Born in 1905, Max Schmeling had advanced through the boxing ranks within Germany and Europe and even impressed Jack Dempsey, heavyweight champion, in a friendly fight during the champion’s tour of Europe. But to be a true star of the boxing world, one had to conquer the US. And it was to America, in 1928, the 23–year-old Schmeling travelled.

The Low Blow Champion

It was an astute move, and the young German was soon a sensation winning his initial fights on American soil. In 1930, the reigning heavyweight champion, Gene Tunney, retired and Schmeling was pitted against fellow contender, Jack Sharkey. Schmeling won the fight but not in a manner that he would have liked – Sharkey had knocked the German to the floor but was disqualified for throwing a punch below the belt, leaving Schmeling floored and clutching his groin. Thus, with Sharkey disqualified, Schmeling had become World Heavyweight champion by default. The press derided Schmeling’s victory, calling him the ‘Low Blow Champion,’ a nickname that must have hurt. Sharkey’s team, feeling grieved, demanded an immediate re-match.

As heavyweight champion, the only German to have been so, Max Schmeling dispatched a boxer called Young Stribling, before facing Sharkey again in 1932. This time the fight went to 15 rounds, and Sharkey, to the astonishment of neutral onlookers, was given the fight on points, stripping Schmeling of his title. ‘We woz robbed,’ screamed Schmeling’s Jewish trainer, Joe ‘Yussel the Muscle’ Jacobs. The newspapers, and even the mayor of New York, agreed.

Hitler’s Boxer

The following year, Hitler came to power as German Chancellor, and the persecution against Jews began in earnest. Max Schmeling’s exploits came to the attention of the Nazi Party and they took the young boxer to their breasts as typical of the Aryan ideal. The Nazis enforced a ban on Jews playing any part in boxing, whether as fighter, trainer, promoter or even fan. Schmeling was told to ditch his Jewish trainer, and to Schmeling’s credit, he refused to do so.

New York, with its large Jewish population, associated Schmeling with the new German regime, not helped that Schmeling’s next fight, in June 1933, was against Max Baer. Although himself not a Jew, Baer’s father had been, which, under Nazi classification, made him a Mischlinge. Bauer came into the ring with the Star of David stitched onto his shorts. The fight was seen as good versus evil, with Schmeling cast as Hitler’s representative in the boxing ring. Baer, much to America’s delight, won.

Schmeling v Louis

Despite the loss, Schmeling was offered the chance to fight fellow contender, Joe Louis (pictured). Louis was not only the role model of African-Americans but of Americans everywhere as the embodiment of a rags to riches tale, a man living the American dream.  Against him, Max Schmeling represented the polar opposite, the land of anti-Semitism and oppression. The Nazis were displeased that Schmeling should deign to fight a Negro but the fight went ahead on 19 June 1936. Schmeling, the underdog, floored Louis twice, knocking him out in the 12^th round and winning convincingly. Schmeling was delighted but not overly surprised: ‘I wouldn’t have fought a colored man if I didn’t think I could lick him,’ he told reporters.

Schmeling returned to a hero’s welcome in Germany not by ship but by another symbol of German superiority, the Hindenburg airship. Schmeling’s victory was ‘not only sport’, crowed the Nazi weekly journal Das Schwarze Korps (The Black Corps), ‘it was a question of prestige for our race.’ A new film was released, Schmeling’s Victory: A German Victory, and shown throughout the country. Schmeling was feted as all that was good in Nazi Germany, appearing smiling at the side of Hitler, a fan of boxing, and Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels. (Indeed, Schmeling’s wife, Anny, listened to the fight on the radio in Goebbels’s living room). When later quizzed about his meetings with Hitler, Schmeling responded by saying, ‘I once went to dinner with Franklin Roosevelt; that did not make me a Democrat’. But Schmeling did attend Nazi rallies at Nuremberg and supported Nazi charities.

Schmeling returned to New York in May 1937 and had been booked onto the Hindenburg but a last-minute change of plan meant he travelled instead by sea. Thus, by a quirk of fate, Schmeling missed being on the Hindenburg when, arriving in New Jersey, it exploded into flames, claiming the lives of 36.

In New York, Schmeling became a spokesman for Germany, often quizzed about life under the Nazis. For Schmeling, the pressure must have been difficult especially when the pressure came from Hitler himself: ‘When you go to the United States, you’re going to obviously be interviewed by people who are thinking that very bad things are going on in Germany at this moment. And I hope you’ll be able to tell them that the situation isn’t as bleak as they think it is.’ Hence, in one interview, he said, ‘I have seen no Jews suffer… whatever pain they are undergoing they have brought on themselves by circulating anti-Nazi horror stories in New York and elsewhere.’

Schmeling v Louis: the re-match

Having beaten Joe Louis, Schmeling now wanted a chance of regaining the title from the reigning champion James Braddock, but Braddock’s camp feigned injury, not wanting to be involved with the man they considered a Nazi puppet. Instead, Braddock fought Joe Louis and lost. The Brown Bomber was now the heavyweight champion of the world.

The much-anticipated Louis–Schmeling rematch of 22 June 1938 (pictured) was billed as the ‘fight of the century’, with its politically charged rivalry between the land of the free and the land of Aryan racial purity. Among the 70,000 audience were Gary Cooper and Clark Gable. As he approached the ring, Schmeling was greeted with jeers and pelted with rubbish. The fight lasted all of two minutes and four seconds when Schmeling was knocked out. He spent ten days in hospital recovering from his injuries which included a number of broken ribs. Louis had got his revenge and democracy, it seemed, had triumphed over fascism. But ultimately it was about boxing and that on this particular occasion, the American was better than the German.

The German ambassador in America tried to persuade Schmeling to claim foul play against Louis but Schmeling refused. This time, when Schmeling returned to Germany, by humble ship, there was no celebration, no welcome party. Schmeling, now considered a loser, was shunned by the party that had been so keen to embrace him.

Schmeling may have previously appeared as an apologist for the Nazi regime but when faced with its reality, he demonstrated true courage. On the night of 10-11 November 1938, when the Nazis unleashed their battering of Jews and Jewish synagogues and businesses during what became known as Kristallnacht, Schmeling hid two Jewish brothers in his hotel suite for two days, sharing what food he had with them and refusing all visitors, claiming he was ill. Later, Schmeling spirited the boys and family out of Germany. One of them, Henri Lewin, speaking in 1989, paid homage to the boxer, saying that had they been discovered, ‘I would not be here this evening, and neither would Max’.

Private Schmeling

With the outbreak of war in 1939, Schmeling was forcibly drafted into the German army as a paratrooper (pictured) and, as a 36-year-old private, saw action during the Battle of Crete in 1941 where he was wounded. Schmeling believed that the particularly perilous assignment had been the Nazi Party’s revenge on him. No doubt they hoped he would be killed and provide them with a new martyr. When ordered by Goebbels to fabricate tales for the press relating to supposed British barbarity against German prisoners, Schmeling refused. He was promptly court-martialed on the personal orders of the Propaganda Minister.

Post-war, Schmeling, living in Germany and in need of money, fought five more matches, his first fights since before the war. He fought and lost his final fight in 1948, as a 43-year-old. He started working for the German branch of Cola-Cola, eventually running his own bottling plant and becoming very rich in the process. Meanwhile, in the US, Joe Louis fell on hard times, unable to pay mounting tax debts. Schmeling visited his former boxing rival in the US and helped him along financially. When Louis died in 1981, Schmeling contributed towards the cost of the funeral.

After 54 years of marriage, Schmeling’s wife, Anny, died in 1987. Anny, a former actress of Polish-Czech descent, had starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1929 film, Blackmail, Britain’s first talkie.

Max Schmeling died on 2 February 2005, seven months short of his hundredth birthday.

Rupert Colley

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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Hitler’s First Love

Adolf Hitler’s first love, in Vienna, was a Jewish girl called Stefanie but, lacking the courage, he never spoke to her. Instead, he wrote love poems about her which his youthful friend, the poor August Kubizek, had to endure.

Hitler extolled the virtues of men remaining celibate until the age of 25. He was both repulsed and fascinated by prostitutes and although he preached that only men of inferior races went to prostitutes he obliged Kubizek to accompany him on numerous trips into Vienna’s red light districts. Rumours persisted that Hitler caught syphilis from a Jewish prostitute. In the early 1920s, Hitler’s driver spoke of them cruising the Munich nightclubs.

Once he had become a national figure, Hitler’s relations with women were always marred by his belief that he was wedded to his mission. A wife would not only be a distraction; it could damage his popularity in the eyes of his female fans. Evidence of Hitler’s popularity amongst women first surfaced during his trial following the failed Munich Putsch in which daily the courtroom was jammed with female admirers. On the day of sentencing, it was festooned with flowers.

In 1926 the 37-year-old Hitler began seeing a sixteen-year-old called Maria (or ‘Mitzi’) Reiter. But his dedication to his mission caused her to be sidelined. Depressed by his lack of attention, Reiter tried to commit suicide.

Hitler and his niece

In 1929 Hitler started on a relationship, maybe intimate, with the daughter of his half-sister, 20-year-old Geli Raubal. Raubal moved into Hitler’s Munich flat and Hitler became obsessed with his niece and boiled over in rage when she started dating his driver, who was immediately sacked (although later re-instated). Hitler started controlling every aspect of Raubal’s life. On 19 September 1931, she was found dead in Hitler’s flat. Aged 23, she had shot herself. Devastated, Hitler became more withdrawn. Heinrich Hoffman, Hitler’s official photographer, later stated that Raubal’s death ‘was when the seeds of inhumanity began to grow inside Hitler’.

Mrs Hitler

Eva Braun worked as a photographic assistant and model for Hoffman and it was through him she met the 40-year-old Hitler as a 17-year-old in 1929. Their relationship began soon after Raubal’s suicide and possibly before. Raubal’s jealousy of Braun has been mooted as a possible cause of his niece’s suicide. Braun, like Mitzi before her, was sidelined. Again, Hitler’s lack of attention resulted in an attempted suicide. Twice Braun tried, once by shooting herself, the second time by poison. Although Hitler looked after her materially, Braun was usually marginalised and only Hitler’s immediate circle knew of her existence. As the end of the war approached Braun refused to leave Hitler’s side and joined him inside the bunker beneath the Reich Chancellery. Finally, aged 33, Braun was allowed to marry her man. Within 40 hours they were dead.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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And so in Munich, Hitler planned his overthrow, or putsch, of the Bavarian government followed by a ‘March on Berlin’. The date set, Sunday 11 November 1923, was an auspicious anniversary – five years on from Germany’s defeat in the war, and, on a more practical level, being a Sunday, a day when the armed forces and police were on reserve strength. (Pictured is Hitler and his Munich entourage including, second from right, Ernst Röhm).

A Beer Hall in Munich

But when Hitler learned about, and indeed was invited to, a public meeting in a Munich beer hall on the evening of 8 November, hosted by government figures such as Gustav Ritter von Kahr, leader of the Bavarian Government, and the Bavarian chiefs of police and army, the opportunity was too perfect to pass by. At his side were Hermann Goring and Rudolf Hess.

The National Revolution Has Begun

As the meeting progressed, Hitler’s armed corps of bodyguards, the SA, silently surrounded the building. With the bulk of his men in place, others noisily barged into the beer hall, interrupting proceedings and shouting ‘Heil Hitler’.

A machine gun was hauled in and the audience, fearing a massacre, cowered and hid beneath their chairs. Hitler took his cue and, brandishing a revolver, charged to the front, leaped onto a chair and, firing two shots into the ceiling, declared that he was the new leader of the German government and that the ‘National revolution (had) begun’. He then forced the three men on the stage, Kahr and his chiefs, into a side room, apologised to them for the inconvenience, and promised them prestigious jobs in his new Germany.

Returning to the stage, Hitler delivered a rousing speech, winning over his audience who applauded ecstatically. They applauded with equal enthusiasm when Hitler’s famous co-conspirator, General Erich von Ludendorff, made his appearance. Ludendorff, as the joint head of Germany’s military during the First World War, was well-known and respected, and Hitler hoped that with Ludendorff as his mascot it would win him support. It seemed to be working.

Ludendorff’s task was to persuade Kahr and his chiefs to support the revolution and join the March on Berlin. After some reluctance, the three men eventually acquiesced.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the city, the SA, led by Hitler’s confidant, Ernst Rohm, was successfully securing vital strong points. Hitler, his speech done and his audience converted, left the beer hall to check on progress.

The Gullible Old General

During Hitler’s absence, Kahr and his chiefs confirmed to Ludendorff their newfound allegiance and asked permission to leave in order to issue orders. Ludendorff, always trusting of fellow men in uniforms, gave his approval. Hitler, on his return, was furious that Ludendorff should have been so gullible.

Across the city scuffles continued throughout the night and confusion reigned as night turned into day. In the morning, Hitler ordered a march through the city to meet Rohm who, earlier, had seized the offices of the city’s War Ministry. With the chastised Ludendorff at his side and about 2,000 men behind him, Hitler set off. But in front of the Feldherrenhalle (the Field Marshals’ Hall) in central town, their way was blocked by a contingent of police. A gunfight ensued and four police officers and sixteen Nazis were killed. Ludendorff marched towards the police lines and was promptly arrested; Goring was badly injured but made his escape (eventually to Austria); and Hitler, falling to the ground, dislocated his shoulder.

Hitler managed to escape to a friend’s house, where, suicidal, he wrote various letters, including one where he handed over the leadership of the party to Alfred Rosenberg.

But Hitler’s luck was about to run out. He was arrested. The Munich Putsch had failed.

Hitler’s Trial

Opening on 26 February 1924 and lasting 24 days, Hitler’s trial offered him his biggest platform to date. Outside Bavaria Hitler was little known. But following the trial, Hitler’s name had become known throughout Germany.

I alone bear the responsibility

Presiding over the proceedings, the Minister of Justice, Franz Gurtner, was, at heart, a Nazi sympathiser, as were the judges. Whilst Ludendorff lied about having anything to do with the putsch and treated the judges as subordinates on the parade ground, Hitler declared his guilt with pride, appealing to the nationalistic patriotism of his listeners: ‘I alone bear the responsibility,’ he told the bench, ‘but I am not a criminal because of that … There is no such thing as treason against the November criminals’. (Hitler was referring to the German politicians that had surrendered in November 1918).

Hitler Guilty

The nation waited for the verdict. Ludendorff was acquitted. Hitler was found guilty and sentenced to five years. Given the evidence against him, an acquittal for Hitler risked the case going to the higher court where judges made of sterner stuff would not have tolerated Hitler’s long speeches and where the maximum penalty for high treason, the death penalty, would have been a distinct possibility. Thus the sentence of five years was deemed extremely light. Sentenced to the Landsberg prison, Hitler was spared prison uniform and permitted to wear his Lederhosen, granted a spacious room, and greeted by the prison wardens with a ‘Heil Hitler’, whilst his fellow prisoners would wait at the table before mealtime until Hitler had sat down.

My 4 1/2 Year Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice

Although frequently depressed and talking of suicide, Hitler used his time in prison constructively, dictating to Hess his autobiographical, ideological rant Mein Kampf. Published on 18 July 1925, it was originally entitled My 4 1/2 Year Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice; the new title being suggested by his publisher.

Hitler served only eight months of his five-year sentence and by the time of his release he had converted most of the prison staff and his fellow prisoners to National Socialism. Immediately on his release, he took up the reins of his party, and visited the Bavarian president, Dr Held, and promised that from then on the Nazi party would respect the legal process. The ban placed on the party within the province following the putsch was lifted, and Held boasted to his colleagues that he had tamed the wild beast. Little did he know…

Postscripts:

Gustav Ritter von Kahr was made to pay for his treachery – he was murdered during the ‘Night of the Long Knives‘ in June 1934.

Ernst Rohm, head of the SA, became increasingly a menace and potential threat to Hitler and was the main reason and victim of the ‘Night of the Long Knives’.

Rudolf Hess was also sentenced for his part in the Munich Putsch and served alongside Hitler.

Alfred Rosenberg had been a member of the German Workers’ Party, forerunner to the Nazi Party, from its inception in January 1919, joining it even before Hitler, who joined in the October. Hitler’s handing over of power to Rosenberg following his arrest was a shrewd move. At the risk of the party disintegrating, he knew Rosenberg, lacking the necessary credentials, would make a poor leader and pose no threat to his own leadership. Sure enough, on Hitler’s release from prison, Rosenberg stepped aside.

The proprietors of the Munich beer hall claimed for the damages: 143 broken beer mugs, 80 broken glasses, 98 stools, 148 pieces of cutlery, plus two unsightly holes in the ceiling.

November 8th and 9th became important occasions in the Nazi calendar as the sixteen ‘blood martyrs’ that died that night at the Munich Putsch were solemnly commemorated each year on the 8th. On the 9th, re-enactments were held of the dramatic events. The flag carried that night, stained with the blood of the Nazi martyrs, the ‘blood flag’, became a symbolic relic of the regime.

In 1935, Hitler had the martyrs reburied in front of the Field Marshals’ Hall in a  Temple of Honour’, adorned with flags and sarcophagi. The ceremony, on the anniversary in 1935, was accompanied by muffled drums and mournful parades down torchlit streets and the display of the blood flag.

Today in front of the Field Marshals’ Hall is a simple plaque to the four policemen who died that night (pictured). The inscription reads: To the members of the Bavarian Police, who gave their lives opposing the National Socialist coup on 9 November 1923.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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The words were Winston Churchill’s and the great general he was referring to was Erwin Rommel.

The Desert Fox

Born 15 November 1891, Erwin Rommel was, as Churchill suggests, respected as a master tactician, the supreme strategist who, in 1940, helped defeat France and the Low Countries and then found lasting fame when sent by Hitler to North Africa where, commanding the Afrika Korps, he earned the sobriquet, the Desert Fox. Germany, his nation, adored him, his troops loved him, Hitler treasured him and his enemies respected him. His Afrika Korps was never charged with any war crimes and prisoners of war were treated humanely. When his only son, Manfred, proposed joining the Waffen SS, Rommel forbade it.

In June 1944 Rommel was sent to Northern France to help coordinate the defence against the Allied Normandy Invasion but was wounded a month later when an RAF plane strafed his car. Rommel returned home to Germany to convalesce.

The July Bomb Plot

Meanwhile, on 20 July 1944, Hitler survived an assassination attempt in his Wolf’s Lair in East Prussia, the ‘July Bomb Plot’, perpetuated by Nazi officers who hoped to shorten the war with his removal. Hitler, although shaken, suffered only superficial injuries, and those responsible were soon rounded up and executed. Rommel, although not involved and actively against any plan to assassinate Hitler, did support the idea of having him removed from power. Once his association with the plotters, however tenuous, came to light, his downfall was inevitable and swift.

On 14 October 1944, Hitler dispatched two generals to Rommel’s home in Herrlingen to offer the fallen Field Marshal a bleak choice. Manfred, aged 15, was at home with his mother when the call came. He waited nervously as the three men talked in private, and then as his father went upstairs to speak to his mother. Finally, Rommel spoke to his son and told him of Hitler’s deal.

Manfred’s story

Writing after the war, Manfred described the scene as his father said, ‘”I have just had to tell your mother that I shall be dead in a quarter of an hour… The house is surrounded and Hitler is charging me with high treason. In view of my services in Africa, I am to have the chance of dying by poison. The two generals have brought it with them. It’s fatal in three seconds. If I accept, none of the usual steps will be taken against my family, that is against you.”

‘”Do you believe it?”‘ asked Manfred.

‘”Yes, I believe it. It is very much in their interest to see that the affair does not come out into the open. By the way, I have been charged to put you under a promise of the strictest silence. If a single word of this comes out, they will no longer feel themselves bound by the agreement.”‘

Manfred continues, ‘The car stood ready. The SS driver swung the door open and stood to attention. My father pushed his Marshal’s baton under his left arm, and with his face calm, gave Aldinger (Rommel’s aide) and me his hand once more before getting in the car… My father did not turn again as the car drove quickly off up the hill and disappeared around a bend in the road. When it had gone Aldinger and I turned and walked silently back into the house.

‘Twenty minutes later the telephone rang. Aldinger lifted the receiver and my father’s death was duly reported.’

A loyal German soldier

Having died from ‘the injuries sustained during the RAF attack in France’, Erwin Rommel was, as promised, buried with full military honours, accorded an official day of mourning, and his family pensioned off.

Writing after the war, Churchill wrote that Rommel was deserving of ‘our respect, because, although a loyal German soldier, he came to hate Hitler and all his works, and took part in the conspiracy to rescue Germany by displacing the maniac and tyrant. For this, he paid the forfeit of his life.’

Pictured is Rommel’s memorial at the place of his suicide at Herrlingen in southern Germany, but, since 1968, known as Blaustein. Manfred died in November 2013, aged 84.

Rupert Colley.

Read more about the war in The Clever Teens Guide to World War Two available as an ebook and 80-page paperback from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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Born 28 September 1905, Max Schmeling had advanced through the boxing ranks within Germany and Europe and even impressed Jack Dempsey, heavyweight champion, in a friendly fight during the champion’s tour of Europe. But to be a true star of the boxing world, one had to conquer the US. And it was to America, in 1928, the 23–year-old Schmeling travelled.

The Low Blow Champion

It was an astute move, and the young German was soon a sensation, winning his initial fights on American soil. In 1930, the reigning heavyweight champion, Gene Tunney, retired and Schmeling was pitted against fellow contender, Jack Sharkey. Schmeling won the fight but not in a manner that he would have liked – Sharkey had knocked the German to the floor but was disqualified for throwing a punch below the belt, leaving Schmeling floored and clutching his groin. Thus, with Sharkey disqualified, Schmeling had become World Heavyweight champion by default. The press derided Schmeling’s victory, calling him the ‘Low Blow Champion,’ a nickname that must have hurt. Sharkey’s team, feeling grieved, demanded an immediate re-match.

As heavyweight champion, the only German to have been so, Max Schmeling dispatched a boxer called Young Stribling, before facing Sharkey again in 1932. This time the fight went to 15 rounds, and Sharkey, to the astonishment of neutral onlookers, was given the fight on points, stripping Schmeling of his title. ‘We woz robbed,’ screamed Schmeling’s Jewish trainer, Joe ‘Yussel the Muscle’ Jacobs. The newspapers, and even the mayor of New York, agreed.

Hitler’s Boxer

The following year, Hitler came to power as German Chancellor and the persecution against Jews began in earnest. Max Schmeling’s exploits came to the attention of the Nazi Party and they took the young boxer to their breasts as typical of the Aryan ideal. The Nazis enforced a ban on Jews playing any part in boxing, whether as fighter, trainer, promoter or even fan. Schmeling was told to ditch his Jewish trainer, and to Schmeling’s credit, he refused to do so.

New York, with its large Jewish population, associated Schmeling with the new German regime, not helped that Schmeling’s next fight, in June 1933, was against Max Baer. Although himself not a Jew, Baer’s father had been, which, under Nazi classification, made him a Mischlinge. Bauer came into the ring with the Star of David stitched onto his shorts. The fight was seen as good versus evil, with Schmeling cast as Hitler’s representative in the boxing ring. Baer, much to America’s delight, won.

Schmeling v Louis

Despite the loss, Schmeling was offered the chance to fight fellow contender, Joe Louis (pictured). Louis was not only the role model of African-Americans but of Americans everywhere as the embodiment of a rags to riches tale, a man living the American dream.  Against him, Max Schmeling represented the polar opposite, the land of anti-Semitism and oppression. The Nazis were displeased that Schmeling should deign to fight a Negro but the fight went ahead on 19 June 1936. Schmeling, the underdog, floored Louis twice, knocking him out in the 12^th round and winning convincingly. Schmeling was delighted but not overly surprised: ‘I wouldn’t have fought a colored man if I didn’t think I could lick him,’ he told reporters.

Schmeling returned to a hero’s welcome in Germany not by ship but by another symbol of German superiority, the Hindenburg airship. Schmeling’s victory was ‘not only sport’, crowed the Nazi weekly journal Das Schwarze Korps (The Black Corps), ‘it was a question of prestige for our race.’ A new film was released, Schmeling’s Victory: A German Victory, and shown throughout the country. Schmeling was feted as all that was good in Nazi Germany, appearing smiling at the side of Hitler, a fan of boxing, and Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels. (Indeed, Schmeling’s wife, Anny, listened to the fight on the radio in Goebbels’s living room). When later quizzed about his meetings with Hitler, Schmeling responded by saying, ‘I once went to dinner with Franklin Roosevelt; that did not make me a Democrat’. But Schmeling did attend Nazi rallies at Nuremberg and supported Nazi charities.

Schmeling returned to New York in May 1937 and had been booked onto the Hindenburg but a last-minute change of plan meant he travelled instead by sea. Thus, by a quirk of fate, Schmeling missed being on the Hindenburg when, arriving in New Jersey, it exploded into flames, claiming the lives of 36.

In New York, Schmeling became a spokesman for Germany, often quizzed about life under the Nazis. For Schmeling, the pressure must have been difficult, especially when the pressure came from Hitler himself: ‘When you go to the United States, you’re going to obviously be interviewed by people who are thinking that very bad things are going on in Germany at this moment. And I hope you’ll be able to tell them that the situation isn’t as bleak as they think it is.’ Hence, in one interview, he said, ‘I have seen no Jews suffer… whatever pain they are undergoing they have brought on themselves by circulating anti-Nazi horror stories in New York and elsewhere.’

Schmeling v Louis: the re-match

Having beaten Joe Louis, Schmeling now wanted a chance of regaining the title from the reigning champion James Braddock, but Braddock’s camp feigned injury, not wanting to be involved with the man they considered a Nazi puppet. Instead, Braddock fought Joe Louis and lost. The Brown Bomber was now the heavyweight champion of the world.

The much-anticipated Louis–Schmeling rematch of 22 June 1938 (pictured) was billed as the ‘fight of the century’, with its politically charged rivalry between the land of the free and the land of Aryan racial purity. Among the 70,000 audience were Gary Cooper and Clark Gable. As he approached the ring, Schmeling was greeted with jeers and pelted with rubbish. The fight lasted all of two minutes and four seconds when Schmeling was knocked out. He spent ten days in hospital recovering from his injuries which included a number of broken ribs. Louis had got his revenge and democracy, it seemed, had triumphed over fascism. But ultimately it was about boxing and that on this particular occasion, the American was better than the German.

The German ambassador in America tried to persuade Schmeling to claim foul play against Louis but Schmeling refused. This time, when Schmeling returned to Germany, by humble ship, there was no celebration, no welcome party. Schmeling, now considered a loser, was shunned by the party that had been so keen to embrace him.

Schmeling may have previously appeared as an apologist for the Nazi regime but when faced with its reality, he demonstrated true courage. On the night of 10-11 November 1938, when the Nazis unleashed their battering of Jews and Jewish synagogues and businesses during what became known as Kristallnacht, Schmeling hid two Jewish brothers in his hotel suite for two days, sharing what food he had with them and refusing all visitors, claiming he was ill. Later, Schmeling spirited the boys and family out of Germany. One of them, Henri Lewin, speaking in 1989, paid homage to the boxer, saying that had they been discovered, ‘I would not be here this evening, and neither would Max’.

Private Schmeling

With the outbreak of war in 1939, Schmeling was forcibly drafted into the German army as a paratrooper (pictured) and, as a 36-year-old private, saw action during the Battle of Crete in 1941 where he was wounded. Schmeling believed that the particularly perilous assignment had been the Nazi Party’s revenge on him. No doubt they hoped he would be killed and provide them with a new martyr. When ordered by Goebbels to fabricate tales for the press relating to supposed British barbarity against German prisoners, Schmeling refused. He was promptly court-martialed on the personal orders of the Propaganda Minister.

Post-war, Schmeling, living in Germany and in need of money, fought five more matches, his first fights since before the war. He fought and lost his final fight in 1948, as a 43-year-old. He started working for the German branch of Cola-Cola, eventually running his own bottling plant and becoming very rich in the process. Meanwhile, in the US, Joe Louis fell on hard times, unable to pay mounting tax debts. Schmeling visited his former boxing rival in the US and helped him along financially. When Louis died in 1981, Schmeling contributed towards the cost of the funeral.

After 54 years of marriage, Schmeling’s wife, Anny, died in 1987. Anny, a former actress of Polish-Czech descent, had starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1929 film, Blackmail, Britain’s first talkie.

Max Schmeling died on 2 February 2005, seven months short of his hundredth birthday.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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In 1907, Hitler moved to Vienna while August Kubizek remained in Linz to work as an apprentice for his father’s upholstery business which was destined to become his trade. But Hitler somehow managed to persuade Kubizek’s father to allow Gustl to join him in Vienna and be allowed to pursue his musical ambitions.

Vienna

Thus the two friends were reunited and shared a room in Vienna. But while Kubizek was successful in his application to the Vienna Music Conservatory, Hitler failed twice to get a place at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. So ashamed of his failure that for a while Hitler kept it hidden from his friend.

In 1912, Kubizek went back to Linz for a brief visit. He returned to Vienna to find Hitler had moved out and had left no forwarding address. He was not to see Hitler again until 26 years later, in 1938.

Kubizek embarked on what promised to be a successful musical career but cut short by the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Following the war, he became a council official.

The Reunion

In 1938, Hitler, by now the most powerful man in Germany, was paying a visit to his hometown of Linz when he agreed to meet up with Kubizek. They met in a hotel lounge and reminisced for an hour. Hitler offered to revive his old friend’s musical career but Kubizek, by now 50-years-old, declined the offer. But he did accept Hitler’s offer of funding his three sons through music school, and for years to come Hitler would send birthday presents to Kubizek’s elderly mother.

August Kubizek reminded Hitler of an occasion when, together in Linz, they went to see a performance of Wagner’s Rienzi. Hitler had come out mesmerized, as if in a trance. Hitler gripped Kubizek’s hands and “spoke of a mission that he was one day to receive from our people, in order to guide them out of slavery, to the heights of freedom.” Hitler remembered the occasion well, looked wistfully at his old friend and said, “It began at that hour …”

‘My Childhood Friend’

In 1939 and 1940 Hitler invited Kubizek to sit with him at the Bayreuth Festival in Bavaria, an annual celebration of the music of Richard Wagner. The occasions were, according to Kubizek in words reminiscent of Hitler’s style, the “happiest hours of my earthly existence.” Thus their friendship ended where it had begun thirty years before.

In 1951 August Kubizek wrote his memoirs, Adolf Hitler, My Childhood Friend, in which he which he declared, “No power on earth could compel me to deny my friendship with Adolf Hitler.”

He died, aged 68, on 23 October 1956, the very day the Hungarian Revolution broke out.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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It wasn’t his first experience of German penal hospitality; twice before Fallada, born 21 July 1893, had been locked up on charges of embezzlement. Now, during his three-month spell in a psychiatric institution, he had chance to reflect on his life as a writer, husband and father living under Nazi tyranny, and felt impelled to write it all down. His request for pen and paper, in order, he said, to write a children’s book, was granted. Thus, with 92 sheets of paper at his disposal, he began to write.

It doesn’t hurt so much

Incarcerated in the ‘house of the dead’, as he called it, and sharing a cell with ‘a schizophrenic murderer and a castrated sex offender’, and checked on at regular intervals by the prison guards, Fallada wrote in minuscule letters, full of abbreviations and code words. His project was foolhardy, criticizing the very people holding him captive, and could have ended badly for himself and his friends and family. Nonetheless he pressed on, venting eleven years of ‘anger, bitterness and sometimes fear’ on the regime that had done so much to ruin the ‘unfortunate but blessed nation’ he loved so much. At the end of it, he writes of the cathartic release – ‘the old hatred of the Nazis is still there,’ he writes, ‘but it doesn’t hurt quite so much.’

Other German writers had fled abroad, but not Fallada despite being labelled for a while as an ‘undesirable writer’. Starting his memoir in January 1933, the month Hitler came to power, Fallada, a staunch anti-Nazi, wrote of living under the new, brutal regime. Laced with irony, Fallada begins by mocking the dim-witted Nazis, ‘psychopaths and sadists’, with their absurd obsession for uniforms, rituals and petty rules. But of course, living in Nazi Germany was no joke, and the mocking is soon replaced by expressions of incredulity and mounting anger.

Arrested previously in 1933 and temporarily detained in a filthy cell, Fallada experienced first-hand the Nazi ability to disregard an individual’s rights, and the presumption of guilt based on no more than the say-so of a Nazi informant. The law may have been on his side, but justice was easily trumped by loyalty to the regime.

All-pervading the poisonousness  

He witnesses the rising anti-Semitism in Germany as Jewish friends find their lives increasingly straitjacketed by new edits and pronouncements. Yet in describing one Jewish acquaintance, Fallada uses an alarming number of stereotypical and frankly anti-Semitic terms, right down to the hooked nose and the words ‘little, degenerate Jew… and grotesquely ugly’. A footnote tells us that in revising the text after the war, Fallada realised what he had written. It just showed, he said, how invidious and all-pervading the poisonous atmosphere of anti-Semitism and how, unbeknownst, it seeped into ‘even the healthiest of bodies’.

Continually droll and occasionally funny, we admire Fallada as a man prepared, even in minor ways, to stand up to the knuckle-headed Nazis. But we also glimpse a man who could be prone to self-pity and often vain. Perhaps conscious of this, Fallada tries to use a self-deprecating tone, occasionally referring to himself in the third person, but the true meaning is still there to be seen. He bore grudges heavily and for sustained periods, often for years. He comes across occasionally as rather high-handed. His treatment of an elderly couple, which in his mind was perfectly justifiable, comes over as bullish. But so convinced is he in the justice of his cause, he fails to see how his actions can impact on others. He makes no mention of his disintegrating marriage, or his violent outbursts, let alone the argument that resulted in him being locked up in an asylum.

Small Battles

But, as we must remember, Fallada was writing under the most difficult of circumstances, fearful of being found out, and, until after the war, without the benefit of a second draft. What we are left with is a vivid, honest account of everyday life under a cruel, unforgiving regime. His is not an account of a brave resistance hero but, as Fallada himself states, merely of the daily struggle, the ‘small battles’, experienced by all those who didn’t fawn in front of the Nazi demagogues.

One day, half way through his sentence, Fallada was allowed home for the day. He took the opportunity to smuggle out his manuscript and hide it where it remained to the end of the war. Now, seventy years later, it is for the first time available in English.

Hans Fallada died 5 February 1947, aged 53.

A Stranger in My Own Country: The 1944 Prison Diary by Hans Fallada is published by Polity Press.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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Count Stauffenberg loses faith

A fervent supporter of Hitler, 36-year-old Count Claus von Stauffenberg had fought bravely during the Second World War for the Fuhrer. Fighting in Tunisia in 1943, Stauffenberg was badly wounded, losing his left eye, his right hand and two fingers of his left. Once recovered, Stauffenberg was transferred to the Eastern Front where he witnessed the atrocities firsthand which made him question his loyalty. As it became increasingly apparent that Germany would not win the war, Stauffenberg lost faith in Hitler and the Nazi cause.

At some point in early 1944, Stauffenberg joined a group of German officers intent on bringing the war to a quick end and negotiating peace with the Allies. Their biggest obstacle was of course Hitler.

But the plotters received a bit of luck when Stauffenberg was appointed to the staff of the Reserve Army, reporting directly to General Friedrich Fromm, another officer who had lost faith in the Nazi cause. When Stauffenberg was invited to a meeting in Hitler’s Wolf’s Lair in Rastenburg, East Prussia, for 20 July, the opportunity seemed perfect.

The conspirators hatched their plan, codenamed Valkyrie, and crucial to its success was Stauffenberg’s proximity to Hitler.

‘I Am Alive, I Am Alive’

About to attend the meeting, Stauffenberg, lacking time to prepare two devices, only managed to prepare one bomb. With it set to detonate after ten minutes, Stauffenberg entered the meeting room at the Wolf’s Lair and found Hitler poring over a large air reconnaissance report from the Eastern Front spread across a table. The Count placed his briefcase beneath the map table and, as prearranged, received a phone call, necessitating his immediate attention and departure. (Picture: five days before the event, a photograph taken at the Wolf’s Lair with Stauffenberg, far left, Hitler, and Wilhelm Keitel, right).

Whilst Stauffenberg made good his escape, an attendant, with his foot, pushed the briefcase further under the heavy oak table so that when, at 12.42, the two-pound bomb went off, the thickness of the wood spared Hitler the main thrust of the explosion.

Billows of black smoke poured from the windows of the meeting room, and staggering out leaning on each other were two men, their clothes torn to shreds, their skin blackened, and their hair singed. One of them was General Wilhelm Keitel, the other was Hitler himself, muttering “What was that? I am alive, I am alive!”

Arrest him immediately

Hitler was examined – contusion on the left arm, damage to his eardrums and wooden splinters in his legs from the floorboards. (His trousers were torn to shreds, as seen in the picture below). Considering his proximity to the bomb his survival was miraculous. So superficial his injuries he was able to keep an appointment that afternoon with Italian leader, Benito Mussolini, meeting him in person at the local railway station and shaking Il Duce’s hand with his left. Hitler himself put his survival down to the hand of providence. Germany, the fates dictated, would win the war and Hitler’s life had been spared to ensure it.

Others had been more seriously injured and taken to hospital. Four of them later died. The movements of all were scrutinised and it soon became apparent that Stauffenberg, seen leaving hurriedly in his car, was the culprit. “Arrest him immediately!” bellowed Hitler.

Hitler is dead

Early afternoon, Thursday 20 July 1944 – Count Claus von Stauffenberg, believing that he had successfully killed Hitler, returned to Berlin. The first part of the operation had been successfully completed. Now he issued the codeword, Valkyrie, the instruction for the Reserve Army to place Germany under a state of emergency. General Friedrich Fromm, Stauffenberg’s senior officer within the Reserve Army, informed local commanders that a new administration would be formed.

However, one of those commanders, Major Remer, received a telephone call directly from Hitler where the Fuhrer informed the Major that, contrary to popular rumour, he was still very much alive – and in control.

When it became obvious that the coup had failed, Fromm, in an attempt to distance himself from the conspirators, ordered the arrest and immediate execution of Stauffenberg. The Count was detained and duly shot, along with three others, at one in the morning, just over 12 hours after the bomb had gone off, and hastily buried in the grounds of the War Ministry.

Himmler takes control

But it did Fromm little good. Once Heinrich Himmler, Hitler’s SS boss, had arrived in Berlin, he re-established control of the city and the mass arrests began, and among the first to be arrested was Fromm. He also ordered the exhumation of Stauffenberg’s body. The Count’s final resting place has since remained a mystery – until recently.

Many committed suicide rather than face Nazi justice. The ringleaders were rounded up and hanged by piano wire, their deaths recorded onto film and the films sent to the Wolf’s Lair for Hitler to watch at his pleasure. Over the coming months, more than 7,000 were arrested, of whom 4,980 were executed. Fromm remained imprisoned until 12 March 1945, when he too was shot.

Rommel’s fateful choice

The highest-ranking victim of this post-July purge was one of Hitler’s favourite and most ablest generals, Erwin Rommel. Rommel, who shared the same birthday as Stauffenberg, 15 November, although not directly involved, had previously voiced sympathy for the plan. Once his endorsement came to light, he was given the option of honourable suicide or subjecting himself to the humiliation and the kangaroo court of Nazi justice, and his family deported to a concentration camp. He chose the former and, on 14 October 1944, accompanied by two generals sent by Hitler, poisoned himself. He was, as promised, buried with full military honours, his family pensioned off.

Aftermath

Those who had been at Hitler’s side in the conference room on 20 July were awarded a specially-made ‘Wounded Medal’, either in black, silver or gold, that bore Hitler’s signature and the date (pictured). It was, for the remaining months of the war, the ultimate badge of loyalty and honour.

The buildings that made up the Wolf’s Lair were demolished soon after the war but today, on the site, is a memorial stone dedicated to Stauffenberg – the “bravest of the best” as Churchill described the fallen Count.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

The post The 20 July Bomb Plot – an outline first appeared on Rupert Colley.

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The earlier chapters concern Hitler’s upbringing, his formative years in Linz, Vienna, and Munich, his desire to be an artist, and his service during the First World War. Then begins the sledgehammer prose – some 600 pages of it. The book has not seen the light of day in Germany since the end of the Second World War but, contrary to popular belief, it is not banned there. Using the Swastika and the Nazi salute for non-educational purposes is forbidden in Germany but not the purchase or reading of the central ideological tenet of Hitler’s thinking. However, the state of Bavaria, which seized the copyright to Mein Kampf after the war, has steadfastly refused to re-publish the book fearing it could fuel racial tensions and be exploited by neo-Nazi groups.

‘My 4½ Year Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice’

Hitler was serving a jail term following his failed attempt to seize power in the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch. He was tried for high treason and could have faced the death penalty but got away with a lenient sentence of five years. In the event, he served less than nine months, being released in December 1924. Although frequently depressed and talked of suicide, Hitler used his time in prison constructively, dictating to his deputy, Rudolph Hess, his autobiographical, ideological tirade. Published in two volumes, the first on 18 July 1925, and the second in 1926, Mein Kampf was originally entitled ‘My 4½ Year Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice‘; the new title being suggested by his publisher.

Much of Mein Kampf is devoted to race; the need for a pure race of German Aryans untainted by the blood of different ethnic groups. The Aryan race was of the highest order, the ‘bearers of culture’; the Jewish race of the lowest. ‘The whole existence (of the Jews) is based on one great single lie… that they are a religious community while actually they are a race – and what a race!’

Hitler’s stated aim was to eliminate the ‘hydra of World Jewry’ from society. Jews are referred to throughout the book by various unpleasant metaphors: parasites, germs, vermin. He expounded at length on the need for Lebensraum, the provision of extra living space for the growth of the German population at the expense of the Slavic races of Eastern Europe. Hitler took Darwin’s concept of the ‘survival of the fittest’, nature’s continual struggle for life or death, and applied it to race. For the Aryan race to survive, not only had it to prove itself as the strongest, but it was necessary to stamp out weaker, inferior races. And of course, no ‘race’ was as inferior or as weak as the Jew.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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Hitler had come to power in January 1933 and immediately started, piece by piece, tearing up the Weimar constitution, squashing opposition and ridding Germany of democracy.

The End of Democracy

In the last parliamentary elections of the Weimar Republic, in March 1933, the Nazis polled 44% of the vote – not enough for a majority but enough to squash any future political resistance. Within a fortnight Hitler proposed the Enabling Act, a temporary dissolution of the constitution whilst he dealt with the problems facing the nation. The Reichstag passed the proposal by 441 votes to 84. There would be no more elections or a constitution to keep Hitler in check. The Reichstag had, in effect, voted away its own power.

The temporary became permanent. Within a matter of weeks, it had become illegal to criticize the government. A new secret police force, the Gestapo, immediately began arresting ‘unreliable’ persons, and Dachau, the first concentration camp, was opened to cater for their custody. Trade unions were banned, freedom of the press curtailed, and all other political parties declared illegal. Germany had become a one-party state with Hitler its leader, and soon its dictator.

Ernst Rohm

A year later, with Hitler’s power almost absolute, only the excesses of the SA 
and their bull-necked leader, Ernst Rohm (pictured), troubled the dictator. Their violence, which as a revolutionary during the 1920s, Hitler would have endorsed, had become an embarrassment to the Chancellor. Having gained power through the proper process Hitler wanted to win over the German people and international opinion through legitimate means not by force.

But Rohm and the SA felt that Hitler was going soft and had not given them their due reward for helping the Nazis into power. They started talking of a ‘second revolution’ with Rohm the leader of the People’s Party, greatly alarming the industrialists and businessmen that Hitler had managed to woo. Rohm wanted also to merge the army with the SA under his command, which, in turn, alarmed the army and its chief, Werner von Blomberg.

In April 1934, Hitler and Blomberg signed a secret pact: Hitler promised Blomberg and the army full control of the military (ahead of Rohm’s SA); and, in return, Blomberg promised Hitler the army’s support when the time came for Hitler to claim the presidency following the anticipated death of 86-year-old Paul von Hindenburg.

Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Goring, who also feared Rohm, concocted false evidence that Rohm was planning a coup against Hitler. The SA’s agitation was beginning to undermine the country’s stability, and Hindenburg threatened to bring in martial law unless Hitler could bring the situation under control. In other words – deal with Rohm and the SA.

Hitler acts

On the weekend of 30 June – 1 July 1934, in what was to become known as the ‘Night of the Long Knives’, Hitler acted. Members of the SS stormed a hotel in the village of Bad Wiessee where the SA had gathered for a weekend of homosexual debauchery, pulled Rohm and his henchmen from their beds and had them arrested. Most were promptly executed on the spot, except for Rohm. Hitler took it upon himself to arrest Rohm personally, marching into his hotel room and, brandishing a revolver, yelled, “You’re under arrest, you pig”.

Rohm was taken to a Munich prison, along with other SA leaders, and there awaited his fate. But Hitler, in a fit of nostalgia, found it difficult to order his murder. Instead, he offered Rohm the chance to kill himself. On 1 July, a revolver was left on the table in his cell and he was given ten minutes. Rohm refused, saying, ‘If I am to be killed, let Adolf do it himself’. When the ten minutes had elapsed and no shot heard, an SS officer marched in and killed the bare-chested Rohm at point-blank range.

Hitler took the opportunity to purge anyone whom he disliked or had crossed him in the past, including the last Chancellor of the Weimar Republic, Kurt von Schleicher. The Night of the Long Knives claimed over 200 lives. Hindenburg congratulated his chancellor for having acted so swiftly. The army, relieved to be freed from its main rival, sided with Hitler, and Blomberg applauded “the Fuhrer’s soldierly decision and exemplary courage”.

All Hitler had to do now was to wait for old Hindenburg to die. He did not have long to wait.

Rupert Colley.

Read more in The Clever Teens’ Guide to Nazi Germany, available as ebook and paperback (80 pages) on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstone’s, Apple Books and other stores.

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