Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death

papers).2 Generalrichter Dr Helmuth Rosencrantz, MS (‘Büsum diary, Jul 1945’), BAOR Counter-Intelligence Bureau report CIB/INT/B5/2908/1/0/D, Sep 29, 1945 (NA file RG.407,entry 427, box 1954m). Rosencrantz had had the trial delayed from Jul 17 to 20 so that hisdeputy judge General Baron von Thüngen would be available to try it. Hase attended themorning session. Sentence, announced at 2 P.M., was nine months’ prison; JG and Naumanninterceded for Martin, and it was reduced to five months’ fortress confinement.3 Speer chronicle, Jul 20; Sündermann, ‘Jul 21, 1944,’ 62.4 JG confirmed this in his broadcast of Jul 26.5 One item concerned an article in the mass circulation Front und Heimat No.22, Jul 1944,which was considered too flattering about conditions in Soviet-occupied Romania.Hadamowsky to JG, Jul 21, 1944 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.62 Re 3, Hadamowsky papers, vol.1).6 OCMH interrogation of Gen Wilhelm Arnold, chief of army signals, Aug 25, 1945 (IfZ,Irving collection). Peter Hoffmann, Widerstand, Staatsstreich, Attentat, 852.—Dr RichardArnhold, Bömer’s P.A., confirmed that the RMVP’s domestic- and foreign press depart-850 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHments had direct telephone and telex links to Dr Dietrich’s office at FHQ. PW paper 80 (NAfile RG.165, entry 79, nox 766).7 Oven, ‘Jul 23, 1944’, 398f. His recollection was that he told Lorenz that JG was asleep,whereupon Lorenz dictated it to him.—And see Oven, ‘Der 20.Juli 1944—erlebt im HauseGoebbels,’ inVerrat und Widerstand im Dritten Reich (Coburg, 1978), 43.8 Morell treated the ear-ache (diary, Jul 23, 1944).9 JG to Leni Riefenstahl-Jacob, Jul 20, 1944, 2 P.M.; he deleted the ‘–Jacob’ and a second,over-fulsome, sentence from the draft (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.90, Go 1, vol.3)10 BAOR interrogation of Colonel Nicolaus von Below, Jan 23, 1946 (Trevor Roper papers,IfZ, Irving collection).11 On Dec 22, 1944 he wrote to the Führer that ‘in a dark hour’ he had trembled forHitler’s life (BA file NL.118/106).12 Otto Ernst Remer’s report on the events, Jul 22, 1944, is in BA file EAP.105/32; publ.by Hans-Adolf Jacobsen (ed.), Spiegelbild einer Verschwörung. Die Opposition gegen Hitler und derStaatsstreich vom 20. Juli 1944 in der SD-Berichterstattung (Stuttgart, 1984), vol.i, 12ff; cf.Hoffmann, 460f. The author also interviewed Remer.13 Dr Hans W Hagen’s report on Jul 22, dated Oct 16, 1944 (NA film T84, roll 19, 0022ff);Spiegelbild, vol.ii, 637ff.—Hagen, Zwischen Eid und Befehl. Semler, 132ff.14 Oven, 398f.15 Speer’s dramatic and self-serving published ‘memoirs’ are based more on secondaryworks than on his memory; he was not ushered out by JG at midnight, as he claims, but leftwith Himmler around 4:30 A.M. as Balzer’s report makes clear.16 From his perch at the absent Schwägermann’s desk, outside JG’s room, Speer tried toreach his friend Fromm without success. He did speak with Olbricht and complain that heand JG were being ‘detained’ by soldiers; Speer reported only the latter conversation to JG.17 Albrecht to his wife, Jul 22, 1944 (IfZ, Irving collection).18 Schaub MS (IfZ, Irving collection).19 BBC monitoring report; see the FO’s printed summary of the putsch in PRO file FO.371/39062.20 Remer.21 Hoffmann suggests the colonel may have been Lieutenant Colonel Walter Horstmann.22 The times are from Remer’s and Hagen’s testimonies. For what follows we also haveJG’s version in his broadcast of Jul 26, text in Zürcher Zeitung, Jul 27; Front und Heimat,No.13, Juni [sic] 1944 (BA file NS.6/28); VB, Jul 27, 1944.23 Remer’s loyalty to Hitler endured to the end. Aged 82, he was sentenced in 1994 to twoyears in prison for doubting the authenticity of the ‘gas chambers’ at Auschwitz—a criminaloffence in Germany; he was granted political asylum in Spain.24 Hitler told ENT-specialist Erwin Giesing on Jul 26, ‘The loyal chap [Remer] recognizedmy voice at once on the phone and confirmed my orders to him by repeating them to theletter’ (Giesing MS, in IfZ, Irving collection.)25 Major-Gen. Helmuth Schwierz, CO of No.1 Army Bomb Disposal School, Lichterfelde,undated report in IfZ, Irving collection. A Capt.(W) Messing from the same school had asimilar mission: letter intercept, [Horst] von Buttlar to Herbert Steinert, Mar 27, 1947GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 851(‘…Messing had orders to arrest Dr Goebbels dead or alive.’) CCD report, in NA file RG.407,entry 427, box 1954a.26 Oven, ‘Jul 23, 1944’; Hoffmann, 855; Speer.27 Kehrl, 398.28 Dr Immanuel Schäffer, interrogation, PWB report SAIC.16, Jun 6, 1945 (NA file RG.332,entry ETO, Mis-Y, Sect., box 116).29 Balzer, liaison officer between OKW/WPr and RMVP, report to chief of WPr (Hassovon Wedel), ‘Jun 21’ [sic: read Jul 21] 1944 (NA film T84, roll 16, 6614; BA file NS.6/31).30 Hoffmann, citing Hase’s testimony to the People’s Court, trial vol.xxxiii, 488ff; andSpiegelbild einer Verschwörung, 45.31 Hadamowsky to JG, Aug 3, 1944 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.62 Re 3, vol.1); he named thelieutenant colonels Pridun, Herber, von der Heyd[t]e, and Kuban, and suggested that JGreceive them together with the panzer colonels Bolbrinker and Glaesemer for drinks oneday.32 Hadamowsky to JG, Aug 1 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.62 Re 3, vol.1); JG referred to thisincident in his broadcast of Jul 26, 1944.33 Remer’s report.34 JG’s text is repeated in the KR-Fschr. from HSSuPolF Stuttgart to Gauleiter Wagner(Karlsruhe), Jul 20, 1944, 9:16 P.M. (Records of the Annexed Territory of Alsace, NA filmT81, roll 179, 7965f).35 Bormann to all gauleiters, Jul 20, 1944, nine P.M. and 9:40 P.M. (Trevor Roper papers,IfZ, Irving collection).36 Bearer of the Knight’s Cross and a veteran Nazi, Bolbrinker commanded an SA brigadein Styria during the failed 1934 putsch in Austria, and had to flee to Germany37 Remer stated in his Jul 22, 1944 report: ‘I was unsure of Colonel-General Guderian’sattitude.’38 On the role of the Panzer-Reserve-Brigade at Cottbus, see Peter Hoffmann, Claus SchenkGraf von Stauffenberg und seine Brüder (Stuttgart, 1992), 400–407, 421, 432–434. There isevidence, states Hoffmann on p.421, that upon Mertz von Quirnheim’s intervention Guderianhad agreed on Jul 19, 1944 to delay the removal of the Krampnitz armour to East Prussia bya few days.39 Rosencrantz.—And see his British interrogation, Nov 16, 1945 (Trevor Roper papers,IfZ, Irving collection.)40 Rosencrantz.41 Balzer report. Fromm was court martialled and shot for cowardice in Mar 1945.42 Himmler also emphasized the delicacy of his position in speeches on Jul 21 and 26, 1944(NA film T175, roll 93, 3904ff, 4146ff.)43 Bormann