The Hitler Myths

Exposing the Truth Behind the Stories About the Führer

Sjoerd J de Boer, Sjoerd J de Boer, Sjoerd J. de Boer

• Publisher: Frontline Books
• Year: 2023
• eBook ISBN: 9781399019064
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Historical Biographies
• Index: History

Adolf Hitler remains one of the most discussed figures in world history. Every year, an untold number of articles and books are published, and television programs and internet pages are produced, by respected historians through to amateur conspiracy theorists. One of the consequences of this continuous flow of stories is that, over time, increasing numbers of falsehoods and fabrications have emerged about Hitler. Many of these have subsequently gained credence by virtue of their constant repetition – however bizarre they may be. These include such claims that Hitler was impotent (contradicted by another myth that he had an illegitimate son), that he had Jewish ancestors, or that he had killed his niece. Another claim, one of the most persistent, is that he did not commit suicide but escaped Berlin to live in Argentina for years after the war, despite his well-recorded failing health. What is the truth about his corpse, his sexual experiences, his years of poverty, his complete dominance of his subordinates? How much of what we think we know is the result of intentional or misunderstood modern interpretations? Many rumours also circulated during Hitler's life and, with the passage of time, have been presented as facts despite having no substantial foundation. Was Hitler really a hero of the First World War and, if so, why was he not promoted beyond the rank of corporal? Was he the true author of Mein Kampf and did he write a second book that was never published, and was Hitler initially a socialist? In The Hitler Myths the author clinically dissects many of these myths, often in a highly amusing fashion, as he exposes the inaccuracies and impossibilities of the stories. The myths – the familiar and the obscure – are discussed chronologically, following the course of Hitler's life. In his analysis of each of the myths, the author draws on an array of sources to prove or disprove the rumours and speculations – once and for all!

Chapter 1

Adolf Hitler, a Jew?

The mystery of his descent

‘I have no idea about the history of my family. My knowledge of this is severely limited,’ Hitler once said.1 He had more than enough reasons for it. His father and mother were relatives and if the rumours were true, chances were that the most ardent Jew hater in history had a Jewish grandfather himself. It didn’t end with just whispers. Long before Adolf Hitler rose to power in Germany, the press published stories about the vague descent of the ‘so-called’ Aryan Hitler. When later on fanatic party members attempted to recover information about his origin, he wasn’t pleased at all. Hitler did everything in his power to hide his past. After the Anschluss of Austria and the German Empire, the entire Austrian village of Döllersheim, where Hitler and his family came from, was razed to the ground and turned into an army training area. The question arose if Hitler had ordered this because he had something to hide as it could be no coincidence that precisely at this location all traces of his parentage were being eradicated. Historians searched for answers to Hitler’s descent until long after the war. The source of the mystery was common knowledge: there was a missing link in the family’s pedigree. But was that the only reason for Hitler’s conspicuous disinterest in his ancestors?

Adolf Hitler was the son of Alois Hitler and Klara Pölzl. Alois was a restless man who was often on the run and moved frequently. Prior to his marriage with Adolf’s mother in 1885, he had been married twice already. He had children from one of these marriages but even before he got married, he had fathered a child.2

The doubt about Hitler’s origin, which exists until this day, was caused, however, by obscurity about the identity of Alois’ father, Adolf’s grandfather. Alois was born out of wedlock and his mother, Maria Anna Schicklgruber, kept the name of the man secret who had impregnated her. Therefore that name wasn’t entered into the official documents, drafted at his birth.3 Alois was given the surname of his mother and so he wasn’t named Alois Hitler but Alois Schicklgruber. That changed after Alois had reached adulthood. In 1876, in the presence of himself and his stepfather, the name of the father was entered into the open space on the certificate of baptism as well as on the birth certificate of the family lawyer. As official documents were involved, the date of the alteration was entered as well and so, years later, it could still be established that the name of Alois’ father had been unknown once. And that establishment became the root of numerous wild speculations about the origin of Adolf Hitler.

A Jewish grandfather

When Adolf Hitler became better known in Bavaria, a discussion soon emerged about the question whether the name that was entered on the birth certificate actually was the name of Adolf’s grandfather. Officially, the name of Georg Hiedler was entered but in particular later on, the name of his brother, Johann Nepomuk Hiedler, was mentioned as well. The most remarkable suggestion, however, pertained to Adolf Hitler’s possible grandfather. It was suggested for instance that Adolf was a descendant from a Jewish family in Bucharest, and a Jewish baron named Rothschild was mentioned as well.4 Information about these two possible ancestors, however, came from the Austrian secret police, which didn’t like Adolf Hitler, and it wasn’t based on truth.5

The most serious rumour about Hitler’s Jewish grandfather, which still circulated after the war, was taken from the memoirs of Hans Frank, a well-known Nazi lawyer and governor-general of the part of Poland under German civil rule. These were drafted when Frank was imprisoned in Nuremberg after the Second World War awaiting his trial.6 He brought an existing story about a third Jewish grandfather once more and convincingly into the world when he stated he had discovered, having been ordered to by Hitler, that Adolf’s grandmother had been employed as a house maid by a Jewish family in Graz, Austria, called the Frankenbergers.7 There she was impregnated by 19-year-old Frankenberger junior. The father of the Jewish boy is supposed to have paid alimony to Alois’s mother until his fourteenth birthday.8 Frank’s statement caused much discussion for a long time and popped up time and again long after the war.

Speculations about Hitler’s origin

The obscurity as to the ancestry of the politician focused on racial purity was soon rich pickings for the critical press, which had more than enough opportunities in the 1920s to attack Hitler as he had not yet become the boss in Germany. The anti-Hitler campaign was fuelled by the socialist paper the Münchener Post, which published the sharpest criticism about Hitler in those years. It is said to have been the first newspaper to ridicule him but also the first that attempted to conduct serious research about him.9

The paper grabbed every opportunity to attack Hitler forcefully with both hands. In 1921, a polemic was published under the heading ‘Adolf Hitler, a traitor’. The paper wondered whether he was of Jewish ancestry and if he maintained secret relations with the Jews. The polemic was fuelled, however, by material from Nazis who thought Hitler had behaved like a Jew when he grabbed dictatorial power over the party in 1921.10 The paper itself wasn’t anti-Semitic in nature but did not fail to use information from Nazis to hit his weak spot.

Less critical minds did research into Hitler ancestors as well. Before the war, as the Führer cult in Germany was in full swing, various Nazis and journalists conducted investigation in the region where Hitler’s family originated. According to American journalist Ron Rosenbaum, who had conducted investigation into Hitler for ten years at the end of the previous century and who published his findings in his book Why Hitler? in 1998, messages about this kind of research caused Hitler to have violent tantrums and on occasion he would have said nobody was to know where he came from and who he was.11 And yet, in the 1940s, Hitler himself had a secret investigation conducted into his pedigree. Although nothing remarkable emerged from this,12 the sole fact that Hitler had this search conducted proved he knew very well there were obscurities about his ancestry and he was bothered about them. After all, the Führer had much to lose if it was found out one of his ancestors hadn’t been racially pure.

A delicate previous history

It is ticklish to understand Hitler’s ancestry. Apart from the vagueness surrounding Hitler’s grandfather, it has also to do with the surname of Adolf’s father, the various ways of spelling those names in the nineteenth century and the fact that Adolf’s father and mother were related. The family had its roots in the Waldviertel in northern Austria, a rural region with small villages mainly inhabited by farmers. Chances are one would find a partner in one of these villages who was related in one way or another. That was the case with Adolf’s parents as well.

So, the story begins with Adolf Hitler’s grandmother, Maria Anna Schicklgruber. She was already 42 years of age and single when she gave birth to Alois, Adolf’s future father.13 In the Catholic villages of Strones, where she came from, her status as a single mother was a problem. It looks like her father and brother locked her out in this period but she was lucky enough to find shelter with a farmer from the village.14 The name of Alois’ father remained a secret, in any case in the official documents of the church and in the office of the lawyer.

Schicklgruber becomes Hitler

When little Alois was 5 years old, Maria Anna married the wandering mill worker Johann Georg Hiedler. Whether speculation existed at the time about Georg being the father isn’t known, but it is likely that Georg and Maria Anna had had a relationship six years before. Evidence is lacking, however, and the five years between Alois’ birth and the marriage is reason to suppose Georg was not the father of Alois. This view is strengthened by what happened to son Alois after the wedding. He did not grow up with his mother and her new husband Georg but in the family of Johann Nepomuk Hiedler, the brother of his mother’s new husband. Nevertheless, within the Third Reich, Georg Hiedler was labelled the grandfather of Adolf Hitler, and that had everything to do with the official documents of Hitler’s ancestors that had been preserved.

Until 1876, Alois Schicklgruber retained the surname of his mother. That year he changed his name to Alois Hitler. At the time, Alois was 39 years of age but more remarkable was the fact that his mother had been dead for 29 years and her husband Georg had died 19 years before. Therefore, they couldn’t be witness to an official alteration of names. And yet, on 6 June, Alois and ‘stepfather’ Nepomuk saw a lawyer in the small Austrian town of Weitra, where they had Alois named as the son of the demised ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Content
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Adolf Hitler, a Jew?
• Chapter 2 Did Hitler Live in Poverty?
• Chapter 3 Adolf Hitler, a Hero?
• Chapter 4 Did Hitler Have a Son?
• Chapter 5 Hitler the Socialist?
• Chapter 6 Where is the Blutfahne?
• Chapter 7 Was Mein Kampf Hitler’s Own Work?
• Chapter 8 Hitler’s Second Book
• Chapter 9 Did Hitler Believe in the Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion?
• Chapter 10 Did Hitler Create an Economic Miracle?
• Chapter 11 Hitler, an Artistic Genius?
• Chapter 12 Did Hitler Suffer from a Sexual Disorder?
• Chapter 13 Did Hitler Always Get his Way?
• Chapter 14 Was Hitler Ill?
• Chapter 15 Did Hitler Really Commit Suicide?
• Chapter 16 Was the Führer Bunker Really That Strong?
• Chapter 17 What Happened to Hitler’s Remains?
• Chapter 18 Hitler’s Testament
• Chapter 19 Was Hitler a Demon?
• Bibliography
• Plate section