Witness to the Fuhrer's death

Noviy Vestnik, Karaganda, Kazakhstan ^ | May 11th, 2005 | Marina Funtikova

[struwwelpeter]

Hitler's personal secretary and telephone operator did a term of imprisonment at the Spassk POW camp

SS Oberscharfuhrer Rohus Misch was not in Karaganda long. His prisoner of war card, which 'Noviy Vestnik' found in the district archives, states: '16 May 1948 arrived, left 10 May 1950'.
The 87-year old retiree, formerly the secretary and bodyguard of Hitler, now lives in Berlin. From time to time he gives interviews to local and international journalists. Rohus Misch can boast of a superb memory, he still remembers his fuhrer's home telephone number: 12-00-50. "I answered it day and night for five years," he explained in one of his last interviews.

APOLITICAL STUDENT PAINTER
POW Rohus Misch's card is still preserved in the district governmental archives. This time-yellowed piece of cardboard is easy to read with its typewritten lines. Violet ink fixed his personal information onto the document. Last name, first name, middle - Misch Rohus Rohus. Year and place of birth - 1917, Opeln region, city of Alt-Schalkenford, Upper Silesia, Poland. In the distant past - a student artist, who finished 8th grade in the public school. No party affiliation.
During the mobilization of October, 1937, he was drafted into the army. He served in the infantry. Before capture he was registered in the 1st infantry regiment. In the place for rank is written: 'Feldwebel', title: 'radio operator'.
Taken prisoner on May 2nd, 1945. Sentenced to 25 years imprisonment in accordance with Proclamation no. 1 of April 19th, 1943.

HOW HE ENDED UP WITH HITLER
After the attack on Poland in 1939, Rohus Misch was seconded to a special military unit, which later formed the first regiment of the SS forces. In his first battle he was seriously wounded. For his superior obedience, in the spring of 1940 his company commander recommended him to the team that accompanied Adolph Hitler.
For the next 5 years Misch was practically always at Hitler's side: he was present at conferences with his brothers in arms, accompanying the fuhrer on all trips, any carrying out his personal instructions.
The title of chief personal telephonist was later added to the bodyguard's duties.

It's said!
Historian Joachim Fest, author of the German best-seller 'Sunset', and Uwe Bansons, author of 'Catacomb', regard Rohus Misch is the most credible source of information about the fuhrer's inner circle.

"I'LL STAY HERE"
Hitler's last days are recounted by the former secretary in the most minute of details. About the bunker in which the Nazi fuhrer lived his last days before suicide, according to Rohus Misch the bunker was small and had an underground entrance which led to the new Reich chancellery building. The underground shelter consisted of tiny rooms, the area of each about 10-12 square meters. The bunker was provided with water, air, and electricity, and for this there was a special maintenance area. Communication with the outside world was with telephone and telegraph.
"Besides myself, there was always a doctor with the fuhrer, or his aide, or Goebbels (minister of propaganda - author)," recalls Rohus Misch. "There was no reception of guests."
In the words of the former secretary, Hitler ceased to leave the bunker after April 12th. When American president Roosevelt died, Hitler was sure that the western allies would attack the USSR. But he was mistaken.
"On the 22nd he declared: 'The war is lost. I'll stay here, you all are relieved'."

"DEATHLY SILENCE REIGNED"
Rohus Misch remembers the last day of his fuhrer's life as if it were yesterday.
"Near Hitler's office at that moment were Bormann, Goebbels, Reichjugendfuhrer Axmann, adjutant Guenshe and his aide Linge. Just before his death, Hitler talked with them. I don't know what they talked about, since I was in my little closet then. After this, he bade his farewells. In a little while I came in and asked what was up. They replied that the chief had asked not to be disturbed. Deathly silence reigned. I didn't hear the shot."
Rohus Misch entered the deceased's office a quarter-hour later. He noticed the dead Eva Braun, who the evening before had become the fuhrer's wife. The woman, her legs crossed under her, lay with her head on Hitler's body.
"I ran along the tunnel that connected the bunker to the Reich chancellery, to report what had happened to me immediate boss, the head of the chancellery. When I returned, Hitler's body was already laying in the field, covered by a blanket. After this they dragged him into the garden, for burning."

POISON FOR THE CHILDREN
Goebbels and his wife decided to follow Hitler in death. They did not spare their six children. Magda Goebbels herself poured cyanide into the mouths of her sleeping sons and daughters, then the couple killed themselves. This story is known in every schoolbook. Rohus Misch says that Goebbels had a chance to save the children. A day before the murders, the well-known aviatrix Hanna Ratch was there, she had flown in to 'save the fuhrer'. She told Magda Goebbels: 'If you want to stay here, that's your business, but I can fly out with your children'. Mrs. Goebbels, however, answered harshly: 'The children will stay with me'.

'BUTYRKA'
Rohus Misch recalled how, after Hitler's death, chief of staff General Krebs wanted to make contact with the Russians. He even went to them, but did not receive any permission. The Russians insisted on unconditional capitulation. In all there remained only three officers in the bunker, including Misch: "We cut all the telephone cables, turned off the telegraph, and went outside through the new Reich chancellery building."
On that day, May 2nd, 1945, Rohus Misch was captured by Soviet soldiers.
The Fuhrer's ex-telephonist was taken to the Butyrsk prison. In 1946, repeated investigations into the circumstances of Hitler's death were conducted by the NKVD and MVD. Not just Misch, but adjutant Gyunshe and aide-de-camp Linge, as well as chief-pilot Bauer were imprisoned in the cells with 'brood hens' - secret informers from the ranks of defecting Germans. Every detail of Hitler's last days in the bunker were verified several times.

BUT NOW?
Rohus Misch tends to idealize his boss. In his stories, Hitler almost never raises his voice and calmly utilizes the services of his Jewish cook: 'That she wasn't a representative of the Aryan race did not seem to bother him."
Misch does not regret that he worked for Hitler, and allegedly never heard about the existance of Nazi concentration camps, mass annihilation of Jews, and other horrors. Misch insists that he found out about these much later, in the 1950s, when he returned from prison.
He did a stint at the work camps in the Urals and in Karaganda, in camp 99/19, located at Spassk. He returned home in 1954, and opened a shop that sold wallpaper, paints, and varnishes. Rohus Misch tried to remain in the shadows, but later a postcard of his portrait in the uniform of a soldier of the Leibstandart 'Adolph Hitler' was printed in the weekly 'Bild am Sontag'. With unabashed pride the former bodyguard and secretary-telephonist recounts that the card was sold overseas for several hundred dollars.

The author thanks Lyudmila Anatolevna Kiseleva, director of the district government archives, for her help in preparing this material.

Marina Funtikova

[OldFriend]

Evil to the core.

[AD from SpringBay]

Well isn't that special.

[Huck]

PJB is deeply saddened.

[Frank_Discussion]

?

[xJones]

It's strange, people talk of Hitler's personal charm, and many of his secretaries, personal minions like Rohus Misch, and top Nazis like Goering and Hess stayed loyal to his memory to their deaths. They identified with and almost worshiped him, even though any rational person could read "Mein Kampf" and recognize a dangerous fruitcake.

Stalin, though, had no personally loyal aides, everyone served nervously out of absolute fear. It was people that didn't know Stalin that worshipped him both in the Soviet Union and abroad thanks to his internatonal propaganda machine.

They were both mass-murdering monsters during approximately the same time span, but Hitler was the mesmerizer, Stalin the terrorizer.

[struwwelpeter]

I keep looking, but I can't find any personal accounts from any Stalin aides. I wonder if any survived the beast.

[Billthedrill]

A day before the murders, the well-known aviatrix Hanna Ratch was there...

That's Hanna Reitsch, one of the most interesting characters of the war. True Nazi, twice winner of the Iron Cross, lived until 1979 completely unrepentant.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

Ah, but Stalin was also known for his personal charm when it suited him.

[Names Ash Housewares]

"Hitler was sure that the western allies would attack the USSR."

Patton thought that is what we should have done.

[AppyPappy]

Both Hitler and Stalin were genocidal maniacs but Hitler seemed to treat it as something that other people did. It doesn't surprise me that Hitler had Jewish cook. Hitler only killed the "bad" Jews in his eyes. Basically all the Jews except the ones he knew.

Stalin became more personally involved. He took personal interest in wiping out people.

[Monterrosa-24]

It is also interesting that many of Hitler's personal aides had very long lives, his nurse, Gerda Christian-one of his secretaries, and this fellow. All three were in the bunker too.

[struwwelpeter]

About the Steplager where Herr Misch spent two years - a friend says that Pope John Paul II went to Spassk in 2000 or 2001, but I can't find anything online on his visit.

Here's a little something on the camp from the same online journal:

Soviet tankers learned to drive on the bones of the dead

Noviy Vestnik ^ | June 2nd, 2004

Last Monday two new memorials appeared simulaneously at the Spassk cemetary. One was placed by the Karaganda city government, the other by the government of Lithuania.

A marker was placed at Spassk to remember all who faced repression on Kazakhstan's soil. The authors of this work were Murat Kalkabaev and Vladimir Trotsenko, who worked on the project and argued for space at the cemetary for a year and a half. Finally it was decided that the marker would not be placed alongside the other memorials, but a bit to the front. Such a composition resulted in a better visual impression than just a straight line of stone markers. So that the memorial complex gave a more unified appearance, Trotsenko decided to take down the iron fence around the cemetary. Well-known architect Aleksandr Titarev, however, was decidedly against such a move.

"It was I, in my day, who thought up the cemetary complex at Spassk," he reported to members of the architectural council at the time. "I know the place very well. The iron fence shouldn't be taken down from the cemetary under any circumstances. Otherwise people will set horses and sheep out to graze among the graves."

But Vladimir Trotsenko knew how to insist on his way, and the fence was taken down. True, it was not removed everywhere - only from the sides of the main entrance. After all the organizational problems were solved, the sign itself was made in about two days in a local metal-working factory.

The memorial to the Lithuanians who died at the Spassk concentraton camp was a bit simpler. A place for a memorial stone had been decided upon long ago. While the marker was sculpted by an artist in Lithuania, Karaganda had only to help with the installation. For the memorial's opening ceremony an entire delegation from Lithuania arrived. Heading it was Lithuanian secretary of labor and social services, Violeta Muruskayte, and Lithuanian Ambassador Romualdas Visokavichus. During the ceremony, it was stated that it was Lithuania that had brought the entire Spassk memorial complex into existance.

"From 1953 to 1954, I did a term in the camps here," recalled former steppe camp prisoner Antanos Seykalis. "In those days Lithuania was actively resisting the Soviet occupation, and in practically every school there was an underground organization. Ours was discovered... and so I showed up in Kazakhstan. Even now I cannot forget the horrors of day to day life in the camps. The prison uprising in Kengira, near Zhezkazgan. How they brutally put it down with the help of tanks. So many died back then. In 1990, I - with the help of comrades from the public organization of former political prisoners - once again came to Karaganda. We wanted to see in what condition was the prison cemetary in Spassk. And in horror we discovered that there wasn't a cemetary! On it's place was a tank training ground. Soviet tankers learned to drive on the bones of the dead! Under the guise of tourists, we went into this field and placed the first Catholic cross. After a few years they told me that the Kazakhstani government had closed the tank training area and built in its place a memorial complex."

Alongside the Lithuanians' memorial stone in Spassk today are markers dedicated to Germans, French, Italians, Japanese, Finns, Poles, Rumanians, Ukrainians, and Armenians. Soon Russia will dedicate a marker, though the Russian memorial will not be in the collective row, but a bit to the side.

[tom paine 2]

bump

[struwwelpeter]

Transliterating from German to Russian and back again lets in some typographical errors. I found that Hitler's secretary (in Russian spelled as 'Rokhus Mish') is actually Rochus Misch. Roosevelt and Reitch got mangled, but I maanged to save FDR. Note that the latin versions of Khrushchev and Gorbachev come up with a few different variations as well.

[JZelle]

I read the other day how they want to restore some of his statues over there. Unbelievable.

[Logophile]

Goebbels and his wife decided to follow Hitler in death. They did not spare their six children. Magda Goebbels herself poured cyanide into the mouths of her sleeping sons and daughters, then the couple killed themselves. . . . Goebbels had a chance to save the children. A day before the murders, the well-known aviatrix Hanna Ratch was there, she had flown in to 'save the fuhrer'. She told Magda Goebbels: 'If you want to stay here, that's your business, but I can fly out with your children'. Mrs. Goebbels, however, answered harshly: 'The children will stay with me'.

Mrs. Goebbels was every bit the that monster her husband and their "fuhrer" were.

[Logophile]

Correction: Mrs. Goebbels was every bit the monster that her husband and their "fuhrer" were.

[T. Buzzard Trueblood]

Mrs. Goebbels, however, answered harshly: 'The children will stay with me'.

Sick friggin' people.

[Hank Rearden]

Mrs. Goebbels was every bit the monster that her husband and their "fuhrer" were.

The film "Downfall" portrays her as every bit the monster; her scenes with the children are painful.

I highly recommend seeing this movie about the last days in the bunker. Warning: graphic scenes here and there, on a par with "Saving Private Ryan".