Chapter 3

On the Berghof

WHEN I VISITED OBERSALZBERG for the first time, at Easter 1932, it was a very awkward place to reach. After snowfall you could not drive up there, and the only recourse was to rent a sledge for the luggage and tramp uphill towing it. Because of his incapacity, a horse would be brought down for Dr Joseph Goebbels, but his wife and her son Harald had to walk up.

At that time Haus Wachenfeld on the Obersalzberg was not owned by Hitler, so he had rented it from a Frau Winter, whose husband had given it to her as a birthday gift. Wachenfeld was her maiden name. Haus Wachenfeld was not large and only a few guests could be accommodated there. If a number of acquaintances and colleagues wanted to visit Hitler they had to be put up in guesthouses or at the Platterhof hotel.

I personally delighted in the glorious Berchtesgaden landscape and the days I spent there were very restful. The household was run by Hitler’s half-sister Frau Raubal. She was a good cook and knew how to make our stay pleasant.

As more and more sales of Mein Kampf were made in 1933, the money became available to purchase Haus Wachenfeld. Hitler himself then designed the fundamental rebuilding work to be undertaken: Haus Wachenfeld was to be expanded into the Berghof.

Obersalzberg was suddenly fashionable. Buildings went up everywhere. Hitler was not living there alone either: Bormann had sized up the situation. Hitler tended to be reclusive and loved to be alone. For this reason he had a fence put up around the property. When Bormann finished building his own house near the Berghof he attempted to convince Hitler to take down the fence, but was unsuccessful: Hitler told him that he had paid for the plot of land with his own money and he would do with it as he wanted.

In the autumn of 1936 Frau Raubal left the Berghof and soon afterwards married Professor Hamitsch, who towards the end of the war fell in action as an officer. From the departure of Frau Raubal until the outbreak of war there were several older women installed as managers or housekeepers at the Berghof. None of them could tolerate the altitude and most resigned after a brief period of employment.

After the war began, Eva Braun took over the duties as ‘housewife’ at the Berghof, and she was assisted by a young married couple who acted as the administrators. Long before I entered his service, Hitler had got to know Eva Braun through Heinrich Hoffmann, who employed her at his photographic studio in Munich. As the Hoffmann firm handled all photographic material relating to Hitler, Hitler spent a lot of time at the studio. Gradually a friendship developed between Hitler and the female employee, but this did not take on a more definite form until 1936.

When one of Eva Braun’s female friends stayed at the Berghof for a short while it fuelled the later rumours that Eva Braun had two children by Hitler. Eva was very fond of the children of this friend, played with them and was often photographed in their company.

If circumstances allowed, my boss would spend every weekend and of course his vacations on the Obersalzberg, often going on long rambles with his guests into the mountains. If Hitler had been asked at that time what spot on the Earth’s surface he considered home, I expect he would have said ‘the Obersalzberg’. It became very popular within a few years. Thousands of people, curious to see Hitler, arrived daily. After Hitler was appointed Reich Chancellor, he used the Berghof to some extent for the purposes of government: State visits and receptions were held there, kings, princes, ministers and diplomats arrived as guests. Among the most frequent visitors from abroad was King Boris of Bulgaria.

Security on the Obersalzberg was in the hands of the RSD (Reich Security Service), which was directly accountable to Heinrich Himmler. It had been created in 1933 as a special police force for the personal protection of Hitler, his ministers and foreign statesmen. It was run on straightforward police lines, and the first officers recruited had previously provided the personal security for Heinrich Held, the former Bavarian minister–president. Initially, many of them were neither SS nor NSDAP members, and some who remained in Hitler’s immediate presence until the capitulation never joined the Party. For state visits, a Waffen-SS company was constantly on hand for sentry duties and in a formal capacity. They had barracks on the Obersalzberg and did a six-month tour of duty.

In 1939, life on the Obersalzberg was rural and peaceful. During the war Hitler seldom went there and instead spent his time in one or other of the Führer-HQs. Only Eva Braun remained, finally leaving the Berghof in March 1945 to end her life at Hitler’s side in Berlin.