Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris

(Gritschneder,
Bewährungsfrist, 110–
12; see also Jablonsky, 133, and Hanfstaengl,
15 Jahre,
160–61).
    67 . Jablonsky, 150.
    68 . Deuerlein,
Aufstieg,
239–40.
    69 . Jetzinger, 276–7; Donald Cameron Watt, ‘Die bayerischen Bemühungen um Ausweisung Hitlers 1924’,
VfZ,
6 (1958), 270–80, here, 272; Jablonsky, 91 and 202 n.190; Deuerlein,
Aufstieg,
239. The initial inquiry of the Bavarian police about deporting Hitler, in March 1924, had been prompted by concern that he would be acquitted at his trial, along with Ludendorff. The concern was also voiced by the Bavarian Minister President, Knilling.
    70 . Gritschneder,
Bewährungsfrist,
101. As we have seen, the Munich Police Direction reinforced this opinion in its report of 23 September.
    71 . Watt, ‘Die bayerischen Bemühungen’, 273.
    72 . Jetzinger, 277.
    73 . Deuerlein,
Aufstieg,
240. Hitler’s war service, it was claimed, meant that he was no longer an Austrian citizen (Watt, ‘Die bayerischen Bemühungen’, 274).
    74 . Watt, ‘Die bayerischen Bemühungen’, 276–7; Jetzinger, 278.
    75 . Whether, as has often been accepted (see Bullock, 127; Toland, 203) Gürtner, influenced by the Austrian refusal to take him back, played a decisive role in having deportation proceedings against Hitler quashed remains, in the light of Watt’s examination of the evidence, uncertain. See Watt, ‘Die bayerischen Bemühungen’, 270–71, 279.
    76 . Deuerlein,
Aufstieg,
250–52; Jetzinger, 272, 279.
    77 .Jetzinger, 280.
    78 . Gritschneder,
Bewährungsfrist,
119–30 (quotation, 130). Leybold had already further testified to Hitler’s good conduct in a report of 13 November.
    79 . See Jablonsky, 150.
    80 . Gritschneder,
Bewährungsfrist,
130.
    81 .
Monologe,
259–60. For Müller, see
Monologe,
146, and Heiden,
Hitler,
199–200.
    82 . Gritschneder,
Bewährungsfrist,
130.
    83 .
Monologe,
259–60; Hoffmann, 60–61; Franz-Willing,
Putsch,
278–9, cit.
Der Nationalsozialist
of 25 December 1924 and
Völkischer Kurier
of 23 December 1924.
    84 .
Monologe,
261.
    85 . Frank, 46–7.
    86 . See Jochmann, 91–2, for Fobke’s description of his normal day in Landsberg.
    87 . See MK, 36.
    88 . Frank, 47.
    89 . Frank, 45.
    90 . Eitner, 75. Eitner (75–82) was prepared to see the time in Landsberg as the major turning-point in Hitler’s life, the ‘Jordan experience’ that convinced him of his messianic mission, that he was no longer Germany’s ‘John the Baptist’, but its actual messiah.
    91 . Even allowing for Hitler’s usual underlining of his own ‘intuitive genius’, his later comment, that it was during this time that a good deal of reflection made him for the first time grasp fully many things that he had earlier understood only by intuition, accords with this interpretation
(Monologe,
262).
    92 .
Monologe,
262.
    93 . Otto Strasser,
Hitler und ich,
Buenos Aires, n.d. (1941?), 56.
    94 . Franz-Willing,
Putsch,
251; Jochmann, 92. Fobke speaks of one hour’s ‘lecture with the chief, or better, from the chief
(‘Vortrag beim Chef, besser vom Chef).
According to one of his warders (who subsequently became an SS-Sturmführer), in an account published in 1933, Hitler read out chapters of his book on Saturday evenings (Otto Lurker,
Hitler hinter Festungsmauern,
Berlin, 1933, 56). See also Werner Maser,
Hitlers Mein Kampf,
Munich/Esslingen, 1966, 20–21 and Hammer, ‘Die deutschen Ausgaben’, 161–78, here 162.
    95 . Hinted at in Heiden,
Der Führer,
226.Though plausible, there is no corroborative evidence for Heiden’s inference (which did not appear in his 1936 biography of Hitler). Heiden,
Der Führer,
226, also appears to be the source of the suggestion that Hitler had begun work in 1922 on a book entitled ‘A Reckoning’ (the title of the first volume of
Mein Kampf),
aimed at dealing with his enemies and rivals.
    96 . Hanfstaengl, 15
Jahre,
172.
    97 . Heiden,
Hitler,
206; Heiden,
Der Führer,
226.
    98 . Franz-Willing,
Putsch,
251.
    99 . Strongly hinted in Heiden,
Der Führer,
226 (though without corroborative evidence).
    100 .Otto Strasser,
Hitler und ich,
59; Frank, 45; Heiden,
Hitler,
188–90; Hans Kallenbach,
Mit Adolf Hitler auf Festung Landsberg,
Munich, 1933, 56. See also Hammer, ‘Die deutschen Ausgaben’, 161–2; Lurker, 56; Maser,
Frühgeschichte,
304 and n.325; Maser,
Adolf Hitler,
192. Ilse Heß claimed after the war that her husband had not taken down the text in dictation, but that Hitler had typed it himself with two fingers on