Hitler's Hangman (23 page)

summer of 1934. More than a year after Hitler’s ascent to power, the severe

economic crisis that had shaken Germany since the autumn of 1929 and

enabled Hitler’s rise was far from over. Only one-third of the

6 mil ion people unemployed in late 1932 had found work since the Nazis

had taken over the government and, gradual y, the initial enthusiasm that

had fired much of the population in January 1933 gave way to disil usion-

ment. Against this backdrop, the SA, with its populist and anti-capitalist

promise of a ‘second revolution’, represented a dangerous source of potential

political unrest. Having broken the power of the left and intimidated the

liberals into submission, the SA leadership also wanted to sweep aside those

conservative al ies – including businessmen, industrialists and bankers –

who had made Hitler’s ascent to power possible in the first place.109

Most ominously, Röhm challenged the leading role of the Reichswehr

in national defence. Hitler feared a civil war and in February 1934 rejected

the SA’s demands, which only exacerbated the smouldering conflict. In

early 1934 the SA’s opponents – the party, the Gestapo and the Reichswehr

– began to prepare for decisive action. From early on the SS – with a

membership of around 200,000 men in the spring of 1934 – had posi-

tioned itself as Hitler’s loyal executive arm for a potential strike against the

rebellious and much larger SA. After taking over the Gestapo in April,

Heydrich intensified his search for incriminating material against the SA

leadership. In May his Gestapo and the military intelligence department

in the Reichswehr ministry began exchanging material on the SA. From

mid-June the SS and SD were put on high alert.110

At about the same time, Hitler’s position was also challenged by his

conservative coalition partners. On 17 June, Vice Chancellor Franz von

Papen provoked a government crisis by delivering a widely circulated

speech at the University of Marburg, in which he heavily criticized the

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Nazis’ arbitrary regime of terror, threatening the future of Hitler’s govern-

ment by suggesting that he would offer his resignation to President von

Hindenburg. This would have ended the coalition government appointed

by Hindenburg on 30 January 1933, leading to Hitler’s dismissal as chan-

cellor. Hitler was alarmed, knowing that in the summer of 1934 the Nazi

regime was by no means so firmly established as to survive an open

confrontation with Hindenburg and the military.111

Hitler solved the crisis by taking decisive action against the SA. He

calculated that by eliminating the SA leadership he could resolve the

tangle of his domestic political problems with a single blow. The threat of

a second revolution would be off the table, the majority of the population

would greet the elimination of the unruly SA with a sigh of relief and the

government alliance between National Socialists and conservatives would

emerge stronger than ever before.112

Heydrich’s impact on Hitler’s decision remains the subject of consider-

able controversy. According to the post-war testimony of senior SS officers,

Heydrich initiated a conscious conspiracy to destroy the SA leadership by

fabricating evidence of an imminent SA coup. Others have argued that

most of the incriminating evidence against the SA leadership was provided

by the army and that the SS played the role of executor rather than insti-

gator. Since most of the documents relating to the Night of the Long

Knives were destroyed after 30 June 1934, the truth is difficult to ascertain.

What is clear is that Heydrich turned on the SA not only for reasons of

career advancement, as has often been al eged, but also because he and

Himmler perceived the SA as a real threat to domestic stability. They firmly

believed that factionalism made Germany vulnerable to enemy attacks.113

In late June 1934, the timing for decisive action against the SA could

not have been more favourable: Röhm had gone on holiday and had sent

the entire SA on summer vacation for the month of July. The SS accord-

ingly commenced its preparations for the elimination of the SA leader-

ship. At the beginning of the month, Dachau commander Eicke secretly

conducted rehearsals for the deployment of SS troops in the Munich area.

On 27 June the district commanders of the SS and leading SD officers

met in Berlin, where Heydrich explained to them ‘that according to

confirmed intelligence reports a revolt of the SA under Röhm is being

planned’. In a fit of anger, Heydrich ranted about ‘Röhm’s connections to

France and the involvement of other forces hostile to the state’ such as ‘the

Communists, who had flowed into the SA in great numbers, and “reac-

tionary circles”. The only forces that can protect the state and the Führer’s

government are the SS and the Reichswehr.’114

Heydrich’s SD provided lists with the names of the SA leaders who

were to be liquidated. While Heydrich co-ordinated the operation from

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Berlin himself, he sent Best and his SD adjutant, Carl Albrecht Oberg, to

Munich in order to oversee a wave of arrests in southern Germany.115 On

30 June, the SA leadership was arrested in Röhm’s Bavarian holiday

retreat, Bad Wiessee. Simultaneous arrests took place in Berlin, Silesia

and elsewhere. Up to 200 people were murdered, among them Röhm

himself and the former Nazi Party organizational leader Gregor Strasser,

who had fallen out with Hitler at the end of 1932. The SS also struck a

blow against the conservative right. Those killed included Papen’s secre-

tary Herbert von Bose, the neo-conservative intellectual Edgar Julius Jung

and Hitler’s predecessor as German chancellor General Kurt von

Schleicher, who was shot with his wife in his home near Berlin. Heydrich

also used the wave of arrests to settle scores with prominent representa-

tives of ‘political Catholicism’, personally ordering the murder of the

leader of the Catholic Action organization, Erich Klausener. The warning

to conservative and Catholic politicians not to stand in the way of the new

rulers was unmistakable.116

The SS – and the SD in particular – emerged as the true victor of the

power struggle between the Nazi Party leadership, the Reichswehr and

the SA that culminated on 30 June in the Night of the Long Knives.

Heydrich’s SD had most likely delivered the material accusing Röhm of

planning a coup in the first place and his Gestapo officers had carried

out most of the murders, proving their unwavering loyalty to the Führer.

In recognition of his achievements, Heydrich was appointed SS-

Gruppenführer
or lieutenant general on 30 June, at the age of thirty.117

Family Troubles

By mid-1934 Heydrich’s professional crisis, triggered by his dismissal from

the navy, was replaced by his rapid ascent in the SS. However, the financial

predicament of his parents continued to cause him grief. After a brief

easing of money problems in the mid-1920s, the Hal e Conservatory’s

finances eroded rapidly. After Bruno Heydrich’s debilitating stroke in

1931, his wife and daughter now ran the family business in Hal e, but they

did not have Bruno’s reputation. In addition, the Great Depression

deprived the Conservatory of both savings and pupils. After a last golden

age in the 1920s, the Depression brought a crash from which institutions

providing classical music education, such as Bruno Heydrich’s Conservatory,

never recovered. Musical education was suddenly a luxury few people

could afford, particularly when the spread of gramophones offered an alter-

native (and much more affordable) form of home entertainment. During

the Depression years, the number of professional musicians and music

teachers declined dramatical y, and the Heydrich Conservatory never

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recovered from the blow. By early 1933, the Conservatory was facing bank-

ruptcy and the family had to move out of its mansion into a rented flat.118

Heydrich’s brother-in-law, Wolfgang Heindorf, informed Reinhard

on 6 November 1933 about his family’s extreme financial difficulties

and enquired whether he was prepared to give them a loan of 5,000

Reichsmarks. Heydrich must have turned down the request, as just a

couple of weeks later Heydrich’s mother asked him personally for at least

a ‘small sum of money’. Heydrich – who had asked his parents for support

only two and a half years earlier – does not appear to have responded to

this letter either. On 23 November his parents contacted him again, this

time with a telex message sent directly to his office. Heydrich’s hand-

written note on the telex’s margins indicate his unwillingness to deal with

the matter, but eventually he sent two postal orders of 50 Reichsmarks

each to his parents – far less than the required 5,000 Reichmarks.119

Less than three weeks later, the money was spent and on 18 December

his sister Maria contacted him again, describing their parents’ financial

position in the bleakest terms. Since Maria and her husband did not have

the financial means to improve the situation and his parents were practi-

cally without income, Heydrich’s support seemed unavoidable if he did

not want his parents to starve to death.120 Maria and her husband also

asked Heydrich for money to subsidize their own existence. In June 1934,

for example, Heydrich received a bill of over 216 Reichsmarks from a

Halle delicatessen store, Pfeiffer & Haase, covering the expenses of the

Heindorfs’ wedding reception. Heydrich was furious and refused to pay.121

In order to gain insight into the complicated ownership structure of the

Dresden Conservatory and to estimate how much money his mother as

co-proprietor could expect in the event of the business’s liquidation,

Heydrich ordered an SD subordinate, the lawyer Dr Herbert Mehlhorn

from Dresden, to advise him on possible legal strategies. Mehlhorn, a

member of the SS since 1932, had entered the SD only in March 1933,

but he had already become deputy head of the Gestapo in Saxony. In the

summer of 1935, presumably thanks to his assistance in resolving

Heydrich’s family matters in Halle and Dresden, he was appointed to a

senior post in the head office of the SD in Berlin.122

Mehlhorn’s response to Heydrich’s request came quickly. On 18

December 1933 he submitted his legal assessment of the situation to

Heydrich’s office. Mehlhorn estimated that, in theory, the share of

Elisabeth Heydrich in the Dresden Conservatory amounted to 36,000

Reichsmarks. In the current economic climate, however, a sale of the

Conservatory was likely to bring in far less, even if her brothers consented

to sel the family business. According to Mehlhorn, her eldest brother had

made a decent proposal, offering to buy her out in three instalments – 5,000

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Reichsmarks immediately, 5,000 RM in five years and a further 2,000 RM

in eight years. He was even prepared to pay interest on the outstanding

debts at a rate of 4 per cent a year. Although the offer did not reflect the

theoretical value of Elisabeth Heydrich’s share in the family business, it

would resolve their pressing financial problems. Much to Mehlhorn’s regret,

the Heydrichs had rejected the offer, insisting instead that their eldest son

give them a loan until the economic situation permitted a sale of the

Dresden Conservatory at a higher value.123

After reading Mehlhorn’s report, Heydrich informed his parents that

his own financial means were insufficient to meet their demands and that

he had asked Himmler for a loan. He pointed out that he had already

provided 700 Reichsmarks towards their living costs over the past two

months – an unsustainable situation given the recent extension of his own

family. In June 1933, Lina had given birth to the Heydrichs’ first child,

Klaus, which meant that Heydrich’s modest salary now had to support a

family of three.124 Heydrich added to the letter a draft contractual agree-

ment between his parents and himself, regulating their respective duties.

According to the agreement, Heydrich offered to pay for the living

costs of his parents – 65 Reichmarks for rent and 50 Reichsmarks for

expenditure – until they had sold their home in Halle and the claims

concerning the Dresden Conservatory had been settled. In return, he

requested that his parents move to Munich and avoid accumulating any

fresh debts. His parents were also to avoid ‘chatter’ in trading and drinking

establishments that might ‘endanger the livelihood of their children’ –

presumably a reference to the fact that both his parents and his sister’s