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Provincial childhood

“My idea of education is tough. Weakness has to be beaten out. My elite academies (Ordensburgen) will produce young men to intimidate the world. A violent, masterful, bold and terrible youth is my wish. The young people must be all of this. They will have to endure pain. There can be no weakness and tenderness with them. The free, magnificent beast of prey must glint in their eyes once again. Strong and handsome is how I want my young people. This is how I can create something new.”¹

The birth had been long drawn out. The young mother lies as if dead amongst the piled up pillows, which only barely conceal the blood on the sheet. She is drenched in sweat and with loose strands of dark hair plastered to her cheeks. They have tucked the infant in next to her. He presses his tiny fists to his mouth. The soft down of his hair gleams dark and wet. Now he lifts his chin and turns his small squashed little head in the direction of his exhausted mother. His tiny nostrils seem to snuffle and sniff the air. His paper-thin lips open slightly and close again, then his pink tongue can be seen. With some effort the infant opens his right eyelid and, underneath it, the iris shimmers a clear blue. Gleaming, with no hint of any green or grey and without a slate-coloured border so that the colour around the pupil seems almost to be without a border. The iris displays the same startling colour as the mother’s. Later this child would deliberately deploy his piercing blue eyes: when he looked into his interlocutor’s eyes for a long time and, in so doing, sink his eyelids very slowly, this gave him subliminal power. Women in his vicinity, above all his admirers, would then swoon.

Klara Hitler, née Pölzl (1860-1907), the mother of Adolf Hitler.

“Poppet,” whispers the mother, or rather breathes in the direction of the child: “my little love, my angel.” Then she sinks into a deep sleep.

The child, who was born on this stormy afternoon in Braunau on the Inn in Upper Austria – it was the twentieth of April in 1889 – had been pushed into the world with much effort, and was christened with the name “Adolf”. Adolf was the fourth child of the customs official Alois Hitler and his wife Klara and the first that was to survive².

No one could have guessed that this Adolf would one day become a symbol of unrestrained enthusiasm and terror without limit.

Adolf Hitler himself was later to apply himself diligently to the legend of his origins. He said his father had worked his way up from very modest beginnings into the senior civil service of the imperial and royal monarchy of Austria through his talent and iron ambition. The disreputable fact that his father was an illegitimate child who, afflicted with the stigma of “father unknown”, bore his mother’s maiden name “Schicklgruber” for many years, was carefully not mentioned by Hitler. And even less his uncertain origins. Thus it was that Alois was perhaps not, as long assumed, the child of the impoverished and vagrant miller journeyman Johann Georg Hiedler, but that of his married brother Johann Nepomuk Hüttler. These discrepancies were best concealed. Since, if Johann Georg were Adolf Hitler’s grandfather, in Klara Pölzl his father would have married his second cousin. The degree of relationship would be even closer with Johann Nepomuk as the father: then Alois would namely be the uncle of his wife Klara. This is because Johann Nepomuk was Klara’s grandfather, possibly however, at one and the same time, the father of Alois as well. Whichever of the two brothers may have been the father: Adolf Hitler was the result of close in-breeding within a society. Hitler’s family came from localities close to each other in the Austrian Waldviertel (lower Austria), an area which was reviled amongst fellow countrymen as being particularly backward. Due to the facts left shrouded in mystery, any chatter about his origins Hitler inflamed involuntarily. There was even a rumour about Jewish blood, which was supposed to be a quarter of that which flowed in his veins. It could even be described as an irony of history that the very person who, decades later, was to demand watertight proof of Aryan origins from every German, could³ himself never provide such proof.

The Jewish version was prompted by a photograph of a gravestone on a cemetery in Bucharest: under Hebrew letters the name Adolf Hitler was emblazoned in Latin script, died aged 60 years in 1892⁴. There is also the story about the life of his grandmother Anna Maria Schicklgruber. As an employee in the Jewish household belonging to the Frankenbergers, she was made pregnant by her employer. She is even said to have received maintenance payments from old Mr. Frankenberger. The stereotype of the hard and resilient man from the Austrian Waldviertel (Forest Quarter in lower Austria) was laid down over this subliminal gossip. Years later the weekly magazine “Das Reich” depicted it as follows⁵: “From the 15^th century onwards, there is evidence of the Hitler (also Hüttler, Hidler or Hiedler) clans in the north-western, original part of the Waldviertel (Forest Quarter in lower Austria). All from solid material, a tough strain: collected strength, perseveringly loyal, bold and robust, and thereby also full of spiritual ardour.”

Adolf Hitler as a small child.

However, neither toughness nor collected strength featured in little Adolf as he was from the outset a “Mummy’s boy”, worshipped and petted by a woman, who experienced little joy and fulfilment in her marriage with the very much older customs officer, whom she called “Uncle Alois”. Her relationship with the humourless, strict civil servant was marked by subservience and silent refusal on her part, whilst spoiling her first born beyond all measure. She did this all the more when she also had to lay Edmund, her youngest son, in his child’s coffin at the age of only six years.⁶

That the little Adolf got caught up in an ongoing conflict between his parents, that is to say, caught between the fronts, was not something of which either he or his mother were conscious. She believed she had to support him to the best of her ability, whereby she rendered him unsuitable for the upbringing at that time based as it was on violence and intimidation. This was definitive for the times and is today known as “black pedagogy”⁷. He could perhaps have learned to put up with the brutality of this by bringing a certain obtuseness to bear some of the time, if he had not been continually seduced by the sweet opposite world. Very early on he was fated not to do anything right in his father’s eyes. The latter even suspected deceit and impudence, and punished him for it with even more unrelenting harshness.

Black Pedagogy

Alois Hitler, the “Senior Customs Officer“, this form of address was highly prized all his life by the pedantic state official in the Austria in thrall to titles, was an authoritarian and irascible man, who took advantage of those deemed below him in rank.

Alois Hitler (formerly Schicklgruber, 1837-1903), customs officer. Adolf Hitler’s father.

And these were first and foremost his wife and children. His excessive punishments also included the family dog, which was then chastised even further when he urinated on the floor out of fear and held his legs in the air in submission. Alois is said to have used a whip covered in hippopotamus leather when punishing his eldest sons⁸. This whip was to play a major role in the career of the boy thus chastised.

It was the harshness against himself that the boy thus tortured drew as a lesson from these punishments and which he was later to demand unrelentingly from the entire German youth:

»But when this struggle is fought out between the parents, and is so every day, in forms which often really leave nothing to the imagination as regards inner brutalness then ultimately the results of such an object lesson, however slowly, will show themselves in the little ones. What their nature may be, when this reciprocal strife takes the form of brutal excesses of the father against the mother, leading to abuse in a drunken state, one who is not acquainted with such a milieu will find difficult to imagine. At six years the little boy, who is to be pitied, perceives things, at which even a grown up can only feel horror.«⁹

Harshness and brutality belonged to Hitler’s view of humanity. He was convinced that the human being was “by nature not a pack animal“ and was only made “to submit through the most brutal of laws … The civil state can only be maintained through iron brutality.”¹⁰

Diversions, entanglements and laziness

Hitler, who already radiated a certain self-confidence as a child, was initially validated by his good scholastic achievements in primary school: “The ridiculously easy lessons at school gave me so much free time that I saw more sun than the classroom.”¹¹ There is an out-of-focus photograph that shows the ten-year-old primary school pupil, as he stands with arms boldly folded in the middle of the top row of pupils, his chin slightly raised and his eyelids slightly pressed together, in a pose surprising for a boy of this age.

Class photograph of the 4th. grade in Leonding. In the top row, centre, the ten-year-old Adolf Hitler.

This pose is recognisable from the well-known photographs, which show him as a statesman and ambitious leader of a coming thousand-year Reich. But he was also a sensitive child who could identify people by their footfall. Furthermore, everything he saw just once was engraved in his photographic memory, which gave him a certain advantage over his milieu. Decades later the supreme commander of the army was to astound others with his ostensible knowledge of different types of weapons. In primary school he always harvested top marks all round, which however then changed drastically upon moving up to secondary school. For now began the time of poor harvests. Poor marks spoiled the pupil’s mood, above all in natural sciences, mathematics and French. And it got even worse, the inattentive and, in part, lazy pupil had to repeat the very first year of secondary school: a bitter blow for a child, who had been used to success up until then. Torn back and forth between the extremes of an extremely strict father and a mother, who continually spoiled him, he had never learned to work systematically. His then German teacher reported that, although the schoolboy Hitler undoubtedly had a gift, even if a one-sided one, his desire to work would however also quickly evaporate. In this case too, decades later Hitler would concoct a matching story, whereby he found convincing explanations for his failure as a scholar: “What I liked I learned, above all everything that in my view I would be needing later as a painter. What seemed to be pointless in this regard or did not attract me at all, I sabotaged completely.”¹²

One can also speak of a selective perception of a boy. Namely, he only learned what interested him and what served his preconceptions and backed them up. Quite early on, in this attitude to learning and way of looking at the world, the rigid features of a thought process become apparent, a thought process that was only activated in relation to his own ego. Thus the schoolboy Adolf was already susceptible to clichés and prejudices from an early age. Later he would maintain that it was above all the history lessons at the Linz high school that shaped his view of the world and thinking. Hitler would later paint a sentimental portrait of his teacher there, a Dr. Leopold Pötsch, in his magnum opus. The latter’s method of teaching the material can be completely described as modern. Each time he addressed a problem of the day in order to consider this in the light of history and thus to illustrate its influence on the present. The teacher thus depicted with so much praise however later vehemently refused to accept responsibility for the endorsements and conclusions made by his pupil in their simplifications. He probably would have regarded it as more than a doubtful honour that he should be the very one who, with his method of teaching, was supposed to have contributed to forming a young revolutionary out of Hitler.

The feared father died before Hitler’s fourteenth birthday in his 65th year. Time to discard the hated chains and control. In his mother he first of all found an ally for his plans to become an artist. Her later appeals for him to learn something sensible after all fell on deaf ears. Another class photograph shows him four years later in the same pose. Only the self-confident gaze is now missing and has given way to a certain discontent and suspicious sullenness. His mother, who had spent her whole life treating her husband with a solicitous subservience, was impotent vis-à-vis this rebellious youth, who was capable of having fits of rage similar to those of his father. His achievements at school continued to be poor, his promotion to the next school year once again in danger and he only managed to move up due to a re-sit. However, he was advised to change schools for the fourth year. Hitler now had to attend the high school in Steyr 80 kilometres away and was boarded with foster parents. Here too his school report was correspondingly mediocre: for mathematics, French and German he received a “sufficient”, in gymnastics however an “excellent”. The man, who later went on to confess that his lifelong dream was to become a great architect¹³, received only a meagre “sufficient” in his weakest subject, descriptive geometry. Once again he was required to re-sit and finally passed the school-leaving examination in 1905. However, to accede to his mother’s wishes now and attend the higher vocational school, which would lead to further qualifications, was a step too far for him. An illness, which Hitler would later dramatise as severe lung disease in „Mein Kampf”, was to relieve him finally of hated school. His then family doctor, Dr. Eduard Bloch, did not support Hitler’s story of a severe illness preventing him from continuing with school. In his records he noted only a case of tonsillitis accompanied by a flu-like infection. However, with his gift for playacting, the patient managed to exaggerate the symptoms for those around him impressively. After leaving school, he led the life of a ne’er-do-well at his mother’s expense, who was also financing the family in Linz, to which his younger sister Paula also belonged, with her widow’s pension. Neither the mother nor the sister objected to this layabout existence, on the contrary, they spoiled him near enough and even viewed his role as man of the house with a certain pride. Hitler thoroughly exploited this goodwill, dressed up like a dandy, was never seen without a walking stick and was often a guest in coffee shops and the theatre. In later years he was by the way to dispense with his vanity in relation to his clothing for image reasons.

Bohemian

He combined the life of the layabout with that of an artist by devoting himself to painting and the pen and ink drawing of architectural designs. One of these was a future view of the city of Linz with a new theatre and a modern bridge over the Danube. 35 years later he actually had the bridge erected there. At this time his tendency to prefer monumental constructions in the style of previous centuries was striking.

One example of Hitler’s inclination to monumental buildings is provided by this model of the Reich’s capital Berlin from 1938/39 designed by Albert Speer.

At this time he had little contact with those of a similar age. He actually just had one friend, the son of a decorator and upholsterer, August “Gustl” Kubizek. Together with him he forged fantastic plans and dwelled in a world, in which reality and fantasy were fluent. With a rare gift, he was able to present his utopian plans with such exactitude and clarity, with such fervour and persuasive force as would later come to be useful in rousing whole masses of people. But first it was Gustl Kubizek, who hung on Hitler’s every word and patiently listened to the long-winded monologues of his friend because he was filled with uncritical and undivided admiration. Richard Wagner’s music united the two men. In this context Kubizek portrays a visit to the early Wagner opera “Rienzi” particularly vividly, which deals with the rise and fall of a Roman tribune. Hitler, in his typical manner of relating everything that happens to himself, naturally identifies himself with the main character and, after the performance, drags his friend up a hill as if in a trance. There he revealed to him, in a hoarse and excited voice, that he was chosen by fate “to unite the German Empire and make it great”.¹⁴ Only 33 years later he would acknowledge to Kubizek in person: “That was the moment it began.”¹⁵

9th. Party Conference of the Nazi Party, “Party Conference for Work”, Nuremberg 7th to 13th September 1937. Appeal by political leaders on the Zeppelin field on 10th September. View over the Zeppelin field with Albert Speer’s “cathedral of light”.

The Nuremberg party rallies, gigantic media spectaculars with enormous publicity impact, organised by the Nazi Party, were from then on always¹⁶ to be opened with the overture from “Rienzi”. Hitler, who designated Wagner as “his forerunner”, which without doubt contributed significantly to the misunderstanding of the composer and his voluminous oeuvre, was convinced that the latter was the greatest “prophet” the German people had ever had. Hitler, who saw in Wagner a kind of soulmate, considered politics to be an art form. Convinced at heart that he was an artist, politics to him was less to do with content and more to do with the aesthetics with which this content is mediated. Thus this meant that politics for him also became a means of self-presentation.

In the winter of 1906/07 Klara Hitler became very ill and her son’s nicely ordered world with its comfortable way of life abruptly collapsed. The diagnosis of breast cancer made an immediate operation necessary. A risky procedure in that era. After a stay in hospital and convalescence at home during which she was cared for by her sister Johanna, the hunchback Aunt “Hanni”, at first her condition improved a little, only to deteriorate drastically again in the spring. She concealed her condition from her son as best she could. Every day she would go to see her Jewish family doctor, Dr. Bloch, in order to have her wound seen to. He was moved by her son’s pain and his care. 34 years later in his US exile, he would confide in a reporter: “No one at that time would have had even the slightest inkling that he would become the embodiment of all evil.”¹⁷

Senior Medical Officer Eduard Bloch. Family doctor to the Hitler family, in his surgery at the house at Landstraße 12. Photograph, circa 1930.

The tumour, an ulcer, had eaten into the skin such that the inflamed layers of flesh underneath could be seen. Hidden away in her innards, metastases were completing their destructive work. The changing of the dressings must have caused the patient unbearable pain. She tried to appear brave and refrain from making any noise. Every day the gauze soaked with wound secretion and pus had to be ripped away from the tissue. The iodoform contained in the dressing material, which was supposed to serve as an antiseptic, burned like fire on the skin. An unimaginable torture for both doctor and patient. In the end the morphine administered could scarcely provide any relief.

In November 1907 Adolf Hitler arrived from Vienna in order to look after his mother and his little sister, Paula. As well as his mother’s illness he had to cope with a quite specific setback: his project to become an artist had failed for the time being. Self-confident and more than convinced of his own capabilities, he had set off in September for the Austrian capital with a bundle of drawings in order to apply to the general painting school of the “Akademie der Bildenden Künste” [Academy of Fine Arts]. The admission examination was notorious and feared due to its exacting requirements; with 112 candidates, who shared the same dream, the competition was very great. In the end, out of 112 examination candidates only 28¹⁸ passed. Hitler initially got through the first round but then in the second one failed a test drawing. Upon viewing the works he had submitted, the examiner attested to him that from these “his unsuitability as a painter was obvious” but his “ability evidently lay in the field of architecture.”¹⁹ Thereupon he applied for a place to study at the Academy’s school for architects. A pointless undertaking: Hitler now received the payback for his lackadaisicalness and aimlessness. An important detail was missing for his admission: a valid matriculation certificate.

It was shortly before Christmas on 21 December 1907 at around two o’clock in the morning when Klara Hitler closed her eyes forever. She was only 47 years old.

Hitler described the period between 1907 and 1913 as his “Viennese years of apprenticeship and suffering”. In his work “Mein Kampf” he describes them thus: “I have that time to thank for the fact that I became tough and can be tough. And, more than that, I appreciate them for having torn me away from the hollowness of the comfortable life.”²⁰