The Heritage Paper

Chapter 43



Maggie sat beside him. Trusting him again. “My history teacher said Hitler shot himself in the mouth while chewing down on a cyanide tablet. And his wife overdosed on pills.”

Youkelstein cringed. “Did your teacher explain to your class that the blood on the wall of the room was A2, which correlates with Eva Braun, not Hitler?

“Did your teacher explain why no signs of a gunshot residue or cyanide poisoning were found in Hitler’s corpse?”

Maggie shrugged.

“Did your teacher explain why the body of Eva Braun had six steel fragments lodged in her chest and severe injuries to the thorax, that even the most novice forensic doctor would recognize as a death from shrapnel injuries? And last I checked, no recorded suicide ever occurred from shrapnel wounds.

“And did your teacher explain to you how a man who had such severe Parkinson’s that he walked by throwing his torso forward and dragging his legs behind him, and shook constantly, somehow held a gun in his mouth and bit on a cyanide capsule at the same time?”

Maggie sighed. “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger.”

Youkelstein had written a book over twenty years ago that laid out his theory of how Hitler was murdered, but only today could he connect a motive. In the end, Himmler attempted to negotiate his safety with the Allies, but it became clear that they would never consider him anything but a war criminal, and he was forced to take the Apostle escape hatch to ensure his survival. But he wasn’t going to play second fiddle to anyone, especially the young child that Hitler proclaimed to be his chosen successor—a bizarre and reckless decision likely driven by the syphilis that was eating away at his brain. So Himmler began a plan of divide and conquer within the group before the war even ended. To control the Apostles he had to remove its leader. He needed to kill Adolf Hitler, and Bormann, who was always willing to attach himself to the winner, was his handpicked man to do it.

Youkelstein explained to Maggie that the expectation was for Hitler and his new wife, Eva Braun, to commit suicide on April 30, 1945. At 3:30 in the afternoon, following Hitler’s marriage to Eva and a long ceremonial goodbye, their ‘much publicized’ and ‘expected’ suicide was to take place. So much so that Hitler’s physician, Dr. Haas, had even tested the cyanide on Hitler’s dog Blondi. But they never were going to kill themselves.

“Which means that someone was going to have to do it for them. The SS guards who protected the lower bunker—the ones controlled by Himmler—locked the doors, supposedly to provide privacy for the Hitlers to end their lives. This left only Goebbles, Bormann, Hitler, along with his driver, Lidge, and Dr. Haas.

“Hitler was unceremoniously strangled to death in his room. For her part, Eva tried to fight off her husband’s attacker, which is how her blood got on the wall. She was helpless to stop it, before being whisked away. A doppelganger was then buried in her place.

“The dental records proved that the corpse burned in the garden was indeed Adolf Hitler. But the cause of death never added up. Those who found him recorded the smell of almonds coming from in his mouth, but when his organs were sent for further testing, no cyanide was detected in his tissues—an obvious attempt to stuff poison into an already dead Hitler’s mouth to make it appear to be a suicide. But by that time, nobody really cared about the how and why, all that was important was that the monster was dead. There was no clamoring for further investigation.

“But when Bormann peeled away the layers, even a dumb block of cement like him was able to figure out that he was being set up to be Himmler’s patsy, and he made a run for it. That is why he never joined the other Apostles in the States … not because he was a casualty of war.”

Maggie appeared unimpressed. “Hitler was murdered by his own people, fine, whatever, but it doesn’t solve our problem. I think we should concentrate on what made him choose Josef to be his successor. One minute you’re saying it was because he was crazy, and then you tell me how he was pretending to be nuts to pull off an escape—it’s the same stuff they tried to say about Oma. Make up your mind, which is it?”

She had a point, and she wasn’t finished. “You know what’s also weird? That they killed him, but they didn’t kill his wife ... at least not the real one. Did you ever try to find her in one of your Nazi hunts?”

He clicked a picture of Eva Braun onto the wall. It was a glamour shot from 1945 when she was in her early thirties. No, he hadn’t looked for her. Why would he? She wasn’t a Nazi criminal—just some dimwit who obsessed on fame, which she gained for being the Führer’s girlfriend, but not until after her presumed death.

Then it hit him.

Youkelstein headed for the door. He realized that he’d already found her.