Rudolf Walter Richard Hess (born April 26, 1894 - death August 17, 1987) is a German politician. Since 1925 - personal secretary of Adolf Hitler, since 1933, his deputy for the party. Behind his eyes, Hess was called "the Fuehrer's shadow." In 1941, he single-handedly made a flight to Great Britain (the so-called Hess mission) in order to convince the British to make peace with Nazi Germany. He was interned by the British until the end of the war.
At the Nuremberg trials, he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Since 1966, the only inmate in the Berlin Spandau prison. 1987, August 17 - 93-year-old Hess committed suicide in his prison cell.
Origin. early years
Rudolf Hess was born in Ibrahimia, an eastern suburb of Alexandria (Egypt), into the family of Johann Fritz Hess, the owner of the export-import company Hess and K °, and his wife Klara.
1912 - Graduated from the Higher Commercial School in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. During World War I, Rudolph served on the Western Front as a platoon commander in the same regiment in which Hitler served. He was wounded at Verdun. By the end of the war, he moved to serve in the aviation. He served as a military pilot in the Richthofen squadron under the command of Hermann Goering. 1919 Hess becomes a member of the Thule Society. Then he joined one of the units of the "Volunteer Corps" under the command of General Franz von Epp. 1920 - becomes a member of the NSDAP.
Military career
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1923, November - after the suppression of the Beer Putsch, during which he commanded a student assault detachment, fled to Austria. April 1924 - returned and received a year and a half in prison. Hess served his sentence with Hitler, helping him write (in fact - edited) the book "Mein Kampf". 1925, April - becomes Hitler's private secretary. 1932 - head of the political department of the NSDAP.
1933, June 29 - Hess becomes Reich Minister without portfolio. After the reorganization of the military and political leadership by Hitler on February 4, 1938, Hess became part of the so-called. Secret Cabinet. 1939, August 30 - becomes a member of the executive defense council.
At the same time, he was appointed to succeed Hitler after Goering. By a special decree, he was put to control all the activities of the Nazi government and other state structures. Not a single government order, not a single Reich law was valid, without the signature of Hitler or Hess. He was entrusted with making decisions on behalf of Hitler, he was declared "the sovereign representative of the Fuehrer", and his office - "the office of the Fuehrer himself."
Unconditional faith in the Fuhrer
Hess's loyalty to Hitler, who raised him from the lowest to the highest positions in the Reich, was absolute. Immersed in himself, devoid of high intelligence and demagogic talent, Rudolf Hess knew only unconditional faith in his Fuhrer. "Hitler," he said, "is just the personification of pure reason."
1934 - Hess said: “We are proud to see that only one person remains beyond all criticism. Each of us feels and understands that Hitler is always right and that he will always be right. " At one of the Nuremberg party congresses, Hess, as always anticipating the Fuehrer's speech, said: "I was gifted for many years to live and work next to the greatest son of the nation, whom our people must carry through a thousand years of their history."
Mission of Hess
1941, May 10 - Hess, allegedly without the consent of the Fuehrer (many of the researchers do not believe this), flew from Augsburg to Scotland on a Me-110 plane and, having jumped with a parachute, landed near the estate of the Duke of Hamilton, who had supported the Anglo -German rapprochement. As Hess himself later said, this was his fourth attempt - before that three were unsuccessful due to bad weather.
Having landed, he called himself Captain Horn, and only in the Glasgow military hospital, where he was taken due to a slight injury, it was revealed who he really was. Hess was arrested and placed in the Tower. After the very first interrogations, it was found out that he had arrived in Britain on a "peacekeeping mission" - to make peace. At the same time, it became clear that no one instructed him to carry out this mission.
Churchill refused to meet with Hess, and the Fuhrer declared him crazy. After Hess fled to the British, a secret purge was arranged by Heinrich Müller in his former circle. All people more or less close to him were arrested - employees, adjutants, secretaries and even a driver. Several soothsayers and astrologers were also arrested, with whom Hess allegedly consulted before escaping.
Sentence. Death
1946 - he appeared before the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. During the trial, Hess pretended to be mentally ill, demonstratively trying to commit suicide. Faking insanity did not help: he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Hess spent the longest time in prison - other war criminals either died or were released.
According to the official version, on August 17, 1987, 93-year-old Hess committed suicide in Berlin's Spandau prison by hanging himself in a house in the prison garden.
Circumstances of Hess's death
The prison administration explains the circumstances of Hess's death in a dry military manner:
“On August 17 at 13.30 the prisoner was allowed to go out into the garden. Having dressed, at 14.10 he took the elevator downstairs and went to the garden house, where he sat down in a chair and began to read the newspapers. There were two lamps near the chair. After about 5 minutes, the warder looking through the window saw that Hess was lying on the floor with an electric cord around his neck - the end of the wire was tied to the window handle. The warden called in the orderlies who gave the prisoner artificial respiration and heart massage. At 3.30 pm an ambulance arrived in Spandau, Hess was urgently taken to the hospital, and at 4:10 pm, death was pronounced.
According to members of Hess's family, his lawyer, three prison officers, and a medical examination in Munich, Rudolf Hess was strangled to death by intelligence agents.
After death
… Several decades have passed since the death of the last person from the Fuhrer's entourage. His son Wolf-Rüdiger and lawyer Seidl died. Tunisian Melaoui, one of the main witnesses, simply disappeared. Hess's grandson nowadays works as an engineer at one of the large German factories. In a telephone interview, he said that the family, having lost faith in the objectivity of the investigation, withdrew the civil suit from the London court (the hearing lasted 15 years).
So what really happened in Spandau on August 17, 1987?
Hess was buried by relatives in the cemetery of the Bavarian town of Wunsiedel, and on the tombstone, according to his lifetime request, they wrote: Ich hab's gewagt ("I dared to do that"). This is a line from the medieval "New Song of Herr Ulrich von Hutten":
The grave immediately turned into a place of pilgrimage for neo-Nazis. It was repeatedly desecrated by representatives of the Jewish communities, who considered Hess responsible for organizing the Holocaust. 2011 - the local church community demanded that Hess's body be removed from the cemetery. It was removed from the grave, cremated and given to relatives. The headstone is destroyed.
Interesting Facts
It was Hess who introduced the word “Fuhrer” into circulation. The last years of his life, “Prisoner No. 7,” as the guards of Hess were called, spent absolutely alone in a huge prison complex of 132 cells, designed for 600 prisoners. He alone was guarded by 100 troops from the Soviet Union, England, France and America, and these "services" cost a million dollars every year.