Berlin at War (79 page)

sites in leading positions’. ‘The world must not forget’, he warned.17

Berlin and its inhabitants had endured much: not only the exuberant

highs and horrific lows of Nazism, but also a ferocious air war and a

ground offensive of unprecedented intensity. The city now lay in ruins,

388

berlin at war

scarcely recognisable from the scene of such grandeur, such optimism

– such hubris – that it had displayed on the occasion of the Führer’s

fiftieth birthday six years earlier. Those tanks that had once rattled

down the East-West Axis were now blasted to smithereens across a

thousand battlefields; those cheering Berliners, if they had survived

at all, had been traumatised by the experiences of the intervening

years. Of the stately backdrop the city had once presented, little

remained. Only Speer’s elegant lampposts still stood, lining the main

boulevard just as they had done in 1939. Now pitted and scarred, even

they had been pressed into service by the SS as makeshift gibbets for

deserters.

Alongside the soul-searching and recriminations, there was also a

renewed sense of hope. The change of the season did much to alter

perceptions, ushering in a fresh optimism among the ruins. As one

diarist noted. ‘May has thrown a blossoming green girdle around the

dead city . . . The breath of spring has chased away the stench of

smoke, decay and corruption. It soothes the brows of the unburied

dead, be they soldiers, men, women or children.’18

As the broken, splintered trees in the Tiergarten and on Unter den

Linden struggled into leaf once again, Berliners were reminded of

nature’s resilience and of the cyclical quality of all life. The spring

sunshine and the silence seemed to herald a change for the better.

‘The sun shines again over the world’, Helmut Altner wrote. ‘No more

shooting, no more dull thunder of a distant storm . . . no tacking of

a machine gun, no chatter of an aircraft engine or roaring of a giant

tank to remind one of war. The world lies at peace.’19

For the first time in many months, Berliners could look forward

once again: ‘The time of misery and death lies behind us like a bad

dream’, Altner wrote, ‘and the future . . . has lost all its fears.’20 The

‘dead city’ had endured much, but it would rise again.

Notes

Prologue: ‘Führerweather’

•
1.
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 19 April 1939, p. 11. •
2.
Ibid., 18 April 1939, p. 2. •
3.
Der Angriff
, 20/21 April 1939, p. 5. •
4.
Henrik Eberle and Matthias Uhl (eds),
The Hitler Book
(London, 2005), p. 43. •
5.
Ibid., p. 43. •
6.
Christa Schroeder,
He Was My Chief
, p. 70. •
7.
Ibid., p. 68. •
8.
Joseph Goebbels,
Die
Zeit ohne Beispiel
(Munich, 1941), p. 102. •
9.
Das Schwarze Korps
, 20 April 1939, p. 16. •
10.
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 20 April 1939, p. 12. •
11.
Der
Angriff
, 20/21 April 1939, p. 15. •
12.
Daily Telegraph
, 20 April 1939, p. 13. •
13.

William Shirer,
This Is Berlin
, p. 39. •
14.
Alexander Stahlberg,
Bounden Duty
(London, 1990), pp. 98–9. •
15.
Shirer, op. cit., p. 39. •
16.
Ruth Andreas-Friedrich,
Der Schattenmann
, pp. 54–5. •
17.
Ruth Andreas-Friedrich,
Berlin
Underground, 1938–1945
, p. 41. •
18.
Stahlberg, op. cit., p. 99. •
19.
Klaus U., correspondence with the author, October 2006. •
20.
Viktor Ulrich,

Geburtstagsparade: Berlin, 20. April 1939
(Kiel, 2004), p. 128. •
21.
Robert G. L.

Waite,
The Psychopathic God: Adolf Hitler
(New York, 1977), p. 49. •
22.

Schroeder, op. cit., p. 70. •
23.
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 20 April 1939, p. 9.

•
24.
J. Noakes and G. Pridham (eds),
Nazism 1919–1945
, vol. II (Exeter, 1984), p. 412. •
25.
Ralf Georg Reuth,
Goebbels
(New York, 1994), p. 247. •
26.
Adolf Hitler,
Mein Kampf
(London, 1939), p. 368. •
27.
Shirer, op. cit., p. 41. •
28.

Ibid., p. 40.

1
Faith in the Führer

•
1.
Völkischer Beobachter
, 1 September 1939, p. 1. •
2.
Der Angriff
, 1 September 1939, p. 1. •
3.
Völkischer Beobachter
, 1 September 1939, p. 2. •
4.
Deutsche Allgemeine
Zeitung
, 1 September 1939, p. 6. •
5.
Wehrmacht proclamation of 1 September 1939, quoted in Max Domarus,
Hitler: Speeches and Proclamations 1932–1945
, vol. 3, p. 1745. •
6.
Günter Grossmann,
Die sieben mageren Jahren eines jungen Berliners
, p. 9. •
7.
Heinz Knobloch,
Eine Berliner Kindheit
, p. 93. •
8.
Ibid., p. 93
.
•
9.
Henrik 390

berlin at war

Eberle and Matthias Uhl (eds),
The Hitler Book
(London, 2005), p. 46. •
10.
Birger Dahlerus,
The Last Attempt
(London, 1948), p. 119. •
11.
Ibid., p. 117. •
12.
Albert Speer,
Inside the Third Reich
, p. 236. •
13.
See Thomas Wieke,
Vom Etablissement
zur Oper: Die Geschichte der Kroll-Oper
(Berlin, 1993). •
14
. Giles MacDonogh,
Berlin
, p. 129. •
15.
Quoted in Domarus, op. cit., pp. 1752–4. •
16.
Quoted in ibid., passim.

•
17.
Ibid., pp. 36–7
.
•
18.
Karl Wahl quoted in Wilhelm Deist et al.,
Ursachen
und Voraussetzungen des Zweiten Weltkrieges
(Frankfurt am Main, 1989),

p. 25. •
19.
Author interview with Dietrich K., Berlin, October 2006. •
20.

William Shirer,
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
(London, 1964), p. 721. •
21
.

Herbert Sonthoff,
Last Hours in Germany
, in
Atlantic Monthly
, November, 1939.

•
22.
Author interview with Erich N., Berlin, October 2006. •
23.
Else Danielowski,
Kindheit und Jugend im nationalsozialistischen Deutschland
, CD produced by the Zeitzeugenbörse, Berlin, 2006. •
24.
Sonthoff, op. cit., p. 687. •
25.
Dorothea von Schwanenflügel-Lawson,
Laughter Wasn’t Rationed
, p. 209. •
26.
Erich N.,
Erlebtes
, unpublished manuscript, kindly donated to the author.

•
27.
Recollections of Theodor G., Deutsches Tagebucharchiv (hereafter DTA), Emmendingen, ref: 540, 4, p. 5. •
28.
Knobloch, op. cit., p. 94. •
29.
William Shirer,
This Is Berlin
, p. 85. •
30.
Knobloch, op. cit., pp. 94–5. •
31.
Neue Zürcher
Zeitung
, 2 September 1939, p. 1. •
32.
Ruth Andreas-Friedrich,
Berlin Underground,
1938–1945
, p. 48. •
33.
Der Angriff
, 3 September 1939, p. 11. •
34.
Andreas-Friedrich, op. cit., p. 49. •
35.
Margarete Behm,
So oder so ist das Leben
, p. 85. •
36.
The text of President Roosevelt’s message is reproduced in Domarus, op. cit., vol. 3,

p. 1762. •
37.
Michael Bloch,
Ribbentrop
(London, 1992), p. 259. •
38.
Winston Churchill,
The Second World War
(London, 1959), p. 161. •
39.
Shirer,
This Is
Berlin
, p. 71. •
40.
Nevile Henderson,
Failure of a Mission, Berlin 1937–39
(London, 1940), p. 288. •
41.
Ibid., p. 288. •
42.
Ibid. •
43.
Schwanenflügel-Lawson, op. cit., p. 209. •
44.
Paul Schmidt,
Hitler’s Interpreter
(London, 1951), p. 157. •
45.
Ibid., p. 158. •
46.
Domarus, op. cit., pp. 1782–3. •
47.
William Shirer,
Berlin Diary
1934–1941
(illustrated edition), p. 101. •
48.
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, Extra, 3

September 1939, p. 1. •
49.
Henderson, op. cit., p. 289. •
50.
Helmuth James von Moltke,
Letters to Freya 1939–1945
, p. 35. •
51.
Shirer,
This Is Berlin
, p. 75. •
52.

Moltke, op. cit., p. 32. •
53.
Christabel Bielenberg,
The Past Is Myself
, pp. 13–15.

•
54.
Domarus, op. cit., p. 1844. •
55.
Ibid., pp. 1847–8. •
56.
Bielenberg, op. cit., p. 67. •
57.
Moltke, op. cit., p. 39. •
58.
Shirer,
Berlin Diary
, p. 114. •
59.
Heinz Boberach (ed.),
Meldungen aus dem Reich 1938–1945
, vol. 2, p. 339. •
60.
Bielenberg, op. cit., p. 68. •
61.
Fred Taylor (trans. and ed.),
The Goebbels Diaries 1939–41
, p.

17. •
62.
Boberach, op. cit., p. 339. •
63.
William Russell,
Berlin Embassy
, p. 74.

•
64.
Howard K. Smith,
Last Train from Berlin
, p. 67. •
65.
Russell, op. cit., p.

76. •
66.
Boberach, op. cit., p. 339. •
67.
Bielenberg, op. cit., p. 69. •
68.
Russell, op. cit., p. 77. •
69.
Moltke, op. cit., p. 39. •
70.
Andreas-Friedrich,
Berlin
Underground, 1938–1945
, p. 51. •
71.
Taylor, op. cit., p. 20. •
72.
Ibid., pp. 20–21.

notes

391

2
A Deadly Necessity

•
1.
Blackout order of 23 May 1939 reproduced at http://

www.12move.de/home/bunker-bs/8dfgvo.htm •
2.
Jörg Friedrich,
The Fire:
The Bombing of Germany 1940–1945
(New York, 2006), p. 363. •
3.
Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv (hereafter BA-MA) RL41/1, ‘Luftschutz-Berichte’, 29 September

1939, p. 2. •
4.
‘Berlin Orders Strictest Blackouts’, in
New York Times
, 13

October 1939, p. 5. •
5.
William Shirer,
This Is Berlin
, p. 69. •
6.
Deutsche
Allgemeine Zeitung
, 2 September 1939, evening edition, p. 6. •
7.
‘Honk, honk, honk’, in
Time
, 16 October 1939. •
8.
William Russell,
Berlin Embassy
, p. 180. •
9.
‘Honk, honk, honk’, op. cit. •
10.
Bundesarchiv, Berlin (hereafter BA-B), RL41/1. Luftschutz-Berichte, 17 January 1940, p. 2. •
11.
‘Die abgedunkelte Stadt’ by Carl Haensel, in
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
,

6 September 1939, p. 5. •
12.
Ruth Andreas-Friedrich,
Berlin Under -

ground, 1938–1945
, p. 48. •
13.
Testimony of Josepha von Koskull, reproduced by the Deutsch Historisches Museum, Berlin, at

http://www.dhm.de/lemo/forum/kollektives_gedaechtnis/067/index.html

•
14.
Verdunkelung – Aber wie?
(Berlin, 1939), p. 4. •
15.
Placard on display at the ‘Berliner Unterwelten Museum’ at Gesundbrunnen Station, Berlin.

•
16.
Quoted from an original ‘Strafverfügung’ of the Berlin Polizeipräsident, in the possession of the author. •
17.
Andreas-Friedrich, op. cit., p. 363.

•
18.
Landesarchiv Berlin (hereafter LA-B), A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt. 198B Nr.

1616, Tötungsdelikte, September 1939. •
19.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt.

198B Nr. 1617, Tötungsdelikte, October 1939. •
20.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03

Tlt. 198B Nr. 1617, Tötungsdelikte, October and November 1939. •
21.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt. 198B Nr. 1620, Tötungsdelikte, January 1940. •
22.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt. 198B Nr. 1620, Tötungsdelikte, December 1940.

•
23.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt. 198B Nr. 1617, Tötungsdelikte, October 1939.

•
24.
See
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 16 January, 1940, p. 7, 25 January 1940, p. 7, and 27 January 1940, p. 7. •
25.
Heinz Boberach (ed.),
Meldungen aus dem
Reich 1938–1945
, vol. 3, p. 696. •
26.
‘Drei Todesurteile des Sondergerichts’, in
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 23 December 1939. •
27.
‘Blackout Robber Executed’, in
New York Times
, 26 January 1940, p. 2, and
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
, 23 January 1940, p. 7. •
28.
Quoted in Terry Charman,
The German Home Front 1939–1945
(London, 1989), p. 43. •
29.
LA-B, A.Pr.Br.Rep. 030-03 Tlt. 198B Nr. 1617, Tötungsdelikte, November 1940. •
30.
‘Night Brings Home War to Berliners’, in
New York Times
, 19 September 1939, p. 11. •
31.
Anne O’Hare McCormick, ‘Paris and Berlin: A Revealing Contrast’, in
New York Times Magazine
, 14 March 1940, p. 89. •
32.