The FSB has published new archival documents concerning the circumstances of the suicide of the leader of the National Socialist Workers’ Party of Germany Adolf Hitler and the destruction of his body by the Fuhrer’s subordinates at the end of April 1945.
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In 2022, the service published materials from the investigative case against Hitler’s former personal pilot, SS Gruppenfuhrer and police Lieutenant General Hans Baur, stored in the archive of its department for the Novgorod Region. Along with the documents on Baur himself, materials with information about other people who were in an underground bunker under the Reich Chancellery in Berlin in April — early May 1945 were preserved in the case.
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The FSB has published new archival documents about Hitler’s suicide. These are the stories of the former commander of the mortar regiment Arthur Schwartz, who was sitting in the same cell with the adjutant of the Fuhrer Otto Gunsche, who was arrested in May 1945.
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According to the memoirs of Gunsche, reproduced by Schwartz, “recently Hitler behaved in such a way that one would think that his mental balance was completely broken.”
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“Hitler declared that in no case did he want to be captured, either alive or dead, and therefore intended to commit suicide. Only a few of the people around him were privy to this,” Schwartz said.
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All of Hitler’s confidants, arrested in May 1945 by the Soviet military counterintelligence Smersh, were taken to Moscow, to the internal prison of the NKVD of the USSR. Among them was Hitler’s personal aide—de-camp, SS Sturmbannfuhrer Otto Gunsche.
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In the inner prison, Gunshe was placed in the same cell with the former commander of the mortar regiment, Colonel Arthur Schwartz, who was captured in January 1943. Gunsche told his cellmate about the events that took place in the bunker in the last days of the existence of the Third Reich.
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Materials containing Schwartz’s statements made in May 1945 during the investigation are now being published. Schwartz reproduced what Gunsche had told him about what was happening in Hitler’s bunker and about the circumstances of the Fuhrer’s suicide.
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Schwartz recounted the daily routine in the “Fuhrerbunker” in the last days of the Nazi regime: “Hitler slept until 13 o’clock, then had breakfast and worked on the wire, meetings. At about 16:30 (Chief of Staff of the Ground Forces. — Ed.) Krebs reported to him about the situation at the front, then the meetings continued.”
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“At 21:00-22:00 dinner, then Hitler rested until zero o’clock, at 2:00 discussions of the situation on the fronts were held again (usually only in the presence of a General Staff officer), which lasted until four o’clock in the morning. Then Hitler drank tea and worked until seven o’clock in the morning,” Schwartz added.
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“Hitler declared that in no case did he want to be captured, either alive or dead, so he intended to commit suicide. Only a few of the people around him were privy to this,” Schwartz showed.
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Gunsche also told Schwartz why, in his opinion, Hitler married Eva Braun at the very last moment before his suicide.
