, University of Vienna, 1970. Correspondence with author May 25, 2011. Puntigam wrote the Duchess of Hohenberg was the mother to every child she met. When she was assassinated, she was wearing flowers presented to her by a young Muslim girl from Sarajevo who the Duchess said reminded her of her own daughter.
94. a conversation the priest never forgot.: Ibid. Nedjo Cabrinovic was physically small, almost birdlike, with a gentle, friendly demeanor that contrasted with his talkative nature.
94. We will die for our ideals.: Ibid.
95. Maximilian did. Ernst refused.: Ibid.
95. because the letter had saved his soul.: Ibid.
95. “Somehow Hitler never got even a letter!”: Carruthers, Bob. Private Hitler’s War 1914–1918, 78, Pen & Sword Books, Barnsley, 2014.
95. “worth much more than any territorial gains.”: Hauner, 13.
96. “instinct for self-preservation and the admonitions of duty.”: Ibid., 13–14.
96. in which they have suffered so much.: New York Times, July 8, 1916.
96. Archduke Karl, and Archduchess Zita.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta. Archduchess Maria-Theresa had initially supported the war and was especially angered when Italy, the homeland of Franz Ferdinand’s biological mother, declared war on Austria. She and two of her sisters hired a submarine to attack the Italian fleet, but it sank with no injuries without accomplishing its goal. She was briefly banned from the Habsburg court.
96. Army Chief of Staff Hötzendorf’s battlefield blunders.: Russell, Gareth. The Emperors: How Europe’s Rulers Were Destroyed by the First World War, 164, Amberley Publishing, Gloucestershire, 2015.
97. Franz Ferdinand’s oldest son was the perfect messenger.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta, March 22, 2013.
97. On November 16, 1916, that abruptly changed.: Brook-Shepherd. The Last Habsburg, 49, Weybright and Talley, New York, 1968. Franz Ferdinand once complained, “I must wait, and be told less than the meanest boot boy in Schönbrunn. My position is like that of an expectant heir to an entailed inheritance who must look on quietly while the aged proprietor lets great properties be depreciated through dishonest management,” p. 278, Kürenberg.
97. “and the cooperation of our enemies permit.”: Vovk, Justin. Imperial Requiem: Four Royal Women and the Fall of the Age of Empresses, 324, University L.L.C. Bloomington, 2012.
97. scattered advisors back to Vienna.: Ibid.
97. “the most intelligent commander of the first World War.”: Hitler, Secret Conversations, 44.
97. “what is the advantage in that?”: Hohenberg, Prince Gerhard.
97. “a few wretched scoundrels agitating for peace.”: Hauner, 14.
98. Franz Ferdinand had wanted and hoped for his son.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta.
98. named for the Duchess of Hohenberg.: Nicoll, March 22, 2013.
98. but declined for herself and her brothers.: Ibid. Many people found Puntigam obnoxious and clueless, but his childlike sincerity regarding faith, charity, and forgiveness connected with others including Franz Ferdinand’s stepmother Archduchess Maria-Theresa, and two of the Archduke’s three children.
98. its German ally were about to get much worse.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta.
98. “a chance of confronting upheaval with success.”: Voyk, 324.
99. and frightened the Hohenberg children.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
99. The Habsburgs’ multinational empire imploded.: Gilbert, Martin. The First World War: A Complete History, 491, Henry Holt & Company, New York, 1994.
99. “is indispensable for Europe’s equilibrium.”: Kürenberg, 230.
100. Duchess was promptly torn down.: Nicoll correspondence. Following the war, Puntigam was the only Catholic priest expelled from Bosnia. Money raised for the Sarajevo memorials, but never used, was eventually given to the Catholic Church. Following the Sarajevo trial of the assassins, Puntigam was given the gun used by Princip to kill the Archduke and Duchess. He gave it to the Jesuit order, but kept Franz Ferdinand’s bloodstained shirt, which he considered a sacred relic of the martyred Archduke. The shirt has since disappeared.
100. “I renounce all participation in the affairs of state.”: Gady.
100. “Only an inner peace can heal the wounds of this war.”: Brook-Shepherd, The Last Habsburg, 219.
100. “and continuous readiness to sacrifice himself.”: Hauner, 15.
101. “the greatest villainy of the century.”: Ibid.
101. There is no making pacts with Jews.: Ibid., 16.
101. the one that convinced him to enter politics.: Hitler, Secret Conversations, 44.
101. “Can cause the ruin of a whole people.”: Ibid.
CHAPTER TEN
EXILES
102. No one came to their defense.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
102. “protective care” of the government.: Ibid.
102. No such room was ever found.: Ibid.
103. her future husband, she received no property.: Ibid. Sophie later did receive one-third of her brother’s land inheritance.
103. propaganda against landlords and aristocrats.: Ibid.
103. Emperor Karl and his family into Swiss exile.: Brook-Shepherd, The Last Habsburg Emperor, 234.
103. remained in loyal service to the orphans.: Nostitz-Rieneck. Franz Janaczek remained in loyal service to the family until his death in the early 1950s. He always refused to write his memoirs or discuss any matters concerning Franz Ferdinand and his children.
103. and their aunt comfort and companionship.: Ibid.
104. last guest they would ever host at Konopiste.: Ibid.
104. countryside could be cleared of armed looters.: Ibid.
104. display any fear in front of their Czech “protectors.”: Ibid.
104. a photo of their parents but was turned back.: King, Greg, and Sue Woolmans, 257.
104. but she was allowed to keep it.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
105. Konopiste remained their true home.: King, Woolmans, 257.
105. for the call to return to Konopiste that never came.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
105. rested the tombs of their mother and father.: Ibid. The burial chambers of the Archduke and Duchess are open to visitors at the Artstetten Castle museum.
105. Archduke Franz Ferdinand and the Duchess of Hohenberg.: Pauli, 303.
105. revolutionary activities in and out of the army.: Hauner, 17–18.
106. “his extraordinary talent as an orator.”: Ibid., 18. In Ronald Hayman’s book Hitler & Geli he discusses Hitler’s training in public speaking during his army days, pp. 58–59.
106. “led to the donation of three hundred Marks.”: Hitler, 322–323. Hitler’s speeches had been tolerated by his roommates and the inhabitants of his homeless shelters, but never before had he received such an overwhelmingly positive response to his orations.
106. he officially joined the small party.: Hauner, 18.
1
06. “I thought of nothing else but revolution.”: Range, Peter Ross. 1924: The Year That Made Hitler, 117, Little, Brown & Company, New York, 2016.
106. unite Germany against its political and military enemies.: Hauner, 19. Hitler believed an entirely new political party was needed in Austria, but it wasn’t until he connected with the small German Workers Party in Munich that he discovered an existing political party he could bend to his will.
106. “All non-German immigration must be prevented.”: Ibid., 20. Anti-Semitism, fierce opposition to immigration, and appeals to nationalism were the cornerstones of Hitler’s rise to power from its earliest days.
107. “a racial tuberculosis among nations.”: Ibid., 18, 21.
107. “in view of the Archduke’s marriage being morganatic.”: Cavendish, William Duke of Portland. Letter to Thomas Masaryk, August 2, 1919, Artstetten.
107. “by the government for the benefit of the children.”: Ibid.
107. Through their letter writing, they fell in love.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
107. to begin her new married life.: Ibid.
108. Some had vanished.: Ibid.
108. but nothing that had been her mother’s.: Ibid.
108. Her wedding day was touched by sadness.: Ibid.
108. but her face showed no joy.: Ibid.
108. son of the exiled German Emperor—committed suicide.: MacDonogh, Giles. The Last Kaiser: The Life of Wilhelm II, 327, Whittle, New York, 1977.
109. and the athletic life they enjoyed.: Nostitz-Rieneck, Count.
109. a daughter completed their family circle.: Ibid.
109. the estates around them vanished with the stroke of a pen.: Ibid.
110. President Masaryk kept none of his promises.: Hohenberg, Princess Sophie de Potesta.
110. “of members of the former royal family of Austria-Hungary.”: Ibid.
110. by their Habsburg relatives or the state.: Ibid.
110. four years before the treaty was legally enforceable.: Ibid.
110. in the Bohemian countryside of their youth.: Ibid. Ernst, the youngest of the orphaned children, seemed the most emotionally fragile following Sarajevo.
111. and Ernst Hohenberg refused to join their ranks.: Ibid.