The incredible events that took place around everything connected with Nazism during the Second World War continue to baffle researchers today. So, many mysteries are associated with the personality of one of Hitler's closest associates - the "bloody" Heinrich Himmler.
Could you wag your tail?
Himmler, as you know, was obsessed with ancient myths and legends, believed in the transmigration of souls (reincarnation) and often "communicated" with the ghosts of long-dead geniuses of the past. He considered himself either a new incarnation of the mythical Briton King Arthur, who gathered around him the knights of the "round table", or King Henry I, whose spirit allegedly appeared to him and gave instructions.
He saw the connection of his activities with the legendary Holy Grail, giving its owner power over the whole world and in search of which King Arthur went in time of it.
The Reichsfuehrer SS was inspired by the ancient German legend that hidden treasures appear on the surface of the earth every 700 years. And in 1944, when the Third Reich was already, in essence, doomed, he even equipped an expedition in search of the Grail.
And on March 16, 1944, he sent Alfred Rosenberg on an expedition, who raised a huge flag with a Celtic cross over the remains of the Cathar castle - the last owners of the Holy Grail.
This date was not chosen by chance: it was on this day in 1244 that the keepers of the mystical shrine were destroyed by enemies. The Nazis, in fact, performed another ancient magic ritual, asking the higher powers for help and protection.
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Earlier, in the spring of 1942, three SS climbers climbed Elbrus, the sacred mountain of the Aryans. There they performed a number of magical rituals and hoisted a banner with a swastika. All this was done with one goal - to establish power over the elements.
Himmler continued to fund numerous expeditions in the spirit of Indiana Jones' adventures to all corners of the world, during which German scientists sought evidence of the "superiority" of the Aryan race.
At the same time, he did not disregard more "mundane" projects. It is known that in the Third Reich they were very serious about such a potential type of weapon, which could become … dogs! The Nazis considered them almost smarter than people and tried to teach them to "speak" and read, and also conducted experiments on telepathic communication between people and animals.
In particular, Himmler oversaw a special dog school Tier-Sprechschule ASRA, founded near Hanover in 1930 and which existed under the leadership of a certain Margaret Schmitt until the end of the war.
This school, says Compulenta, selected "especially talented" animals from all over Germany. Some of them were able to imitate the human voice, and one even allegedly held out "Mein Fuehrer" in response to the question of who Hitler was.
Another of the pupils, the Airedale Terrier Rolf, "spoke" by pressing the special keys with his paw. Each letter was designated by a certain number of clicks. It was argued that in this way he … talked about religion!
In addition, Rolf took lessons in foreign languages, wrote poetry and once asked one of the noble visitors: "Could you wag your tail?"
How to get gold from paraffin?
Two other incredible projects led by Heinrich Himmler in the Third Reich involved experiments in extracting gasoline from water and gold from paraffin!
As the German historian Helmut Werner notes in the recently published sensational study "Hitler's Alchemists - Secret Attempts to Produce Gold at Dachau," Himmler first believed a certain Heinrich Kurshildgen, who claimed that he could turn water into gasoline.
Ultimately, the Reichsführer exposed the charlatan and sent him to a concentration camp, but this failure did not shake his faith in the power of alchemy, and he began to finance the work of another alchemist - Karl Malkhus, who promised to make the Reich rich without the help of the "philosopher's stone".
According to the German historian, the idea of turning ordinary river sand into gold sparked Himmler's enthusiasm after small gold nuggets were discovered in the rivers of Bavaria in the 1930s.
After that, the Reichsführer met with Malkhus, and he assured the head of the SS that in the future he would be able to produce gold in abundance for the needs of the Third Reich, receiving it with the help of paraffin, stones and sand from the bottom of the Isar River flowing in Munich.
A secret alchemy laboratory on the orders of Himmler was created on the territory of the infamous concentration camp in Dachau. Before the start of work, the Daily Telegraph notes, all members of Malkhus's group were searched.
Himmler needed to make sure they weren't carrying any precious metals with them, which would allow them to trick the Reichsfuehrer. However, as it turned out a few weeks later, Malchus hid grains of gold in cigarettes. At first, he extracted them and claimed that he received gold as a result of his experiments.
However, the deception was eventually exposed, and Malchus from Dachau's employee turned into his prisoner. However, not for long. Having an incredible craving for everything mysterious, Himmler, also known as the "killer of millions", released the alchemist only under the promise of telling something about the experiments in Dachau on pain of death, after which he switched to other equally incredible and fantastic projects …
Gennady FEDOTOV
