One of the most evil regimes seen in World History was the Nazis, and Hitler sought to
build a new empire that he hoped would span continents.
But during the Second World War he would make a series of mistakes that would lead to the
Germans and the Nazis losing the conflict, and inside of his bunker in Berlin Hitler
would concede that the war was lost.
He was surrounded during his time in power by a number of incredibly powerful men who’s
names today have gone down in history for their evil and links to war crimes and the
horrors of the concentration camp system.
But alongside these men were a number of women who stood by their husbands, and a number
of the wives of the senior nazis were more ardent and staunch supporters of Hitler than
their husbands were.
Many were loved by Hitler, including the wife of Joseph Goebbels, and the couple were even
given marriage counselling and advice from the Dictator of Nazi Germany.
But who were the wives of the senior nazis, and what happened to them at the end of the
Second World War?
Join us today to find out and remember to support our channel, please make sure to subscribe.
Despite having little power inside of the Nazi heirarchy herself, Eva Braun was the
long time companion and brief wife of Adolf Hitler.
Eva met Hitler when she was 17 and when she worked as a assistant and also model for his
personal photographer, and Hitler was infatuated.
At the time he had a rather bizarre history of relationships including being linked romantically
to his niece, but Eva Braun would win out over her.
Hitler lived with his half niece Geli Raubal, however she died suspiciously from a gunshot
wound sustained with Hitler’s own pistol.
But it’s believed that Hitler’s fledgling relationship with Braun may have led to Geli
Raubal’s death.
Eva Braun would also attempt to take her own life twice, as she shot herself with her father’s
pistol and many historians have claimed that this was not serious and was a plea for more
attention from Hitler.
But following this the pair became more committed, but she would try again to end her life after
Hitler couldn’t make time for her.
Eva Braun was much in the shadow of her boyfriend whilst he was in power, and she was never
allowed to stay in the room when important political conversations occurred.
During the war she would never be involved in Hitler’s war cabinet meetings, but she
remained almost in secret, to the point that thousands of Germans would never know that
she was involved in a relationship with the Dictator.
She enjoyed a lot of time at Hitler’s mountain retreat at Obersalzburg known as the Berthed,
and she hosted many parties here.
It was said in the evenings here that she and Hitler had interconnecting doors at the
Berghof, and that Hitler spent most of his evenings working alone in his study, and then
the pair would retire to bed.
Eva would spend the evenings drinking wine in her dressing gown or house coat, and the
couple would never display affection towards each other.
She remained by the side of her man until the very end of the Second World War, and
she was rewarded by marrying Hitler in the evening of the 29th April 1945, and this was
witnessed by Goebbels and Martin Bormann.
But around 1pm on the 30th April 1945, along with Hitler, Eva Braun bid farewell to the
remaining members of the inner circle inside of the Bunker and also the staff of the Fuhrerbunker.
At 3:30pm a loud gunshot was heard, and Hitler’s valet and adjutant entered the study and found
Eva Braun and Hitler slumped on a sofa, with Eva Braun having bitten down on a cyanide
capsule, and inside the office the smell of burned almonds emanated around.
Heinrich Himmler became the second most powerful person inside of Nazi Germany as the Head
of the SS, and it was believed that many SS members were more loyal to Himmler than the
actual dictator.
He met his wife Margarete Boden in 1927, and she was 7 years older than him.
Margarete was a nurse who was interested in homeopathy, and she owned a small private
clinic.
The pair met during one of his lecture tours, and they wrote to each other.
But Margarete was a blonde haired blue eyed nurse, and she was Himmler’s ideal woman.
The couple lived a life in a sense was very Nazified, and Margarete would listen to her
husband’s rants, and she too was very antisemitic.
The couple married in July 1928, and none of Himmler’s family attended the wedding.
The couple had one child, a daguther named Gudrun, and they were also foster parents
to a boy that became later an SS officer.
Himmler was always busy, so his wife took charge of their farm and business to raise
livestock.
She was described as an exemplary housewife who devoted herself to her husband, and she
stayed loyal to him.
During his rise to power, their relationship suffered, and the couple united for social
occasions, however Himmler would stray.
Himmler had a mistress named Hedwig Potthast, and she would father two of Himmler’s children.
Hedwig would see Himmler when he wasn’t busy which was very few and far between, and
it’s not known how much she knew about Himmler’s work in the SS and what was happening inside
of the concentration camps.
She would learn about Himmler’s death on the radio and she went into hiding, but was
arrested by the US Army and was interrogated in Munich.
But she remained in close contact with Himmler’s older brother and his former confidants.
However himmler’s mistress died in 1994 at the age of 82, and remained quiet about
Himmler’s responsibility for the huge crimes.
But his wife Margarete would have a more hands on role during world war 2, as despite being
separated she helped to run a German Red Cross hospital.
She remained anti semitic and a staunch Nazi and she then also reached the rank of Colonel
in the German Red Cross, and she said of her husband ‘"How wonderful that he has been
called to great tasks and is equal to them.
The whole of Germany is looking to him."
In 1945 she went on the run, but was arrested and interrogated but it was clear she didn’t
know much about her husband’s activity.
She was considered a lesser offender according to denazification, and she was not considered
accountable for the crimes of her husband.
Her final years were spent in Munich in an apartment, and she had been stripped of her
right to note and also her rights to claim a pension.
She died in 1967 at the age of 73.
Hermann Goring, the flamboyant Reichsmarshall and Head of the Luftwaffe was married twice.
His first wife Carin Goring was Swedish, and they married in 1923.
They lived in a house in the suburbs of Munich, and she cared for him following his injuries
in the wake of the failed Beer Hall Putsch.
The couple travelled Germany together to further the Nazi cause, however Carin suffered from
tuberculosis.
In September 1931 her mother died and Carin travelled to Sweden to attend the funeral,
however she had a heart attack the following day and died of heart failure on the 17th
October 1931.
Her death had a huge effect on Goring, and he built a hunting lodge named after her.
But Hermann’s second wife was Emmy Goring who became known as ‘The First Lady of the
Third Reich,’ and she was Hitler’s hostess at many state functions and important meetings.
They married in 1935, and together they had a daughter Edda.
Emmy Goring’s relationship with Hitler attracted criticism and animosity from Eva Braun who
Emmy greatly disliked.
Hitler was known for bellowing at Goring for his wife to have more respect for Eva, but
she was a prominent public figure.
Goring himself was one of the richest men in Europe, and Emmy was part of this, and
she lived in mansions and castles with the walls adorned with stolen artwork.
At the end of the war, her husband was placed on trial and Goring would later escape the
hangman noose, but Emmy Goring was sentenced to a year in jail for being a staunch Nazi.
She had 30% of her property confiscated also, and she spent the rest of her life in a small
flat in Munich before she died at the age of 80 in 1973.
The love life of Joseph Goebbels was tumultuous and shocking, and despite being married to
Magda, a woman who was considered Hitler’s best friend, he would have a number of mistresses
many of whom were high profile actresses.
Magda Goebbels his wife, had previously been married to a rich industrialist who was twice
her age, but in 1930 she attended a Nazi meeting and she was impressed by the speaker, Joseph
Goebbels who was the Gauleiter of Berlin.
She joined the Nazi party, and then the couple became involved with each other on a trip
to Weimar in 1931.
Magda was a staunch Nazi herself and she was an ambitious woman who wanted to be at the
very top of the Nazi party.
She had a close friendship with Hitler and she would work for him writing and receiving
letters from women inside of Germany and she would consult on these problems.
But as mentioned, her husband had many affairs throughout their marriage, and one woman a
Czech Actress named Lida Baarova almost took Joseph away from her.
Magda spoke to Hitler about this and Hitler was not happy about one of his closest friends
and top ministers having a scandalous affair that would be all over the newspapers.
Hitler insisted that they stayed together, but Magda would also have a number of affairs.
During the Second World War, Magda in quiet would believe that the war was not going well
fore Germany and she would in quiet criticisize hitler.
But she remained devoted to the Fuhrer.
She was not a well woman, but as the Soviet’s entered Berlin the Goebbels family took up
residence in the Fuhrerbunker.
It was clear that Magda had no intention of living out the war, and she would kill her
children inside of the bunker shortly after hitler’s death.
She rejected offers to smuggle her children out of the bunker and she made the decision
to kill them.
But she then after this with her husband died by their own hand inside the garden of the
Reich Chancellery.
Magda consumed cyanide and was then given a coup de grace afterwards.
Described as the Butcher of Prague, Reinhard Heydrich’s involvement in the Second World
War and the SS saw thousands of people killed and executed.
He was a brute of a man who ordered large scale executions to pacify the population
he was overseeing.
He was seen by Hitler and Himmler as the ideal aryan.
His wife was Lina Heydrich, who joined the Nazi party in 1929, and the two would marry
in 1931 and they had four children.
It was Lina who convinced her husband to take up a position in the SS, and she packed his
suitcase for his interview.
Heydrich would be killed by SOE trained assassins in Prague in 1942, and following his death
Lina was given the country estate of Jungfern-Breschan by Hitler.
On her estate Lina kept a number of prisoner of war working in forced labour.
As the Second World War came to an end, she was allowed to receive a pension and got a
rather large sum because her husband had been involved in the German police when killed.
They had previously refused to pay this, but in Czechoslovakia she was tried in absentia
and was sentenced to life imprisonment as the wife of the Butcher of Prague.
She remarried, and operated her husbands former summer house as a restaurant until it burned
down, and she died in 1985.
Hitler’s private Secretary Martin Bormann attracted a huge amount of hate and criticism
from other members of his inner circle.
He would control access to Hitler and often had the ear of him and turned the dictator
against specific members of the inner circle.
He was seen as a key organiser, and was involved in the Chancellery and he was a brutal man
himself.
He was responsible for thousands of deaths, and what specifically happened to Bormann
is not completely clear today.
In 1929, Martin Bormann married Gerda Buch, and their marriage would produce 10 children.
Hitler would regularly attend the home of Gerda’s father and it was here where the
couple met.
At the wedding Rudolf Hess and Hitler would act as witnesses, but Bormann would also like
Goebbels have a number of mistresses.
Gerda and her children would be in Hitler’s Berghof region at the end of the war, and
in April 1945 they fled following an allied air attack for Italy.
They made it there but within a year Gerda had died from Cancer.
The Bormann children were cared for in foster homes.
Rudolf Hess was appointed the Deputy Fuhrer to Adolf Hitlr in 1933 and he held this position
until he flew on an alleged peace mission to Scotland to negotiate the British exit
from the Second World War.
Hess would be later tried at Nuremberg, and he was considered the last Nazi remaining
in Spandau Prison until 1987.
But he was married to a lady named Ilse.
Ilse met hess in April 1920 in Munich, and she studied at university there and she was
a very early member of the Nazi Party.
Hess was hesitant to enter a relationship with Else, but it was her who introduced Hess
to Hitler.
But Hitler was the one who told Rudolf Hess to marry, and the couple married in December
1927.
They had one child named Wolf, and Hitler was the boy’s godfather, but following his
flight to Scotland Ilse left Munich to live with her son in a small village in Bavaria.
As she was the wife of a prominent nazi, she was arrested and interrogated, but was held
for around 9 months before she was released.
She remained loyal to Hitler until her death, and remained a Nazi until her death in 1995.
The women of the Nazi party and the wives of the high ranking members played an important
role in their husband’s lives.
But many of them remained loyal to the Nazi cause until their final days, long after their
husbands had died or been executed for their war crimes.
Some lived out their lives in obscurity and quiet, but others would make statements to
the media.
They were forgotten women of the Second World War, and their stories are varied and captivating.
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