EXCLUSIVE: Obituary for Adolf Hitler (May 2, 1945): The mutual suicide of twice-elected German Chancellor-President Adolf Hitler and his wife, Eva, took place at 3:30 pm on April 30, 1945.

The following obituary or memorial tribute appeared in the Hamburger Zeitung on May 2, the day before the city fell to the combined armies of three collaborating empires.

It reflects the sombre, respectful attitude of heroic stoicism with which the German population received the news of the Führer’s death.

Source: Farewell to Hitler by Hermann Okrass

He (Adolf Hitler) once said: ‘I wish nothing on my gravestone other than my name.’

Even his name will probably not stand over his grave, for we know that he must have perished while fighting bitterly in the Reich Chancellery.

We know that the enemy will be able to find a body in the ruins caused by countless artillery shells and countless flame throwers, and that they may say that it is the Führer’s body, but we will not believe it.

If the enemy says that, we will not believe it. That his body is dead, we believe, what is mortal of him has perished, has passed away, but he has fulfilled his most beautiful oath, this affirmation:

‘The most valuable thing God has given me in this world is my people. My faith rests on it, I serve it with my will, and I give my life to it.’ His life is fulfilled. He began by fighting for his people, and he ended that way. A life of battle.

Now the world will attempt to explain him. Books will be written about him, some praising, others cursing him. People will criticize him; people will pray for him.

A great one has left this world, and where a strong, bright light is extinguished, creatures suddenly appear in the twilight that had been hidden from the bright light.

That is all foreign to us, far from our way of thinking. For this we affirm: We swore an oath to this man and his teachings, we pledged ourselves to him during our people’s dark days, we rose with him to the heights to which he led our people in the brief, beautiful years of peace, and like all good Germans, we stood by him in battle.

The world should not appear small and shabby to us because the victors can rejoice. We can confidently leave his judgment to world history. We today cannot decide it.

But will posterity be able to understand him fully? It is hard for contemporaries to pass judgment on someone of their own era, particularly if it is one as unique as Adolf Hitler.

Future generations see the great from a distance, reads his words, reads our words, but it cannot understand the world of our day in all of is breadth.

One can only hope that they believe the great words of the great man. ‘One could give me whole parts of the earth, but I would rather remain the poorest citizen of this state.’

‘I am not so crazy as to want war.’ ‘I was a worker in my youth, and have remained one in my inmost being.’

‘We are not fighting for theories, nor for dogmas. It makes no difference whether or not we live. The only important thing is that our people live!’

How will these words sound to posterity? Will they be able to understand why a whole people, amid its deepest poverty, affirmed this man?

We may only hope so, for we know that world history will then truly understand this man, his teachings, and our age.

We see that more clearly today than ever before; we see it proven by the immeasurably hard battle that our people have withstood so bravely.

We see it in the silent unspoken loyalty of the poorest sons of our people that Adolf Hitler gathered as a lens that focuses all light on a single point; the most beautiful virtues, the most fervent desires, the noblest longings, the beautiful will of our people, the longing for the Reich, the drive for social justice, the will for freedom, for clear leadership, our people saw that all united in Adolf Hitler and his idea.

That many small minds darkened the image of his clear will, that traitors and bad counsellors deserted and betrayed him, that finally he was overcome by a great superiority of steel and money, that cannot change the image of him that is in the deepest heart of our people.

The present hour may perhaps dim that image, the enormous sacrifices, the sorrow and misery, may distort it, but when one day the senses clear, when thoughts are once again free, he will appear once more even to the last people’s comrade as he did in days in which the whole nation joyfully affirmed him.

The man is dead. He fell fighting. He remained loyal to himself. He wanted the best for his people, which is why it loved him so much.

We know that he will continue to live in our land not as a war hero in the form of a metal statue, but rather as a child of the people whose pure will the people understood, and whose most beautiful words will remain a memorial for us, his words that in a people’s deepest need, one must love his people more than himself.

NOTE: Background: By the end of the war, German newspapers were reduced to single sheets.

This is the commentary on Hitler’s death by a Hamburg newspaper, dated Wednesday, 2 May 1945. The rest of the issue includes grim military news (Allied forces were nearing Hamburg), a surprising bit of sports news (including an upcoming table tennis match), and many brief death notices. I here translate three items dealing with Hitler’s death.

Herman Okraß, the author of the first article, an obituary for Hitler, was an early National Socialist who had written a book on the early years of the movement. He was the paper’s editor.

After the war, he was sentenced to a prison term, but was released due to time already served. The second item is an appeal to keep fighting from Hamburg’s Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann. The third item is on world press reaction to the approaching end of the war. The source: Hermann Okraß, ‘Abschied von Hitler,’ Hamburger Zeitung, 2 May 1945, p. 1. TELL US WHAT YOU THINK

PLEASE SHARE OUR PUBLIC INFORMATION STORIES

Mike Walsh books

in English and German

https://derschelm.com/andere-buecher/buecher-von-michael-walsh