Hermine by Moniek Bloks

Author:Moniek Bloks
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
Published: 2020-10-22T00:00:00+00:00

After the meeting, newspapers immediately jumped on the story.89

She was still in Berlin when the Reichstag building was set on fire and claimed that her life and that of the Emperor’s sons had been in danger. The following Reichstag Fire Decree of 28 February suspended basic rights and allowed detention without trial. Just a few days later, the NSDAP managed to get 43.9 percent of the votes during the election. Hermine believed that the monarchist movement was making progress and she returned from Berlin a happy woman. Reportedly, Nazi-leader Ernst Röhm had said to expect a monarchy by the autumn. In April, Sigurd von Ilsemann wrote that Hermine had totally turned the Emperor to the Nazi cause. Around this time, Prince Wilhelm had written to his grandfather about his marriage to Dorothea von Salviati. He had come to realise that she was definitely the woman for him and that no one was going to stop him from marrying her. “Wilhelm is damaging the monarchist movement with this engagement, just as it’s making progress,” the Emperor said. He immediately sent General von Dommes to Bonn in an attempt to change the Prince’s mind.90 However, his mind could not be changed. On 5 May 1933, Bella Fromm recorded in her diary, “Today I met Prince Wilhelm, the eldest son of the Crown Prince. He is engaged to be married to Dorothea von Salviati from Bonn. ‘Grandfather and my parents were mad at me. But I shall marry her anyway,’ he said. ‘I renounce my rights. You know, Grandfather really lives in the illusion that the Nazis are going to restore our throne!’”91 When the wedding day was upon them, Count Finckenstein told Sigurd von Ilsemann, “Today is the day that Prince Wilhelm smears the Hohenzollern race and breaks the principle of legitimacy.”92

Meanwhile the Emperor confided in Sigurd von Ilsemann about Hermine, “My wife’s barometer is stuck on storm again. She is in an unbearable state. Politically, she means well. My return to the throne cannot happen fast enough for her but we won’t get there with her way. She follows the Nazis and does all she can in Berlin, and in writing from here, which does more damage than good. I try to give her a good example with my reserved attitude. I’ll have them come to me. I will not follow those people. If I am ever able to take up the reins of government again, then providence will take care of it. For that we must now wait with calm, dignity and reservedness. Her Majesty says that it is my fault that we have not gotten any further, because I let Kleist and von Levetzow go. Through them I had the necessary contact with the Nazis. Well, thanks for that. What has von Levetzow done in those five years? Absolutely nothing, despite the enormous sums I paid him. And Kleist, what has he done? He brought the second man of the Nazis, Göring, here and he behaved rudely too! Yes, it is sad that Her Majesty is making my life so difficult.

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