I did not want to show my cards too early.
—GUSTAV VON KAHR
By the early-morning hours of November 9, 1923, probably around or not too long after one a.m., Kahr, Lossow, and Seisser had reached the new counter-putsch command center. Two important pieces of information had arrived as well. First, they learned that the Bavarian crown prince, Rupprecht, strongly disapproved of the putsch. Second, they received notification that General von Seeckt, the head of the military in Berlin, also opposed “this crazy mutiny,” as he called it. He ordered the Bavarian authorities to suppress the rebellion at once, or he would do it for them.
At 2:50 a.m., more than four hours after leaving the beer hall, the three Bavarian leaders sent a joint statement to radio stations around the Reich:
GENERAL STATE COMMISSIONER VON KAHR, GENERAL VON LOSSOW, AND COLONEL VON SEISSER REJECT THE HITLER PUTSCH. STATEMENTS EXTORTED IN BÜRGERBRÄUKELLER GATHERING BY FORCE OF ARMS ARE INVALID. CAUTION ADVISED AGAINST MISUSE OF THE ABOVE NAMES.
The Bavarian leaders also composed a longer text for posters that attacked Hitler’s “deceit and breach of promise,” and pledged to act decisively to quash this act of betrayal.
At this point, the Nazi Party and their Kampfbund allies were declared illegal and dissolved. Kahr’s decree, Ordinance No. 264, also ordered the confiscation of all currency, weapons, armaments, vehicles, and other property belonging to these banned parties, and stipulated that any member of them could face up to fifteen years in prison. General Ludendorff, Hitler, and their supporters were, in the words of a subsequent order, to be arrested “on sight.”
Various proclamations repudiating Hitler were quickly printed and posted around town. They would, however, have to compete with the posters the Nazis were pasting up, announcing the success of the Hitler- Ludendorff-Kahr-Lossow-Seisser regime. Hitler’s men had a large lead in the battle of the kiosks.
Worse still, the triumvirate would have to counter newspaper accounts too, which would soon hit the street. Kahr’s adviser and speechwriter, Adolf Schiedt, the editor of Münchener Zeitung, had warned that the newspapers would be able to report only what its writers had observed at the beer hall; namely the Bavarian leaders’ speeches in support of the revolution. Munich would, in other words, read page after page in the morning papers describing the alliance of Kahr, Lossow, and Seisser with Hitler, but not one word of their disavowal. Schiedt urged them to stop the presses to avoid “the immense danger” of confusing the entire country.
Although the Bavarian authorities had agreed that this was a good idea, no one, in the chaos of the night, had gotten around to doing anything about it. At some point between three and four that morning, Schiedt finally gained access to a telephone and called his publisher, Hans Buchner, who also served as chairman of Munich’s association of editors and publishers. “Publication of the morning newspapers throughout Munich is forbidden,” Schiedt said, asking him to relay the order to his colleagues, along with news that violators would be punished by death.
The publisher’s response to this astonishing order was not recorded, but he dutifully started making calls to his colleagues around town. He woke Fritz Gerlich, editor of the Münchner Neueste Nachrichten, who had gone to bed after the midnight press conference at the police library.
Gerlich told him that he had already printed at least thirty thousand copies of his paper, and they were about to be delivered. It was impossible to stop it, he said. He could not comply, even if he had wanted to.
The editor then called Ernst Pöhner to complain about this last-minute attempt to suppress free speech.
But Pöhner was surprised at the news as well.
He had not given any such order, Pöhner said, emerging from his post–press conference nap. He was certain that Kahr had not done so either. It must be a mistake. Unable to return to sleep, Pöhner tried to call his right-hand man, Wilhelm Frick, at police headquarters.
Several other people had been inquiring about Frick too, the duty officer at the switchboard said, but he was not in his office or his apartment, and no one knew where he was.
Minutes later, the editor called Pöhner back to confirm that, after some investigation, he knew for a fact that the order to stop the presses had indeed been given by Kahr’s office. Pöhner was taken aback by this revelation. Kahr was his old friend. Surely he would not issue such a proclamation without informing him. Still, he started to worry. Where was Frick? It was not like him to leave his post without informing his staff.
As Pöhner ruminated over these developments, the doorbell rang. It was Max von Scheubner-Richter who had been sent to bring Pöhner to the War Ministry. Something was amiss, the visitor said. Hitler needed him immediately.