The future Fuhrer of the German people, the leader of the most "civilized Aryan" race, was born in the center of Europe, in Austria, in the city of Braunau on the Inn River. His ancestors are 52-year-old Alois and 20-year-old Clara Giedler (née Pelzl). Both branches of his family came from the Waldviertel (Lower Austria), a remote hilly region where communities of small farmers were engaged in languid labor. Alois - the offspring of a wealthy peasant - instead of going down the beaten path, he made a career as a customs bureaucrat, moving up the career ladder well. Alois, being illegitimate, bore the surname Schicklgruber until 1876 - the surname of his own mother, until he officially changed it - as he was brought up in the house of his own uncle Johann Nepomuk Hiedler - to Hitler. By April 1889, when his offspring was born, Alois was married for the 3rd time. He was a fairly wealthy burgher, who received a more than decent municipal pension and tried to live in an urban manner, strenuously copying the "master's" lifestyle. He even bought an estate for himself near the city of Lambach, becoming, though not large, but a landowner (later, Alois, however, was obliged to sell it).

The neighbors unanimously recognized his authority (it was hard not to recognize the authority of the angry and booming mustachioed man, who always walked in an official uniform). Adolf's mother was a quiet, hard-working, pious lady with a stern, pale face and large, attentive eyes. She was, as they write about her, a kind of downtrodden. True, the “downtrodden” here must be understood in a dual way: as an argument in family quarrels, Alois was not embarrassed to give free rein to his fists. And the reason for quarrels could be anything. Namely, the displeasure of the retired customs officer was caused by the fact that Clara could not give birth to his offspring. The presence of a male descendant was the main moment for Alois. Adolf and his younger sister Paula were born weak, prone to a host of different diseases.

There is a version according to which the father Hitler was half Jewish Adolf Hitler was a quarter Jew, that is, Hitler has Jewish blood, and in connection with this, he simply does not have the right to make anti-Semitic speeches. It must be emphasized that he Adolf was born as a result of incest, because his father Alois Hitler married for the 3rd time to a lady (Hitler's future mother), being related to her in the 2nd degree. So, Adolf Hitler, one of the more often cursed historical characters of the last century, entered this world, having inherited not very good health from his parents, but instead a clear mind and the persistence inherent in the peasants in achieving the goal. It was this perseverance that became the prerequisite for his high rise and deepest fall.

Having learned to read early, he quickly acclimatized in his father's library and honed the ability to tell stories read from books on his peers. The oratory of the German Fuhrer is rooted in his early childhood. In general, not only oratory - comes from youth and has become a world-famous sign of the swastika. He first saw the swastika, or "Hang's cross", at the age of 6, when he was a chorister in a boys' choir in Lambach, in Eastern Austria. It was introduced by the former abbot Hang as the coat of arms of the monastery and in 1860 was carved on a stone slab above the bypass gallery of the monastery. A banner with a swastika designed personally by Hitler in 1920 became the banner of the NSDAP, and in 1935 - the municipal flag of Nazi Germany.

Adolf stood out among his comrades for his perseverance, turning out to be the favorite in all children's games. Moreover, a love of storytelling and a penchant for leadership almost led the future leader of the German people to a church career. “In my free time from other activities, I studied singing at a choir school in Lambach,” he recalled on the pages of “My Struggle.” “This gave me the opportunity to often go to church and directly get drunk on the splendor of the ceremony and the festive splendor of church festivities. It would be very natural if the position of abbot became the same standard for me now, as the position of country pastor was for my father in his time. For some time it was. But my dad did not like
and the oratorical talents of his fighter son, nor my dreams of becoming an abbot. Thoughts about the clergy attended not only Hitler, Joseph Goebbels dreamed of becoming a church hierarch in his time, Hitler’s close ally. Make their dreams come true, church, without any doubt, she would have got beautiful, selflessly devoted servants, and the world - who knows! - would have done without the Third Reich.

But soon the dream of a future connected with the church left Adolf Hitler, replaced by the dream of becoming a fighter. Adolf won the junior classes of the basic "folk" school effortlessly. But, having finished the basic classes, it was necessary to choose a gymnasium or a real school in order to continue education. Naturally, Alois did not like the gymnasium. This, firstly, would have cost the family quite a lot, and secondly, at the gymnasium they taught a lot of humanitarian subjects, completely unnecessary for a bureaucrat in the civil service. Because Adolf began to attend a real school in Linz, here his successes were very non-individual. The childhood dream of a military career faded a little, and the desire to become an artist took its place. This idea, supported by good taste, a hard hand and the skill of a draftsman, captured Hitler forever. But his father was against it. It is one thing to be able to draw, and another thing to throw everything for the sake of the implicit future that awaits the artist!

Alois Giedler was heavy on hand and quick to execute, and often used his fists when the rest of the arguments ended or he turned out to be very drunk to resort to them. So, contradicting the pope, Adolf exposed himself to a completely real threat: while drunk, Alois did not look where he was hitting, and did not measure his strength. A sensational discovery has been made in Germany: a diary written by Adolf Hitler's younger sister, Paula, has been found. The diary testifies that Paula's brother was a brutal child and often beat her. Historians have also found memoirs written together by Hitler's half-brother Alois and half-sister Angela. One of the passages describes the ruthlessness of Hitler's father, also named Alois, and how Adolf's mother tried to protect her offspring from constant beatings; “In horror, seeing that her father could no longer restrain his own unbridled anger, she decided to end these tortures. She goes up to the attic and covers Adolf with her body. When Adolf Hitler was 13 years old, his father died suddenly of apoplexy.

Adolf somehow made it to graduation in a real school, and was already preparing for the matriculation exams. But here a failure happened to him: he fell ill with pneumonia and, at the insistence of doctors, for a long time was obliged to avoid severe stress on nervous system. The year following his recovery, Hitler did not work or study. But he went to Vienna to find out about the ability to enter the Academy of Arts, enrolled in the library of the Public Education Society, read a lot, took piano lessons. His life in that year would have been completely blissful, if not for the overshadowing event - the intensified illness of his mother, after the death of his spouse. Fearing that, having left Linz, he would no longer find Clara alive, Adolf abandoned the idea of ​​entering the Academy of Arts in the fall and stayed with his mother. In January 1907, she underwent an operation, and although, according to the admission of the attending doctor, this could only delay her death for a short time, Clara assured her offspring that her condition was steadily improving. Adolf, reassured by these assurances, again went to Vienna, cherishing the dream of eventually becoming a real artist.

Hitler took exams at the Academy of Arts. “When they announced to me that I was not accepted, it acted on me like a bolt from the blue,” Adolf wrote on the pages of My Struggle. “Dejected, I left the beautiful building on Schiller Square and for the first time in my short life I experienced a feeling disharmony with myself. What I just heard from the rector about my abilities, immediately, like lightning, illuminated for me those internal contradictions that I had semiconsciously experienced before. Only until now I could not give myself a clear account of why and why this is happening. After a few days, it became completely clear to me and myself that I should become an architect. " Curious how personal this assessment could be. When in 1919 the paintings of Adolf Hitler - watercolor landscapes and portraits painted in oils - were shown to a great connoisseur of painting, Dr. Ferdinand Steger, he issued a specific verdict: "A completely unique talent

Since 1896, five children have been living in the Hitlers' house. In conditions when seven family members live under one roof, Adolf has to join in the intense rhythm of life. Alois willingly ran away from the family to a restaurant, where he drank wine or beer and read newspapers. He achieved a lot in his life, defiantly wore a mustache like an emperor and enjoyed peace after forty successful years of service. All his life he worked for himself and for the good of his family, made a career and liked to "submit himself", as evidenced by his speech, beyond any measure interspersed with foreign words. Like most self-taught self-taught people, he was convinced that his social position must be asserted by the demonstrative use of Latin and Latinized expressions. Adolf Hitler, who masterfully imitated most of the dialects and features of speech, this shortcoming was unusual. He used foreign words correctly and only when they expressed the thought much more accurately than the vague German description.

Alois Hitler had to process 38 thousand square meters land, which was not easy for him, since the last time he was engaged in peasant work 35 years ago, and the children were not yet able to provide him with any significant assistance. It is no coincidence that he wrote to his neighbor on December 29, 1901: “... I learned that Frau von Zdecauer was going to sell the Rauscher estate (the former house of Alois in Hafeld. - Note. author)… to Viennese buyers. For such people, it is just entertainment for a few years and a means of gaining experience, which says that everything has to be learned.

From the moment Adolf went to school, his father's character deteriorated. He constantly finds fault with his 14-year-old son Alois and eventually forces him to leave home in 1896. Although Adolf did not become the eldest child in the family after that, his father treats him exactly as the eldest, fearing that he could turn out to be the same loafer as Alois. He finds himself in the center of paternal care, which consists in impatient prodding. Alois's dissatisfaction with the development of political events in Austria, where the Germans already at that time began to fear the loss of their influence, of course, still does not affect Adolf in any way due to his young age.

The role played by half-siblings Alois and Angela in early childhood Adolf, not well defined. True, Angela, whose daughter Geli became his great love, enjoyed his trust for almost 30 years and from 1928 to 1935 even assisted him in housekeeping, before one fine day she suddenly disappeared from his entourage. However, there is no exact data on how she influenced the formation of his character. Patrick Hitler, her nephew, admitted in an article in the Paris Soir newspaper that the manifestation of any selfish interests caused in him a radical and sudden negative reaction. “In 1935,” writes William Patrick, “Adolf Hitler met Angela on the doorstep of his house in Berchtesgaden and gave her exactly 24 hours to pack her bags ... He accused her of helping Goering purchase in Berchtesgaden land plot... which was located directly opposite his house and on which Goering was going to build a house for himself. He did so even though Geli shot herself in his Munich apartment four years ago. He was never able to erase this event from his memory and from his heart until the end of his life without a trace. Alois, whose son William Patrick gave him a lot of trouble with his 1939 article in the Paris Soir, he constantly treated as if he were a stranger. When he left the Hitlers' house, Adolf went only to the second grade, and when he met him again many years later, he saw in front of him a man who knew the prison firsthand. Adolf was so distant from him that he did not have to resort to acting when he told his nephew Patrick that his father was not really related to him at all. He always treated Alois as a half-brother who turned out to be a failure in life. His son from his second marriage, Heinz Hitler, who in 1938, after studying at the national political educational institution in Ballenstedt (NPEA) decided to become an officer (Adolf Hitler opposed this, as he feared that his surname alone could lead to sycophancy on the part of officers and subordinates), died in 1942 in Russia, being a non-commissioned officer of the 23rd Potsdam artillery regiment, and thus finally broke the already not very strong bonds that bound the half-brothers.

The fact that neither Alois nor Adolf ever visited the poor village of Strones, where Maria Anna Schicklgruber lived and where Alois was born, but constantly visited Spital, had logical and good reasons. While their direct and close relatives lived in Spital, only the Zillips family remained in Shtrones, connected by collateral relationship with Adolf's great-grandfathers. Their descendants, in the course of the deportation of the Dellersheim district, moved to Weissengut near Krenglebach. In Strones, where the Schicklgruber family ended with Maria Anna's childless brother Josef, they would have been strangers. Since Alois took the surname Hitler, his contacts with other members of the Schicklgruber family, who lived in various villages in Austria, were cut off. In 1876, he also received 230 guilders from Franz Schicklgruber and corresponded with the Veit family. Then these ties were cut off, and neither Alois nor Adolf was ever interested in their relatives, which consisted only of the descendants of Maria's sister Anna Josef and Leopold Schicklgruber in the villages of Fünfhaus and Hernals. Perhaps only Alois knew about it. In connection with the change of surname, it is even difficult to say whether the Schicklgrubers, who visited Hitler's house in Leonding in the summer of 1938 and left their signatures in the guest book, were aware of their distant relationship with Adolf Hitler.

In July 1897, Alois sold his house in Hafeld and moved to Lambach an der Traun, where at that time there were about 1,700 inhabitants and where he and his family had to live for almost half a year in house number 58 (later the Leingartner hotel), and then, until the late autumn of 1898, to rent an apartment at the miller Tsöbl, where the nine-year-old Adolf had to hear the noise of the mill all day long and the blacksmith Praisinger, who worked in the neighborhood, who was shoeing horses. The new environment pleased his father, who made acquaintance with new people and spent most of his time with them. In addition, he did not have the opportunity to work here with his beloved bees. However, for Adolf, who was very sensitive to noise, this time did not leave particularly pleasant memories. Perhaps this is where the roots of the strange dislike that he felt all his life towards horses and riding are hidden, but this is only an assumption.

At this time, Hitler, in his own words, began to experience "an increasing craving for everything that was somehow connected with the war and the army." Kubicek's assertion, made in 1938, that the young Hitler "didn't want to hear" about anything "that had anything to do with the war and the army" was dictated by propaganda intent to show the whole world a peace-loving Hitler. Adolf's classmate Badduin Wismayr confirmed Hitler's statement with the words: "More than anything in the world, he loved to play war." His friend from Leonding Franz Winter often repeated after 1939: "He drove us even as a boy, and now he continues." Another student from Hitler's class, Johann Weinberger, noted the young Hitler's particular penchant for war games and said that, at Hitler's initiative, students from Leonding and Untergaumberg often waged "war" among themselves. "We under Hitler were Boers, and the guys from Untergaumberberg were English." There is no doubt that Hitler already at that time was aware of his charismatic power. His references to the fact that already in his school years he had special oratorical abilities are confirmed by all his classmates without exception. He himself said: “I believe that even then I began to hone my oratorical talent in more or less fierce disputes with classmates. I became a little ringleader."

In November 1898, when Adolf was not even ten years old, his father acquired a house in Leonding near Linz, which stood next to the cemetery. The family moved there in February 1899, before Adolf had time to go to the fourth grade of his already third school, where he would have to go until September 1900. This house, which the Americans in 1938 after the "Anschluss" were going to buy and exhibited in the United States as an attraction, for a long time was considered the "home of the Fuhrer's parents" and since 1938 has become a place of pilgrimage for thousands of people from all over the world who entered their names in guest books. Adolf Hitler's relatives, the Schmidts and Schicklgrubers, Alois Hitler's acquaintances, Adolf's school friends and his official guardian Mayrhofer, representatives of the nobility, the bourgeoisie and the working class, scientists, employees, businessmen, soldiers, students and many other "pilgrims" who came to Leonding swore Adolf Hitler, in loyalty to his death and with religious enthusiasm, added to their signatures laudatory hymns and thanks to him.

In September 1900, Adolf, whose brother Edmund died of measles on February 2, and who has since remained the only son of Clara Hitler and the last hope of an ambitious father, entered the state real school in Linz, where he graduated twenty years later high school and the beautiful daughter of his half-sister Angela, who will draw attention to herself with her "cute personality". How this period of life affected Adolf is shown by two of his school photographs. One shows him as a fourth-grade elementary school student in Leonding, and the other shows him as a first-grade student at a real school in Linz. In the photograph from Leonding, we see a self-confident boy who is used to being in the spotlight, already a real "Führer". Hitler stands proudly behind the teacher, in the middle of the top row, with his arms folded across his chest. On his forehead, a strand of hair is already guessed, which will become famous in the future. In the photograph from Linz in 1901, although he is in the top row (albeit on the edge), he does not look too self-confident. It is obvious that he is dissatisfied with himself. He stands hunched over and doesn't seem to care much about being noticed at all.

Studying in Linz, Hitler continues to live in his parents' house in Leonding until the sudden death of his father (in January 1903). Then, in the spring of 1903, he moved to a school dormitory in Linz and, together with the future government official Fritz Seidl and the Haudum brothers, one of whom would later become a priest in Leonding, came up with all sorts of "pranks", which he would call twenty years later in Mein Kampf » typical forms of expression of their character. He will constantly remember Leonding with a warm word until his death. It was a clean little village inhabited by peasants and artisans. It was located in the middle of an immense landscape, only 4 kilometers from Linz. In Leonding, Alois Hitler seems to have reached the limit of his dreams. Very close to the city he had a beautiful house with a garden, so that he no longer had to go to his bees for several kilometers, as in Braunau or Passau, since the hives were only a few meters from the bedroom. Elisabeth Pleckinger, who rented his apartment, partially covered the cost of maintaining the house with her rent. Numerous later statements by Adolf Hitler prove that his critical attitude towards the church originated in Leonding, where he began to perceive some facts in the spirit of his father, although in Lambach he treated them positively.

Despite the excellent success in the elementary schools of Fischlham, Lambach and Leonding, as well as the good performance in the real school at first in history, geography and drawing, that is, in those subjects where, according to his teacher Sixtl, he knew more than some teachers, Hitler remains in the first grade of a real school for the second year. He recalled Sixtle forty years later in his Wolfschanze (Wolf's Lair) headquarters: “I was in my sixteenth year. This is the age when poetry is written. I've been to every show at the freak show and anywhere that says "Adults Only." At this age, everyone wants to know. One evening in Linz, I went to the cinema at the South Station in the evening. There was a terrible mess! At the charity session, very ambiguous films were shown. This in and of itself was bullshit. But it is characteristic how liberal the Austrian state was. My teacher Sixtl was also sitting in the hall and said to me: “So you also donate to the Red Cross!” - "Yes, Mr. Professor." He laughed, but I was a little uncomfortable in this ambiguous situation.

The change from the usual village school to a large and alien real school in the city was not to Hitler's liking. He only liked the 5-6 km long path from home to Steingasse, where the school was located. The report card he received after completing his first year in Linz told him and his parents that he had "uneven" application, and his knowledge of mathematics and science was not enough to transfer to the next grade, so he would have to repeat the course of the first year. In Mein Kampf, he talks about this time: “My assessments at that time expressed two extremes, depending on the subject and my attitude towards it. Along with commendable and excellent, there were satisfactory and even unsatisfactory in the report card. Best of all were my progress in geography, and even more so in world history. Those were my two favorite subjects in which I was head and shoulders above the rest of the class.” Hitler gives a simple explanation for this, and it seems to be true: "What I liked, I taught ... what seemed unimportant and did not attract me, I completely sabotaged."

Alois Hitler, who has achieved something in life and now stated with disappointment that his eldest son (Alois) is unable and not ready to follow in his footsteps, begins to press on the bright Adolf with such force that he loses all desire to learn. “I had to get a higher education,” Hitler said. - Based on my whole nature, and even more from temperament, my father concluded that the humanitarian gymnasium did not meet my inclinations. It seemed to him that a real school would be best. He especially established himself in this opinion because of my obvious ability to draw. It was a subject to which, in his opinion, insufficient attention was paid in Austrian gymnasiums. Perhaps the hard work that he had to do all his life and which led him to the idea that a liberal arts education was impractical also affected here. In principle, he was of the opinion that ... his son should become a government official. The difficult youth prompted him to overestimate what he had achieved, especially since he achieved everything only at the expense of iron diligence and his own energy. It was the pride of a man who achieved everything himself, and he believed that his son should achieve the same, and if possible, a higher position in life ... The mere possibility of denying what was for him the meaning of his whole life seemed to him ... absurd. Therefore, the father's decision was simple and definite ... After all, for his nature, hardened in hard battles for existence ... it would be completely unacceptable to give the right to make decisions in such things to an inexperienced and irresponsible, from his point of view, youngster. Such pernicious weakness when it came to paternal authority and responsibility for the future life of his child… did not fit into his concept of a sense of duty… For the first time in my life… I found myself in opposition. The harder and more resolutely the father tried to carry out his plans and intentions, the more stubbornly and boldly the son rebelled against this. I didn't want to be an official. Neither persuasion nor "serious" suggestions could break the resistance. I didn’t want to be an official… All my father’s attempts to create in me love or a desire for this profession, using examples from his own life, turned out to be the complete opposite. I was yawning at the thought that I would be sitting in an office, not being able to manage myself and my time.

Twenty years later, Hitler portrayed his poor academic performance as a conscious protest against his father's will and argued that his poor studies at the real school were ultimately to help him defend his opinion and get his father's permission to become an artist. “I thought,” he said, “that if my father sees my lack of progress in a real school, then, willy-nilly, he will allow me to realize my dream.” Alois Hitler's stubborn desire to make his son a successful civil servant, as he himself was, already at the age of eleven drove Adolf, by his own admission, "in opposition", made him stubborn and impudent. No matter how Hitler portrayed this situation, but all the details and relationships clearly show that even at a young age, Hitler perceived systematic work as hard labor. Bad grades in a real school, of course, were not due to a lack of intelligence and abilities. Along with the aversion to coercion, already at that time Hitler showed signs of dislike for regular and constant intensive work, if he himself did not have the opportunity to set standards and place accents. In all subjects where, along with abilities, diligent work was required, he had unsatisfactory grades. He shone only in those areas where it was not required to intensively study the content of the subject. His success, no doubt, was determined by inclinations, interest and improvisational gift. When he was in the second grade of a real school, on January 3, 1903, his father died unexpectedly. He passed out in a restaurant, and when they brought him home, he was already dead. Adolf Hitler, who writes in Mein Kampf that, despite all the arguments and skirmishes with his father, loved him very much, sobbed inconsolably, standing at the coffin. Although he subsequently goes to meet the advice and requests of his mother, who wants to fulfill her husband's will, and continues to attend the school, from that moment on he is even more strengthened in the idea that he will not be an official, but only an artist. Shortly before his death, his father took him with him to the Linz customs office to show him the range of future tasks, but Adolf was only once again convinced that such an activity did not make sense to him. He skips school, and in the classroom he works only half-heartedly. Now he is the only man in the house. His mother, sister Paula, aunt Johanna Pölzl and lodger Elisabeth Pleckinger live with him. On June 21, 1905, the mother sold the house for 10,000 crowns and moved with her children to Linz. On September 14, 1903, Angela married the official Leo Raubal and left her parental home. Adolf's mother tried to cope with the grief that befell her, devoting all her time to the children Adolf and Paula. Fate was unkind to her. What she expected from marriage to a smart, dexterous and self-confident childhood friend, neighbor and relative from Spital did not come true. When August Kubicek met her, she was over forty, but she was already a widow and the mother of six children, of whom only Adolf and Paula survived their father. She had a haggard face, a tired figure. She kept quiet and inconspicuous. She lacked her husband's vitality, which not only supported her from childhood until his death, but also suppressed her, preventing her own abilities from revealing. On May 22, 1904, when Adolf was already 15 years old and had been going to the third grade of the state real school in Linz for the last weeks, he was confirmed and after that he went to the cinema for the first time in his life. Since he wants to always be and remain a "free man", he is not interested in the information that in Austria the completion of the fourth grade of a real school makes it possible to enter a state-funded cadet school. He is still learning with reluctance. What he dislikes the most is French lessons. He works without any effort and demonstrates appropriate success. The result is that he has to retake his French exam in order to be promoted to the fourth grade. In the autumn of 1904, he takes this exam, but is forced to make an unambiguous promise to the examiner Eduard Hümer, who considers Hitler "definitely capable", that he will transfer to another school. Humer, who taught Hitler not only French, but also German, knew his student well and litigation over Hitler in Munich in 1924, he described him as follows: “Hitler was a definitely capable student, although somewhat one-sided, but he did not know how to control himself and was considered at least an obstinate, self-willed, intractable and quick-tempered young man. It was definitely difficult for him to obey school rules. He did not differ in diligence either, because with his indisputable inclinations, he could have achieved much greater success.

In September 1904, Hitler is announced at the State Higher Real School in Steyr with the director Alois Lebeda, who until September 1905 will consider him one of his best students, and applies for admission to the fourth grade. The reason for this transfer remained in the shadows for a long time and gave rise to a wide variety of assumptions. So, for example, political opponents in 1923 claimed that Hitler was forced to leave the school in Linz due to the fact that he spat out prosvir during communion and put it in his pocket. After the Münchner Post on November 27, 1923, told about this sacrilege of the young Hitler, the Bayrischer Kurir on November 30, 1923 gave vent to its imagination and reported that this incident led to a "great scandal" in Linz.

In Steyr, Hitler lives in the house of the merchant Ignaz Kammerhofer in the apartment of the judicial official Konrad Edler von Zichini at Grünmarkt 19, which was later renamed Adolf-Hitler-Platz. 37 years after he left school, he recalled it like this: “I didn’t like Steyr. He was the complete opposite of Linz. Linz was painted in national colors while Steyr was black and red. I lived ... in a room overlooking the backyard, together with a friend whose name was Gustav. I don't remember his last name. The room was very comfortable, but the view of the courtyard was terrible. I constantly shot at the rats running around there. The landlady loved us very much, in any case she always treated us with more sympathy than her own husband. He had no voting rights at all. She constantly pounced on him like a viper. I told her more than once: "Dear Madam, don't make the coffee so hot. I have too little time in the morning and I can't wait for it to cool down." One morning I announced that it was already half and there was still no coffee. She replied that not half yet. To this her husband remarked: "Petronella, but it's really thirty-five minutes already." She straightened up and did not calm down until the evening. And in the evening there was a real disaster. He needed to go somewhere. We were both doing our homework, and he wanted one of us to go out with him. Every time someone had to shine for him, because he was afraid of rats. As soon as he was outside the threshold, she locked the door. We thought: "Well, now it will begin!" We really liked her. He called out, "Petronella, open it!" She laughed, began to hum some song, walked up and down the apartment and did not even think to open it. He began to threaten her, then beg: "Petronella, I beg you, open it! Petronella, you can't do that!" - "As much as possible." Then suddenly: "Adolf! Open immediately!" She told me: "Do not open!" - "Madam forbids." She kept him outside until 7 o'clock. When he entered with the milk, he looked miserable. Oh, how we despised him! She was about 33 years old, and it was difficult to determine his age - he had a full beard. I think he was 45. He was from an impoverished noble family… Austria was full of impoverished aristocrats… My wife was constantly slipping us something tasty. The students called the landlady "Mom". Oh, it was a wonderful, bright time! But for me it was a lot of worries, because it was very difficult to overcome all the school obstacles, especially when the exams were on the nose ... On the Damberg mountain I learned to ski. After the end of the semester, we always had a big party. It was a lot of fun there: we were partying with might and main. It was there that the only case in my life happened when I got too drunk. We received the testimonies and decided to celebrate the cause. "Mommy", having learned that everything was already behind, was slightly touched. We quietly went to a peasant tavern and there we drank and said terrible things. How it all happened exactly, I don’t remember ... I had to restore the events later. The certificate was in my pocket. The next day I was awakened by a thrush who… found me on the road. In such a terrible state, I came to my "mother". "My God, Adolf, how you look!" I washed up, she served me black coffee and asked: "And what kind of certificate did you get?" I reached into my pocket - there is no evidence. "God! I need to show my mother something!" I decided: I'll say that I showed it to someone on the train, and then the wind came up and tore it out of my hands. But "mommy" insisted: "Where could it have gone?" - "Probably, someone took it!" - "Well, then there is only one way out: you will immediately go and ask for a duplicate. Do you actually have any money?" - "Not left." She gave me 5 guilders and I went. The director made me wait in the waiting room for a long time. In the meantime, four scraps of my testimony had already been delivered to the school. Being unconscious, I confused it with toilet paper. It was a nightmare. Everything that the rector said to me, I simply cannot convey. It was terrible. I swore by all the saints that I would never drink again in my life. I got a duplicate... I was so ashamed! When I returned to "mommy", she asked: "Well, what did he say?" "I can't tell you that, but I'll tell you one thing: I'll never drink again in my life." It was such a lesson that I never took alcohol in my mouth again. Then I went home with a joyful heart. True, there was no particular joy, because the evidence was not the best.

The testimonial Adolf used instead of toilet paper on February 11, 1905, was not only “not the best”, but worse than ever. His progress in German, French, mathematics and shorthand was marked "unsatisfactory". In addition to drawing and physical education, where he received "excellent" and "excellent", the rest of the marks were satisfactory.

In the school, where in 1904-1905. the German language was taught by the Jew Robert Siegfried Nagel, the progress of Adolf, who has no reason to complain about the conditions, improves after the initial stagnation. Only in physics (Prof. Bernhard Bacha) do they get worse; in chemistry (Bacha) remain stably weak; in drawing (prof. Emil Haytum) and physical education (director Alois Lebeda) the marks are excellent. Hitler is obviously satisfied with this. In the first half of the year alone, he has 30 days of absence "without good reason." On March 3, 1942, Hitler tells his guests at the Wolfschanze headquarters, in full accordance with his memoirs in Mein Kampf: “In general, I taught no more than 10 percent of what others taught. I have always done my homework very quickly. However, I was good at history. Often I felt sorry for my classmates. "Let's go play?" - "No, I still have to study!" They are preparing for exams. They're giving them away! And how disappointed they are when a person comes without preparation and also copes with it. "How so! After all, we were preparing!" Lord, this is given to one, and not to another.”

In Steyr, Hitler remains as obstinate and stubborn as in Linz. On the night of January 8-9, 1942, he recalled: “If not for a couple of teachers ... who stood up for me, I would have had a bad time ... One of our professors (Koenig, who taught Hitler French. - Note. author) ... was at one time an inspector for steam boilers ... During the explosion, his speech was taken away, and he could not pronounce everything. When we came to his lesson, I sat down at the first desk. He started the roll call. When he reached me, I did not even move, but only looked at him. He picked me up and asked what was the matter. "My name is not Itler, Professor, but Hitler!" He couldn't pronounce "g". And yet Koenig gives him French in the autumn of 1905, no longer "unsatisfactory", as in February, but "satisfactory". September 16, 1905 Hitler receives the following final grades: behavior - "satisfactory", diligence - "satisfactory", religion - "satisfactory", mathematics - "satisfactory", chemistry and physics - "satisfactory", geometry and descriptive geometry - "satisfactory "(after the second exam), drawing - "excellent", physical education - "excellent", singing - "satisfactory". Real school teachers throughout the year never cease to wonder why such a great athlete like Adolf Hitler, who as a child had only surgery on his tonsils and was ill with measles, looks so “sickly” and feels rejected. Professor Gregor Goldbacher, who taught him geometry, told on January 29, 1941, that Hitler "apparently, as a result of the death of his father and ... being away from home ... behaved quietly and depressed" and that "the young student did not feel well at that time" and with found contact with classmates with difficulty, being a stranger in the city and at the school. An idea of ​​what he looked like at that time can be given by the drawing of his classmate Sturmberger, who depicted him in profile. In the portrait we see too mature and too serious for fifteen years of thin young man with a sloping high forehead, a long sharp nose, a prominent chin and piercing eyes on an ascetic face. Poorly combed hair hangs from right to left on the forehead. The description of the appearance of the young Hitler, which gives Kubicek - "a very pale, thin young man ... with a fiery look" - as a whole coincides with Sturmberger's amateurish drawing.

Despite his distaste for school, Adolf is forced to obey his mother and prepare for his Abitur. In any case, he gives her such a promise. The seriousness of his intentions, however, inspires great doubt. Nevertheless, he leaves the school in the autumn of 1905 only because of illness. He himself tells about it this way: “And then the disease came to my aid and in just a few weeks determined my future, eliminating the constant source of disputes in my father’s house. In view of a severe pulmonary disease, the doctor strongly advised my mother ... under no circumstances to give me to work in the office. School attendance was also to be suspended for at least a year. What I secretly hoped for so long, what I argued about, suddenly became a reality by itself ... thanks to this event. Impressed by my illness, my mother finally agreed to take me away from the real school and allowed me to enter the art academy. Hitler is happy and, together with his also unhealthy mother, travels by train from Linz to Gmünd, where they are met by the Schmidts, relatives from Spital, and driven by an ox cart. In Spital, he falls into the hands of the doctor Karl Kais from Vaitra, drinks a lot of milk, eats well and quickly recovers. However, he keeps to himself, often plays the zither, paints, walks around the neighborhood and observes the field work of relatives, without trying to take part in them. He does not try to get closer either to his aunt, his mother's sister, or to the village youth. The more interest they show in the "student" from the city, the less he pays attention to them.

Finally, he finished with the school, which, according to his youth friend Kubicek, he left with a feeling of hatred. For admission to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, he has enough education, which he received at school, and a certificate. In the autumn of 1905, at the age of sixteen, he achieves what he aspired to during his father's lifetime. However, now he is in no hurry. His illness does not allow his mother to insist on the early start of his studies, moreover, the entrance exams in 1905 had already passed when he was still at the school. Now he can enter the academy no earlier than the autumn of 1906, and he is firmly set on this. In May 1906, he goes to Vienna, where he visits museums and other sights of the city until June. But he did not wait for the entrance exams. He postpones admission to the next year. Already on May 7, he writes to his friend: "I arrived well and now I wander around the city all day long. Tomorrow I'm going to the opera at Tristan, the day after tomorrow at the Flying Dutchman, etc. Although everyone here very beautiful, I miss Linz." Perhaps the study of works of art in Vienna slightly knocked him down. It is more likely, however, that he did not want to leave the carefree life so quickly and again, as in September 1905, join the rhythm, which he does not define himself.While his Steyr classmates prepare for bureaucratic careers, he, a "mummy's boy", as he would write about himself 20 years later, enjoys freedom and idleness, an "empty serene existence". mother has already sold June 1905. Clara, Adolf and Paula Hitler now live at Humboldtstrasse 31 in Linz, so that Adolf no longer has to walk into the city, as in the spring of 1903. In Linz, he enrolls in the library of the Public Education Society, starting from From October 2, 1906 to January 31, 1907, he takes piano lessons from the former military musician Prewatzky-Wendt, regularly goes to the local theater, watches all productions of Wagner, draws, writes poetry, composes music, develops projects for theatrical scenery, bridges, cities and streets and discusses great and fantastic plans with a student of the music school Kubicek. He no longer needs to obey discipline, and he himself determines what to do. The mother begins to clearly age, and her health is deteriorating. On January 18, 1907, she goes to the Hospital of the Sisters of Mercy in Linz, and the surgeon Karl Urban performs a complex operation on her for an hour, after which he enters the diagnosis in the medical history: sarcoma of the pectoralis minor muscle. Clara underwent this operation, but after that she lived only 11 months, tormented by the consciousness that Adolf, not paying attention to anything, "would go his own way, as if he alone lives in this world." In order not to disturb him, she pretends that she is better, although she knows that she does not have long to live. Adolf seems to misjudge her condition. In any case, he leaves her alone with her sister and leaves for Vienna. When Kubicek visited her at the end of the summer of 1907, while Adolf was in Vienna taking the entrance exams to the Academy of Fine Arts, he saw an old and sick woman in front of him. “She seemed to me,” he wrote, “more preoccupied than before. The face was covered with deep wrinkles. His eyes were cloudy, his voice was quiet and distant. I got the impression that now that Adolf wasn't with her, she was very weak and looked sicker and older than usual. Of course, she concealed her state of health from her son in order to facilitate parting ... Now, left alone, she seemed to me like an old sick woman.

Notes:

Hitler only once deviated from the information he presented in Mein Kampf. On 29 November, in a letter to an unnamed addressee, he claimed that his father was a "postal clerk" (typed copy 26.VIII.1941). At the bottom left is the stamp of the Main Archive of the NSDAP and under the inscription "made a copy:" - the surname "Richter" (former Main Archive of the NSDAP, Federal Archive in Koblenz, NS 26/17a).

Even if Hitler sometimes said that he was not endowed with superhuman abilities and powers, like the mythological characters of Greek and Roman antiquity, at the same time he did not stop the importunate desire of Hess, Goebbels and Himmler to attribute to him just such qualities.

On the contrary, he often mentioned his mother in conversations.

Gustav Hitler died on December 8, 1887, Ida Hitler died 25 days later, on January 2, 1888, from diphtheria. Otto Hitler lived only a few days after his birth (1887).

Apparently, he even wrote on these issues in special journals. Evidence for this has not been found. Even his relatives in Spital and Linz only know about it by hearsay.

He took care of her when her mother fell ill in 1907, and in 1911 he renounced his monthly "orphan's" pension of 25 crowns in her favor.

So, for example, she saved the life of an Austrian engineer sentenced to death, who subsequently brought her to Leonding in 1945, where, as in Spital and even abroad, she had friends always ready to help. For example, in 1945 she received food parcels from a Dutch family in Rotterdam.

The SS men, who had been looking for her on Hitler's orders in 1945, but never found her, were ordered not to eliminate her, but to hand over a large sum of money to her.

Half-brother Adolf first worked as a waiter, in the period from 1900 to 1902 twice went to prison for theft. In 1907 he worked in Paris, from where he moved to Ireland in 1909, where he married and had a son, William Patrick. In the 1920s he lived in Germany, was again imprisoned in Hamburg on charges of bigamy, and then returned to England again. When Adolf Hitler became the most important political figure in Germany, Alois tried to capitalize on it. Shortly before the start of the war, he opened the Alois restaurant on Wigtenbergplatz in Berlin. However, Adolf always completely ignored him and even forbade mentioning his brother's name in his presence.

Adolf's cousin Anton Schmidt from Spital (whose mother was the sister of Hitler's mother) came to Leonding in 1938 to be married by the priest Haudum.

Mayrhofer was mayor of Leonding and Adolf's official guardian after the death of Alois Hitler.

He was often referred to as "savior" and "deliverer".

Lebeda taught physical education lessons.

Hitler, both in the circle of his party comrades and before the public, denied these accusations.

What Hitler was sick with has not been established. It would be superfluous to give here a list of numerous and varied assumptions. It is only known that in 1905 he really was ill.

See also chapter 4. Only when he was advised to study architecture at the academy, which was not originally his plan, did he have to admit that he could use a matriculation certificate (or at least the best marks in mathematics and geometry).

Rudolf Bachleiter, Franz Eder and Karl Oehler became employees on the railway, Ferdinand Hoeflinger and Engelbert Schnurpfeil became teachers, Otto Kiederle became an employee of the Vienna Zoo, Johann Schreiberhuber became a postal official, and Karl Plochberger joined the Steyrwerke factory.

Adolf Gitler- German politician, founder and central figure of National Socialism, founder of the totalitarian dictatorship of the Third Reich, head of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, Reich Chancellor and Fuhrer of Germany, Supreme Commander armed forces Germany in World War II.

Hitler was the initiator of the outbreak of World War II (1939-1945), as well as the creation of concentration camps. To date, his biography is one of the most studied in the world.

Until now, various feature films and documentaries continue to be made about Hitler, as well as books are written. In this article we will talk about the personal life of the Fuhrer, his rise to power and inglorious death.

When Hitler was four years old, his father died. After 4 years, in 1907, the mother also dies of oncology, which becomes a real tragedy for a teenager.

Adolf Hitler as a child

After that, Adolf became more independent, and he even filled out the relevant documents for receiving a pension.

Youth

Soon Hitler decides to go to Vienna. Initially, he wants to devote his life to art and become a famous artist.

In this regard, he is trying to enter the Art Academy, but he fails to pass the exams. This upset him greatly, but did not break him.

The following years of his biography were filled with various difficulties. He experienced difficult financial circumstances, often went hungry, and even spent the night on the street, because he could not pay for his lodging for the night.

At that time, Adolf Hitler tried to earn money by painting, but this brought him a very meager income.

Interestingly, having reached draft age, he hid from military service. The main reason was his unwillingness to serve along with the Jews, whom he already treated with contempt.

When Hitler was 24 he went to Munich. It was there that he met the first world war(1914-1918), which he was sincerely glad about.

He immediately signed up as a volunteer in the Bavarian army, after which he participated in various battles.

Hitler among colleagues (sitting on the far right), 1914

It should be noted that Adolf showed himself to be a very brave soldier, for which he was awarded the Iron Cross of the second degree.

An interesting fact is that even after becoming the head of the Third Reich, he was very proud of his award and wore it on his chest all his life.

Hitler took the defeat in the war as a personal tragedy. He associated it with the cowardice and venality of the politicians who govern Germany. After the war, he became seriously interested in politics, as a result of which he got into the People's Labor Party.

Hitler's rise to power

Over time, Adolf Hitler took over as head of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), having great authority among his associates.

In 1923, he managed to organize the "Beer putsch", the purpose of which was to overthrow the current government.

When, on November 9, Hitler with a 5,000-strong army of storm troopers headed for the walls of the ministry, he met armed police detachments on his way. As a result, the coup attempt ended in failure.

It is worth noting that all these actions were contrary to the Treaty of Versailles, signed after the end of the First World War.

However, for some reason, European countries turned a blind eye to such actions of the Nazis.

However, this is not surprising if we recall how it was signed, after which Hitler made the final decision to seize all of Europe.

Soon, on the initiative of Adolf Hitler, the Gestapo police and the concentration camp system were created.

On June 30, 1934, the Gestapo staged a massive pogrom against the SA attack aircraft, which went down in history as the Night of the Long Knives.

More than a thousand people were killed, representing a potential threat to the Fuhrer. Among them was the leader of the attack aircraft, Ernst Röhm.

Many people who had nothing to do with the SA were also killed, in particular Hitler's predecessor as Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher and his wife.

After the Nazis came to power, active propaganda of the superiority of the Aryan nation over others began in Germany. Naturally, the Germans themselves were called Aryans, who had to fight for the purity of blood, enslaving and destroying the "lower" races.

In parallel with this, the idea was instilled into the German people that they should become full-fledged masters of the whole world. Interestingly, Adolf Hitler wrote about this 10 years ago in his book Mein Kampf.

The Second World War

September 1, 1939 began - the bloodiest in humanity. Germany attacked and completely occupied it within two weeks.

This was followed by the annexation of territories, and. The blitzkrieg continued with the capture of Yugoslavia.

On June 22, 1941, Hitler's troops attacked the Soviet Union, of which he was the head. Initially, the Wehrmacht managed to win one victory after another quite easily, but during the Battle of Moscow, the Germans began to have serious problems.

A column of captured Germans on the Garden Ring, Moscow, 1944

Under the leadership, the Red Army launched an active counteroffensive on all fronts. After the victories in the Battle of Kursk, it became clear that the Germans would no longer be able to win the war.

Holocaust and death camps

When Adolf Hitler became head of state, he created concentration camps on the territory of Germany, Poland for the purposeful destruction of people. Their number exceeded 42,000.

During the reign of the Fuhrer, millions of people died in them, including prisoners of war, civilians, children and those people who did not support the ideas of the Third Reich.

Some of the most famous camps were in Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Treblinka (where he died a heroic death), Dachau and Majdanek.

Prisoners in concentration camps were subjected to sophisticated torture and cruel experiments. In these death factories, Hitler destroyed representatives of the "lower" races and enemies of the Reich.

In the Polish camp of Auschwitz (Auschwitz), gas chambers were built, in which 20,000 people were killed daily.

Millions of Jews and Gypsies perished in such cells. This camp has become a sad symbol of the Holocaust - a large-scale extermination of Jews, recognized as the largest genocide of the 20th century.

If you are interested in knowing how the Nazi death camps operated, read the short biography that has been nicknamed the "blonde devil."

Why did Hitler hate the Jews

Biographers of Adolf Hitler have several opinions on this issue. The most common version is "racial politics", which he divided into 3 parts.

• The main (Aryan) race were the Germans, who were supposed to rule the whole world.
• Then came the Slavs, whom Hitler wanted to partly destroy and partly make slaves.
• The third group included Jews who had no right to exist at all.

Other researchers of Hitler's biography suggest that the dictator's hatred of the Jews was born out of envy, since they owned large enterprises and banking institutions, while he, as a young German, eked out a miserable existence.

Personal life

It is still difficult to say something about Hitler's personal life, for lack of reliable facts.

It is only known that for 13 years, starting in 1932, he cohabited with Eva Braun, who became his legal wife only on April 29, 1945. At the same time, Adolf had no children from her or from any other woman.

Photo of Hitler growing up

An interesting fact is that, despite his unattractive appearance, Hitler was very popular with women, always knowing how to win them over.

Some biographers of Hitler claim that he could hypnotize people. At least, he mastered the art of mass hypnosis for sure, since people during his performances turned into a slavishly submissive crowd of thousands.

Thanks to his charisma, oratory and bright gestures, Hitler fell in love with many girls who were ready for anything for him. Interestingly, when he lived with Eva Braun, she twice wanted to commit suicide because of jealousy.

In 2012, the American Werner Schmedt announced that he was the son of Adolf Hitler and his niece Geli Ruabal.

As proof of this, he provided some photographs showing his "parents". However, Werner's story immediately aroused distrust among a number of Hitler's biographers.

Death of Hitler

On April 30, 1945, surrounded by Soviet troops, 56-year-old Hitler, along with his wife Eva Braun, committed suicide after killing his beloved dog Blondie.

There are two versions of exactly how Hitler died. According to one of them, the Fuhrer took potassium cyanide, and according to another, he shot himself.

According to witnesses from among the attendants, even the day before, Hitler gave the order to deliver canisters of gasoline from the garage to destroy the bodies.

After the death of the Fuhrer was discovered, the officers wrapped his body in a soldier's blanket and, along with the body of Eva Braun, were taken out of the bunker.

Then they were doused with gasoline and set on fire, as such was the will of Adolf Hitler himself.

The soldiers of the Red Army found the remains of the dictator in the form of dentures and parts of the skull. At the moment they are stored in Russian archives.

There is a popular urban legend that the corpses of Hitler's doubles and his wife were found in the bunker, and the Fuhrer himself and his wife allegedly hid in, where they lived quietly until the end of their days.

Similar versions are put forward and proved even by some historians, including the British Gerard Williams and Simon Dunstan. However, the scientific community rejects such theories.

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The date of birth of Adolf Hitler is well known in society: according to the relevant metric documents, he was born on the evening of April 20, 1889, shortly before Easter, in the Austrian town of Braunau am Inn. This town is often confused with the town of Braunau (now Broumov) in Bohemia (Czech Republic). It was precisely because of this confusion that President Hindenburg called Hitler "Bohemian corporal" all his life.

Adolf's father was the customs official Alois Hitler. 13 years before the birth of his son, he changed his surname Schicklgruber to Hitler. This was due to the fact that his actual father, Johann Nepomuk Hüttler, a poor landless peasant who later became rich, could not give his surname to his illegitimate son, whose mother, Maria Anna Schicklgruber, was married to his brother Johann Georg Hiedler, who died in 1842. in 1857. He began to be officially listed as the father of Alois. Johann Nepomuk could not recognize his paternity during the lifetime of his wife Eva Maria, who died only in 1873. And then it was more convenient to imagine Alois as the son of Johann Georg Hiedler, who was the legal husband of Maria Anna and the brother of Johann Nepomuk, in whose house young Alois was brought up. But either under dictation, the priest wrote down the surname not quite accurately, or for some other, unknown reasons, it was changed to Hitler. So Alois Schicklgruber became Hitler. I also note that Johann Nepomuk was also the grandfather of Adolf Hitler's mother, Clara Pölzl. So the future Fuhrer was born from a marriage between fairly close relatives, which made him more susceptible to many diseases.

The fact that Alois Hitler (by mother Schicklgruber) was born out of wedlock (and this happened in 1837) was not unusual. In Lower Austria, where Alois was from, at that time about 40 percent of children were born out of wedlock. According to this indicator, this peasant province of Austria surpassed even the capital Vienna, with its cosmopolitan population and freedom of morals, where the proportion of illegitimate children did not exceed 25 percent. Probably, in part, everything was explained by the fact that the peasants, due to their poverty, were in no hurry to spend money on a wedding ceremony and raised children in actual marriages for years. In addition, they were all Catholics, and divorce for representatives of this denomination in the 19th century was extremely difficult, and this required the permission of the Pope himself. Therefore, many Austrian peasants already lived in new families, formally remaining connected with their former spouses by bonds of undissolved marriage.

There was another factor, very specific to Lower Austria, the reasons for which are not fully understood. The inhabitants of this area are much more likely than, for example, those living in similar natural and climatic conditions their Swiss neighbors suffered from a lack of iodine in the body. As a result, Graves' disease developed, which increased the risk of infertility in both men and women. Therefore, the Austrian peasants were in a hurry to try out their reproductive function, not thinking too much about the legality of marriage.

In addition, sexual relations were often carried out between close relatives, marriages between which were forbidden or condemned by the church. It is no coincidence that Lower Austria was called the "reserve of cretins and dwarfs" for European circuses. There were genetic consequences of closely related marriages. In fact, Adolf Hitler, I repeat, was the fruit of such an alliance, which, however, does not at all give grounds to suspect him of dementia.

But Johann Nepomuk Hüttler had a different case that forced him to hide his paternity for a long time. Maria Anna Schicklgruber served as a servant in his house, and he was married and in every way concealed his relationship with her from his legal wife. The entire genealogy of Hitler was studied in detail by Werner Maser, who was the first to write a "human" and objective biography of Hitler. I refer readers to the text of this remarkable book for details. Here I will only note that the mother of Adolf Hitler, Klara Hitler, nee Pölzl, was too closely related to her husband, so that their marriage required special church permission.

Some historians subsequently began to refer to Adolf Hitler as Adolf Schicklgruber. Some continue to do so to this day. The motive here is obvious: they tried to accuse the Fuhrer of another unseemly act - the appropriation of a surname that did not belong to him by law. In fact, as we have seen, Adolf Hitler never bore the surname Schicklgruber.

The illegitimate birth of Hitler's father gave rise to legends about all sorts of exotic ancestors of the Fuhrer. Mindful of his bestial anti-Semitism, special emphasis was placed on versions of Jewish ancestors, among which even representatives of the Rothschild family of bankers were recorded. The fact that the German surname "Hitler" was also widespread among Jews was also used here. However, detailed studies undertaken by W. Mather on church archives proved that there is not even a trace of any “Jewish trace”, so beneficial from a propaganda point of view, in the Fuhrer's genealogy.

The change of surname brought about by his father helped the future German Fuhrer in one respect. As American historian William Shearer wittily remarked, “Would Hitler have succeeded in becoming the ruler of Germany if he had remained Schicklgruber? There is something funny about the way this name is pronounced by the Germans in the south of the country. Is it possible to imagine a crowd shouting furiously: "Heil, Heil Schicklgruber!"? (It is perhaps more difficult to pronounce such a patter than the famous one: “Karl stole corals from Clara ...” - B.S.)"Heil Hitler!" not only resembled Wagnerian music, singing the pagan spirit of ancient Germanic sagas and corresponding to the mystical mood of mass Nazi gatherings, but was also used during the Third Reich as an obligatory form of greeting ... "Heil Schicklgruber!" it is much more difficult to imagine in this capacity. By the way, Hitler was greatly helped in his oratorical activity by the fact that he could skillfully imitate any of the German dialects and, therefore, in every land, be it Bavaria or Saxony, the Rhineland or Prussia, was perceived as his own.

Alois Hitler made a brilliant career for those times, breaking out of the environment of by no means wealthy peasants into officials. For more than forty years of impeccable service, he received a fairly decent pension. Between Alois and Clara, the age difference was 23 years, and she was his third wife (the first two wives died). From his second wife, Franziska Matzelsberger, Alois had an illegitimate son, also Alois, later adopted by his father, and the legitimate daughter of Angela, whose daughter, also Angela (Gel) Raubal, later became Hitler's mistress.

In 1895, Alois Hitler, who had risen to a rather high rank of senior official, retired due to illness and soon settled in a purchased house with a plot of land in Leonding near Linz. He died in 1903. His wife survived him by only four years and died in 1907. In 1888, Alois managed to receive a significant inheritance from Johann Nepomuk Hüttler. It allowed Adolf Hitler to lead a relatively comfortable existence even after the death of his parents. His mother's sister Johanna Pölzl, who witnessed the baptism of Adolf Hitler on April 22, 1889, died in 1911 and also left Adolf an inheritance, so that he, not needing money, renounced his pension for the loss of a breadwinner in favor of his younger sister Paula .

Adolf Hitler's father was a powerful and purposeful man, who, thanks to these qualities, managed to break out into people on his own. The Fuhrer emphasized this purposefulness of his father in the book "My Struggle". In Adolf himself, the paternal character manifested itself to an even greater extent. In the book “My Struggle”, he says this about his parents: “In a small town, illuminated by the golden rays of martyrdom, the German people were hurt (Hitler means the execution in Braunau by the French invaders during the Napoleonic rule of the Nuremberg bookseller Johann Palm, a great German nationalist. - B. S.), in this town, Bavarian by blood, Austrian by nationality, my parents lived in the late 80s of the last century. The father was a conscientious government official, the mother was engaged in housework, evenly sharing her love among all of us, her children. Only very little remains in my memory from those times...

Given my inclinations and temperament, my father came to the conclusion that it would be wrong to send me to a gymnasium where the humanities predominate. It seemed to him that it would be better to send me to a real school. He was even more strengthened in this intention by my obvious ability to draw. And this subject, in his opinion, was in the perfect pen in the Austrian gymnasium ... He thought that his son, like himself, should eventually become an official, and was very proud that he had achieved everything himself, with his work. The imperious nature of his father, hardened in a difficult struggle for existence, did not allow the thought that an inexperienced boy would choose his own path in life. Then he would have considered himself a bad father...” But Adolf wanted to be a free artist and already in childhood showed will and stubbornness.

In 1895, the year his father's career ended, Adolf went to elementary school in Fischlham. He studied "excellently". Alois hoped that his son would also be an official. In 1896-1898, Hitler studied at the school of the Benedictine monastery in Lambach, where he took singing lessons and sang in the boys' choir. In 1939, Hitler visited the Lambach school and again sat at his school desk. The Fuhrer ordered the construction of a new school in Lambach, and bought the old one as a museum building.

In 1896, due to a conflict with his father, Adolf's half-brother Alois left home, whom his father constantly reproached for idleness. After that, Adolf became the main hope of his father and his heir. But a bureaucratic career did not appeal to the future Fuhrer, and not only because he wanted to be a free artist. Even in his school years, according to the memoirs of classmates, he showed an increased interest in everything that was connected with the war and military service. One of his classmates, Baldwin Wismire, claimed: "More than anything, he loved to play war."

In 1899 the Hitler family moved to Leonding. Adolf's classmate at the Leonding school, Johann Weinberger, recalled how, during the game in the Boer War, "we under the command of Hitler were Boers, and the guys from Untergaumberg were English." At the same time, Hitler, by his own admission, “began to hone his oratorical talent in more or less fierce disputes with classmates. I became a little ringleader."

In June 1900, Adolf's brother Edmund died of measles, and he remains the only son in the family. In September, Adolf entered the state real school in Linz. He believed that Leonding was the best place in Austria, and there he continued to live during his studies in his father's house at Michaelsbergstrasse 16. After his father's death, the house was sold, and Hitler moved to a school dormitory in Linz.

In a real school, Adolf could not boast of the same successes as in primary school. Here he had excellent marks only in history, geography and drawing. In these subjects, as his teacher Sixtl recalled, Hitler knew more than his teachers. But due to poor performance in other disciplines, the future Fuhrer of Great Germany remained in the first grade of a real school for the second year. The reason, as explained by Hitler in Mein Kampf, was as follows: “My grades at that time reflected two extremes, depending on the subject and my attitude towards it. Along with commendable and excellent grades in the report card, there were satisfactory and even unsatisfactory. Best of all were my progress in geography and especially in world history. Those were my two favorite subjects in which I was head and shoulders above the rest of the class... What I liked, I taught... What seemed unimportant and didn't appeal to me, I totally sabotaged."

All his father's attempts to convince Adolf that one must study well in order to become an official and achieve more than he himself achieved, led to nothing. The Fuhrer recalled: “The harder and more resolutely the father tried to put his plans and intentions into practice, the more stubbornly and boldly the son rebelled against this. I didn't want to be an official. Neither persuasion nor suggestion could break my resistance. I didn't want to be an official... All my father's attempts to instill in me a love for this profession by his own example achieved the opposite result. I was yawning at the thought that I would be sitting in an office, not being able to manage myself and my time.

As if protesting against his father's intentions, Hitler began to skimp on classes at a real school. A truly future Fuhrer was fond of drawing and hoped to become an artist. He was disgusted by those subjects that required perseverance and hard work.

In 1903, Alois Hitler died suddenly of a stroke. Adolf loved his father and sincerely grieved, sobbing over the coffin of a loved one. And although now it seemed that there was no longer anyone to protest against, he began to study even worse, frankly skipping classes and even more strengthened in his intention to become an artist, not an official.

Worst of all, Hitler was given the French language, although during the First World War, during a long stay in France, he mastered this language quite well. But when he was transferred to the fourth grade of a real school, he even had to retake this subject. His teacher Eduard Huemer testified at the trial of the participants in the "beer putsch" in 1924: "Hitler was a definitely gifted student, although somewhat one-sided, but he did not know how to control himself and was considered an obstinate, self-willed, intractable and quick-tempered young man. It was difficult for him to obey school rules. He did not differ in diligence either, because with his indisputable inclinations, he could have achieved much greater success.

In 1904, Hitler entered the fourth grade of another real school - in Steyr. Here he studied very poorly, as they say out of hand. And on the occasion of receiving a certificate, Hitler got drunk drunk for the only time in his life. And it was from what! He recalled: “We received the testimonies and decided to celebrate the cause. "Mommy" (a landlady from the impoverished nobles. - B.S.), having learned that everything was already behind, was slightly touched. We quietly went to a peasant tavern and there we drank and said terrible things. How it all happened exactly, I don't remember... I had to restore the events later. The certificate was in my pocket. The next day I was awakened by a thrush who... found me on the road. In such a terrible state, I came to my "mother". "My God, Adolf, how you look!" I washed up, she served me black coffee and asked: “And what kind of certificate did you get?” I reached into my pocket - there is no evidence. "God! I need to show my mother something!” I decided: I'll say that I showed it to someone on the train, and then the wind came up and tore it out of my hands. But "mommy" insisted: "Where could it have gone?" - "Probably, someone took it!" - “Well, then there is only one way out: you will immediately go and ask for a duplicate. Do you actually have any money?" - "Not left." She gave me five guilders and I went. In the meantime, four scraps of my testimony had already been delivered to the school. Being unconscious, I confused it with toilet paper. It was a nightmare. Everything that the rector said to me, I simply cannot convey. It was terrible. I swore by all the saints that I would never drink again in my life. I got a duplicate... I was so ashamed! When I returned to "mommy", she asked: "Well, what did he say?" “I can’t tell you this, but I will say one thing: I will never drink again in my life.” It was such a lesson that I never took alcohol in my mouth again. Then I went home with a joyful heart. True, there was no particular joy, because the evidence was not the best.

The certificate that Hitler received in Linz on February 11, 1905, was indeed such that it was not a pity to use it instead of toilet paper. The future Fuhrer of the German people received "failures" in German, French, mathematics and shorthand. He received "excellent" and "excellent" only in drawing and physical education, in other subjects his knowledge was rated as "satisfactory".

Apparently, on that day, Hitler really got drunk for the first and last time in his life. Well, there was a good reason. In many countries, not only in Austria and Germany, schoolchildren and students celebrated and celebrate the end of high school and sessions with noisy feasts, plentiful in terms of booze, but not snacks.

Quite often the question arises of what would happen if Hitler could realize himself as an artist. According to many, with the exception of the very intolerant opponents of Hitler, the Fuhrer really had certain artistic abilities for painting and architecture. And as some researchers and publicists think, Hitler would have become a professional painter or architect, and there would have been no National Socialism in Germany, a “final solution to the Jewish question” and the Second World War. But it seems to me that even if Hitler had been admitted to the Academy of Arts, he would not have been able to exist as a professional painter for a long time. Adolf thought of himself as nothing more than a great man capable of shaking the world. To achieve such a position in the world of beauty, Hitler would need to at least reach the level of Salvador Dali. And according to the unanimous opinion of experts, the Fuhrer did not have such extraordinary abilities for painting. And he himself admitted that he wanted to be not an artist, but an architect. But in this, as we will see, he did not succeed. So the only field where he had the opportunity to achieve greatness was politics and war as its most extreme manifestation. But before that it was still far away. In the meantime, Hitler faced the urgent task of finishing school and getting a certificate of secondary education.

In Steyr, Hitler studied more successfully than in Linz, but he still had excellent marks only in drawing and physical education. During the first half of 1905, he skipped 30 days. On March 3, 1942, he recalled in Wolfschanz: “In general, I taught no more than 10 percent of what others taught. I have always done my homework very quickly. However, I was good at history. I often felt sorry for my classmates. "Let's go play!" I suggested. “No, I still have to study!” They are preparing for exams. They're giving them away! And how disappointed they are when a person comes without preparation and also copes with exam tasks. "How so! After all, we were preparing!” Lord, this is given to one, and not to another.” Hitler from early youth believed in his chosenness by Providence, and therefore boldly skipped classes and did not consider it necessary to prepare especially hard for exams. God or fate will not allow failure anyway.

Nevertheless, Hitler was able to correct something in the last year of his studies. So, in French, instead of “failure”, he had “satisfactory”. Exactly the same marks he received in all other subjects, except for drawing and physical education, for which the final certificate was excellent marks. Hitler's behavior and diligence were rated "satisfactory". He began to prepare for the matriculation exams, but became seriously ill and was forced to leave the school without receiving a certificate. Later, the Fuhrer recalled this as a happy gift of fate: “And then an illness came to my aid and in just a few weeks determined my future, eliminated the constant source of domestic disputes. In view of a severe pulmonary disease, the doctor strongly advised my mother ... under no circumstances to give me to work in the office. School attendance had to be suspended for at least a year. What I secretly hoped for so long... suddenly became a reality... Impressed by my illness, my mother finally agreed to take me away from the real school and allowed me to enter the Academy of Arts.

Hitler was sent to live with relatives in Spital. There, fresh milk, hearty and plentiful country food and clean mountain air contributed to the fact that the patient quickly recovered. Hitler devoted his leisure time to playing the zither, drawing and walking. He watched with interest the relatives' field work, but did not try to help them. With relatives, 16-year-old Adolf kept himself rather aloof, not trying to get close either to his aunt, his mother's sister, or to her children, their peers.

In May 1906, Hitler came to Vienna to take the entrance exams to the Academy of Arts and for the first time seriously visited museums. Austrian capital and the world famous Vienna Opera. However, in 1906 he did not enter, preferring to return to Linz and indulge in blissful idleness. Or rather, it cannot be said that Hitler was idle. He simply did only what he wanted: he read a lot, enrolled in the library of the Public Education Society, took piano lessons.

In the meantime, Clara Hitler's health had deteriorated significantly, and it may have been this circumstance that prompted Hitler to refuse to enter the Academy in the autumn of 1906 and return home to care for his mother. In January 1907, she underwent surgery for breast sarcoma, but this only slightly delayed the sad end. Clara was very upset that her beloved son Adolf "would go his own way, as if he were living alone in this world." And she understood that her son would indeed soon be left alone. Nevertheless, Clara pretended to feel better after the operation, and the reassured Adolf left for Vienna in September 1907 to take exams at the Academy of Fine Arts, leaving his mother in the care of his sister Paula. In the last months of her life, Clara hoped that her son would devote his future to his beloved work.

Before you, dear readers, is the first biography of Hitler, written by a Russian author not in a caricature-sarcastic, but in the most objective manner. To denounce Hitler, to mix him with dirt, to expose him as a type that inspires disgust and horror at all stages of his life, today, half a century after his death, is simply ridiculous and unpromising. People have already been fed accusatory propaganda biographies of the Fuhrer. On the other hand, no recognition of Hitler's merits in any sphere will in the least diminish his crimes and the evil that he brought to all mankind, not excluding the German people. Now it's time to try calmly, without anger and predilection, to look at the personality and fate of Adolf Hitler and at the same time try to understand the causes and consequences of his actions, when the turning point occurred and as a generally handsome young man, loving son and brother and beloved the Fuhrer of the German people arose as parents of a promising artist and architect, a brave soldier of the First World War.

It is unlikely that any psychiatrist will ever be able to accurately diagnose all of Hitler's mental illnesses and combine them into a sufficiently capacious and comprehensive formulation.

There were so many deviations in the psyche of the German dictator that they simply do not fit into the standard diagnosis for ordinary patients.

The future dictator was mercilessly beaten by his father

The roots of mental illness are usually sought in childhood patients. Therefore, of course, psychiatrists did not disregard Hitler's childhood either.

His sister Paula told them how his father had severely punished little Adolf, leading to the opinion that Hitler's aggressiveness was the result of an oedipal hatred of his father.

The dictator's father, Alois Schicklgruber (he changed his surname to Hitler at the age of 40), was known as an insatiable voluptuary. His many connections on the side were sometimes not enough to fully satisfy his lust. Once he savagely raped his wife, who refused him intimacy, in front of the young Adolf. Perhaps this incident left its mark on the entire sexual life of the future dictator.

Mother Clara pathologically loved her boy (before him she had lost three sons), and he responded to her in the same way. Of the six children of Alois and Clara, only two survived - Adolf and the feeble-minded Paula. Hitler called himself a sissy all his life. Pathological love for his mother and hatred for his father became the cause of many negative features of his psyche.

Blinded with fear

According to Hitler, during the First World War he was a brave soldier and honestly earned his reward - the Iron Cross. Only a gas attack by the British in 1918, due to which he temporarily lost his sight, interrupted his military career.

However, recently, the British historian Thomas Weber, on the basis of archival documents, letters and diaries of Hitler's fellow soldiers, managed to dispel this legend about the heroism of the gallant corporal in the trenches of the First World War.

The historian discovered the correspondence of the famous German neurosurgeon Otfried Förster with American colleagues. In one of the letters, he mentioned that in the 1920s, Hitler's medical record accidentally fell into his hands and he read the diagnosis that the doctors had given him.

It turned out that Hitler temporarily lost his sight not because of the gas attack, but because of hysterical amblyopia. This rare disease occurs with mental stress, for example, due to a strong fear of military action.

The brain, as it were, refuses to perceive terrible pictures of reality and ceases to receive signals from the optic nerves, while vision itself remains in order.

A brave soldier simply could not have such a disease, but Hitler was not one. He served as a signalman at the headquarters and was far from the front line, fellow soldiers even called him "rear pig". However, Hitler knew how to please his superiors, for which, according to Weber, he received the Iron Cross.

Hitler was treated for blindness with the help of hypnosis sessions. Therapeutic hypnosis at the hospital was handled by professor of neurology Edmund Forster from the University of Greifswald. It was to him that the blind corporal Hitler came.

For about two months, Forster tried to find the key to the subconscious of this man who lost faith in his future. Finally, the professor found out that his patient had an extremely painful pride, and understood how, thanks to this, he could influence the patient's psyche during a hypnosis session.

In a completely dark room, Forster put Hitler into a hypnotic trance and told him: “You are actually blind, but once every 1000 years, a great person who has a great destiny. Perhaps it is you who is destined to lead Germany forward. If so, then God will restore your sight right now.”

After these words, Forster struck a match and lit a candle, Hitler saw the flame ... Adolf was simply shocked, because he had long said goodbye to the hope of someday seeing the light. It never occurred to the doctor that Hitler would take his words about his great destiny too seriously.

According to the psychiatrist and historian David Lewis, who wrote the book The Man Who Made Hitler, it was thanks to Forster that the idea of ​​​​his great destiny arose in Hitler's head. Subsequently, Forster himself realized this. When Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, the professor risked his life to have his case file sent to Paris, hoping it would be published.

Unfortunately, the publishers did not dare to publicize this case history: Germany was located too close, and Hitler at that time already had long arms. This is evidenced at least by the fact that this demarche of Forster did not remain a secret for the leader of the Nazis. Two weeks after the attempt to publish Hitler's medical history, the professor died ...

As Weber found out, everyone who knew about Hitler's true illness was destroyed, and his medical cards disappeared without a trace.

Nightmare lover

With his speeches, Hitler brought women literally to ecstasy. He had many admirers, but as soon as some of them reached their cherished goal - intimacy with the Fuhrer, their life turned into a real hell.

Susie Liptauer hanged herself after spending only one night with him. Geli Raubal, Hitler's niece, told a friend: "Hitler is a monster... you will never believe what he makes me do." Until now, Geli's death is shrouded in mystery. It is known that she died from a bullet. At one time, there were rumors that Hitler shot Geli during a quarrel, while the official version of the Nazis said that she committed suicide.

German movie star Renata Müller achieved intimacy with the Fuhrer, which she immediately regretted. Hitler began to crawl at her feet and asked to give him a kick ... He shouted: “I am vile and unclean! Hit me! Bey! Renata was in shock, she begged him to get up, but he crawled around her and moaned.

The actress had to kick and spank him anyway ... The movie star's kicks led the Fuhrer into extreme excitement ... Shortly after this "intimacy" Renata committed suicide by throwing herself out of the hotel window.

Eva Braun, who lasted the longest next to Hitler, tried to commit suicide twice, ultimately she had to do it for the third time, already as the wife of a dictator ... Many psychologists and sexologists doubt that Hitler was capable of normal intercourse.

Animal sense of danger

According to various estimates, from 42 to five dozen serious attempts were made on Hitler's life. Professional bodyguards and aces of special services cannot explain at all how the German dictator managed not only to save his life, but also not to get a single serious injury.

In their opinion, this is no longer just luck, but a real mysticism. Usually, 2-3 well-prepared assassination attempts are enough (and most often one!), To at least, if not kill, then seriously injure a person and take him out of the game for a long time.

The most interesting thing is that Hitler often managed to save his life due to a literally bestial instinct for danger. For example, in 1939, during the assassination attempt of Elser, who organized the explosion in a Munich pub, Hitler unexpectedly left the meeting place of party veterans unexpectedly early, and this saved him from death. Subsequently, he said to one of his close associates: “I was seized by a strange feeling that I must leave immediately ...”

Once Hitler said: "I escaped death several times, but by no means by chance, an inner voice warned me, and I immediately took action." Hitler believed in this inner voice until the end of his life.
The rearmament of the German army, the occupation of the demilitarized Rhineland, the annexation of Austria, the occupation of Bohemia and Moravia, the invasion of Poland - any of these actions between 1933 and 1939 should have led to war with France and Great Britain, a war in which Germany had no no chance of winning.

However, Hitler seemed to know that the Allies would be inactive, and boldly gave orders, from which the generals of the Wehrmacht were covered with sticky sweat. It was then that the mystical faith in the prophetic gift of the Fuhrer was born among Hitler's entourage.

Did Hitler really see pictures of the future? J. Brennan, author of The Occult Reich, believes that the Fuhrer, like shamans, entered into a special ecstatic state that allowed him to see the future. In a fit of rage, Hitler often became almost insane.

In a person in this state, as biochemical analysis shows, the content of adrenaline and carbon dioxide in the blood rises sharply. This can lead to changes in the functioning of the brain and access to new levels of consciousness.

“Intoxication of this kind drove Hitler to the point,” writes J. Brennan, “that he could throw himself on the floor and start chewing on the edge of the carpet – this behavior was observed among Haitians who surrendered to the power of spirits while performing magical rituals. This led to the fact that the nickname Carpet Eater stuck behind him.

Germany under hypnosis

For the rest of his life, Hitler's school teacher remembered the strange look of the teenager Adolf, which made the teacher tremble. Many of the Fuhrer's entourage spoke of his outstanding hypnotic abilities.

Whether they were congenital or Hitler took hypnosis lessons from someone is unknown. The ability to subjugate people greatly helped Hitler on his way to the heights of power. In the end, almost all of Germany was hypnotized by the former corporal.

Geli Raubal, Hitler's niece, told a friend: "Hitler is a monster... you will never believe what he makes me do."

Here is what General Blomberg wrote about Hitler's hypnotic gift: “... I was constantly influenced by a certain force that emanated from him. She resolved all doubts and completely excluded the possibility of objecting to the Fuhrer, ensuring my complete loyalty ... "

Professor H. R. Trevor-Roper, a former intelligence officer, wrote, "Hitler had a hypnotist's gaze that overwhelms the mind and feelings of all who fall under his spell."

J. Brennan, in The Occult Reich, describes a striking case. One Englishman, a true patriot of Britain, who does not know German language, listening to the speeches of the Fuhrer, involuntarily began to raise his hand in a Nazi salute and shout "Heil Hitler!" along with the electrified crowd...

"Infernal Cocktail"

So many mental deviations were mixed in Hitler that any, even an experienced psychiatrist, would have been clearly confused, trying to unravel the composition of the “hellish cocktail” that was seething in the head of this nondescript man, a madman who intended to conquer the whole world in his time.

Obvious sexual deviations, the ability to exert a hypnotic effect on people, as well as an animal instinct for danger, which allows us to talk about certain clairvoyant abilities, are far from all that Hitler differed from other people.

Erich Fromm, for example, noted in him a clear tendency to necrophilia. As confirmation, he cited the following quotation from Speer's memoirs:

“As far as I remember, when meat broth was served on the table, he called it “corpse tea”; he commented on the appearance of boiled crayfish with a story about a dead old woman, whom close relatives threw into a stream as bait to catch these creatures; if they ate eels, he did not forget to mention that these fish love dead cats and are best caught on this particular bait.

In addition, Fromm draws attention to a strange mine on the Fuhrer's face, which is visible in many photographs, it seems that the Fuhrer constantly smells some disgusting smell ...

Hitler had an amazing memory, he had the ability to preserve in it a photographically accurate reflection of reality. It is believed that only 4% of children have such a memory at an early age, but as they grow older, they lose it.

In Hitler's memory, both minor architectural elements of buildings and large pieces of text were perfectly imprinted. The dictator amazed the highest generals of the Reich, citing from memory numerous figures concerning the armament of both the German army and its opponents.

The Fuhrer was an excellent imitator. As Eugen Hanfstaengl recalls: “He could imitate the hissing of geese and the quacking of ducks, the lowing of cows, the neighing of horses, the bleating of goats ...”

The dictator's acting skills were also at their best, he even knew how to influence his autonomic nervous system with the help of self-hypnosis, for example, he made himself cry without any problems, which is given to few professional actors. Tears from the eyes of the Fuhrer had a magical effect on the audience, enhancing the effect of his speeches. Knowing about this gift of Hitler, Goering at the very beginning of the Nazi movement in critical situations literally demanded: "Hitler must come here and cry a little!"

Admiral Doenitz believed that some kind of "radiation" emanated from Hitler. It had such a strong influence on the admiral that after each visit of the Fuhrer, Doenitz needed several days to recover and return to the real world. Goebbels also noted the clear impact of his patron, he said that after talking with Hitler, he "feels like a recharged battery."

In many ways, Hitler's actions were determined by a very deep factor - an inferiority complex, described by Alfred Adler. The dictator constantly compared himself to the great conquerors of the past and tried to surpass them. According to Alan Bullock, "a huge role in Hitler's entire policy was played by the strongest feeling of envy inherent in him, he wanted to crush his opponents."

There is no doubt that Hitler developed Parkinson's disease, which is caused by an organic brain lesion. True, the dictator managed to pass away before this illness had a serious impact on his health and psyche. In 1942, Hitler's left hand began to tremble, and in 1945 facial expression disorder began.

In the last months of his life, Hitler, according to the recollections of others, resembled a ruin and moved with great difficulty. It is known that Parkinson's disease disrupts logical thinking and the patient tends to more emotional perception of reality. From 1941, Hitler's unique memory began to fail more and more often.

So, Hitler was such a strange and abnormal person that the existence of such a "mental anomaly" is even difficult to imagine. Therefore, the dictator practically did not fit into the tight diagnostic schemes of various psychological and psychiatric schools, and it was not possible to make a comprehensive diagnosis of him, although such attempts were nevertheless made.

Among the documents in one of the law libraries, a secret psychological portrait of Hitler, compiled back in 1943 by psychiatrist Henry Murray from Harvard University, was discovered several years ago. It was ordered to Murray by the leadership of the US Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor of the CIA). The American military and intelligence officers wanted to know more about the character of Hitler in order to be able to predict his actions in a given military-political situation.

Staff at Cornell University have published this 250-page analysis of Hitler's psyche that is, in fact, one of the first attempts to study the dictator's personality. “Despite the fact that psychology has stepped far forward, the document makes it possible to see some traits of Hitler’s personality,” says Thomas Mills, Researcher university libraries.

This curious document has the following title: "Analysis of the personality of Adolf Hitler with forecasts regarding his future behavior and recommendations on how to deal with him now and after the surrender of Germany."

It is clear that Murray did not have the opportunity to personally examine such a dangerous "patient", so he was forced to conduct psychoanalytic studies of the dictator in absentia. All the information that could be obtained was used - the genealogy of the Fuhrer, information about his school years and military service, the dictator's writings, his public speeches, as well as the testimonies of people who communicated with Hitler.

What kind of portrait did an experienced psychiatrist manage to draw? Hitler, according to Murray, was an evil, vindictive man who did not tolerate any criticism and despised other people. He lacked a sense of humour, but he had plenty of stubbornness and self-confidence.

In the Fuhrer, the psychiatrist believed, the female component was quite pronounced, he never went in for sports, physical labor, had weak muscles. From a sexual point of view, he describes him as a passive masochist, suggesting the presence of repressed homosexuality.

Murray believed that Hitler's crimes were partly due to revenge for the bullying he suffered as a child, as well as a hidden contempt for his weaknesses. The psychiatrist believed that if Germany lost the war, Hitler could commit suicide. However, if the dictator is killed, then he can turn into a martyr.

Murray's diagnosis includes a whole bunch of diseases. In his opinion, Hitler suffered from neurosis, paranoia, hysteria and schizophrenia. Although modern experts find in this psychological portrait dictator a number of misinterpretations and inaccuracies, due to the level of development of psychiatry in those years, the discovered document is undoubtedly unique.

Sergey STEPANOV
"Mysteries and mysteries" May 2013