Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death

On the fourteenth theNazis re-entered the Reichstag, but only briefly because two days later they walkedout again.By the end of the year there were 5,660,000 registered unemployed—a desperatepeople turning to the Nazis for their salvation, and a regime determined to stay inoffice by hook or by crook. On December 8 Brüning issued still more emergencydecrees banning political uniforms and prohibiting all political assemblies until thenew year. Two days later Hitler held court again at the Kaiserhof with Röhm, Hess,Ernst ‘Putzi’ Hanfstaengl and Schaub; the next day police HQ learned that Hitlerwas conferring all morning with the Ruhr steel millionaires Albert Vögler and FritzThyssen, and planned to hold a press conference with American journalists. Grzesinskipleaded with Severing to ban at least the press conference as an ‘illegal assembly’, orfailing that to deport Hitler from Prussia as persona non grata: the Berlin policecould then forcibly put him on the midday train to Munich. President Hindenburghowever disapproved—another sign that the Nazis were coming in from the cold.HITLER had begun visiting Magda Quandt’s apartment on Reichskanzler Platz moreoften than Göring’s. Both Goebbels and Gregor Strasser welcomed this—the Görings,said Strasser, had always had a houseful of fortune hunters hoping to meet the Führer.(‘I myself get on quite well with Goebbels,’ Strasser told Wagener.) With Carin nowdead, Göring moved permanently into the Kaiserhof. Fleeing from the political atmospherethere, Hitler became a more frequent visitor to Magda’s household. ‘Here,’he told Goebbels, ‘we’ve got everything to ourselves.’ Magda served her home-baked248 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHpastries to Hitler and fussed over him, while he relaxed and expatiated upon thebrainless cretins who claimed to admire and understand degenerate modern worksof art. ‘Dr Goebbels,’ he said casually, ‘I want you to think over how we’re to stopthis rot when we take over and you’re in charge of all government propaganda.’The Goebbels wedding was fixed for December 19, 1931. As a divorcee and convertto protestantism, Magda could not marry under the rites of the catholic church.Goebbels’ plea to the bishop of Berlin for a waiver was denied. Marrying as a protestant,he would be excommunicated. ‘He thereupon saw no further reason to paytheir church tax,’ said Hitler years later, mocking the church’s hypocrisy. ‘But thechurch informed him that excommunication … did not affect the obligation to payup as before.’Hitler acted as one witness, and General von Epp as the other. Since a Berlin weddingwas out of the question—the communists would have raised mayhem—it wassolemnized at Severin, the Quandt estate in Mecklenburg. Quandt did not hear aboutthis until afterwards.82 The village notary of Goldenbow performed the legal ceremony,then Dr Wenzel, a pastor from Berlin, officiated at the protestant ceremonyin the chapel at nearby Frauenmark; a swastika banner draped the altar.83 Magda’smother came, but not her father who disapproved of Goebbels; she had stitchedtogether a little brown S.A. uniform for her son Harald to wear as a pageboy. ‘Weaccept the obligation to bring up our children in the evangelical-lutheran faith,’ thecouple affirmed.84As for Joseph Goebbels, if Magda looked closely, she would have seen that her newhusband was wearing a gold tiepin shaped like a wolf’s head—a gift, he had once tolda friend, from a girl he had become very fond of at university.85GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 2491 Diary, Apr 9, 11, 1931.2 Hans-Otto Meissner; JG diary, Apr 12, 1941.3 Diary, Apr 14, 1931.4 Ibid., Apr 14, 1941; Schickedanz to Amann, Mar 19 and Oct 27, 1931 (Rosenberg files,NA film T484, roll 78, 0109–113).5 Diary, Apr 21, 25, 1931. Hinkel does not mention his work for Angriff in postwar interrogations.6 Ibid., Apr 14, 18, 29, 1931.7 Police report on JG’s speech of Sep 26, 1929, in Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, itemÊ 2.8 Diary, Apr 15–16, 1931.9 Ibid., Apr 18, 1931; Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 23, vol.3.10 Diary, Jun 17, 1931.11 Ibid., Apr 18, 1931.12 Ibid., Apr 20, May 9, 1931.13 Ibid., Apr 25, 1941.14 Ibid., Apr 25, 1931; police file author’s film DJ-81).15 Police file, May 22, 1931. This appears to have become a common police requirement;see the similar declaration signed by JG on Oct 1, 1931 in Hoover Libr. files, NSDAP papers,box 1.16 Diary, Apr 28, 1931; and Lohse MS on the Strasser case. See too the NSDAP archives fileon Gregor Strasser (BA file NS.26/1370).17 Diary, Apr 23, 25, 1931. There had been rumours in Angriff on Apr 28 that Hinkel was toreplace him.18 Ibid., Apr 28, 1931.19 Angriff, Apr 28, 1931.20 NYT, Apr 28, 193121 Diary, Apr 30, 1931; the appeal failed (diary, Jun 2–3, 1931).22 Memo on file in Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 39, vol.4.23 Diary, May 12, 1931; Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 24, vol.iv.24 For a file of JG correspondence with Kamecke see ZStA Rep 90 Go 1, vol.2.25 Diary, Jun 6, 1931.26 Ibid., Jun 13, 1931.27 Ibid., Apr 18, 1931.28 Ibid., Apr 19–21, 25, 1931.29 Ibid., May 18, 1931.30 Ibid., May 26, 1931.31 Ibid., May 27, 1931.32 Ibid., May 31, 1931.33 Ibid., Jun 5–6, 193134 Ibid., Jun 13–14, 1931.35 Ibid., Jun 11, 1931.36 Schimmelmann to Anka Stalherm, Dec 17, 1931 (Irene Prange papers).37 Diary, May 2, 1931.38 Ibid., May 3, 8, 10, 12, 19, Jun 16, 1931.250 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH39 Ibid., May 20, 1931.40 Ibid., Jun 8, 1931.41 Ibid.Jun 10, 1931.42 Goltz MS (BA file Kl.Erw., 653/2).43 Werner Schwarz (commanding 3 Standarte) to USchlA, Jun 25, 1931 (BDC; Fritz Tobiasarchives).44 Diary, Jun 21, 1931.45 Police file, May 29, 1931.46 Angriff, Jun 30, 1931.47 In Feb 1945 this very oval would be RAF Bomber Command’s aiming point in a raid thatwould kill three times more people thasn were in his audience.48 Dokumente; for Dietrich’s career see Münchner Neueste Nachrichten, Jul 30, 1941 (ND:NG-3787); CSDIC(WEA) BAOR report PIR.8, Sep 10, 1945 (NA: RG.219, IRR case files,XE.003812); defence documents in Nuremberg StA Rep.501; and interrogations (ibid.,Rep.502).49 Diary, Jul 17, 1931.50 Ibid., Jul 24, 1931.51 Ibid., Jul 27; and see Jul 31, 1931.52 Gauorganisationsleiter. Born in Lauban, Silesia, on Aug 24, 1903, the son of an enginedriver and four generations of blacksmiths, Karl-August Hanke would become JG’s righthandman, and