In the years since the end of humanity’s most destructive war,
historians have uncovered no less than 42 different plots to kill its mastermind,
Adolf Hitler. But who were these would-be assassins, and how close did they get? In
this video, we shine the spotlight on five plots to kill one of the most hated men in history.
Let's start with by far the strangest recorded attempt on the Fuhrer’s life.
This incident occurred on November 26th, 1937 — two years before the start of the
Second World War Hitler was inside an office in the Reich Chancellery building
in Berlin when a commotion was heard in the hallway. A man by the name of Josef
Thomas had *somehow* managed to get past ALL the security in the building with a pistol
and was meandering around in an attempt to find Hitler and his number-two man,
Hermann Goring. Guards rushed to the scene and disarmed him before a shot was fired.
The Reich Chancellery guards handed Thomas over to the Gestapo — the Nazi’s secret
police force. When interrogated, it became abundantly clear that Thomas was deranged.
Some sources claim he had spent time in an insane asylum before his assassination attempt,
but this is difficult to verify. It is unclear what Thomas’s motivation for killing Hitler and
Goring was, but if the madman had succeeded, the Second World War might never have happened.
Unbelievably, this wasn’t the last time a madman tried to shoot Hitler. Maurice Bavaud, a Swiss
seminary student, nearly got close enough to shoot him several times but was invariably unlucky.
Bavaud was a devout Catholic studying to become a missionary. While at seminary school,
he met Marcel Gerbohay, a charismatic man who claimed to be a Romanov descendant.
Bavaud was enraptured with Gerbohay’s stories and joined his fan club,
“La Compagnie du Mystere.” The club was dedicated to bringing about the fall of extreme left and
right-wing politics in Europe, to preserve Catholicism. As Gerbohay was purportedly a
Romanov, the Company planned to install him on Russia’s throne when Bolshevism was destroyed.
After spending some time with this group,
Bavaud concluded that Hitler was an atheistic agent of Satan, and killing him would save
European Catholicism. Whatever Gerbohay said must’ve been REALLY convincing.
Bavaud bought a pistol and a ticket to Munich for the 15th anniversary of the failed 1923
Beer Hall Putsch. The Nazis held a street march in remembrance of their dead comrades,
and Hitler was sure to be there. Bavaud posed as a Swiss journalist to get close,
but when Hitler was nearest, he was obscured by a gaggle of Nazi elites and SS guards.
Bavaud knew straight away that he couldn’t get a clean shot, and decided to try again later.
After learning that Hitler was en route to Berschetgaden in a few days, Bavaud seized
his chance. Arriving early, he tried to enter Hitler’s residence with a forged letter from a
prominent French nationalist. The guards didn’t buy it, and a demoralized Bavaud was forced to
call off his attempt. Through sheer luck, Hitler had escaped. Bavaud wasn't so lucky, on his return
journey home he was found with an incriminating letter and a gun. The Gestapo made him disappear.
While Bavaud’s attempt on Hitler’s life was foiled by a lack of planning,
another plot was ruined by the assassin’s strict adherence to schedule. The man in question was
Georg Elser, who attempted to blow up the Nazi leadership on November eighth, 1939.
Elser could sense a war on the horizon and was compelled to act.
He saw the Nazi leadership as warmongers and knew that if they were left to their own devices,
Germany would be pulled into another grisly war. A proud working man, Elser had seen the effects of
the Great War on German workers and was determined to avoid another one. He wasn't a communist,
but that didn't stop the Nazis sending him to Dachau for "re-education." When captured
after his bombing, Elser declared, [“I … wanted to prevent[,] by my act[,] even greater bloodshed.”
Elser spiralled into obsession, with his friends noting,
[He] was always extremely interested in some act of violence against Hitler and his cronies.”
He decided to build a bomb and took jobs at a quarry and a clock factory
to steal explosives and parts for a timer. He took these parts to Munich, where Hitler was
due to give a speech at a building called the Bürgerbräukeller on November 8th.
Elser arrived three months early, on August 5th.
By day, he drew up plans and constructed his bomb, while at night, he prepared the Bürgerbräukeller.
He hollowed out a space behind a wooden panel next to the stage, and, after roughly thirty
nights of work, finally fitted his bomb into place with a timer on the night of November 5th.
Hitler was due to give a speech at the Bürgerbräukeller, but the French invasion
needed planning, and he was short on time. It was foggy too, meaning he would have to take the train
back to Berlin that evening instead of flying. Consequently, Hitler decided to cut his speech
short by an hour, and by 9:07 pm, he was finished and out of the building. Thirteen minutes later,
at 9:20, Elser’s bomb went off, bringing down the ceiling, killing 16 people, and injuring 63 more.
For political reasons, the Nazis claimed the bomber was a foreigner,
but Hitler had a different take. He believed his survival was a sign from God, declaring, “My
leaving the Bürgerbräu earlier than usual is proof to me that Providence wants me to reach my goal.”
When it comes to eliminating the Chancellor of Nazi Germany, bombs seem to be the way to go. At
least that’s what Wehrmacht Colonel Rudolf Christoph Freiherr von Gersdorff thought.
As you’ve guessed from his name, Gersdorff was an old-school
Prussian with a strong sense of martial honour. He and his fellow conspirator Henning von Tresckow
were appalled at the treatment of Soviet POWs and Russian civilians by the Wehrmacht.
To avoid becoming even more complicit in genocide, the men plotted to kill Hitler and his top Nazis
and transfer control of Germany to traditional Prussian military authority.
Gersdorff formulated a plan while serving with Tresckow in Army Group Center during the invasion
of Russia. As an expert in enemy weaponry, he had been invited to lead Hitler, Goring, Himmler,
Field Marshal Keitel, and Grand Admiral Donitz through an exhibition of Soviet weapons in Berlin.
Gersdorff planned to light a bomb and keep it inside his coat. When the fuse ran out
after ten minutes, he’d give the Fuhrer a hug of death. It was a suicide mission,
but Gersdorff was committed to the cause. In the words of Tresckow,
“[B]oth duty and honor demand from us that we should do our best to bring about the
downfall of Hitler and National Socialism to save Germany and Europe from barbarism.”
On March 21st, 1943, Hitler was led into the exhibition by the bombed-up Gersdorff. The fuse
had been lit, and in ten minutes, the Nazi high command would be a stain on a blown-out wall.
Contrary to all expectations, Hitler just wasn’t interested in Soviet weapons that day. He simply
strolled through the exhibition and was out the other side in less than ten minutes.
Gersdorff had lost his chance, and, *literally about to explode*, ran into the toilets. According
to his account, the Prussian Colonel managed to diffuse the bomb at “the last second.”
Hitler never found out about Gersdorff’s plot, nor how close he came to death. It wasn’t the
first time a Prussian officer had tried to kill the Fuhrer, and it wouldn’t be the last.
Immortalized in the 2008 film *Operation Valkyrie*, the July 20th plot was the last
recorded attempt on Hitler’s life. It was supported by a staggering proportion of the
military establishment, including nine key conspirators and many other sympathizers.
When the Nazis seized power from the Weimar Republic in 1933, they had to have many key
members of the conservative German elite onside. These elites were descendants of the Prussian
aristocracy which traditionally had an extensive say in German policy. As the years went by and the
Nazi regime grew to dominate all spheres of public life, these old-school elites were beginning to
realise that, in clubbing in with Hitler, their status as leaders of Germany was in jeopardy.
Tresckow was one of the first to realise this and started gathering supporters to eventually
take the Reich back from the Nazis. Before July 1944, there had been five assassination
attempts by Tresckow’s conspirators, including the previously mentioned bombing by Gersdorff.
The July 20th plot was supposed to be the final one, killing Hitler,
ending the war, and setting Germany on a path towards conservative Prussian dictatorship.
The plot was led by the young Lieutenant Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg,
a committed German nationalist who believed Hitler’s dictatorship was a moral evil.
On July 20th, 1944, the plot was set in motion. Stauffenberg placed a bomb in his briefcase and
entered the conference room in the Wolf’s Lair — Hitler’s military headquarters. Hitler and
24 other officers were gathered in the room, discussing military plans, when the bomb went off.
Minutes beforehand, Stauffenberg had received a pre-arranged telephone call and left the building,
saving himself. The blast killed four officers but spared the Fuhrer, who was only slightly wounded.
The conspirators had planned to launch a coup after killing Hitler, but his survival rendered
their plans moot. It had been a colossal failure, and effectively a death sentence.
The Gestapo quickly investigated the plot and had the conspirators purged.
Tresckow stayed true to his beliefs, pledging after his trial, “The whole world
will vilify us now, but I am still totally convinced that we did the right thing.”
“The whole world will vilify us now, but I am still totally convinced that we did
the right thing.”