Hitler's father: How the son became a dictator

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No historical personality has had more books published about him than Adolf Hitler. There are biographies about Hitler's photographer, his lawyer, chauffeur, personal physician and chief neurologist, the secretary and the diet cook. About his family from grandmother to half-nephew, even about alleged children - but none about his father.

Until now.

It was probably due to the lack of sources. Now the Austrian historian Roman Sandgruber has published "Hitler's Father". Previously, all publications on Hitler's childhood and youth were based on only three detailed writings with questionable truth content - Hitler's own propaganda book "Mein Kampf" and two from the 1950s: Franz Jetzinger's account of "Hitler's Youth" (1956) and August Kubizek's eyewitness account of "Hitler, my childhood friend" (1953).

The discovery of letters in an attic in Upper Austria gave rise to a new biography now published on Alois Hitler by the Austrian historian Roman Sandgruber. Until now, hardly any personal records of the dictator's father were known, apart from two requests for reimbursement of his service deposit, a few private letters and a few card greetings.

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@Walter Hinteler,

The recently discovered letters, written in Kurrent script typical of the time, had been sent by Alois Hitler to the road master Josef Radlegger. His great-granddaughter had found them and turned to historian Sandgruber.

The recently discovered letters, written in Kurrent script typical of the time, had been sent by Alois Hitler to the road master worker Josef Radlegger. His great-granddaughter had found them and turned to historian Sandgruber.

Hitler's father Alois was considered strict and brutal. According to Sandgruber, he was often portrayed as a bumpkin who only sat in the inn and raised bees. According to the historian, the letters "open up a completely new and more accurate view of the person who undoubtedly had the greatest influence on Adolf Hitler's career".

Adolf Hitler was born on 20 April 1889, Holy Saturday, in Braunau am Inn. His father Alois had started work there as a customs officer in 1871. In 1892 the family moved to Passau.
Despite 21 years in Braunau, Alois Hitler never felt accepted by the bourgeois society there, according to historian Sandgruber. Alois' greatest wish was to become a farmer. He had grown up in the countryside, but without his own property. Instead, he had trained himself in modern agriculture.

Given his origins as an illegitimate child from an agricultural background, Alois Hitler had made a spectacular career: although he had only attended a one-class primary schools, he earned as much as a professor at the time (as a middle-ranked customs officer).

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@Walter Hinteler,

Confusing family relationships: Alois' father is unknown. At the age of almost 40, Alois, who until then had been called Schicklgruber like his mother, registered her husband Johann Georg Hiedler as his father. The spelling of his new surname changed to "Hitler". After Hiedler's death, Alois grew up with his brother Johann Nepomuk Hüttler. His foster father Hüttler was also the grandfather of his third wife, Klara Pölzl, Adolf Hitler's mother. By registering her father's name, Klara had formally become Alois' grandcousin. Before the two could marry, therefore, a papal dispensation, the so-called incest dispensation, was required. The letter outlining the relationship was sent to the bishop.

In his research, historian Sandgruber examined numerous details and previously circulated assumptions about Hitler's childhood and youth and made some discoveries, such as the fact that among all of Hitler's known places of residence, two addresses were concealed. In research, there was the assumption that the young Hitler had temporarily escaped his authoritarian father when he was transferred from Passau to Linz in 1894 and the family continued to stay in Passau. All of Hitler's flats in Upper Austria were considered known since they had been listed in 1938.
Sandgruber doubts that the family lived apart for a whole year. In registration books he found two other Hitler addresses - in Urfahr near Linz. One of the house owners was Leopold Mostny, the richest citizen of Linz at the time. The brandy manufacturer was Jewish - the only one who was not deported from Linz for a long time because of earlier merits as a German nationalist member of parliament. He was only taken to Theresienstadt in 1942 and was dead a few days later.
The address in Urfahr was not overlooked by chance in 1938, says Sandgruber, "that was already a conspicuous omission that could now be cleared up".

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@Walter Hinteler,

he young Adolf Hitler probably saw the first swastika in his life as a choirboy and altar boy in the monastery of Lambach. Whether he was inspired by this is disputed. Theodorich Johann Georg Hagn, 51st abbot of the monastery between 1858 and 1872, had chosen it as a speaking symbol of his coat of arms in reference to his surname"Hagn" as in (Haken
["hook"]). "The Lambach swastikas certainly do not have a German nationalist or even National Socialist background," Sandgruber writes.

According to Sandgruber, many things are now much clearer what had an effect on Adolf Hitler - his father as well as the German nationalist exaggeration in Linz.
The peculiar thing: In Upper Austria there were practically only German speakers before the First World War. And yet hostility against Czechs, other Slavs and so-called Gypsies played an enormous role; very early on, around 1900, people in Upper Austria demanded that they be marked or concentrated in camps. There were also few Jews and yet this anti-Semitic thinking. Adolf Hitler always saw Linz as his favourite city, considered the time there the happiest of his life. In his last weeks, Hitler had a model of the city brought to him in the bunker of the Reich Chancellery. And until shortly before his suicide, he also carried mementos of his family with him, his father's pocket watch, his mother's letters. He remained decisively influenced by his origins until his death.

Text translated from a Spiegel (paywall) report. Photos via some source.

Hitlers Vater: Wie der Sohn zum Diktator wurde @ amazon

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Interesting. I never saw the Lambach swastika before.

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@hightor,

There are actually quite a few publications about the alleged connections between Lambach Abbey, the local "Hitler myth" and the local "swastika legend" - precisely because Hitler was a primary school pupil and choirboy here and Abbot Theodorich Hagn left his personal coat of arms here, combined from the family name and the Benedictine cross, as a heraldic trace of his reign (1858-1872).
From this, the often-publicised thesis was derived that the boy Hitler got the impulse for the "hook cross" from this "Hagn cross".

This thesis was refuted already years ago, and Hitler never referred to it. (The swastika was used by the party when Hitler was not yet a member of the NSDAP or its predecessor party, the DAP).

The abbot's coat of arms above the Flavia fountain in the Abbey courtyard, which shows an angled "swastika", was for many years a place of pilgrimage for European neo-Nazis
In 2015, the then Abbot Maximilian had the Hagn cross replaced with the initials 'TH'. They stand for the first and family name of his predecessor Theoderich Hagn. The year 1860 was preserved. The figure with the patron saint of Lambach and the fountain bowl were also relocated.

The remaining "swastika" symbols in the sacristy and in the convent cemetery are not accessible to visitors and remain.

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The latest findings are contrary to portrayals by Hitler's teenage friend, August Kubizek, who is often cited by other historians, according to a report in DW. And that Hitler-era text passages still linger :

Letters from Adolf Hitlers father give rare glimpse into dictator's upbringing

Quote:

[...]
Anti-Semite Adolf Hitler — born in Austria's Braunau am Inn in 1889 to Alois and his third, much-younger wife, Klara Pötzl — likely later sought to conceal that the family once lived in a Jewish-owned property in Urfahr near the Danube river city of Linz, the book reveals.

The letters also show that Hitler's mother, nearing death in 1907, was treated by a Jewish doctor who later escaped to America.

Hitler was already an anti-Semite in his youth, concludes Sandgruber, disputing claims that Hitler's hatred of Jews was forged after he moved to Vienna.

As a young man, Hitler moved to the city around 1908, aiming to become an artist, despite being turned down for study.

The latest findings are contrary to portrayals by Hitler's teenage friend, August Kubizek, who is often cited by other historians, maintains Sandgruber.
[...]
Adolf Hitler's only significant revolt against his father, notes Sandgruber, was to reject Alois' wish that he also pursue a civil service career.

"He wanted to be a free artist and not to follow in his father's footsteps," writes Sandgruber.

However, both father and son also shared "contempt" for authority and were anticlerical, although Hitler did not quit the Roman Catholic church, the historian added.

Alexandra Föderl-Schmid, who reviewed the book for the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, noted that Hitler, "who attached so much importance to an ancestral passport and Aryan origin, had himself more than one gap in the family tree."
[...]
Even over 75 years after World War II, modern-day Germany still needs to rid itself of 29 legal or regulatory texts that allude to wording introduced when Hitler was in power, government-appointed anti-Semitism commissioner Felix Klein told news agency AFP last month.

Government critics, for example, are calling for the removal of the term "race" from Article 3 of Germany's constitution. Last year, Chancellor Angela Merkel declared herself open to such a deletion.

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@Walter Hinteler,

Walter, I remember learning a long time ago in my youth that Hitler was himself of Jewish descent. Is there any truth in this memory? He certainly does not look Aryan in my estimation. How can one possibly press a certain "look" that is so different than ones own self and then send people who "look" like you to concentration camps?

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@BillW,

That Hitler was of Jewish descent isn't true (and explained in the links above) and this has also been known for decades.

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Norman Mailer’s The Castle in the Forest tells the story of Hitler’s childhood through the eyes of a demon. Alois is centre stage and the claim that Hitler had a Jewish grandparent is also examined.

The book had mixed reviews, but I liked it.

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@izzythepush,

Hitler's direct lineage is questionable. Being "Jewish" is DNA, not what church, temple, synagogue one attends! His mother is even questionable. Has there ever been any DNA studies that anybody knows of?

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@BillW,

BillW wrote:

Being "Jewish" is DNA, not what church, temple, synagogue one attends!

Yes, that's what the Nazi "race theory" says.

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@Walter Hinteler,

It is far more than what the Nazi's say. It KS in the Torah. In fact, they formed their on state based on being Jewish! It's called Israel.

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@BillW,

BillW wrote:

Hitler's direct lineage is questionable.

To quote from the above linked Spiegel interview (my translation)

Sandgruber wrote:

I consider it almost impossible that Adolf Hitler had a Jewish grandfather or a Jewish origin. That is a propaganda story of the twenties or thirties. However, Alois was an illegitimate child, the father is definitely difficult to prove. It could also be an infidelity. The confusion arose because Johann Georg Hiedler did not have Alois legitimised as his son when he married his mother Maria Anna Schicklgruber. Either it was sloppiness or Johann Georg Hiedler really was not the father.

Following this response, Spiegel stated:

Quote:

At the age of almost 40, Alois Schicklgruber initiated his own name change and registered Johann Georg Hiedler, who was already deceased at the time, as his father. This resulted in another name change.

To which the book author responded:

Sandgruber wrote:

The notary's certificate is remarkably sloppy, almost everything in it is wrong: the father's date of death, the first name and the spelling of the surname - Hiedler became Hitler. How this came about is not known. Adolf Hitler is said to have described the name change later as his father's best decision: Neither Schicklgruber nor the soft-sounding Hiedler would have worked as well as Hitler as party advertising.

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@Walter Hinteler,

Lineage sounds sketchy at best. One thing I would like to add is that judaism, per the Torah, is passed down by the mother. However, per DNA, only a father can determine if a child is to be male. But, that hasn't been known till relatively recently. Everyone has 23 chromosomes, 50% from mother and 50% from father for the 22 autosomes. The 23rd pair, the sex chromosomes, differ between males and females. Females have two copies of the X chromosome, while males have one X and one Y chromosome.

Let me add, I do not believe any book is written by God, all religious books (and, all books) are written by man and therefore contain bias. Sometimes a whole lot of bias!

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@BillW,

BillW wrote:

Lineage sounds sketchy at best.

I am not an expert in 18th/29th century Austrian genealogy (nor at any other) and therefore cannot say anything about the accuracy of the documentation there.

But I do know that here where I live, many name changes resulted from transcription and spelling mistakes.

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@Walter Hinteler,

They do here also. Names mean nothing and the only real way to know parentage is DNA. BTW, I added some to my last post if you didn't see it.

Please understand Walter, I have no dog in this fight and could care less what Hitler is or isn't. I just find it very hypocritical that a person that looks like Hitler did to kill millions (Jews plus others) because they weren't Aryan!

I also know I have proven my paternal lineage back to 1500's England and my maternal lineage back to at least the early 1700's USA. My last name has been spelled at least 5 different ways over time.

Anyone who gets into DNA discovery must be ready to unearth an NPE, Non Parental Event. This may occur as recently as your own parents to any set of grandparents in the past. The more current it is discovered, the more possible to resolve it. The more into the past, well, good luck!

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@BillW,

I almost forgot. When coming to America or even England for that matter, immigrants from Europe, especially northern and eastern would anglicize their last names. This makes it extra difficult to trace families at that point. I've never done it, one must find entries into the United States and then trace it back. I have been fortunate enough that I have always found someone else's tree that coordinates with mine when I needed one. Is it always correct? I hope so, it runs less risk that an NPE. Who knows in the end.

I have traced one branch to Martin Luther and another branch to one of Henry VIII's mistresses. She bore a son shortly after her relationship with him. Was it his? She was married directly after him. Maybe I'm royal blood, but she wasn't direct male line to me. Fortunately he didn't kill his mistresses. In all truth and reality, I doubt either one of these lines are correct, but it is fun to do the tracking!

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Hitler's father: How the son became a dictator

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