Hitler's Valkyrie

by David R L Litchfield

  Her ladyship was also sufficiently well informed to appreciate that Unity’s attraction to Munich, like many of her contemporaries, was likely to have been sexual:

  Lots of English girls got tied up [!] with SS men, you know, the boots, the red leather in their cars. We had a lot of trouble. Unity was a dumb blonde. She came quite often to see us at home in the Mauerkirchestrasse, but was at the consulate more often still, turning up without an appointment.

  Lady St Clair was not the first person to underestimate Unity’s intelligence. Understandably, her opinion may have been coloured by Unity’s Nazi-based attitude towards Jews. ‘They had taken a lot of Jews to an island in the Danube and stranded them there to die, and she said, “That’s the way to treat them. I wish we could do that in England to our Jews”.’

  The consul’s wife apparently also underestimated both Unity’s and the Mitford family’s Nazi sympathies. Or perhaps she was too polite, or too much of a snob, to admit that such people could possibly be sympathetic with such a ghastly little man as Adolf Hitler. But both Unity and members of her extended family made the extent of their sympathy obvious by their conspicuously exulted position at the London banquet of the Anglo-German Fellowship on 15 December 1936.

  In the main speech of the evening, Ribbentrop demanded the return of German colonies, lost after the First World War. This was also one of Lord Redesdale’s favourite subjects, which he raised in several speeches in the House of Lords. He and Lady Redesdale were seated with Unity at the top table, as were Lord and Lady Rennell, Nancy’s parents-in-law. There was no mention of Nancy having been present, though it seems highly likely as she had already been a member of the BUF for some three years; something that her public tends to overlook.

  * * *

  In 1936, while the rest of the family were becoming increasingly enthusiastic concerning Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, only Jessica continued to swim against the tide by eloping to Spain with her ‘red cousin’, Esmond Romilly; having finally met and fallen in love. In fact, their motivation for heading for Bilbao was more as a result of their commitment to socialism than marriage. But, wherever the Mitfords went, publicity was never far behind. This time Esmond even managed to report their own ‘goings on’ by persuading the News Chronicle, presumably encouraged by the fact that he was Winston Churchill’s nephew, to commission him as their Spanish correspondent.

  Meanwhile, as a cover for her elopement, 19-year-old Jessica had pretended to be staying in Dieppe with her friends, the Paget twins. When they discovered the truth, the Redesdales reacted with customary predictability. Drawing upon their social contacts to do something, within a miraculously short space of time they had enlisted the aid of Anthony Eden, then foreign minister and, somewhat unsurprisingly, cousin Winston. This was claimed to have resulted in the unlikely despatch of a Royal Naval destroyer carrying Nancy, who had been instructed to retrieve the errant couple. The destroyer had, in truth, probably been sent to Spain to rescue British nationals marooned by the conflict, and, as a result of the family’s political connections, Nancy was permitted on board as a passenger. She had no particular interest in their moral welfare but recognised the publicity value and doubtless enjoyed the adventure.

  In the meantime, Sydney had also alerted the media with the story, ‘Pretty teenage daughter of a peer of the realm, eloping with a younger cousin who also happened to be the notorious and rebellious “red” nephew of Winston Churchill.’ The News Chronicle was beside itself with excitement. Young Romilly was already proving an extremely valuable investment and, with the assistance of the Mitford family, was dominating the newspaper headlines with their story. The story was further enhanced when Lord Redesdale had Jessica made a Ward of Court, which was frightfully fashionable at the time, but of course had no legal status south of Dover or north of Carlisle.

  Some cynics even suggested that the couple had initially refused to board the naval destroyer in Spain in the knowledge that the press needed more notice if they were to organise appropriate coverage. Others claimed that a week later they all met up again in the south of France. It looked good in print, although Saint-Jean-de-Luz, where the Navy were dropping off some of their rescued charges, is actually in the Basque area of south-western France, just across the border from Bilbao and rather a long way from the Cote d’Azur. But the press felt safer in France than war-torn Spain, and Nancy was able to organise even more publicity.

  Having arrived, the mothers of both Esmond and Jessica soon decided, to the obvious delight of the press, that their respective son and daughter would indeed make a ‘good match’, and the wedding was swiftly organised to take place on 18 May in Bayonne, the closest large town to Saint-Jean-de-Luz. It was, the newspapers said, ‘the wedding that even a destroyer could not stop’ (for by now Sydney’s claim that the foreign secretary had sent a destroyer whose sole purpose was to find Decca, had been enthusiastically adopted by the press).

  Esmond also continued to fuel the story by referring to the entire Mitford family as Nazis and Lord Redesdale as ‘the Nazi Baron’. This did not prevent Sydney and Nellie Romilly from attending the wedding while Unity, in a letter to Decca, explained in what she no doubt considered her rather ‘conciliatory’ manner:

  My attitude to Esmond is as follows – and I rather expect his to me to be the same. I naturally wouldn’t hesitate to shoot him if it was necessary for my cause, and I should expect him to do the same to me. But in the meanwhile, as that isn’t necessary, I don’t see why we shouldn’t be quite good friends, do you? I wonder if he agrees.

  Meanwhile, Nancy doubtless sold more books and the press more newspapers, while the Mitford girls further enhanced their celebrity status. Even Esmond appeared to be learning a thing or two from the Mitfords as, in order to take advantage of the substantial press coverage, he spent his honeymoon writing an account of his Spanish experience, which was subsequently published under the title Boadilla. Later, Jessica managed to get even further mileage from their story by suggesting that her husband was in fact the illegitimate son of Winston Churchill, obviously having scant regard for the fact that if this had indeed been true, it meant she had married the offspring of half siblings; a somewhat incestuous arrangement.

  For a brief period of time, Unity’s celebrity status was quite overshadowed by the Esmond and Jessica story.

  * * *

  By now Unity’s sister Pamela had also married well, though with a great deal less drama and publicity. Her new husband, Derek Jackson, enjoyed important financial and political qualifications for entry into the Mitford family. He was bisexual and very rich, having inherited a large fortune from his father. He also shared many of Mosley’s and Adolf Hitler’s fascist and racist opinions. Following their wedding at the end of 1936, Pamela and Derek set off to spend their honeymoon, somewhat predictably considering their political leanings, in Vienna.

  Derek’s father, Sir Charles Jackson, and his friend Lord Riddell had, at one time, invested in a number of newspapers together, including The News of the World. Riddell, an honouree member of the British Medical Association was, in Derek’s case, more important than Jackson, due to the influence he appeared to have had on the boy (whose father died when he and his twin brother were only 14 years old). It was a relationship that developed into a shared enthusiasm for fascist and Nazi principles.

  In 1932 Lord Riddell’s socio-political beliefs became public knowledge when he wrote a small but worrying pamphlet entitled ‘Sterilisation of the Unfit’.

  A man of exceptional intelligence, Derek became a leading atomic physicist with an international reputation and a chair at Oxford. He could variously be considered as mad as a March hare, extremely amusing, annoyingly arrogant, deranged, or, indeed, all four. He was certainly blessed with sufficient financial privilege to practice eccentricity on an advanced level.

  There was also something of the notorious wit and friend of the Mitfords, Brian Howard, in Derek Jackson’s humour. Able to speak both French and German, with as strong a
n English accent as he could muster, he was once overheard ‘announcing to a group of bewildered Viennese: “Ich bin steinreich, bildschön und weltberühmt” (I am rich as Croesus, pretty as a picture and world-famous).’6

  The RAF, in which he served with considerable distinction, provided him with a particularly satisfying, reactive audience, especially to his pronouncements concerning the attractions of homosexuality (also interesting in light of the fact that Pamela would eventually adopt that mode of sexual preference) and Nazi politics; quite openly voicing the opinion that all British Jews should be killed. But there was apparently little doubt, certainly amongst the Mitfords and their peers, that Derek, as well as being a committed fascist, an extreme anti-Semite and a screaming snob, was also considered an all-round ‘good egg’!

  * * *

  While Unity’s relationship with Hitler appeared rather benign to many observers, there was increasing evidence of collateral danger for those who got too close. One of those who found himself in this position was Putzi Hanfstaengl, following a bizarre assassination plot in which Hitler was the instigator rather than the victim. Their friendship ended abruptly on 11 February 1937, Putzi’s fiftieth birthday.

  Hitler had arranged for him to be thrown out of a military aircraft over the Spanish Nationalist-held lines. With or without a parachute, his German uniform would have guaranteed his immediate demise. Fortunately, the pilot, a fellow Bavarian, saw fit to forewarn Putzi and let him off the plane after making an excuse for an emergency landing at Zurich (or Leipzig, depending on who you believe).

  A loyal friend of both Unity and Diana, whom he had looked after at party rallies and Brown House functions right until his downfall, Putzi was convinced that a remark made by Unity, either intentionally or otherwise, had started the chain of events.

  The story was that some time previously Putzi had said to Unity that he rather regretted the Nazi Party’s achievement of its unassailable position of power, as he missed the years of struggle and conflict, and that the only place where such things continued was in Spain, and that, consequently, he now envied those who were fighting for Franco. Unity then repeated this story to Hitler, which seemed harmless enough until Hitler, who obviously had doubts concerning Putzi’s loyalty, said, ‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do, we’ll let him fight for Franco if that is what he wants,’ and issued orders for Putzi to be dropped into Spain.

  Having fled from Switzerland to England, Hanfstaengl would eventually end up working for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS, forerunner of the CIA) in America, before returning to Germany after the war. His work for British and American intelligence could of course have been seen as validating Hitler’s suspicions that he was being plotted against, as well as confirming what many considered to be Hitler’s highly developed ability to sense disloyalty and treachery (even while Hitler also possessed an undoubted paranoia).

  * * *

  Unity may have returned to England in 1936 to celebrate the coronation of George VI, to which her parents had been invited, but it was far more likely that she only really went to take delivery of a brand new, shiny black, four-seater MG car that her father bought for her; yet further evidence of his appreciative encouragement of her relationship with Hitler and his ‘warriors’.

  Now she would be able to scream up and down the autobahn with … total freedom and so, with no further ado, she was soon heading back to Munich, for neither London nor Swinbrook held any further attraction for her.

  By now, Unity’s friendship with Hitler had reached new levels of intimacy, and in contradiction of various claims that she never spent time alone with her Führer, Unity’s letters reveal that Hitler ‘often’ invited her back to his flat, where ‘We sat for hours, chatting, quite alone’.

  After Hitler had given one of his hysterically energetic performances at yet another party rally, he would return home quite exhausted. With insufficient energy to even talk, they listened to music together, particularly the 1927 live recordings of Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries from Bayreuth, which would have left them both in a trance-like state of ecstasy.

  Sometimes they would also talk about politics. On more than one occasion Hitler commented on the mistakes he thought Mosley might be making concerning the BUF. Unity later told Diana:

  He said very emphatically that he thought it might have proved a fatal mistake in England to call them Fascists and Blackshirts instead of something typically English and suggested that if he had been starting a party in England he would have gone back to Cromwell and perhaps called his SA Ironsides.

  One wonders if he had been aware that it was Cromwell who allowed the Jews to return to Britain after they were expelled by Edward I in 1290. Apparently, Hitler told Unity that he sometimes wondered if England was ready for fascism. He may also have reminded her how long the English had lived with democracy, particularly in comparison to Germany, and that the last absolute ruler in Britain had in his opinion been William of Orange in 1689.

  But Unity and Hitler also shared a highly developed, if potentially life-threatening, sense of humour, and Gaby Bentinck, whose husband was a direct descendant of one of William’s pages, heard tell that Unity reminded him, ‘You know the first city William of Orange took was not London but Exeter, which he rode into on a white horse, with two hundred black men forming a guard of honour, dressed in white with feathered turbans. Doesn’t it sound just so much like Reichsmarschall Göring?’

  Tears would have rolled down Hitler’s face as, roaring with laughter, he may even have reminded Unity of the other reason why the English would probably never willingly adopt fascism. ‘Your sense of humour, you find everything so funny! Even Reichsmarschall Göring and all those niggers!’

  Many years later, during an interview with the Sunday Express, Nancy, still as bitchily jealous as ever, would support Hitler’s opinion of Unity’s humour with considerably less generosity, while belittling her intelligence and political knowledge: ‘With [Unity] the whole Nazi thing seemed to be a joke. She was great fun. She used to drive round Central Europe in a uniform with a gun. Unity was absolutely unpolitical. No one knew less about politics than she did.’

  This was also a perfect example of the Mitfords’ subsequent trivialisation of the relationship between Adolf Hitler and Unity.

  * * *

  Hitler and Unity undoubtedly shared a reliance on the influence of fantasy. In the latter’s case it was manifest in her love and belief of Milton, Blake and subsequently Wagner, her worship of Hitler and willing participation in physical devotion through sexual submission to his SS disciples. There was also, in Unity’s case, an increasing erotic pleasure in necromancy, gained from submission to Janos Almasy’s physical and spiritual influence.

  Quite how Gaby Bentinck knew such intimate details was never revealed but she was certainly in no doubt that while Janos practiced the more traditional form of occult necromancy, his sexual manifestation of this black art was apparently the practice of asphyxiophilia, erotic oxygen depletion or what he and Unity referred to as ‘gaspers’. It was apparently her willingness to take part in such dangerous practices, in order to heighten the pleasure of their ‘comes’, that endeared her to Janos, on a sexual level at least.

  While Hitler may not have been as susceptible to the more extreme levels of the occult as Himmler, or have relied so heavily on the advice of his crazed spiritual adviser, Karl Maria Wiligut, he certainly accepted and encouraged its influence on the development of the Nazi Party, particularly via Dietrich Eckart, his mentor, a founder member of the NSDAP. Meanwhile, Hitler’s susceptibility to the influence of fantasy during his rise to power would be well recorded, while his obsession with necromancy would become increasingly evident in his belief that he was Germany’s new messiah and in his subsequent responsibility for the deaths of millions.

  The fifteenth-century Munich Manual described the purpose of necromancy to be, amongst other things, ‘To manipulate the mind and will of another person (or people). To drive them mad, to enfl
ame them to love or hatred, to gain their favour or to constrain them to do or not to do some deed’ (translated from Latin). But it cannot be overemphasised that there has never been any evidence that Adolf Hitler ever personally killed anyone, apart from himself.

  It was entirely logical that Unity and her Führer, who had already admitted the sexual euphoria he experienced during his frenzied public speeches, should also achieve sexual fulfilment through shared erotic fantasy.

  According to Gaby Bentinck, who Unity avidly confessed to, the first enactment of this fulfilment took place when Hitler was feeling sufficiently relaxed to take the development of his transcendental sexual relationship with Unity onto another level altogether. Although she knew that, contrary to popular belief, Hitler enjoyed the occasional glass of wine, she had apparently bragged to Gaby that during one of her visits she had been surprised to see a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket and lighted candles on the table in his apartment. Ecstatically apprehensive in the belief that her beloved Führer was intending to seduce her, Unity was somewhat surprised when, after pouring them both a glass, he sank back into the cushions and in the best bedside manner of a family doctor, quietly asked her for details of her erotic devotions with his elite disciples.

  Initially shocked and embarrassed, she found it extremely difficult to answer such direct questions, particularly from someone whom she worshipped. But when it became obvious he had no intention of assigning guilt or being judgemental, she began to relax and as his questions became increasingly more intimate and detailed so did the erotic explicitness of her replies. Also, as Unity became increasingly aware that Hitler’s arousal was heightened by her personal revelations – in the same way that Diana had, in their early days together in Munich, been excited by watching her have sex with her Führer’s Storms – so she in turn was aroused by his mounting excitement.