Who bankrolled Hitler's rise to power?

 

So who bankrolled Hitler’s march to power in 1930s Germany? The answer is – the filthy rich.

In the early 1930s, the Nazis were facing financial ruin, with Goebbels saying their situation was ‘hopeless’. Then in stepped the bosses of two leading industrial companies - arms manufacturer Krupp and I G Farben, which would make the poison gas used in the Nazi gas chambers. They appear to have been impressed by Hitler’s promise to get rid of trade unions and communists.

Together they raised 3 million Deutschmarks (worth about £22 million today) for the Nazis, and by the end of 1933, Hitler was Chancellor and I G Farben alone had donated about 4.5 million DM (c £33 million). Leading figures in both companies would be tried at Nuremburg and convicted of using slave labour among other crimes.

Hitler was quite keen on building up a personal fortune. As early as 1925 he used party funds to buy himself a luxury Mercedes, with a personal chauffeur. He made a lot of money from his book Mein Kampf, helped by Germany’s practice of giving it to newly married couples as a wedding present, but the Fuhrer was not enthusiastic about paying taxes, and quickly got himself declared exempt.

Magdeburg: another claim to fame

Earlier this month, Magdeburg, capital of the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, found itself again at the centre of world attention, as the Far Right AfD emerged as the biggest party in state elections. The city, part of the former East Germany, was the victim of a terrorist attack in 2024, when a 51 year old man from Saudi Arabia, drove his car into crowds at a Christmas market, killing six people. 

But the worst moment in Magdeburg's history came during the Thirty Years War. The population were nearly all Protestants, but in May 1631, after a six month siege, it fell to the army of the Catholic League.   

The League's soldiers wrought havoc. In the words of the great German writer Friedrich Schiller: 'Neither innocent childhood, nor helpless old age; neither youth, sex, rank, nor beauty, could disarm the fury of the conquerors.'  

After burning the city to the ground, the soldiers carried off thousands of women to their camp. One of the generals sent priests to tell their men to do the decent thing, and marry those they had abducted or give them up for a reasonable sum.   

A few of the surviving Magdeburg men were able to scrape together enough to ransom themselves and buy back their women, but those who could not had to march off with the Catholic troops as their servants. Perhaps 20,000 people were killed, and the atrocity caused such horror throughout Europe that victory celebrations were called off.  

As the war dragged on for another 17 years, many a Catholic soldier crying for quarter to his Protestant enemy would be met with the retort "Magdeburg quarter!" and shot down.

The Thirty Years War killed perhaps ten million people across Central Europe. For the full story, see A Disastrous History of the World published by Piatkus Books.

Fireworks: the missing Whistler picture

I went to the James McNeill Whistler exhibition at Tate Britain in London, hoping to see his famous (notorious?) Nocturne in Gold and Black: the Falling Rocket (1875) (above) but it had obviously decided not to make the journey from its home in Detroit.

The picture, showing a firework display at the Cremorne Pleasure Gardens near Whistler's fashionable Chelsea home, became the centre of a celebrated court case. The distinguished critic, John Ruskin, hated it and accused Whistler of 'throwing a pot of paint in the public's face' when he put a price of 200 guineas (£210) on the work. Whistler sued for libel.

Perhaps the most famous exchange came when the painter was asked how long it had taken him to paint the picture, and he replied a couple of days. The Attorney-General was incensed and said; 'The labour of two days is that for which you ask 200 guineas?' Whistler replied: 'No. I ask it for the knowledge I have gained in the work of a lifetime.'

The good news for Whistler was that he won the case. The bad news was that he was awarded the deliberately insulting damages of one farthing (c 0.1p). The legal fees broke him and he had to leave his Chelsea home.

The exhibition does feature another fireworks picture Nocturne: Black and Gold. The Fire Wheel, which is well worth a look. If you want to know more about fireworks in art and the arts, there's a chapter in my book A History of Fireworks from Their Origins to the Present Day (Reaktion Books).

 Another American publication, Stndrds, has interviewed me about fireworks, having spotted my book A History of Fireworks from their Origins to the Present Day (Reaktion). 

I told the writer about their mysterious origins back in ancient China, about how they came to Europe and featured in all manner of important occasions - church services, royal occasions, celebrations of military victories and the ends of wars.

I revealed their first known appearance in Britain, and in America, where they were used to overawe native Americans. Then we went on to how they helped to mark American independence and other significant celebrations, as well as covering the chemical and technological innovations that have created the great global displays we now all see on television.

You can find the article here https://www.stndrds.com/cultivate/how-fireworks-became-an-american-fourth-of-july-tradition

July 4! 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. A busy fireworks night beckons

July 4, America's biggest fireworks night, draws on apace and my book 'A History of Fireworks from their Origins to the Present Day' (Reaktion Books) is drawn on heavily in this article for the American educational magazine 'Science World'. This year being the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the displays will probably be bigger than ever.

I-spy Paris. Montmartre Cemetery highlights

Montmartre Cemetery is Paris's 3rd biggest. This is the last resting place of Emile Zola, Stendhal, Degas, Pierre Cardin, Jeanne Moreau, Francois Truffaut, Berlioz, Delibes, Offenbach, Theophile Gautier, Can-can dancer La Goulue, Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone, among other big names. 

But the prize for the grave with most flowers must go to the singer Dalida, Egyptian-born, of Italian descent and France's biggest selling recording artist from 1957 to 1961.

Thank you Boundless! History of assassination talk

Great to talk to people from the Boundless organisation last night about 'Assassins' Deeds', my history of assassination. It featured the famous ones - Julius Caesar, Good King Wenceslas, Thomas Becket, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Abraham Lincoln, JFK. But also the less well know, such as the only British prime minister to be murdered.

Then there were the weird ones - the booby trapped statuette, the assassination dressed up as a tv reality show, the killer disguised as a bear. And the ones that got away - Napoleon, Queen Victoria, Fidel Castro (more than 600 times), Adolf Hitler. Some good questions at the end too - which assassination would I have most liked to prevent, which assassin was the most misunderstood?

https://www.boundless.co.uk/events/online-events/a-history-of-assassination-from-ancient-egypt-to-the-present-day

I-Spy Cascais: a memorial to four of Portugal's wars

Cascais is a charming historic town along the Tagus estuary from Lisbon. Its war memorial, pictured above, commemorates four of Portugal's wars.

First, the War of Roussillon and Catalonia (1793-5) when, following the French Revolution, they landed troops in Catalonia to join up with Spanish forces and tried to attack France in the Pyrenees. It did not go well.

 The second was the Peninsular War (1808-14) in which British troops joined the Portuguese and Spaniards to drive out the French who had occupied the Iberian Peninsula. The war turned the tide against Napoleon in Western Europe and made the reputation of the Duke of Wellington, who went on to become the victor of Waterloo.

The third commemoration is of a Portuguese auxiliary division that fought in one of Spain's civil wars in 1837.

And the fourth is the First World War, or Great War (1914-18). Portugal had been Britain's ally since 1377, but approached the conflict cautiously. It had been hoping to remain neutral, but there were clashes in Africa where German South-west Africa bordered Portuguese Angola. 

Britain was at the time Portugal's most important overseas market, and when German U-boats tried to impose a blockade, Portugal seized German ships in its ports, so in 1916 Germany declared war. More than 12,000 Portuguese servicemen were killed in the conflict.

Media careers, centenarians, assassination, disasters all feature in my Bandwidth podcast

My conversation with Katie Brewer of Bandwidth is now available. 

We talk about getting into Oxford from an ordinary Manchester primary school, getting into the media and working in radio and television.

Then there are my books: we discuss the secrets of living to 100 and whether, in spite of increased life expectancy and determined scientific research, there remains a limit to human lifespan. There's the history of assassination, and the role of love in the murder of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand which helped to spark the First World War, plus the continuing mysteries surrounding JFK's death. 

We talked about how disasters happen and how mercilessly they can expose organisational shortcomings.

The podcast is entitled: 'Surviving the Storm: John Withington on Catastrophe, Longevity and the Human Spirit.' You can find it here on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/episode/68HQDGsIC4vKBG6Xsw9up9?si=cefbc5dfc9354602&nd=1&dlsi=29cbb59e41194b1f

And I'm told also on @bandwidthconversations on Instagram & @podcastbwc on Twitter

My Fireworks History: a talk and a quote

Great fun to give a talk to the CSNA, Camden Square Neighbourhood Association, in London last night about my book 'A History of Fireworks' (Reaktion). Told the story of their origins, the ambivalent attitude to the authorities in the UK to Bonfire Night, and in the USA to 4 July, how the technology changed, and their place in art, literature and music, their effect on animals, and much more. Good audience with interesting questions.

Meanwhile, the book's also been quoted in this Encyclopaedia Britannica article https://www.britannica.com/procon/fireworks-debate

The last Gorton by-election

Thursday sees the Gorton by-election in what was the safe Labour seat of Manchester Gorton and Denton. 

I was brought up in Gorton (East Manchester) and I was living there in 1967 at the time of another high profile by-election. (Though the constituency’s boundaries have been changed substantially since then.) 

The sitting MP was Konni Zilliacus, half-Finnish, who had worked for the League of Nations between the wars, was very much on the Labour left, and was dismissed as a ‘crypto-Communist’ by George Orwell. 

In July 1967, he died of leukemia. By the time the by-election was called for November, the Labour government was facing a sterling crisis largely because of Britain’s chronic balance of payments deficit, but Zilliacus had bequeathed his would-be successor Kenneth Marks, a former head teacher, a majority of nearly 8,000, having won more than 60 per cent of the vote at the 1966 general election.

Running for the Conservatives against Marks was Winston Churchill. No, not Britain’s wartime prime minister, but his grandson. Labour suffered an adverse swing of more than 14 per cent, but hung on to win by fewer than 600 votes.

In this week’s Gorton by-election, Labour are defending a majority of more than 12,500. In 2024, Reform was their nearest challenger. Turnout was well below 50 per cent.

 

New Year firework disasters

It now seems that sparklers being carried too close to the ceiling was the cause of the New Year fire in the Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana.  At least 40 people are thought to have been killed in the blaze in a bar.

Fireworks have been involved in a number of New Year accidents. On the first day of 2001, 350 young people had packed into three cafes in a building in the picturesque Dutch fishing village of Volendam, when sparklers set fire to ceiling decorations that had not been treated with flame retardants. 14 people died. 

One of the deadliest firework accidents ever happened in the run-up to the next New Year celebrations. The narrow streets of the Mesa Redonda shopping area in Peru's capital, Lima, were lined with wood and adobe buildings, and on 29 December 2001, hundreds had flocked there to buy fireworks for New Year.

Many traders were selling, and the ground was covered with gunpowder that had fallen from fireworks being unloaded. Witnesses said the blaze started as one trader was demonstrating his wares. It spread rapidly, destroying five blocks in a few minutes, and killing nearly 300 people. 

For more on firework accidents, see my book A History of Fireworks from their Origins to the Present Day. (Reaktion Books)