Bombing Hitler by Hellmut G. Haasis

Author:Hellmut G. Haasis
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781616087418
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing

XII

Elser’s Youth and Working Years in Königsbronn

ALL DURING THEIR investigations, the Gestapo focused on estab-lishing the extent to which Elser’s heredity might have predetermined the assassination attempt, as if a propensity for assassination could be inherited. Right from the beginning, however, Georg Elser showed none of the tendencies that the Gestapo found significant: He didn’t drink, a trait that attracted attention in the Bürgerbräukeller; he had never had a venereal disease; and he didn’t associate with Jews. Most important, there were no members of the clergy among his relations.

There were, however, throughout Elser’s family history, numerous illegitimate children, but this was fairly common in Germany at the time. Contraception was not accessible to many living in rural areas, and marriage was often put off until people could afford a dowry and a place to live. Georg Elser’s illegitimate son Manfred was by no means an anomaly in his family history.

His maternal grandmother, Karolina Müller, had been illegitimate. On December 29, 1879, she bore a daughter by the name of Maria—Georg’s mother. Nine days later she disappeared from her childbed. Her child remained with the father and Karolina was never heard from again. The child’s father first took his daughter to a children’s home and did not return for her until he had married into the family of a carriage maker in Hermaringen, a village south of Heidenheim.

Grandfather Elser was also illegitimate. He took over the family farm in Ochsenberg, near Königsbronn, where he generally enjoyed a good reputation. During a fight at a wedding he hit a wedding guest on the head with a beer mug, for which he spent two months in jail. This incident hardly qualifies as evidence of a hereditary defect. In the end, he died of food poisoning from eating a sausage—a real Swabian, he couldn’t bear to throw away food, even spoiled food.

Georg’s father, Ludwig Elser, was born in 1872 in Ochsenberg, had eighteen siblings, and was a good student in elementary school. When his eldest child Georg was conceived in 1902, Ludwig was a wagoner at a mill in Hermaringen. Georg’s mother Maria worked in the same village at her parents’ farm and helped out there in the household. Georg was born on January 4, 1903, in Hermaringen.

After getting married in 1904, Georg’s parents moved to Königsbronn, a community north of Heidenheim. There Ludwig ran a hauling business—at first with two horses, then later on with four—and he dealt in wood. With the help of an inheritance, he was able to build up a farm. However, it was Maria who had to manage the farm, even though they had small children—the father paid little attention to it.

Georg’s relationship with his father was very difficult for him, but that relationship was of no interest to the Gestapo, even though it was marked by extreme rage and brutality. Georg’s long-standing and deeply rooted aversion to the Nazis had its basis in his experiences with his father. In the interrogation in Berlin, Elser was questioned extensively about his father.

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