In another instance, as the detailed research of the Austrian historian Brigitte Hamann has shown, Kubizek proves a reliable source despite Jetzinger’s sustained attempt to discredit him.* This is the question of his financial standing during his time in Vienna. Where Kubizek portrays Hitler as hard-up, Jetzinger claims that inherited money left him well-off. Certainly Hitler was not poverty-stricken until his money ran out, after contact with Kubizek had been broken off. But the picture of a modest, even downright frugal lifestyle painted by Kubizek was accurate, whereas Jetzinger’s calculations had exaggerated the funds allegedly at Hitler’s disposal (again something taken up in a number of secondary works). Once more, Kubizek proves an important source and corrective.
Above all, for all its manifold flaws, Kubizek’s book rings true in the portrait of Hitler’s personality and mentality. In particular, the lengthy parts of the book which tell of Hitler’s views on history, art, architecture, and music (where Kubizek was especially at home) illustrate facets of his character which become only too familiar in later years. The docile, impressionable, compliant Kubizek, a few months older than his friend but with a pronounced inferiority complex, was a perfect receptacle for the domineering, opinionated, know-all young Hitler. He listened. Hitler talked – and talked, and talked. The dogmatic opinions – and outright prejudices – on art and music are similar to those we come across in the later Hitler. The precise words Hitler used can only be Kubizek’s invention but the sentiments are surely genuine. And since it is certain that Hitler and Kubizek did spend a great deal of time in each other’s company for close to four years, in Linz then in Vienna, and since they were both passionately interested in music and art, it can be presumed that these topics figured prominently in their conversations and made a lasting impact (even if not a precise one) on Kubizek’s memory.
Like so many ‘memoirs’ and recollections of those who knew Hitler at first hand, Kubizek’s account is faulty and inaccurate in many respects. Medieval historians are used to working with flawed and inaccurate sources which can nevertheless provide important insights. Kubizek’s book has to be used in a similar way – recognising its deficiencies, but acknowledging the intrinsic value of the portrait of the young Hitler which it provides.
Ian Kershaw
*
Kubizek later claimed that he had ‘had only one friend in his life: Adolf’. – Letter to Franz Jetzinger, 24 June 1949, Oberösterreichisches Landesarchiv, Linz, NL Jetzinger, 64/19.
*
Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Munich, MA-731, NSDAP-Hauptarchiv, ‘Notizen für Kartei: Bericht über meinen Besuch bei Herrn Kutbitschek [sic] in Eferding’.
*
In the Oberösterreichisches Landesarchiv, NL Jetzinger 63.
†
At the end of his typescript, Kubizek admits that much else had happened but with the passage of time now escaped his memory. NL Jetzinger 63, p. 48.
‡
In his letters, he recalled incidents and episodes, prompted by Jetzinger’s questions, that did not figure in his typescript. He also indicated that he was in the process of rewriting some passages after discussion with Jetzinger since he recognised that they were incorrect as drafted. NL Jetzinger, 64/18, 19 June 1949.
§
NL Jetzinger, 64/18, letter to Jetzinger, 19 June 1949.
¶
NL Jetzinger, 64/14, letter to Jetzinger, 3 June 1949; 64/18, 19 June 1949.
*
NL Jetzinger 64/18, letter to Jetzinger, 19 June 1949; 64/20, 28 June 1949.
*
He calls her ‘Isaak’ (NL Jetzinger 64/20, letter to Jetzinger, 20 June 1949). Her family name (in its correct spelling) only came to light, however, in Anton Joachimsthaler, Hitlers Liste. Ein Dokument persönlicher Beziehungen, Munich, 2003, pp. 46–52.
†
Franz Jetzinger, Hitlers Jugend. Phantasien, Lügen und die Wahrheit, Vienna, 1956.
‡
NL Jetzinger 64/18, letter to Jetzinger, 19 June 1949.
*
Brigitte Hamann, Hitler’s Vienna. A Dictator’s Apprenticeship, Oxford & New York, 1999, pp. 58–9.
THE YOUNG
HITLER I KNEW
* * *
Original Publisher’s
Foreword
In 1951 our attention was drawn to a civil servant of sixty-two years of age employed by the municipal council at Eferding in Upper Austria. We were told that August Kubizek had been a musical conductor and spent four years of his youth as a soul-mate of Adolf Hitler.
We realised that Kubizek’s story was of the greatest importance for the historical record of the German dictator, because Kubizek had been Hitler’s only friend in his teens and must have influenced Hitler’s development to a large degree. The human personality begins to take shape at that stage and it is there that the historian must begin his research if he proposes to lay the groundwork for a biography of Hitler as politician and statesman. For these reasons we asked August Kubizek it he would write his recollections of those years as well as memory allowed. We knew that Kubizek could be relied upon. He was an idealist who, after re-establishing contact with Hitler in 1938, politely but firmly turned down the German leader’s every suggestion that he leave the Austrian civil service and accept a leading position in Reich music. When Hitler’s star had begun to wane in 1942, however, Kubizek, although inwardly opposed to National Socialism, joined the NSDAP in an act of solidarity towards the friend of his youth.
It was with considerable reflection and self-examination that Kubizek set about his task as author. His book was published for the first time in 1953 and caused great excitement. It was translated into English, French and Spanish, while extracts appeared in the world’s press and were much referred to subsequently by historians.
By the time of his death on 23 October 1956, Kubizek’s account had received international recognition. The allegation made in many publications that ‘guidelines’ for a memoir of this kind had been agreed as early as 1938 between Kubizek and ‘the main NSDAP archive’ is false. The Leopold Stocker publishing house knows of no such agreement, and Kubizek’s widow wrote to assure us that her husband had never visited the NSDAP archive at Munich.
There is, in any case, nothing to suggest that he had drafted his memoirs pre-war. From our knowledge of him, moreover, we believe that Kubizek was not the kind of author who was suited to writing material ‘within guidelines’, and on page 294 of the German language first edition he emphasised that his memoir had been ‘neither influenced nor commissioned’ by anybody.
Leopold Stocker Verlag
Graz,
June 1966
* * *
Author’s Introduction
My Decision and Justification
My decision to commit to paper my reminiscences of the Adolf Hitler I knew in our late childhood did not come easy, for the danger of being misunderstood is great. But the sixteen months I spent in US detention as a 57-year-old ruined my health, and so I must employ usefully whatever time is left to me.
Between 1904 and 1908 I was the single and exclusive friend of Adolf Hitler, first in Linz and then in Vienna, where we shared a room together. Of these formative years of Hitler, in which his personality began to take shape, little is known, and much of what is known is incorrect. In Mein Kampf it suited his purposes to gloss over the period with a few fleeting references, and so it may be that my own observations may serve to fortify the image which the passage of time leaves us of Adolf Hitler, from whatever standpoint one happens to look at it.
I have been at pains neither to add anything untrue, nor leave out anything for political reasons: I want to be able to say: this was exactly how it happened. It would have been wrong, for example, to attribute to Hitler thoughts and ideas which were typically his of the later period, and I have taken great care to avoid this pitfall and set out my narrative as if this same Adolf Hitler, with whom I shared such a close friendship, were somebody with whom I had lost contact for ever after 1908, or w
ho had fallen in the Great War.
I am mindful of the difficulty in recalling accurately ideas and events which occurred more than forty years ago, but my friendship with Adolf Hitler bore from the outset the stamp of the unusual, and details of the relationship are more firmly impregnated on the memory than would normally be the case. Furthermore I was indebted to Adolf Hitler for his having convinced my father that, by virtue of the special musical talents which nature had bestowed upon me, I belonged in the Vienna Conservatoire rather than a furniture workshop. This decisive change in my life, engineered by Adolf Hitler against the determined resistance of my family, gave our friendship greater substance in my eyes. Additionally, thank God, I have an excellent memory linked to my fine acoustic sense. In writing my book, I have been able to call upon letters, postcards and sketches I received from my friend, and my own brief notes, which I set down some considerable time ago.
August Kubizek
Eferding,
August 1953
* * *
Chapter 1
First Meeting
I was born in Linz on 3 August 1888. Before his marriage my father had been an upholsterer’s assistant to a furniture manufacturer in Linz. He used to have his midday meal in a little café and it was there that he met my mother, who was working as a waitress. They fell in love, and were married in July 1887.
At first the young couple lived in the house of my mother’s parents. My father’s wages were low, the work was hard, and my mother had to give up her job when she was expecting me. Thus I was born in rather miserable circumstances. One year later my sister Maria was born, but died at a tender age. The following year, Therese appeared; she died at the age of four. My third sister, Karoline, fell desperately ill, lingered on for some years, and died when she was eight. My mother’s grief was boundless. Throughout her life she suffered from the fear of losing me too; for I was the only one left to her of her four children. Consequently all my mother’s love was concentrated upon me.
There was a noteworthy parallel between the destinies of the Kubizek and Hitler households, and the two mothers shared much suffering in common. Hitler’s mother had lost three children, Gustav, Ida and Otto. Adolf was an only child for a considerable time. When Hitler was five, brother Edmund came along, but died in his sixth year. The only other survivor was sister Paula, born in 1896. Although Adolf and I rarely mentioned our deceased brothers and sisters, nevertheless we felt like the survivors of an endangered lineage which brought with it a special responsibility.
Without realising it, Adolf referred to me occasionally as ‘Gustav’ instead of August – even a letter he sent me has this forename on the envelope. It had been the name of his first brother who died. Possibly it was a sort of mix-up with the diminutive ‘Gustl’ for August, or perhaps he wanted to please his mother by bestowing the name on a person such as myself who was received into the Hitler family like a son.
Meanwhile my father had set up on his own and had opened an upholsterer’s business at No. 9 Klammstrasse. The old Baernreitherhaus, heavy and ungainly, which still stands there unaltered, became the home of my childhood and youth. The narrow, sombre Klammstrasse looked rather poor in comparison with its continuation, the broad and airy promenade, with its lawns and trees.
Our unhealthy housing conditions had certainly contributed to the early death of my sisters. In the Baernreitherhaus things were different. On the ground floor there was the workshop and, on the first floor, our apartment which consisted of two rooms and a kitchen. But now my father was never free from money troubles. Business was bad. More than once he contemplated closing down the business and again taking a job with the furniture makers. Yet each time he managed to overcome his difficulties at the last moment.
I started school, a very unpleasant experience. My mother wept over the bad reports I brought home. Her sorrow was the only thing that could persuade me to work harder. Whereas for my father there was no question but that in due course I should take over his business – why else did he slave from morning to night? – it was my mother’s desire that I should study in spite of my bad reports; first I should have four years at the grammar school, then perhaps go to teachers’ training college. But I would not hear of it. I was glad that my father put his foot down and, when I was ten, sent me to the council school. In this way, my father thought, my future was finally decided.
For a long time, however, there had been another influence in my life for which I would have sold my soul: music. This love was given full expression when, at Christmas 1897 when nine years old, I was given a violin as a present. I remember distinctly every detail of that Christmas and, when today in my old age I think back, my conscious life seems to have started with that event. The eldest son of our neighbour was a young pupil-teacher and he gave me violin lessons. I learned fast and well.
When my first violin teacher took a job in the country I entered the lower grade of the Linz School of Music, but I did not like it there very much, perhaps because I was much more advanced than the other pupils. After the holidays I once more had private lessons, this time with an old sergeant-major of the Austro-Hungarian Army Music Corps, who straightaway made clear to me that I knew nothing and then began to teach me the elements of violin playing ‘in the military fashion’. It was real barrack-square drill with old Kopetzky. Sometimes when I got fed up with his rough sergeant-major manners he consoled me with the assurance that, with more progress, I should certainly be taken as an apprentice-musician by the Army: in his opinion the peak of a musician’s glory. I gave up my study with Kopetzky and entered the intermediate class of the School of Music where I was taught by Professor Heinrich Dessauer, a gifted, efficient and sensitive teacher. At the same time I studied the trumpet, trombone and musical theory, and played in the students’ orchestra.
I was already toying with the idea of making music my life’s work when hard reality made itself felt. I had hardly left the council school when I had to join my father’s business as an apprentice. Formerly, when there was a shortage of labour, I had had to lend a hand in the workshop and so was familiar with the work.
It is a repulsive job to re-upholster old furniture by unravelling and remaking the stuffing. The work goes on in clouds of dust in which the poor apprentice is smothered. What rubbishy old mattresses were brought to our workshop! All the illnesses that had been overcome – and some of them not overcome – left their mark on these old beds. No wonder that upholsterers do not live long. But soon I also learned the more pleasant aspects of my work: personal taste and a feeling for art are necessary in it, and it is not too far removed from interior decorating. One would visit well-to-do homes, one saw and heard a lot and, above all, in winter there was little or nothing to do. And this leisure, naturally, I devoted to music. When I had successfully passed my journeyman’s test, my father wanted me to take on jobs in other workshops. I saw his point, but for me the essential thing was not to improve my craftsmanship, but to advance my musical studies. Thus, I chose to stay on in my father’s workshop, since I could dispose of my time with more freedom there than under another master.
‘There are generally too many violins in an orchestra, but never enough violas.’ To this day, I am grateful to Professor Dessauer for having applied this maxim and turned me into a good viola player. Musical life in Linz in those days was on a remarkably high level; August Göllerich was the director of the Music Society. Being a disciple of Liszt and a collaborator of Richard Wagner at Bayreuth, Göllerich was the very man to be the musical leader of Linz, so much maligned as a ‘peasant’s town’. Every year the Music Society gave three symphony concerts and one special concert, when usually a choral work was performed, with orchestra. My mother, in spite of her humble origin, loved music, and hardly ever missed one of these performances. While still a small boy, I was taken to concerts. My mother explained everything to me and, as I came to master several instruments, my appreciation of these concerts grew. My highest aim in life was to play in the orchestra, eit
her on the viola or the trumpet.
But for the time being it was still a matter of remaking dusty old mattresses and papering walls. In those years my father suffered much from the usual occupational diseases of an upholsterer. When persistent lung trouble once kept him in bed for six months, I had to run the workshop alone. Thus the two things existed side by side in my young life: work, which made calls on my strength and even on my lungs, and music, which was my whole love. I should never have thought that there could be a connection between the two. And yet there was. One of my father’s customers was a member of the provincial government, which also controlled the theatre. One day there came to us for repair the cushions of a set of rococo furniture. When the work was done my father sent me to deliver them to the theatre. The stage manager directed me to the stage, where I was to replace the cushions in their frames. A rehearsal was in progress. I do not know which piece was being rehearsed, but it was certainly an opera. But what I remember still is the enchantment which came over me as I stood there on the stage, in the midst of the singers. I was transformed as though now, for the first time, I had discovered myself. Theatre! What a world! A man stood there, magnificently attired. He seemed to me like a creature from another planet. He sang so gloriously that I could not imagine this man could ever speak in the ordinary way. The orchestra responded to his mighty voice. Here I was on more familiar ground, but in this moment everything that music had hitherto meant to me seemed to be trifling. Only in conjunction with the stage did music seem to reach a higher, more solemn plane, the highest imaginable.
But there I stood, a miserable little upholsterer, and fitted the cushions back into their place in the rococo suite. What a lamentable job! What a wretched existence! Theatre, that was the world that I had searched for. Play and reality became confused in my excited mind. That awkward fellow with ruffled hair, apron and rolled-up shirt-sleeves who stood in the wings and fumbled with his cushions as though to justify his presence – was he really only a poor upholsterer? A poor, despised simpleton, pushed from pillar to post and treated by the customer as if he were a step-ladder, placed here, placed there according to the moment’s need and then, its usefulness over, put aside? It would have been absolutely natural if that little upholsterer, tools in hand, had stepped forward to the footlights and, at a sign from the conductor, had sung his part to prove to the audience in the stalls, nay to an attentive world, that in reality he was not that pale, lanky fellow from the upholsterer’s shop in the Klammstrasse, but that his place was really on the stage in the theatre.
The Young Hitler I Knew Page 2
