Site Presented By
Sunday, Nov 22, 2009
Authoritarian?
No, he was never authoritarian. And we were with him day and night; we knew him. He was never without us, day and night. If he wanted something in the night, his servant was asleep, so he called one of us. If he wanted to be awoken an hour later, or to call Eva -- anything. We just had a wonderful boss. We couldn't have wished for better. When I was married he had a case of champagne delivered to my house, this one we're sitting in [gestures to the surrounding rooms].
What were your duties as Hitler's bodyguard?
Strictly speaking, yes, I was a bodyguard to Hitler, that's right, but of course usually there wasn't much to do as bodyguard, so they put us to work at other things, as a courier for example, and then later, during the time in the bunker, I worked at the telephones. There were six of us. We weren't the direct aides. Those were the adjutants. If the boss wanted something, any simple thing, he would go to an adjutant, say, "Hey, I heard Wolfgang Wagner got engaged -- we have to do something for him," and then the adjutant would come to us and tell us: "Get some flowers and deliver them personally to Wolfgang Wagner. He's engaged."
One of the most harrowing scenes in the film is the murder of the Goebbels children [six of them, ages 4 to 12]. What do you remember about the Goebbels family in the bunker?
[Minister of Propaganda Dr. Joseph] Goebbels and the kids arrived suddenly about 14 days before the end. Then Hitler's doctor, Dr. Morell, had to move out so that Goebbels could move in, and his wife lived one story higher, in the adjoining bunker, with the children. But the children came down to play all the time, you know? But when they were too loud we sent them back up. [Laughs.] Usually they were up in the New Chancellery; there were people around up there and they had freedom to move about.
I went up there too, shortly before the end, because the big kitchen was there. Goebbels sat down at a long table with the children. A young man played the harmonica. And Goebbels was saying goodbye to the civilians, with the children; there were so many people there in the New Chancellery, people looking to take shelter there. And it occurred to me for the first time that maybe I should say goodbye, too. That was the moment it became clear to me that Hitler and Goebbels would stay. And Eva Braun and Frau Goebbels had agreed they wouldn't abandon their men either, stay to the end, too. And then plans were made for the children. The other women in the bunker all offered -- Frau Rindell for example, from the office, she said, "Frau Goebbels, if you want to stay here, that's your business, but the children can't possibly stay here..." and Frau Bruns said, "I'll take them to Arnbruck to my sister, as she can't have children -- she would be happy. Please!" and she cried.
You know, we, the service people, we all knew that the children were meant to stay, and what would happen. They would stay and they would die.
Oh, and then of course the aviator, Hanna Reitsch, offered to fly them out as well. She said even if she had to fly back and forth 20 times, she would fly them out. Of course, that's not what happened.
Frau Goebbels, she had to come down to my room to get the children ready [administer the cyanide]. Up above there were so many people around, but down in our rooms there was no one. We ourselves weren't even down there. We only slept there. So she could take care of them on her own. I went out of the room and waited outside. Then Dr. Naumann came out of the room and said to me -- he whispered in my ear -- that if it had been up to him, Dr. Goebbels he meant, then the children wouldn't still be in the bunker, they would be evacuated. And I had seen Naumann with Goebbels up above, and he was probably right. I took him as a trustworthy representative. Goebbels didn't want it. It was Frau Goebbels who did. One must stick with the truth. That's how it was.
The film suggests both parents colluded to kill their children -- misrepresented, in your opinion?
It's all Americanized. That's how the Americans want to see things...
But what about here in Germany? The film was made in Germany for Germans, by Germans, wasn't it?
Oh, the Germans have no idea about anything, either. If I had been in the New Chancellery instead of in the bunker, I wouldn't have any idea either, how that happened with the Goebbels children, how they killed the six children.
