His relations with women have come to a similar impasse. Visiting Anka in January
1930 he has failed to detect that she is four months pregnant by yet another man.
Returning to Weimar in June he checks into the ‘Elephant’ and sends her tulips and
a card: ‘Can I call round?’ it reads.77 Meanwhile he has his eye on the neat daughter of
188 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH
Hitler’s photographer, Henrietta Hoffmann; but she is already stepping out with a
handsome Nazi student leader.78 A half-cocked but still platonic episode begins in
June when Lucie Kammer, a young shorthand secretary (‘still a pure child’) with a
much older, unloved, and now mortally ill husband comes to the gauleiter with her
marital problems; he rapidly grasps that she loves him.79 A few days later he decides
that Princess zu Wied loves him too; at the Görings he meets the Baroness Erika von
Paleske and records that ‘Ika’ (because there is already another Erika in his ménage)
also loves him. His phone jangles all day—Charlotte, Xenia, L.K.—‘Always the same,’
he whimpers in his diary, ‘I am a victim.’ Women are a plague upon him. ‘But they are
an incredible stimulation to work,’ he confesses. What he fears is losing his liberty.
He writes about Ika that August, ‘She comes on too strong… Thank goodness we
were sitting out in the open.’80
He is vacationing—or hiding—at Erika’s house in the forest when word comes on
July 18, 1930 that Brüning’s government is in difficulties. Tonak rushes him back to
the Reichstag building in the Mercedes Supercharger. Goebbels romanticizes that his
one vote may seal Brüning’s fate. In fact Brüning dissolves the Reichstag. As the communist
deputies roar the Internationale, Goebbels slips out of the building, naked to
the law, even his residual parliamentary immunity annulled.
1 They were Hans Kütemeyer, Nov 17, 1928; Gerhard Weber, Nov 4; Walter Fischer, Dec
14; Werner Dölle, 16, stabbed to death by a Jewish opponent in Kurfürstendamm, and Fritz
Radloff, Dec 24, 1929.
2 Diary, Oct 2, 6; Dec 23, 1929.
3 Ibid., Oct 30, 1929.
4 Ibid., Dec 23, 1929.
5 Ibid., Sep 29, 1929.
6 Stennes, Jul 29, 1968 (IfZ; ZS.1147).
7 Report by Berlin police section IA.III.1, Berlin, Jun 9, 1931 in Wessel’s file in NSDAP
Hauptarchiv (BA file NS.26/1370a).
8 The case files against ‘Ali’ Höhler, Else Cohn, Rückert, Kandulski, Junek, Mrs Salm and
the brothers Max, Walter and Willi Jambrowski (Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 11)
were marked for historical preservation but released to the Soviet sector in 1947 and not
GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 189
returned. Höhler, Willi Jambrowski and seven others were tried on Sep 26, 1930 for manslaughter
and given sentences ranging from one to six years. ‘There these creatures sit in the
dock,’ wrote JG (Sep 24, 1930), ‘real criminals with an air of injured innocence... Poor
Horst. To die at the hands of [illegible word] pimps like these!’ In a subsequent trial from Jun
15, 1934 against the defendants Peter Stoll (seaman), ‘Sally’ Epstein (Jewish painter), and
Hans Ziegler (barber), Epstein and Ziegler were sentenced to death, Stoll to seven and a half
years; Höhler (who was kidnapped from his prison cell and lynched by S.A. men in 1933)
was stated to have ‘deceased in the interim’ (Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 22; Stoll
case files courtesy of R G Reuth).—Report on trial in Vossische Zeitung,Ê Sep 23, 24, 1930.
9 Diary, Jan 19, 1930.
10 Ibid., Jan 27, 1930.
11 Angriff, Feb 6, 1930.
12 Rote Fahne, Jan 15, 1930.
13 Diary, Feb 24, 1930.
14 Vossische Zeitung, Mar 2, 1930.
15 Angriff, Feb 27, 1930.
16 Diary, Mar 2, 1930; Dokumente, 311f.
17 Ibid., Jan 13, 1930.
18 Ibid., Jan 20, 31, 1930.
19 Ibid., Jun 10, 20-22, 1928.
20 Ibid., Jun 22, 1928; Oct 18, 1929.
21 Ibid., Jan 16, 17, 1930.
22 Ibid., Jan 24, 1930.
23 Ibid., Jan 29, 1930.
24 Ibid., Jan 30, 1930.
25 Ibid., Jan 31, 1930.
26 VB, Feb 5, 1930. On Feb 6 Angriff published a statement by JG on the newspaper question
designed to reassure his gau members.
27 Diary, Feb 8, 9, 11, 15, 16, 1930.
28 Ibid., Feb 20, 21, 1930.
29 Ibid., Mar 2, 4, 1930.
30 Ibid., Mar 5, 1930.
31 E.g., Mar 12, 1930.
32 Diary, Mar 1, 1930; Grzesinski MS
33 Diary, Feb 11, 1930.
34 Ibid., Feb 21, 1930; Goltz memoirs, MS (BA file Kl.Erw., 653/2) and interrogations,
NA : RG.319, IRR case file XE 1026, esp. U.S. Seventh Army interrogation SAIC/X/10, Jul
5, 1945. Born Jul 10, 1894, father of ten children, Goltz had been a lawyer in the Stettin
county court since 1926.
35 Reichstag, 141. Sitzung, Mar 13,, 4442ff; diary, Mar 14, 1930.
36 In the Sport Palace on Feb 7, 1930 he attributed the remark to August Bebel. ‘Attacking
the present system of government,’ the police reported, ‘he wound himself up into ever
greater ecstasies ... [saying] the opponents of the NSDAP were now laughing on the other
190 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH
side of their face.’ (Justice ministry file,‘Libel actions against Joseph Goebbels Nov 1929—
Aug 1931’ in Deutsches Zentralarchiv; IfZ film MA.118).
37 Police file, 20f. He was accused of libelling Weiss in issues of Angriff dated Oct 29, Nov
26, Dec 10, 1928; Sep 9, 1929; Apr 8, May 1, 1930: seven volumes of court files are in
Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 47; of libelling him at a speech in the Victoria Park on
Mar 23, 1929 (item 39); and at a speech on Sep 20, 1929 at the Veterans Building printed as
Der Kampf gegen Young. Eine Sache des deutschen Arbeiters (item 2); for further libel cases resulting
from articles in Angriff, see item 39.
38 Angriff, No.65, Dec 29, 1929.
39 Police file, NA film T581, roll 52, BA file NS.26/1224.
40 Summons dated May 17, 1930 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep 90, Go 1, Bd.1); for the resulting
court case see Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 48.
41 Diary, May 8, 26, 27, 1930.
42 Ibid., Jan 1, 4, 24, 1930; and see Zezschwitz to (unknown), Apr 20, 1930 on the background
to the Hindenburg case (IfZ film MA.744).
43 Diary, May 15, 16, 28, 1930.
44 Angriff, Jun 5, 1930.
45 NYT, Jun 1, 1930.
46 Diary Jan 23, 30, Feb 2, 3, 1930.
47 Ibid., Jan 6, 8; Mar 7, 1930.
48 Ibid., Mar 13, 21, 1930.
49 Ibid., Feb 19, Mar 6, 1930.
50 Ibid., Apr 18, 20, 1930.
51 Ibid., Apr 24, 1930.
52 Ibid., Mar 16, 1930.
53 Ibid., Mar 20, 1930.
54 Ibid.Mar 22, 23, 1930.
55 Ibid., Mar 28; on Mar 29, depressed, he noted, ‘No word from Munich.’ And the next
day, ‘All thanks to this stupid Munichery. We’re faced by the gravest decisions. And Munich’s
fast asleep.’
56 Ibid., Apr 1, 2, 5, 1930.
57 Ibid., Apr 13, 1930.
58 Reichspropagandaleiter. As late as 1930 the Nazi Jahrbuch which had gone to press in Sep
1929 listed Hitler as chairman of the RPL with Himmler as deputy; the last RPL decree
cou
ntersigned by Himmler was published in VB on Apr 5, 1930; the first by JG (as Reichsleiter
I ) on May 23, 1930.—Diary, Apr 28, 1930.
59 Diary, Oct 13, 1929; Apr 9, 1930.—Re Muchow: Oct 2, 4, 1929; Jan 21, 1930; and see
his article, ‘Die Strassenzellen-Organisation des Gaues Berlin,’ in VB, Mar 11, 1930.
60 Ibid.Aug 27, Oct 6, 1929; Apr 10, 30; May 2, 1930.
61 Ibid., Apr 30, 1930.
62 Ibid., Apr 16, 1930. Hans Johann Friedrich Goebbels, b.Jan 25, 1895, had joined the
NSDAP on Nov 1, 1929 (party number 160,449). JG scraped together 100 marks a month
for his mother (diary, May 14, 1930.) On Jun 10, 1946 the New York Times would report that
JG’s sister Maria had said, ‘We did not see Joseph often, although we lived in Berlin, and I
GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 191
know he never gave mother any money or helped support her.’ This seems unjustified. The
diaries contain many other references to JG’s financial help for his mother, e.g. on Jul 13,
1930.
63 Diary, May 18, 1930. The killers of the communist Heimburger claimed self-defence,
but there were many arrests.—Grzesinski MS.
64 Ibid., May 4, 14, 1930.
65 Ibid., May 3, 1930.
66 Ibid., May 22, 1930. Much later Otto Strasser published in Hitler und ich (Konstanz,
1948) his own fanciful record of his two talks with Hitler. Postwar American authorities
termed him a wastrel, debt-incurrer, rabid anti-semite, and anarchist (NA: RG.319, IRR,
file G8172121: about 3,000 pages of Otto Strasser papers, 1946–59.) This file also contains
a 1948 description by Otto Strasser of his May 1930 clash with Hitler. On Otto Strasser see
also Donovan to FDR, Jan 20, 1942 (FDR Libr. PFS box 163)
67 Diary, May 24, 1930.
68 Ibid., Jun 11, 12, 15, 17, 1930.
69 Ibid., Jun 12, 1930.
70 Ibid., Jun 14, 17, 1930.
71 Ibid., Jun 18, 21, 1930.
72 Ibid., Jun 25, 1930.
73 Ibid., Jun 29; and Strasser’s Der Nationale Sozialist, Jul 1, 1930.
74 Diary, Jun 28–30, Jul 1, 2, 5; Angriff, Jul 3, 1930. After Der Nationale Sozialist reported
on Jul 3 that he was still its publisher and director, Gregor Strasser issued a statement through
the Telegraphen Union agency sharply disowning the ‘circle around Kampf Verlag led by my
brother Dr Otto Strasser’ and announcing that he had severed ties with the publishing house
on Jun 30. ‘I still stand loyally behind Adolf Hitler and the NSDAP led by him.’—Hinrich
Lohse MS, ‘The Strasser Case’ (IfZ: ZS-265, 8f); and see Günter Bartsch, Zwischen drei Stühlen.
Otto Strasser, Eine Biographie (Koblenz, 1990). Otto Strasser later accused JG of ordering ‘SA
Standarte 208’ to assassinate him; he was beaten up by several S.A. men in Aug 1930, and
claims to have shot two of them (NA file RG.319, IRR, G8172121).
75 Landesarchiv Berlin, Rep.58, item 24, vol.iii, 4.
76 Diary, Jun 15, Jul 3, 16, 1930; Moabit criminal court summons to JG, endorsed by
postman on Jul 24, 1930 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.90, Go 1, Goebbels, Bd.1).
77 Diary, Jan 10–13; JG’s visiting card is in Anka’s papers, endorsed in her hand on Jun 3,
1930.
78 Diary, Jun 9, 1930.
79 Ibid., Jun 21, 25, Jul 6, 7, Aug 7, 17, 24. Interrogated on Feb 3, 1948 Lucie Kammer
née Zimpel testified that her husband died in 1930; she had joined the NSDAP in 1927 (StA
Nuremberg, Rep.502, K.19; NA: RG.260, OMGUS files, box 15).
80 Diary, Jul 12–15, Aug 3, 7, 1930.
192 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH
13: His Week in Court
SO FAR Dr Goebbels had had to face no real challenge as gauleiter. But as the new
Reichstag election of September 14, 1930 approached the rift between his gau’s
officers and the impoverished and disgruntled fist-fighters of the Berlin S.A. came to
a head. They saw no signs that Hitler intended to allow them any real reward for
their bravery. The result would be the first full-scale S.A. mutiny during the heat of
the summer in Berlin.
Captain Walter Stennes, the ex-army officer who as supreme S.A. commander
(Osaf) ‘Ost’ commanded twenty-five thousand of these disaffected men east of the
river Elbe, shared many of Dr Goebbels’ political views. He had dubbed the gauleiter
the Nazis’ Joseph Stalin, responsible for preserving the purity of the movement’s
ideals.1 Both deprecated Hitler’s legalistic approach to power. Though not as radically
leftwing as the gauleiter, Stennes was like him an activist and revolutionary.
Most of the S.A. men were unemployed. Recognizing this, Hitler had ordered the
gauleiters to enforce a twenty-pfennig monthly levy on each Party member to support
their local S.A.; Goebbels had ordered an additional ten pfennig levy in Berlin
—the ‘S.A. Groschen’ as it was known.2
Battered and bruised, the S.A. watched bitterly as the Party squandered considerable
sums on the Brown House, its national HQ.3 In short, the S.A. wanted to get at
the pork-barrel and they were not prepared to wait.
Goebbels sympathised with them. ‘We shall reach our goals only on the basis of the
S.A.,’ he asserted at one confidential meeting.4 He was torn between instinct and
GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 193
logic. Captain Stennes and the S.A. represented manpower and muscle—but Hitler
and Munich held promise of power, office, and even bigger automobiles. Late in July
Hitler called a secret conference to decide the official list of Nazi candidates. Goebbels
was amused to see how tame Strasser and the other fractious big-shots suddenly
became. They finally agreed a list of one hundred names (though not in their wildest
dreams did they expect to win so many seats.)5
The list brought the problems with the S.A. to a head. Stennes sent to the Supreme
S.A. Commander, Franz von Pfeffer, a letter asking for safe Reichstag seats for three
S.A. men.6 But Hitler was opposed to allowing the S.A. any more political clout than
it already had. On August 1 Stennes mentioned in his diary reports from all his subordinate
commanders that relations between the S.A. and Munich were becoming
intolerable. He invited his boss, Pfeffer, to Berlin at once. Meanwhile on the second
his S.A. commanders reiterated their demands for Reichstag seats. The next day
Pfeffer revealed that Hitler was on the contrary talking of cutting the S.A. back to
what they could afford.
Monetarism did not commend itself to the Brownshirt rednecks. ‘This shows,’
reported Stennes’ chief of staff, ‘that the objectives of the Reich director [i.e. Pfeffer
in Munich] are no longer those of old.’ This was true. Hitler intended to attain power
strictly legally. In Munich Goebbels, now Reich propaganda director, briefed his
deputy Himmler on the broad outlines of the election campaign, then returned to
Berlin. Nationwide over the next two months the glaring red hues of his posters
Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death Page 31
