Die Polenausweisung 1938’, Menora: Jahrbuch fur deutsch-judische Geschichte 1990, 184–206; and H. G. Adler, Der verwaltete Mensch. Studien zur Deportation der Juden aus Deutschland, Tubingen, 1974, 91–105. Grynszpan later successfully deployed the argument that he had had a homosexual relationship with vom Rath to prevent the show-trial which the Nazi regime had intended from taking place. See Heiber, ‘Der Fall Grunspan’, 148ff., demonstrating the implausibility of this as a genuine motive for the shooting. Hans-Jurgen Doscher, Reichskristallnacht. Die November-Pogrome 1938, Frankfurt am Main, 1988, 62–3, attempts to revive the argument that vom Rath’s killing did in fact arise from a homosexual relationship with Grynszpan, though this remains no more than speculation. Doscher’s case rests heavily upon the fact that the bar to which Grynszpan went to load his revolver on the morning of 7 November was known as a haunt of homosexuals, and that, when he went to the embassy, Grynszpan did not ask for the Ambassador, but for ‘a legation secretary’ to whom — vom Rath — he was ushered in with little prior formality. The ambassador at the time, Johannes Graf von Welczek, recalled after the war, however, returning from his morning walk and meeting Grynszpan outside the embassy, where Grynszpan, not knowing whom he was addressing, asked how he might see the Ambassador and was directed to the porter of the building (Heiber, ‘Der Fall Grunspan’, 134–5).
43. Graml, Reichskristallnacht, 13.
44. Hermann Graml, Der 9. November 1938. ‘Reichskristallnacht’, Beilage zur Wochenzeitung ‘Das Parlament’, No.45,11 November 1953, here 6th edn, Bonn, 1958 (Schriftenreihe der Bundeszentrale fur Heimatdienst), 17–23; Graml, Reichskristallnacht, 12–16.
45. TBJG, I/6, 178 (9 November 1938); Tb Irving, 407 (9 November 1938).
46. TBJG, I/6, 180 (10 November 1938); Tb Irving, 409 (10 November 1938).
47. TBJG, I/6, 180 (10 November 1938); the alternative reading of the last word in Tb Irving, 409 (10 November 1938): ‘Now it’s good’ (‘Nun aber ist es gut’), can almost certainly be discounted, even if the text remains difficult to decipher at this point. Close comparison of the handwriting, especially in adjacent passages, gives ‘gar’ as the best reading. I am grateful to Elke Frohlich for advice on this point.
48. IfZ, ZS-243, Bd.I (Heinrich Heim), Fol.27: statement of former SA-Gruppenfuhrer Max Juttner. See also Irving, Goebbels, 274.
49. Adam, Judenpolitik, 206; Domarus, 966ff. for the speech.
50. Uwe Dietrich Adam, ‘Wie spontan war der Pogrom?’, in Pehle 74–93, here 76. It seems highly unlikely, as often claimed, that Hitler heard of vom Rath’s death for the first time shortly before nine o’clock that evening during the meal at the Old Town Hall in Munich. Vom Rath had by then been dead for several hours. The Foreign Office had been informed of vom Rath’s imminent death already that morning. A telegram from Dr Brandt to Hitler, notifying him of vom Rath’s death at 4.30p.m., arrived in Berlin at 6.20p.m. It could be surmised (and would be supported by the testimony of Below that Hitler heard the news that afternoon) that the telegram followed a telephone communication. (See Below, 136.) The German News Agency (DNB) circulated the news to newspaper editors by 7.00p.m. (Ralf Georg Reuth, Goebbels, Munich, 1990, 395 — according to Irving, Goebbels, 273 and 612 n.22, though without supporting source, even as early as 5.00p.m.). The Foreign Office dispatched a telegram of sympathy to vom Rath’s father at 7.40p.m. The above chronology (except where otherwise stated) is taken from Hans-Jurgen Doscher, ‘Der Tod Ernst vom Raths und die Auslosung der Pogrome am 9. November 1938 — ein Nachwort zur “Reichskris-tallnacht”’, Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, 41 (1990), 619–20. If indeed the stories are correct — see Adam, in Pehle, 77, 92 — that the telegram announcing vom Rath’s death was delivered to Hitler during the meal in the Old Town Hall as late as 8.45p.m., it can only, therefore, have been for effect. It seems in the light of this probable that some degree of pre-planning between Goebbels and Hitler took place between vom Rath’s shooting on 7 November and the discussion in the Old Town Hall prior to Goebbels’s speech on the night of 9 November. See Adam, in Pehle, 91–2; Doscher, ‘Der Tod Ernst vom Raths’, 620. See also Doscher, ‘Reichskristallnacht’, 79.
51. Below, 136.
52. IMG, xxxii.20–29 (Doc.3063-PS, Report of the Party Court, Feb.1939); IMG, xx.320–21 (Eberstein testimony); Graml, Reichskristallnacht, 17–18; Graml, Der 9. November 1938, 23ff.
53. TBJG, I/6, 180 (10 November 1938); Tb Irving, 409 (10 November 1938). According to the Party Court’s assessment of the pogrom and its aftermath, sent on 13 February 1939 to Goring, ‘the Fuhrer had decided after his [Goebbels’s] account, that such demonstrations [as had occurred in the Gaue of Kurhessen and Magdeburg-Anhalt] were neither to be prepared nor organized by the Party. But if they arose spontaneously, they were not to be countered’ (IMG, xxxii.21).
54. TBJG, I/6, 180 (10 November 1938). Away from Munich, among Party leaders who had not been present at Goebbels’s speech, there were some initial attempts to ignore the encouragement to unleash pogroms. See IMG, xx.48–9, for the instructions — only partially obeyed — of Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann (Hamburg) to prevent the ‘action’ being carried out in his Gau. See also Graml, Reichskristallnacht, 24–6; Graml, Der 9. November 1938, 30–35; Irving, Goebbels, 612 n.33. Goebbels had not been content to have his message conveyed only by telephone. At 12.30 and 1.40a.m. on 10 November, he cabled Gau Propaganda Offices to ensure as much Party coordination as possible (IMG, xxxii.21–2; Graml, Der 9. November 1938, 27).
55. TBJG, I/6, 180 (10 November 1938); Tb Irving, 409 (10 November 1938). For the pogrom in Munich, see Hanke, 214ff.
56. According to a note dictated by Himmler at 3.00a.m. on 10 November (IMG, xxi.392), and the subsequent account of his chief adjutant, SS-Gruppenfuhrer Karl Wolff (IfZ, ZS-317, Bd.II, Fol.28), Himmler was in Hitler’s apartment in Prinzregentenplatz at the time. Wolff said he had learned of the ‘action’ around 11.20p.m. — presumably at the same time as Heydrich — and had then immediately driven to Hitler’s private apartment. Heydrich was contacted at 11.15p.m. by Stapo Munich. He gave out a first order on the wearing of civilian clothing at 0.20a.m. (Adam, in Pehle, 77; Kurt Patzold and Irene Runge, Kristallnacht. Zum Pogrom 1938, Cologne, 1988, 113–14).
57. IMG, xxi.392; IfZ, ZS-317, Bd.II, Fol.28.
58. Patzold/Runge, 113–14.
59. IMG, xxxi. 516–18; Patzold/Runge, 114–16; Adam, in Pehle, 77–9; Graml, Reichskristallnacht, 21, 33; Thalmann, 59–61.
60. IMG, xv, 377 (Doc.734-PS).
61. Peter Longerich, Die braunen Bataillone. Geschichte der SA, Munich, 1989, 230–37; Patzold/Runge, 112–13, 116–18.
62. Milton Mayer, They Thought they were Free. The Germans 1933–45, Chicago, 1955, 16–20.
63. Adam, in Pehle, 74–5.
64. Goebbels does not specify which synagogue it was. But Munich newspaper reports of the pogrom-night refer to the old synagogue in Herzog-Rudolf-Stra?e in flames. The interior of the synagogue for east-European Jews in Reichenbachstra?e was also set on fire, but the building itself was not burnt down. The main synagogue in Herzog-Max-Stra?e had been demolished in the summer. See Wolfgang Benz, ‘Der Ruckfall in die Barbarei. Bericht uber den Pogrom’, in Pehle, 28; Hanke, 214; and Ophir and Wiesemann 50, 52.
65. The figure of 20–30,000 Jews to be arrested was mentioned in the instructions sent by telegram by Gestapo chief Heinrich Muller just before midnight (IMG, xxv.377). This was after Himmler and Hitler had met in the latter’s apartment in Prinzregentenplatz in Munich, when the SS leader had sought clarification of directions. These preliminary instructions, passed on by Himmler to Muller, were amplified only once the SS chief had returned from the midnight swearing-in of SS recruits. On his return, Himmler immediately saw Heydrich, who put out more elaborate instructions to the Gestapo by telegram at 1.20 a.m. (IMG, xxxi.516–18). The number of Jews was not specified in this later telegram. It was
