Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death

capsules. Goebbels had sent Schwägermann back to thedeserted No.20 Hermann-Göring Strasse a few days earlier to fetch the 6·35-millimetrepistol with which he intended to kill himself; he kept this and his poison capsulewith him all the time.79 He gave to Heinz Lorenz copies of Hitler’s testamentand his own annexure. ‘Make for British or American-occupied territory,’ he briefedhim, ‘and publish the testaments as and when you think fit for the purpose of thehistorical record.’80 Hitler held three more situation conferences that day. Sharpshootersof the Russian 301st Guards Division were less than five hundred yardsfrom the barricaded windows of the chancellery. At one-thirty A.M. on April 30, theSoviet high command ordered heavy artillery to bear on the building. Within minutesthe upper floors were ablaze. There were no more conferences. Fifty feet belowground Goebbels heard toward mid-day that the Russians had broken into the subwaysystem between the ruined Kaiserhof and Potsdamer Platz, and had overrun theTiergarten bordering on the chancellery.At lunch time he glimpsed Hitler and Eva going into their private quarters. Shewas wearing a dark blue dress with white trimmings. They invited only the twosecretaries—but neither Goebbels partner—to join them. After a while Traudl Jungeslipped out to see Magda and smoke a cigarette. Magda was in even more sombremood than Hitler. ‘I prefer my children to die rather than survive as the objects ofmockery and scandal,’ she woodenly said. Around three-thirty P.M. Hitler and Evaemerged for one last time, shook hands wordlessly with Goebbels, and then retiredclosing the padded doors behind them. Artur Axmann arrived to request orders forhis young tank-killer squads. Goebbels intercepted the one-armed Hitler Youth leaderand told him curtly that the Führer was ‘seeing no-one.’81 In the old bunker TraudlJunge found the children waiting restlessly and giggling each time the bunker shook.She busied herself spreading bread and butter until a shot rang out, so close that their922 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHgiggling stopped. It echoed through the concrete labyrinth, and Hellmut exclaimed,‘That sounded like a direct hit.’82Otto Günsche went to investigate. He returned to the map room where Goebbelsand the others were waiting. ‘Der Führer ist tot,’ he announced 83.Thus, if only by fiat of the departed Führer, Joseph Goebbels became the last chancellorof the Third Reich. His brief dominion extended one mile from north to south,from the Weidendamm Bridge to Prinz-Albrecht Strasse, and rather less than thatfrom east to west.1 The remark was provoked by the behaviour of the congregation who had chattered duringthe eulogy at Justice Minister Gürtner’s state funeral (diary, Feb 2, 1941).2 Diary, Mar 30, 1945.3 Ibid., Jan 16, 1940.4 ‘Robert Ley as described by his mistress,’ SAIC.40, Jun 4, 1945 (NA file RG.165, entry79, box 756). Ley had obtained seven envelopes with cyanide crystals from Prof Bockacker,chief of the Labour Front’s health department.—And see NYT, Oct 275 Diary, Feb 1; and similar on Feb 2, 1943.6 Oven, ‘Oct 3, 1943’; Krämer, 229.7 Semler, ‘Nov 16, 1943.’8 JG to Hitler, Jul 18, 1944 (BA file NL.118/107).9 E.g., in JG’s speech to officers, Jul 17 or 18, 1943: ‘You only have to read the correspondenceof Frederick the Great and you’ll find that, uh, he, uh, rolled that poison phial toand fro in his pocket, and was strongly tempted to have a swig.’ (VfZ, 1971, 83ff).10 Diary, Mar 3, 1945.11 SS Gruppenführer Gottlob Berger, Chef des SS Hauptamtes, remarks on Jun 13, 1945,reported in CSDIC(UK) report SRGG.1299C (PRO file WO.208/4170).12 Bella Fromm diary, May 6, 1933 (Boston Univ., Mugar Memorial Libr., Fromm papers,box 1).13 Naumann interrogation, Nuremberg, Oct 10, 1947 (IfZ, ZS.361).14 Hausintendant Rohrssen, 59, had trained at the court of first the Kaiser, then the Duke ofDessau. Leo Barton to Capt Smith, G–2, USFET MISC, Mar 12, 1946 (Trevor Roper papers,IfZ, Irving collection); interview with Gault McGowan, in New York Sun, Aug 4, 1947(Hoover Libr., Julius Epstein papers, box 26). The story reappears in Auguste Behrend,‘Meine Tochter Magda Goebbels,’ in Schwäbische Illustrierte, No.22, May 31, 1952.GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 92315 Krosigk diary, Apr 13, 1945. USFET document DE.443/DIS.202 (Hoover Libr. Lernerpapers; and Trevor Roper papers, IfZ, Irving collection.)16 Krosigk to JG, Apr 14, 1945, in PID report No.34 (Hoover Libr., Daniel Lerner papers,box 5).17 By their ignoble allegation on Jul 3, 1992 that I had stolen items from the Moscowmicrofiche collection the Munich institute of contemporary history (IfZ) achieved its prematureclosure before I could test this theory. See Author’s Acknowledgements.18 Hitler’s desk diary, Apr 1945, was found in his bunker’s ruins by British Intelligenceofficers in Sep 1945. It is now in the Cabinet Office Historical Section, London (Transcriptin IfZ, Irving collection).19 Baur, lecture, ca.1950 (IfZ, ZS.683)20 His diary is quoted in Borresholm, 186.21 JG, ‘Der Einsatz des eigenen Lebens,’ in Das Reich, No.15, Apr 15, 1945.22 Oven, ‘Apr 19, 1945.’23 Naumann testimony, May 18, 1950 (IfZ, ZS.274).24 Oven, ‘Apr 18, 1945.’25 BBC Monitoring Report, Apr 19 (IWM archives); DNB text of broadcast in HamburgerZeitung, No.92, Apr 20, 1945.26 US Seventh Army interrogation of Dr Robert Ley, SAIC.30, May 29, 1945 (NA fileRG.332, Mis-Y, box 73).27 Ibid., and Else Krüger (Bormann’s secretary) MS, ‘Die letzten Tage … im Führerbunkerder Reichskanzlei,’ written in British captivity, Itzehoe, Jul 22, 1945 (Trevor Roper papers,IfZ, Irving collection.)28 Hans-Leo Martin, Unser Mann bei Goebbels (Neckargemünd, 1973), 157ff.29 JG told this to Krosigk on Apr 24. Krosigk diary, Apr 24, 1945. USFET documentDE.443/DIS.202 (Hoover Libr. Lerner papers; and Trevor Roper papers, IfZ, Irving collection.)—Kritzinger’s own report on the evacuation of the ministries is in Jodl’s papers,captured in Flensburg (British FO Libr.)30 From an MS of Fritzsche’s ‘Notes on Hitler’s last days’ in the papers of Field MarshalErhard Milch (IfZ, Irving collection).31 Otto Günsche, Soviet interrogation (IfZ, Irving collection); and see Koller diary, Apr21, 1945. ADI(K) report 348/1945, Jul 12, 1945 (ibid; and author’s film DI–39)32 Fritzsche, op.cit.; Oven, ‘Apr 21, 1945,’ 650f.33 Borresholm, 187f.34 Naumann testimony, May 18, 1950 (IfZ, ZS.274). Dr Schultz von Dratzig of the Personneldept. committed suicide that same Saturday.35 Author’s interviews of Curt Gasper, who accompanied the ‘burial party,’ Jul 1, 1970,and Otte, Mar 31, 1971;