* * *
In the Mitfords’ social circles, the concept of chance encounters between men and young girls was still considered quite unacceptable. All social intercourse was formalised by introduction, which made Unity’s behaviour so extreme. The very idea of a young girl hanging around in a public place, alone, with the intention of being picked up would have been considered quite outrageous behaviour, redolent of a tart. But while Diana and Unity had yet to actually meet Hitler, let alone be formally introduced, ‘they already knew one of the most intimate secrets of Hitler’s life: that he had a mistress’14. They had even met Eva Braun, twenty-three years the Führer’s junior, whose existence was then virtually unknown to members of the general public.
Eva modelled for Hitler’s ‘court’ photographer and constant companion, Heinrich Hoffmann, and worked in his shop. It was there, one evening in 1929, that Hitler had first seen her. She was only 17; slim, pretty and athletic; a great deal more extrovert and uninhibited than has been generally accepted and remarkably similar in many respects to Unity, whose habits of wearing make-up and sunbathing naked she shared. It was not until 1932 that Eva and Hitler became lovers, though the exact details of their sexual habits, or whether they ever even had sex in any conventional form, are still the subject of conjecture. This is doubtless due to Allied propaganda that cast Hitler as a sexual pervert with scatological tendencies.
As early as 1 November 1932, Braun was said to have attempted to commit suicide with her father’s pistol. There would be more attempts, largely as a result of Hitler’s necromantic influences, but partly as a means of coercion. As far as Eva was concerned, if she was to remain at his beck and call, she wanted some tangible commitment on Hitler’s behalf. The following summer he set her up in an apartment in Munich, close to his own at 16 Prinzregentenplatz, a square in one of the most expensive neighbourhoods in the Bavarian capital. His flat, in a corner house, was on the second floor, from where he would send for her whenever he came to the city.
It was inevitable that before long Unity would become aware of Eva Braun’s existence and her relationship with the Führer. As a keen photographer, Unity often visited Hoffmann’s shop to both buy and develop film. It was during one of these visits that she became aware of an extremely attractive girl working at the rear of the shop. In a letter to Diana, she deemed her worthy of comment. Some time later she saw the same girl, expensively dressed in the back of a chauffeur-driven white Mercedes and assumed she must have been the mistress of a high ranking party member. At the 1935 Parteitag she realised just how high the party member was; though she never revealed exactly how she discovered this information.
According to Diana, ‘At the Parteitag we were given seats next to Fräulein Braun, and thought her pretty and charming.’ There was apparently some jealousy on the part of Eva, who was later believed to have referred to Unity as ‘the Valkyrie’. Unity, on the other hand, while appreciating Eva’s physical attraction, regarded her as a mere shop girl and as such far too ‘common’ and of insufficient social standing to have even warranted any consideration, let alone communication.
While Hitler continued to prefer living in Munich, due to his status he was obliged to spend more time in Germany’s capital city and, at the end of 1934, officially at least, took up residence at the Chancellery in Berlin, giving his first dinner party there on 19 December. ‘Lord Rothermere and his son Esmond Harmsworth were among the guests in the 100-foot dining room with its red marble pillars, blue and gold mosaic ceiling and Gobelin tapestry from the museum in Munich.’15 Theoretically, this move should have diminished Unity’s chances of meeting Hitler. But due to his preference for Munich, where Eva continued to live and to which he returned regularly, in reality it made little difference. The German public remained quite unaware of the existence of either Eva or Unity.
Unity continued to frequent both the Carlton Teeraum and, especially, the Osteria Bavaria where ‘she often saw Hitler, who would sometimes give her a friendly nod, an event always noted with delight in her diary’. The long period of waiting to meet Hitler should have diminished her enthusiasm but on the contrary; by her own family’s admission, ‘Hitler had become Unity’s God and National Socialism … “my religion, not merely my political party”.’16
* * *
It was on 9 February 1935 that their relationship made the great leap of faith for which Unity had been waiting so long, finally moving from conceptual to realised fantasy. According to Jonathan Guinness, ‘The night before she had been to a fancy dress dance for the foreign students. She spent much of the time with Brian (Howard)’, but although Unity had not left until three o’clock in the morning ‘she would not have been hung-over, as she never drank much’. Finally, after sleeping until noon, she wandered along to the Osteria for a late lunch at 2.30 p.m. and her patience was rewarded. Afterwards she was in heaven and in love and could not wait to tell her father:
Forgy darling. Yesterday was the most wonderful and beautiful day of my life. I will try and describe it to you, though I can as yet hardly write. I went alone to lunch at the Osteria and sat at the little table by the stove where we sat … last time you were there.17
In January Lord Redesdale, who had returned to Munich with Unity, had apparently accompanied her on her vigil at the Osteria, where Unity would later insist he came under Hitler’s spell, despite the fact that he did not actually meet the Führer but only lunched in his presence:
At about 3, when I had finished my lunch, the Führer came and sat down at his usual table with two other men … about 10 minutes after he arrived, he spoke to the manager, and the manager came over to me and said: ‘The Führer would like to speak to you’. I got up and went over to him and he stood up and saluted and shook hands and introduced me to the others and asked me to sit down next to him.
I sat and talked to him for about half an hour … Rosa (the fat waitress) came and whispered to me: ‘Shall I bring you a post-card?’ So I said yes, really to please her … I was rather embarrassed to ask him to sign it … and I said I hoped he wouldn’t think it very American of me. He made me write my name (which I did as you may believe very shakily) and then he wrote on the card: ‘Frl. Unity Mitford, zur freundlichen Erinnerung an Deutschland und Adolf Hitler’ (For Miss Unity Mitford as a friendly memento of Germany and Adolf Hitler) … I can’t tell you all the things we talked about.
Unity loved her father and the fact that he had introduced her to Blake, fascism and doubtless anti-Semitism and racism; but she also knew that any metaphysical references could all too easily result in his famous response to ‘all that nonsense’. For while her sisters’ belittling may have been limited to mere teasing, Farve could react with immediate, hysterical fury and ‘one just never knew’.
But Unity did eventually tell Janos Almasy the story, who then told Gaby Bentinck. Adolf Hitler did not speak English and apparently asked Unity to pronounce her name as well as write it. But as the Germans share the English habit of adopting more than one Christian name, he also asked her for her full name.
Up until this point, Hitler’s attraction for the young English girl had probably been based on her Rhine Maiden appearance. But when she gave her full name as Unity Valkyrie Freeman Mitford, he was both surprised and delighted. ‘… you are a Valkyrie. You choose who shall die in battle and bring these bravest of the warriors to Valhalla, the afterlife hall of the slain, ruled over by the God Odin. You serve them mead and take them as lovers …?’
Her name and its connotations immediately established a bond between them through the Teutonic mythologies that so inspired Hitler and his idolised Wagner. Pride surged through Unity and her confidence soared as the ecstatic fantasist delightedly agreed that she did indeed fulfil the full responsibilities of her role. Meanwhile, the equally euphoric Hitler was convinced Unity had been assigned to him by the gods as his own personal Valkyrie.
Unity also brought more to their relationship than her name and appearance, in the shape of her own cultural and
mythological influences. She took copies of the works of both Blake and Milton wherever she went, particularly during the long hours of waiting at the Osteria. According to Gaby, Hitler questioned her as to the subject of her reading and was delighted by a phrase from Blake that Unity considered particularly appropriate. ‘I must create a system or be enslaved by another man’s.’
He was incredibly impressed by the fact that Unity could recite from memory whole passages, some of which, particularly Blake’s ‘A War Song of Englishmen’, it was difficult to believe had not been written especially for them.
Hitler was even more impressed when Unity explained that Blake was an artist as well as a poet. She soon came to realise that his respect for artists, particularly visual artists (or at least those whose work he considered acceptable), was greater than for almost any other category of creativity; though he may have been less impressed if Unity had mentioned the fact that Blake abhorred any form of racism, believing in both racial and sexual equality. She was far more interested in underlining his interest in Wagner.
He asked me if I had ever been to Bayreuth and I said no but I should like to, and he said to one of the other men that they must remember that the next time there was a festival there.
He said he felt he knew London well from his architectural studies and … believed it to be the best town, as a town, in the world. He thinks Cavalcade (a movie based on the show by Noel Coward) is the best film he ever saw. Isn’t it just killing that John Betjeman and Adolf Hitler share the same taste in movies!
He talked about the war, he said … that international Jews must never again be allowed to make two Nordic races fight against one another. I said no, next time we must fight together. He talked of the roads, the new buildings that were being put up in Nuremberg for the Parteitag, and other things.
In the end, he had to go. He kept the bit of paper with my name on. Rosa told me it was the first time he had ever invited someone he didn’t know to sit at his table like that. He had also apparently said that my lunch was to go on his bill.
So, Forgy, after all that you can imagine what I feel like. I am so happy that I wouldn’t mind a bit dying. I suppose I am the luckiest girl in the world. I certainly never did anything to deserve such an honor.
A very nice thing was that two very poor girls, who really work themselves to the bone for him – the ‘Hungry Girl’ and the girl you met in Café Hag – were sitting at another table. After he had gone, they waited outside for me and shook my hand for ages and congratulated me … If I had been them, I would have been furious that a foreigner who had never done a hand’s turn for him had such wonderful luck …
You may think that this is hysterical. I’m sure Muv will, but when you remember that at any rate for me, he is the greatest man of all time, you must admit that I am lucky even to have set eyes on him, let alone to have sat and talked to him.
Unity’s diary revealed that from then on, between February 1935 and September 1939, she met with Hitler on at least 140 occasions, approximately once every twelve days, which was quite remarkable when one considers what Hitler’s schedule must have been like in the four years leading up to the outbreak of war.
Far from being brief, snatched moments they were, more often than not, lengthy, relaxed encounters, illustrating not only the importance of Unity in Hitler’s life, but also, in his role as supreme dictator, how little time he devoted to the mechanics of actually running the country.
So quickly did the relationship between Unity and Hitler develop, that within a matter of months she had also introduced him to her entire family, with the exception of Nancy. Something which, with Sydney’s success in achieving a considerable degree of press coverage, gave her tremendous kudos and added immeasurably to the Mitfords’ notoriety.
This has not prevented various authors, with her family’s subsequent encouragement, from attempting to play down Unity’s relationship with Hitler. In her role as editor of the Mitford letters, Charlotte Mosley claimed, ‘She was rarely alone with him and, in spite of what has often been speculated, there was no love affair.’ But there was certainly a degree of unintentional accuracy in her pronouncement concerning ‘love’, for what Unity felt for Hitler far surpassed mere love. Both Gaby Bentinck and Milly Howard-Brown agreed that Unity ‘worshipped him’.
They were in fact alone together on a number of occasions, but as far as Unity was concerned, even when accompanied, the intensity of their relationship transcended all others. Unity could often not even remember what her Führer had said, only the feeling of all that power focussed on her alone; concentrating her senses into a cerebral vortex of ecstasy. The same power that took the howling masses of half a million people to the point of hysteria; the same power that drilled into the very core of her soul. According to Gaby she said it could only be compared to the feeling she experienced when she was being ‘taken’ by his SS disciples; roped to her deity’s altar, where her senses were concentrated to the point of orgasm. It appeared to be remarkably similar to the sensation that Hitler claimed to experience when bringing his adoring crowds to their climax at one of his numerous rallies.
* * *
In the spring of 1935 Diana also met Hitler, but despite the fact that she would remain loyal to his ideals for the rest of her life, by comparison with her sister her friendship with the Führer remained largely superficial.
That Unity and Diana were ‘young, upper class and socially at ease’ was obvious, but whether ‘Hitler was always impressed by women who had the sophistication, assurance and polish which he knew he himself lacked’18, was open to conjecture. That was certainly not what he saw in Unity and if he had been so impressed by social sophistication he could certainly have chosen a considerably more sophisticated and aristocratic girlfriend than Eva Braun. However, in the surviving documentary footage, Eva comes across as a very different and far more attractive woman than the weak, pitiful character so often portrayed.
Hitler may have ‘enjoyed their unafraid manner’. Diana and Unity may even have appealed to his ‘penchant for the English aristocracy’, if indeed he really had such a thing. Doubtless they were ‘pretty, stylish, frank and amusing’ and chatted away with all the ‘Mitford inconsequence and insouciance’ that ‘made him roar with laughter’. But it is extremely doubtful that there was the merest crumb of truth in the claim that ‘Hitler was very attracted to Diana’ and that ‘their relationship was further strengthened by this subterranean sexual link’1819. While there is no reason to doubt that, like most men, Hitler found Diana aesthetically, though not necessarily sexually, attractive, she never became as close to him as her sister did. In fact, there is evidence to suggest that, motivated by unconscious jealousy, Diana may well have overestimated her own personal magnetism somewhat; certainly as far as Hitler was concerned.
He was also more than capable of seeing through Diana’s rather superficial charm. His ability to judge people’s true motives was illustrated by a George Washington-style anecdote.
Apparently Hitler called in to a small Bavarian inn on his way to Berlin. The Bürgermeister and the other leading men of the village all sat down at a long table with Hitler at its head. Hitler said he would take his customary Fachinger, a mineral water. The great big, beer-blown-up Bürgermeister said he would also take a Fachinger. ‘One by one all down the table, the beer drinkers of Bavaria proclaimed themselves converts to the cold, clear water – All, that is except an inconspicuous citizen at the far end, who apparently had not been listening and who said he would have his usual – a large Stein of Dunkles.’ His neighbours nudged each other and look scandalised. But Hitler called to him down the table, ‘It seems you and I are the only two honest men in this village.’20
Hitler, who would eventually illustrate his contradictory values by marrying Eva Braun shortly before he persuaded her to commit suicide with him, would have been unlikely to have appreciated Diana’s betrayal of her husband and position as Mosley’s mistress, let alone her abandonment of her chi
ldren.
Unfortunately, it was Diana whom Winston Churchill, having recently written that Hitler had ‘succeeded in restoring Germany to the most powerful position in Europe’, invited to lunch to question her about Germany’s leader. The fact that the most profound opinion considered worthy of recording was her observation that Hitler found negotiating with democracies disconcerting – ‘One day you are speaking to one man, the next day to his successor’ – only illustrates her superficial understanding of what drove Adolf Hitler.
However, Diana was said to have ‘found Hitler’s aura of power profoundly exciting or, as she put it, “He was the person in control – the person that everyone was interested in”’21. Compared with Unity’s belief that he was a deity and the incarnation of her deepest beliefs it was, while doubtless an accurate statement, once again a fine example of her somewhat facile understanding of the man.
Hitler may not have liked Churchill, but he was knowledgeable of England and fascinated by the ability of such a small island nation to control and subjugate such a vast empire and its millions of native inhabitants.
Hitler's Valkyrie Page 20