Hitler's Heroine: Hanna Reitsch (9 page)

Udet had loved the war for the very simple reason that it had enabled him to fly to his heart’s content. Yes, there was always the risk of being shot down, dying in a blazing ball of flames, a fate many pilots dreaded to the point of nightmares, but if you could avoid being morbid there were endless opportunities to fly. After the war Udet crashed back to reality. He drifted from job to job; he had no acumen for business and spent the 1920s and 1930s barnstorming to thrill crowds or acting as a stuntman in Hollywood. He was as uninterested in politics as ever, though on his return to Germany in 1933 his old flying pal Göring persuaded him to join the Nazi Party. In 1935, also under the subtle influence of Göring, Udet joined the Luftwaffe as an oberst and within a year was Inspector of Fighter and Divebomber Forces. It was a new world for Udet, but, at least for the time being, he didn’t mind his role, nor the steady income he could now enjoy. Not to mention the people he could meet, such as Hanna Reitsch. It was certainly better than drifting from place to place barnstorming.

Udet experienced his first problems in 1936. The inspector role had suited him perfectly as it involved little more than flying and reporting. Unfortunately, he proved too good at the role and it was decided that he deserved promotion. Udet stumbled into the job of Head of the Technical Office. He was now responsible for supply and procurement for the emerging Luftwaffe; significantly, he was responsible for promoting which aircraft would be produced and the level of manufacture required. This went beyond just knowing that a plane was a good flyer: he had to consider cost of production, level of skill required to build and fly it, available resources and, of course, the timescale of manufacture. Tied up with all the practical considerations was the heckling of politicians, who all had their own thoughts of what aircraft the Luftwaffe should have. Udet was not good at politics and though his technical decisions were good (he promoted the Stuka dive-bomber and Messerschmitt Bf 109), the negotiations and paperwork his new role required, not to mention the diplomacy, were somewhat beyond him. Garmisch was good publicity for gliding and for Udet it was a chance to cast off the shackles of office work. Both he and Hanna had a naïve sense of honour that made them incredulous of the extremes of Nazism. In those wintry days of 1936 Udet had hope and he flew with relish.

In the summer preparations for the big games began in Berlin. The Olympic bell was ceremonially paraded down the grand avenue before the Brandenburg Gate then on to Unter den Linden; months later another parade down the same avenue would mark the opening of the games. Booted soldiers marched between buildings slung with swastika flags and loudspeakers that would proclaim every exciting minute of the games. Visitors were fewer in number than expected and an atmosphere of controversy cast a shadow over the Olympics.

Hanna performed her flying stunts once again and was watched by a British schoolboy named Eric Brown. Brown’s father had been invited specifically by Udet because he had served as a fighter pilot in the First World War. Eric was fascinated by the flying aerobatics that were performed over the stadiums, not just by German flyers (though they got all the coverage in the German papers), but by aviators from Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Switzerland and Austria. He was particularly enthralled by Hanna, to whom he was introduced. He fell somewhat in love with this charming aviatrix who would later dash his dreams by staying loyal to Hitler.

If the 1936 Olympics were marred by the reek of racism and anti-Semitism, the taint did not extend to Hanna. Fiercely patriotic she may have been, but she never discriminated against others because of their race or colour. One of her closest friends remained Joachim Küttner, even after he was penalised for the misfortune of having Jewish heritage. Hanna never quite understood anti-Semitism, it didn’t fit into her cosy image of how the world should be, but she did understand discrimination for it happened to her all the time. At the 1936 Rhön soaring contest Hanna discovered that women had been banned from competing. Fired up like a furious Valkyrie, Hanna set about reversing the decision, enlisting the help of Udet. Ultimately she was granted permission to compete, but it reminded her that the world of flying was a male realm where women were not welcome.

A growing sense of militarisation was also impeding German women, not to mention fuelling tensions concerning Germany’s future plans. At Darmstadt, in between Olympic demonstrations, Hanna was testing out a new safety invention – dive brakes. Ostensibly, they were intended to reduce deaths caused by inexperienced glider pilots diving too harshly and exceeding the limitations of their machines. In reality, these brakes would prove invaluable on the new range of military aircraft being churned out by factories across Germany. Any doubt concerning this must have been dispelled when Udet visited Darmstadt to watch a test, accompanied by his colleague Ritter von Greim.

Von Greim would become an integral part of Hanna’s story years later. Born in 1892 in Bavaria, he had served as a leutnant in the early stages of the First World War before transferring to the German Air Service. Von Greim claimed his first aerial victory in 1915, shooting down a Farman while acting as an artillery observer. Two years later von Greim was a pilot flying with Jagdstaffel 34 and scoring his first victory in this capacity on the same day he was awarded the Iron Cross. Von Greim went on to command Jasta 34 and earned his name as a First World War ace in August 1917 with the shooting down of a Sopwith 1½ Strutter (a two-seater biplane with a synchronised machine gun). Von Greim finished the war with twenty-eight confirmed kills; he had served as the commanding officer of Jagdgruppe 10 and 9, had made the first successful aerial assault on armoured tanks and had been awarded the Pour le Mérite and the Bavarian Military Order of Max Joseph. The latter had conferred on him the title Knight – Ritter in German.

Post-war, von Greim found there was no place for him within the remnants of the German army, so he moved on to a career in law, passing the difficult and rigorous German law exams. Flying was his passion, however, and when he was invited to teach in China and to help create a Chinese Air Force he emigrated with his family to Canton. Teaching the Chinese did not rest easily with von Greim. He was already an ardent believer in the superiority of Europeans over Asians and held the view that his Chinese students were incapable of operating aircraft with the finesse required. Von Greim returned to Germany, where National Socialism was on the rise. The Nazi creed and Hitler’s oratory appealed to von Greim, who became an ardent supporter and took part in the 1923 putsch when Hitler and other revolutionaries attempted unsuccessfully to seize power in Munich.

A devoted Nazi, von Greim was the ideal choice for Göring when he was trying to rebuild the German Air Force in 1933. Von Greim was appointed to command the first fighter pilot school that was not to operate in secret in 1934, and over the next decade would rise to become a field marshal. When Hanna met him in 1936 he was still training fighter pilots, and little did he know how their lives would intertwine.

For her work on testing the dive brakes, a dangerous task at the best of times as Hanna had to attempt deliberately to stall and crash her glider, she was a awarded her first and only title, Flugkapitän Reitsch. She was one of a few women to be awarded the honorary title and all Hanna could do was beam at Udet and everyone watching. Life in Germany seemed very good at that moment.

5

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It seemed to Hanna that 1937 was a year of promise. In March she returned to Hirschberg for her sister Heidi’s wedding. She had not been home much over the years and this too was to be a fleeting visit. Hirschberg seemed slightly more sombre, slightly less welcoming. Anti-Semitism had swept through Silesia and there was a strange atmosphere hovering over everyone. Nazi propaganda was rife, Jewish shops and faces were not. Hanna brushed it off as she always did; politics was politics and she couldn’t be troubled with it. Instead she settled in to enjoy the wedding, talking almost non-stop about her new title and mildly annoying her family. Emy looked on, worried that Hanna was being carried away by her successes; she was always anxious for her eldest daughter, fearing her pride and boastfulness would land her in trouble one day.

Hanna moved on to a new challenge: becoming one of the first ever pilots to cross the Alps. The challenge was being held under the auspices of the International Study Commission for Motorless Flight, its chairman none other than Professor Georgii himself. Hans Jacobs had built a tailor-made Sperber Junior for Hanna. The cockpit was so small that no one but Hanna could squeeze in. She was one of five Germans who made the triumphant flight into fame over the Alps. Hanna landed in Italy, over 100 miles from her starting point.

In July she was back at Wasserkuppe. This time she was not the only woman present: an Austrian named Emmy von Roretz was also flying and was worthy of an honourable mention in
The
Times
. Hanna, however, made the big news. Both she and Heini Dittmar flew their planes 220 miles to Hamburg, not only enabling them to share the prize for the longest straight glide, but creating a new women’s record. In August Hanna found herself in England, a strange thing considering that the tensions between Germany and Great Britain were growing by the day. Under the guidance of the Anglo-German Fellowship, a society trying to promote harmony between the two nations, Wolf Hirth, Hanna and another female pilot, Eva Schmidt, were invited to attend a gliding camp in Dunstable as guests of honour. Gliding in Britain was still fairly new but, as one journalist reported, ‘the Germans may find … that although there are few British soaring pilots of outstanding merit, the system has created a big pool of pilots of average ability.’ No doubt the Luftwaffe would be taking note, especially as one of their test pilots was attending the camp – Hanna had been flying at the research centre at Rechlin for the benefit of the Luftwaffe for several months. Though technically on loan from Darmstadt, she would spend most of 1937 at Rechlin.

Not everyone was happy to see Germans in Dunstable. Local papers roundly criticised the move, though the national papers were more sympathetic. Gliding enthusiasts seem to have a natural ability to mentally soar above such mundane things as politics, and the glider students and instructors saw no reason to exclude their German friends. Hanna arrived at Croydon on 27 August and was attending the British National Soaring Contest on the 29th. She warranted a small mention in the press as one of the three German glider pilots visiting England.

As Germany ramped itself up for war, Hanna found herself travelling all over the place, completely oblivious to the fact that gliding was being used as a friendly but false goodwill message by the Third Reich. That same summer she went to Zurich for a gliding demonstration. Udet went with the pilots, finding himself placed in an awkward role as unofficial ambassador for German aviation. He was growing increasingly concerned about the actions of the Nazi regime, particularly those of his superior, Göring. While in Zurich he obtained a Swiss pamphlet decrying Nazism and showed it to a number of glider pilots, including Heini Dittmar’s brother Edgar:

It described events quite differently from the way they were presented in Germany, where propaganda had been given out which everyone was meant to believe … in the document Udet showed us we saw everything, not as it had been presented to us and as we were meant to believe it, but as it really was. It was dangerous – if one of us glider pilots had said a word in Germany, it would have cost Udet his head.

Udet had told Edgar there would soon be war. ‘Of course, I didn’t believe in the seriousness of the situation, but the rest of the world saw it differently.’

Hanna was not immune to the changing tides of German fortunes. Udet refrained from exploding her beliefs as he did the others’: Hanna was rather too likely to march up to Hitler and confront him on the matter – or at least one of his subordinates – to make this safe. But she knew trouble was brewing. Joachim Küttner was feeling the effects of anti-Semitism. Peter Riedel had gone to America with no intention of returning home (though he would later gather intelligence for Germany), and Hanna and Heini Dittmar were testing more and more military planes – not the sort of thing you expect from a country constantly spouting about peace. Hanna flicked this to the back of her mind, as she had done so often before, to take advantage of a new opportunity. Professor Focke of Bremen had been working on a helicopter, and after years of research had created the first viable model. For years people had explored this incredible idea of a plane that could hover, but no one had as yet succeeded in producing a real one. Focke’s design had the potential to be revolutionary, but it needed testing and Focke asked for Karl Franke, chief test pilot at Rechlin, to try out his helicopter.

Franke found Hanna test flying dive brakes on the airfield and asked her if she would care to fly him there in her favourite plane, a Dornier 17. When they arrived at Bremen, where the helicopter was waiting, Professor Focke rushed to meet them. Smiling in astonishment, he declared, ‘Oh, it is wonderful that Hanna Reitsch also comes to test the helicopter!’ Hanna glanced at Franke, whose eyes were twinkling as he tried to conceal his own smile. ‘Thank you, thank you,’ Hanna whispered silently to herself. It was as though a dream had come true.

Hanna took time to study the technical drawings and instructions for flying the helicopter. It was quickly apparent she would have to disregard much of what she knew about flying, the helicopter was such a unique and unusual concept. For safety reasons the helicopter was normally anchored to the ground during testing. Hanna was having none of that; she asked that the anchor be removed and the helicopter set in a white painted circle. Perhaps because of her reputation, her requests were agreed to. In any case, Hanna soon found herself in the open cockpit of the helicopter.