There was really no subject he had not dwelt on: architecture, painting, sculpture, theatre, films, artistry: all were an inexhaustible fund for conversation. If there was a pause in the talk and we were stuck for something to discuss, it was only necessary to mention any of the foregoing and Hitler was in his element. The Church was always a favourite topic. Hitler had no affiliation. He considered the Christian religion to be a hypocritical trap which had outlived its time. His religion was the Law of Nature.
Science has not yet decided from which roots the human race sprang forth. We are probably the highest stage of development from some mammal or other which had developed from the reptile, and then perhaps through the apes to the human being. We are a limb of Creation and children of Nature and the same laws apply to us as they do to all living beings. In Nature, the law of the jungle has been in force from the beginning. All those unsuitable to live, and the weak, are trampled underfoot. Man, and above all the Church, have made it precisely their goal to keep alive by artificial means the weak, those unfit for life and the invalids.
Hitler was clever enough to know that he could not destroy the moral high ground which religious belief provided, and he remained to the end a Catholic, although he intended to renounce membership as soon as the war ended. This act would have a symbolic significance: for Germany the end of an historical epoch and for the Third Reich the beginning of a new era. On the subject of the closing ceremonies at the Nuremberg rallies he once said: ‘The closing Congress must be as solemn and festive as the Catholic mass. The bringing in of the standards, the whole ceremony should be planned like a ritual of the Catholic Church.’ He also planned mass marriages with 50–100 couples. ‘The mass service will make it possible to have very festive ceremonies.’ Great music bands, flower decorations everywhere.
He also spoke of the motherly, self-sacrificing ladies of high society, in whose salons new contacts would be made. He said that it reinforced in him the impression ‘that he was being eyed-up like an ape in a zoo’. One day after the renovation work at the Radziwill Palace, I was called to the Reich Chancellery apartment in the late morning. Hitler was at breakfast with his adjutants in the dining room. I was asked to take a seat at table. Scarcely had I sat than the waiter Karl Krause led in a very young and pretty blonde. This was the baroness Sigrid von Laffert, whose photo at the time was gracing the title page of the Berlin Illustrierte under the heading ‘A German Girl!’ She was the daughter of an officer from Doberan in Mecklenburg, but better known as the niece of Hitler’s patroness Viktoria von Dirksen. David Irving related the following anecdote about her in his very superficial analysis How Sick was Hitler Really?:[44] ‘There was for example Viktoria von Dirksen, an ambitious 150 per cent National Socialist who once managed to inveigle a twenty-one-year old relation, pretty as a picture, naked into Hitler’s bed at the Reich Chancellery. Hitler found her there, but did no more than politely request her to dress and leave the room.’ This was a fable, however.
Viktoria von Dirksen ran a political saloon in which Hitler was often centre-stage. In later years in the Staircase Room he would make remarks about the invitations and say: ‘I felt there like an exotic zoo animal, peered at curiously by everybody as an attraction.’ At this time he was probably still enjoying the invitations of Her Excellence. He was pleased by her pretty niece and took a few steps in her direction, saying something like ‘Here comes my sunshine’ or ‘The sun is rising’, I cannot be sure any more. In any case, his attraction to Sigrid von Laffert could not be missed, and neither could it be hidden from Eva Braun in Munich.
Hitler’s clothing was purely functional. He hated trying things on. Since he made lively hand and arm movements to emphasise points he was making in his speeches, and also liked to extend his body while strolling in conversation, especially when the subject was one which excited him and which he did mainly by raising the right shoulder, he had an aversion to a close fit. His tailor[45] had to shape all uniforms and suits for comfort in this regard. This occasional raising of the right shoulder may have been due to the left shoulder being stiff. During the putsch of 9 November 1923 Hitler fell to the pavement, dislocating his left shoulder. Dr Walter Schultze, husband of Ada Klein and leader of the SA medical corps, could not convince Hitler to have it X-rayed. Hitler feared being ‘bumped off’ at the hospital. The shoulder was therefore never properly fixed and remained stiff ever afterwards, which I often had cause to notice.
Although with this slightly lop-sided posture and ample jacket Hitler did not exactly cut an elegant figure, he still commanded respect. As soon as he entered a room everybody present would notice him. Looking back this seems to have been because he never hurried. His manner of walking was always measured, almost ceremonial, when he went to greet somebody. This tended to induce in the other person a feeling of uncertainty, for it contrasted with the free and unforced approach one expected. Hitler had always to be the controller! He mentioned frequently for example: ‘how uncertain it made visitors to the new Reich Chancellery to have to cross the long marble hall, polished like a mirror, and then traverse his large study to get to his desk’.
I found his eyes expressive. They looked mostly as if interested and searching, and became increasingly animated during conversation. They could look friendly and warm-hearted, or express indignation, indifference and disgust. In the last months of the war they lost expressiveness and became a more watery, pale light blue, and rather bulging.
One could always tell his mood from his voice. It could be unusually calm, clear, exact and convincing, but also excited increasing in volume and overwhelming in aggression. Often it would be ice-cold. ‘Ice-cold’, or ‘Now I am ice-cold’ were much-used phrases of his. ‘I am totally indifferent to what the future will think of the methods which I have to use,’ I heard frequently. ‘Ruthless’ (rücksichtslos) was common in his vocabulary: ‘Force it through ruthlessly, whatever the cost!’ Other phrases to crop up a lot were ‘with brute force!’ and ‘with brutal energy!’, and in conclusion, ‘simply idiotic!’
Hitler’s nose was very large and fairly pointed. I do not know whether his teeth were ever very attractive, but by 1945 they were yellow and he had bad breath. He had wisely grown a small moustache to cover up his very thin lips. During the years of his friendship with Ada Klein[46] he told her: ‘Many people say I should shave off the moustache, but that is impossible. Imagine my face without a moustache!’ and at that held his hand below his nose like a plate. ‘My nose is much too big. I need the moustache to relieve the effect!’
I liked his hands, either in motion or at rest. They were not manicured, but had a cared-for look with their short nails. Over the years the joints got increasingly thicker. During a flight a photographer, perhaps Heinrich Hoffmann himself, took a very fine photograph showing Hitler’s hands on the armrest of his seat. Hitler never wore personal jewellery. Even his gold watch he carried loose in his jacket pocket. It was always a few minutes fast so that he arrived at meetings and conferences punctually. He doubted the reliability of his waiters and adjutants although he was perpetually asking them for the time.
45
Hitler’s wardrobe came almost exclusively from the Wilhelm Holter’s gentleman’s outfitters on Wilhelm-Strasse 49, Berlin.