For years, the official story of Heinrich Himmler’s death in British custody in May 1945 never satisfied me. I kept picking at it, certain that the bigger story remained just out of focus. One question haunted me above all others: Himmler had wielded immense power through the SS state, commanding an army of nine hundred thousand men and controlling every police and security organization in Nazi Germany. Yet he never moved to oust Hitler and take power for himself, even though from 1943 onward he had been secretly attempting to make a separate peace with the Western Allies behind the Führer’s back.
We know now that Himmler probably aided the July plot of 1944, when a cabal of aristocratic army officers tried and failed to assassinate Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair. Himmler had some knowledge of the plot before the attack and did nothing to stop it. But afterward, Hitler tasked him with rounding up and destroying the plotters, a task he performed with great zeal, perhaps to ensure his own involvement was never revealed. What may surprise you is that an SS plot did exist to kill Hitler and replace him with Himmler.
But it did not originate with the Reichsführer himself. It came from a conspiracy of top SS generals who believed, in the last months of the war, that Hitler was no longer fit to lead and that terms had to be sought with the Western Allies before Germany was completely destroyed. In late 1944, Himmler, a man with no real military experience, was given command of Army Group Upper Rhine in Alsace, tasked with assisting Hitler’s last great offensive in the west, Operation Nordwind, launched on New Year’s Day 1945 against weak American opposition. The aim was to relieve pressure on the stalled Ardennes Offensive further north.
Himmler’s subsidiary attack actually went quite well, and he made some limited gains. On the twenty-fifth of January 1945, Hitler promoted him to command of Army Group Vistula on the Eastern Front, with orders to stop the Soviet advance into Pomerania. Himmler was completely inadequate to this task. Without a proper military staff, he very publicly failed the Führer and eventually resigned his post, citing illness caused by the great stress of command.
From that point, the relationship between Hitler and Himmler was broken. Outwardly, Himmler remained as loyal as ever, but he decided to try once more to make peace secretly behind Hitler’s back. However, sometime in January, while Himmler was struggling at Army Group Vistula, a conspiracy began to brew in the upper echelons of the SS. The goal was to make Himmler Führer.
It started with various characters carefully sounding one another out, sharing their dissatisfaction with how the war was being fought and with Hitler’s evident incompetence as a leader. Four SS generals in particular were named after the war as active plotters from January 1945 right up to the German surrender in May, with things reaching a head in April as the Battle of Berlin began. All four men held the same rank, SS Obergruppenführer, lieutenant general. The first was Felix Steiner, commander since the twenty-eighth of January of the Eleventh SS Panzer Army, part of Himmler’s Army Group Vistula.
The second was Richard Hildebrandt, Himmler’s chief liaison officer to the commander in chief of Army Group Center, and from April 1945, Higher SS and Police Leader of Bohemia and Moravia. The third was Curt von Gottberg, deputy commander to Himmler in his post as commander of the Replacement Army inside Germany. The fourth was Otto Ohlendorf, chief of Department Three of the Reich Main Security Office in Berlin. Ohlendorf had once commanded one of the Einsatzgruppen mass murder units in the Soviet Union.
By 1943, he was a top SS economics advisor. Deeply involved in this coup plotting stood SS Brigadeführer Walter Schellenberg, head of SS foreign intelligence until the war’s end, who stood beside Himmler throughout his secret peace negotiations with the Allies. There were others as well, some of whom came to light later. As the war dragged into 1945 with no sign of the promised victory, dissolution grew in the highest ranks of the SS and the army.
Martin Bormann, Hitler’s powerful secretary and gatekeeper, was identified by the SS as someone who needed to be removed. Bormann was encroaching on SS power over the security police and the Gestapo, treading directly on the toes of SS Obergruppenführer Dr. Ernst Kaltenbrunner, the feared Austrian head of the Reich Main Security Office. It was no secret that Bormann disliked Himmler and sought to undermine him at every opportunity.
Ohlendorf told his interrogator on the twenty-seventh of October 1945 that he had become aware of Steiner’s discussions with other plotters about the possible reorganization of the government as early as January 1945. But Steiner and the others knew they could not act without Himmler, and Steiner worried whether the hesitant Himmler would ever move. Ohlendorf believed Kaltenbrunner would not support a coup to place his boss Himmler in Hitler’s place, as Kaltenbrunner had found himself increasingly in Hitler’s favor, despite his conflict with Bormann, and seemed interested only in advancing his own career. Meanwhile, Himmler, through Schellenberg, had opened a fresh round of communications with the West via Count Folke Bernadotte of the Swedish Red Cross and former Swiss President Musy.
Himmler would ultimately use Jews from his concentration camp system as diplomatic pawns at war’s end, negotiating the release of certain groups in return for access to high Allied officials, even selling Jews to American Jewish groups through Switzerland. An examination of Himmler’s calendar for 1945 shows several private meetings with Felix Steiner, though they may have been connected only with military affairs regarding Army Group Vistula. These meetings occurred on the twenty-fourth of January and the first of February. Himmler’s machinations behind the Führer’s back had started a rumor that he was to be Hitler’s replacement.
Dr. Joseph Goebbels, the propaganda minister, noted in his diary on the seventeenth of March 1945 news coverage from Sweden. He wrote: “The really grotesque feature of this news coverage is that Himmler, not the Führer, is presented as the guarantor of peace for Germany. A powerful German clique is said to have offered the Führer’s head as a surety.
Not a word of this is true, of course. All this has been cooked up by the British themselves. ”
It was not just rumblings from the SS that threatened Hitler, but once again from the army. Colonel General Heinz Guderian, acting chief of the general staff of the army high command and Hitler’s advisor on the Eastern Front, confronted Himmler twice over two days in March 1945.
On the twentieth of March, Guderian had sounded out top Nazi leaders concerning making peace with the West. Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Foreign Minister, was evasive, stating that he was loyal to Hitler. Guderian approached Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz, commander of the Navy, without success. Finally, he spoke to Himmler, asking him to act as a mediator between Guderian and Hitler to get the Führer to see sense.
Himmler told Guderian that it was too early for such a step, that his instincts made him feel the war would go well yet. The following day, Guderian met Hitler in the bunker in Berlin and afterward walked privately with Himmler in the Reich Chancellery Garden. Guderian said: “I told him bluntly what he had always known for a long time. The war cannot be won.
The only problem now is how quickly to put an end to the senseless slaughter and bombing. Apart from Ribbentrop, you are the only man who still possesses contacts in neutral nations. I must ask you to use your contacts and to go with me to Hitler and urge him to agree to an armistice. ”
Himmler replied: “My dear Colonel General, it is still too early for that.
”
Guderian refused to back down. He said: “I don’t understand you. It is not now five minutes to twelve, but five minutes past twelve. If we don’t negotiate now, we shall never be able to do so at all.
Don’t you realize how pitiful our situation has become? ”
For ten more minutes, Guderian tried to get Himmler to act, but he would not. Guderian concluded there was nothing to be done with the man. He was afraid of Hitler.
Two days later, Himmler told Colonel General Gotthard Heinrici, who had replaced him as commander-in-chief at Army Group Vistula, that he had taken steps through a neutral country to begin peace feelers with the West. This was completely true, yet he had not divulged any of it to Guderian. On the twenty-eighth of March 1945, a top secret Special Operations Executive report landed in London from a Danish agent. It spoke of Himmler having initiated not one but three peace feelers via Sweden, Switzerland, and the Vatican.
The report noted: “Himmler has hinted that the demand for the deposition of Hitler was not an obstacle to an understanding, even on the basis of capitulation, but Himmler to remain, at all events, for a time, on the grounds that Himmler represents the German nation and can prevent chaos on capitulation. ”
The same day, Winston Churchill’s daily briefing included a decoded cable from the Chinese diplomatic mission, passed through Bletchley Park, which read: “I hear that the Führer is still adamant on severe measures,” a reference to the executions of deserters and defeatists and Jews, “but that Himmler has suddenly begun to advocate leniency, hoping to placate the United Nations. The conflict of opinion between the two is intense. ”
The SS conspirators believed Hitler’s increasing ill health and frailty were cause for his removal from power, not to mention his mental state.
Schellenberg reported to Count Bernadotte that Hitler had Parkinson’s disease. On the thirteenth of April 1945, Schellenberg met with Himmler and the head of Nazi public health, Leonardo Conti. Afterward, Himmler and Schellenberg walked alone in the forest at Himmler’s Wustrow headquarters. Himmler said: “Schellenberg, I don’t think we can let the Führer go on any longer.
” He asked whether Schellenberg’s medical experts were sure of their private diagnosis of Hitler’s Parkinson’s. Schellenberg replied: “Yes, it is true that it has been two or three years since I met Hitler, but from what I can judge of his behavior in recent times, I am convinced that it is high time for you to act. ”
But this was the problem. Himmler seemed incapable of taking that step, as Guderian and others had found.
Schellenberg wrote of Himmler: “It was clear that a breach between him and Hitler had commenced. Over and over, he asked me what he could do. ”
That very same day in Berlin, Armaments Minister Albert Speer had an early afternoon meeting with the head of the V-weapons program, SS Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler. Usually a very confident man, Kammler was noticeably downcast.
Bluntly, he told Speer that he was part of, or at least had knowledge of, a plot within the SS, that efforts were being made to get rid of the Führer. Even more incredibly, Kammler told Speer he was prepared to hand over all files concerning Germany’s jet aircraft and V-weapons to the Americans in return for immunity from prosecution and freedom. He then invited Speer to join him. That same day in London, Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, the First Sea Lord, met with Winston Churchill.
He recorded the exchange in his diary: “During our interview, the PM mentioned that Himmler appeared to be trying to show that he wasn’t so bad as painted. And the PM said that if it would save further expenditure of life, he would be prepared to spare even Himmler. ”
This is a rather extraordinary admission by Churchill, recognizing that the Reichsführer SS was holding the fate of Germany at this time, not Hitler. The British were secretly negotiating with Himmler through Sweden.
By sparing Himmler, was Churchill suggesting some kind of immunity deal in return for Himmler getting Germany to capitulate to the Western Allies? It certainly seems so. Cunningham replied: “I suggested there were plenty of islands he could be sent to. ”
Schellenberg’s plan advanced further on the nineteenth of April, the day before Hitler’s last birthday, when he organized a meeting between Himmler and Nazi Finance Minister Count von Krosigk at Himmler’s Berlin office.
Nazi Labor Minister Franz Seldte also met separately with von Krosigk. While Himmler and von Krosigk had a private discussion, Schellenberg spoke to Seldte. The Finance Minister was incredibly blunt. He felt that Himmler should seize power himself and force Hitler to read a proclamation to the German people on his birthday, announcing a plebiscite, the formation of a second party, and the abolition of the People’s Courts, the kangaroo courts set up following the July plot.
Seldte spoke on these matters to Schellenberg for two hours, then met Himmler and repeated what he had said. He told Himmler that he must act, that only he had any possible means of influencing the Führer, that this was no longer about individuals but the substance of the entire German people at stake. Even more bizarre was Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring’s last meeting with Himmler on the twenty-first of April 1945 in shattered Berlin, now under direct Soviet ground attack since the previous day. Göring had been Hitler’s legal successor since 1941.
Himmler told Göring that Count Bernadotte had come to see him at his headquarters at Hohenlychen, and that he believed Bernadotte to be a negotiator sent by General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Allied Supreme Commander. Göring replied: “I can’t believe that. Don’t take offense, but I doubt whether they will accept you as a negotiator.
”
Himmler replied airily: “Sorry to contradict you, but I have undeniable proof that I am considered abroad to be the only person who can maintain peace and order. ”
Göring would recall that Himmler kept returning to the same subject at least ten times over the two-to-three-hour meeting: the succession following Hitler’s death. Himmler asked variations of what might happen if Göring could not succeed Hitler. Eventually, Himmler asked Göring to nominate him as his Chancellor upon becoming Hitler’s successor, which Göring said he could not legally do.
Himmler then said: “If anything should prevent you from becoming the successor, can I have the job then? ”
To my mind, this bizarre exchange indicates that Himmler was seeking a legal path to ultimate power by plotting to prevent Göring from succeeding, but beforehand being legally named as his successor. This was instead of mounting some kind of military coup by the SS to place him into power, perhaps limiting the chances of civil war breaking out. Göring certainly had plenty of time to ruminate on this strange conversation, for two days later he was arrested by the SS on Hitler’s orders, via Bormann, on the charge of attempting to take power while Hitler was still alive.
Göring had not actually attempted anything of the sort, but his enemy Bormann was happy to connive his downfall. Göring appealed to Himmler to order the SS guards standing over him at his Obersalzberg home to release him, but Himmler said his detention had been ordered by the Führer, that it must all be a mistake, and told him to sit tight. Presumably, Himmler believed Hitler was about to name him as his new legal successor. As it turned out, he wasn’t.
Through these confused days, as Hitler sought to control the battle for Berlin from his bunker beneath the Reich Chancellery Garden, the SS plotters continued to hasten his end. On the twenty-second of April, General Steiner categorically refused to make an attack with his forces to relieve Berlin despite repeated orders from the Führer. He cited lack of proper troops and armor, but in reality, he had no reason to see Hitler survive. He was, after all, a plotter with Ohlendorf, Hildebrandt, and von Gottberg, wanting Himmler to take over.
Letting the Soviets finish off Hitler in Berlin would lead to such an outcome. We also see reluctance by Himmler to aid the Führer in his hour of greatest need. That same day, Himmler was at his Hohenlychen headquarters with his escort battalion of six hundred well-equipped SS troops. Obergruppenführer Gottlob Berger, a Hitler loyalist, arrived and was aghast that Himmler hadn’t marched to the sound of the guns in Berlin.
Himmler seemed unsure what to do and asked Berger for advice. Berger didn’t mince his words: “You go straight to Berlin, Herr Reichsführer, and your escort battalion, of course, right with you. You haven’t the right to keep an escort battalion here at a time when the Führer intends to remain in Berlin and defend the Reich Chancellery. I am going to Berlin, and it is your duty to do likewise.
”
Himmler then telephoned his liaison officer at the bunker, Gruppenführer Hermann Fegelein, but Berger lost his cool. “What kind of Reichsführer are you? ” he shouted. “Why don’t you speak to the Führer in person?
” Which is what Himmler then did, Hitler allowing Himmler to bring himself and his battalion to the city. On the twenty-third of April, Himmler and Berger went to the Führerbunker. Berger alleges that Himmler had a long private meeting with Hitler. Himmler said he tried to get Hitler to leave Berlin, but he refused, saying he would die in the capital.
Himmler then returned to Hohenlychen, leaving his escort battalion behind to stiffen the defenses of the government quarter. That same day, Schellenberg met again with Count Bernadotte, this time at the Swedish Consulate in Flensburg in northern Germany. Schellenberg told Bernadotte that Hitler was finished, that he would not live more than a couple of days. Schellenberg said Himmler had decided to bring about a meeting with General Eisenhower to inform him he was willing to give orders to the German forces in the west to capitulate.
He asked Bernadotte to take this message to Eisenhower. Remember, this is the same day Göring was arrested and removed from the succession. Hitler was still alive, but he had not yet named his successor. It appeared Himmler was next by right of seniority and power.
It seemed the logical choice, certainly to the SS leadership. On the twenty-fourth of April, Sir Victor Mallet, British Ambassador to Sweden, telegraphed London: “Himmler, though tired and admitting Germany was finished, is still calm and coherent. Himmler said that Hitler was desperately ill, that he might be dead already, and in any case would be so in two days’ time. Schellenberg of Himmler’s staff told Bernadotte that it was a hemorrhage of the brain.
Himmler stated that while Hitler was still alive, he would not have been able to take the step he now proposed. But as Hitler was finished, he was now in a position of full authority to act. ” Himmler wanted to meet Eisenhower to capitulate the whole Western Front. He hoped to continue fighting on the Eastern Front, at least for a time.
Bernadotte told him that was not acceptable to the Allies. Earlier that day, Albert Speer had visited Himmler at his headquarters. He found Himmler drawing up a plan for his future governance. Himmler said: “Europe cannot manage without me in the future.
You will go on needing me as Minister of Police. After I’ve spent an hour with Eisenhower, he’ll approve that fact. They’ll soon realize that they’re dependent on me, or they’ll have hopeless chaos on their hands. ”
Himmler told Speer that he and Göring had a long-standing agreement that Himmler would be his premier, which we know to be a lie.
He said he was in the process of organizing his cabinet, that many people had come to see him, including Grand Admiral Dönitz, the new military commander in the north. He invited Speer to join his cabinet. Speer left and overheard the arrival of Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel from Berlin, Hitler’s head of the armed forces. Speer recalled Keitel swearing his complete loyalty to the Reichsführer SS, which must have further convinced Himmler he was about to be named Hitler’s successor.
But then, on the twenty-seventh of April, the British deliberately leaked details of Himmler’s secret peace negotiations with the Western Allies. By the following day, the German people knew of them. The British did this to preserve Allied unity, to keep the Soviet Union happy, as a separate peace between Germany and Britain and America would never have been acceptable to Stalin. The other reason was to further destabilize the Nazi regime.
Churchill had effectively led Himmler up the garden path, and now slammed the door in his face, leaving him hanging in the wind and exposed, despite Churchill’s earlier ambiguous comments about striking a deal with him to end the war. Himmler’s downfall seemed assured. It would have been dangerous to have Himmler in charge of Germany. He may have proven a more competent leader than the ailing Hitler at this stage of the war.
Martin Bormann finally managed to bring down his number one opponent by presenting Himmler’s actions to Hitler as barefaced treason. On the twenty-eighth of April, Himmler was officially stripped of all his offices of state and completely disgraced. However, the SS actually continued to follow his orders. Who would now succeed Hitler?
There didn’t appear to be a good candidate except for the Reichsführer. Perhaps Hitler might still see sense and pass the baton to him. General Ohlendorf saw Himmler shortly after and wrote: “He was no longer the same man. He asked me the queerest questions and made the most absurd proposals and plans.
I could no longer understand him. He seemed to have lost his self-confidence, his aim, and ambition. ”
At this point, Himmler considered death in battle. On the thirtieth of April, he and his headquarters moved to Schloss Kalkhorst, not far from Grand Admiral Dönitz’s headquarters at Plön.
Later that day, Himmler summoned Dönitz to a meeting at the police barracks in Lübeck. The building was absolutely full of senior SS leaders. Himmler kept the Grand Admiral waiting. Dönitz wrote: “He seemed to regard himself as head of state.
I asked him whether the report was true that he had sought contact with the Allies through the medium of Count Bernadotte. He asserted that it was not true, and that in his opinion, it was essential in these last days of the war that discord among ourselves shall not be allowed to create further chaos in the country. We parted amicably. ”
Then the hammer fell.
At 18:07 hours, Bormann sent a message from the Führerbunker. The Führer was dead. He had named his new successor as Reich President: Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. Later that evening, Dönitz telephoned Himmler and asked him to come to Plön.
He arrived about midnight, escorted by six heavily armed SS officers. Dönitz handed him Bormann’s telegram, saying, “Please read this. ”
Dönitz recalled the effect. As Himmler read, an expression of astonishment, indeed of consternation, spread over his face.
All hope seemed to collapse within him. He went very pale. Finally, he stood up and bowed. “Allow me to become the second man in your state,” he said.
Dönitz replied that it was impossible. Himmler left at one in the morning on the first of May 1945. His machinations were apparently at an end. According to General Ohlendorf, who was with him at his headquarters at the time, after Hitler bestowed his mantle upon the Grand Admiral, Himmler changed his plans.
He did not attempt to assert his claim to the succession of the Nazi Führership but placed himself unreservedly at Dönitz’s disposal. Himmler, however, wasn’t quite done. In the days following Dönitz’s promotion, and Himmler’s flight south, he continued to search for a role for himself.
It would take his eventual capture and death in British custody, just twenty-two days later, to finally end his ambitions.
