| CENTRAL STORE 2 UNIVERSITY LIBRARY NOTTINGHAM ee VS t hte PERT perens ~aee es a = set Chass Mark 9/ 253- R44 Book No} OG Ohi boi UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM LIBRARY ES OS SRG ORI SOS EPR PEPE 2 PRESENTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM from the bequest of Hyman Fagan, Esq., 1990. a 22 — p OTTINGHAM i ae cece ene APY : Ty S & & > rT. a eee eI (#) S \ | pee 1 Ld STA \ > | Veto, pee | peas \ ay 6} get r mn ain 3 = | ig to the ‘text ‘of ofan. eerianee read ab rimes trial here today. ~M. Kempner, deported from Germany. in "1935. former Minister of the Interior—and now a US. ational law expert, disclosed this today whén present- e Case against Frick—the man who had turned him | — out. Z REMBERG, "Weduesiass oi mberg gaol that he’ or the Reichstag fire anted it that w SFENy It was Dr. Kenmnertone |}merly a Berlin judge thrown jinto a concentration camp. when Hitler came to power— who questioned Goering Ap | his cell. He asked Goering how it was | possible for him to have told his s s »q m Goering: ifs Arete fio Riia's ‘ Press agent an hour after the Reichstag caught fire that the Communists were responsible, ** Doubtful ”” Goering said, it was stated: |“ When I came to the Reichstag |the Fuehrer and this gentleman | (the Press agent) were there, was doubtful at the time but. it was their opinion that the Com- | munists had started the fire.” aa Dr. Kempner: “Why did the | Fuehrer want to issue at once a tatement that the Communists had tarted the fire? “He was convinced. of ba iyseb wb hts if I § ,UBUIOIN( ‘A[JIOUS SUSIE -ared AOT]qnd sioul YIM yor}: 34} Of UINjar TTA sysnoioq eul0sS ‘asuods: 9[SUIS B JNOUIIM 'Sj9071Ss O¢ NOC UI SIeployesnoy 4oeyUOD 0} s104r “SeAUT 94g pesoidue sey Aouyor ‘sooejd eul0S UT pesn wussq st SuUISieApe eueuta ‘susteduit | taysod iTay} dn Mojjoy 01 saesst “UBD BSUISN aae sysnorog jsop "pres ¢ « OTGM YJIOM st JI. uayy ‘settrun Mo9y 8 UsAad IO} sawoy Aous -ieu1s Aue pednpoid sey eedde at JI,, “STPIOWJO SIt{ Jo suo Aq 4YstU 4s1 Ppessoidxe SEM—PdsAT[OAUT SUleTqou Omm1 TIRE TO ATPMP CT NTTIM—.IMTCH) THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG DATE DUE FOR RETURN 7— mineoerry | IRBRARY UNIVERSITY LIShA ay 14 may 2007 A Ga~ - “ee SEM HALL 12 THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG by DOUGLAS REED Special Correspondent of The Times at the Leipzig Trial y% | INGHA AF ss sy LONDON VICTOR GOLLANCZ LTD 14 Henrietta Street Covent Garden 1934 LC S401 SUlo Printed in Great Britain by The Camelot Press Ltd., London and Southampton Chapter I. CONTENTS Foreword Germany at the Crossroads ene lire The Morrow The Law of Suspect Seven Months of Preparation The Reichstag Fire Trial Opening Scenes The Chief Defendant Imbecile or Simulant? The Revolutionary Leader Popoff The Parliamentary Communist Taneff The Vagrant The Amateur Incendiary A German Judge High Politics in Neukolln The Compleat Incendiary van der Lubbe Torgler’s Alibi The Case for the Prosecution Beamtenbeleidigung Dimitroff The Bulgarians’ Alibis Denials and Admissions From Leipzig to Berlin The Beginnings of the Fire The Drama Re-enacted A Deputy in Flight The Tunnel Footsteps in the Night 6 Ch. XXXII >,6,OG UNE XXXIV. XXXV. Witnesses for the Prosecution Faust or Fawkes ? Hilarious Interludes “* That is the Man!” * Mistaken Identity ? ” On Perjury and other Things Strange Tales from the Gaols CONTENTS A Time-Table Powers of Observation The Storm Troop Commander The Dash through the Reichstag David and Jonathan The Storm Troops and the Trial The Watchful Waiter The Propaganda Minister The Charlady and the Lodger “ With the Nazis !” The Unnamed Deputy Courtesies in Court Political Prisoners ““ Monkey Grothe ” Return to Leipzig The Awakening of van der Lubbe More Tales from the Gaols “ Moral Responsibility ”’ What was Proved ? ** Certified Sane ” “Death for Torgler Lubbe ! ” The Innocence of the Bulgarians “A Rebellious Ragamuffin ” “ An Honest Simpleton ” and van Dimitroff’s ““ Wasted Time ” The Verdict Unanswered Questions Aftermath The Last Act page 157 159 164 17a 174 180 189 195 205 209 213 226 233 237 242 247 250 253 255 256 260 263 264 272 278 295 393 310 317 319 323 326 329 337 343 351 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Reconstructing the Fire facing page 112 Plan of Reichstag 120 The Reichstag 126 The Tunnel 150 FOREWORD Tue creater part of this book was written during the trial of the five men accused of firing the Reichstag. It was thus written in ignorance of the verdict : but in the conviction that four of these men, on the evidence, were innocent of all connexion with the fire. This leads of necessity to the further conviction that the great historical question, ““Who fired the Reichstag?” remains for the future to answer, and has not been answered by the trial. There is only one small qualification to this conviction, a qualification that a logical mind, while instinctively rejecting, must not alto- gether dismiss: that Marinus van der Lubbe fired the Reichstag alone and unaided. The weight of evidence and probability against this theory—the chief and inveterate exponent of which was van der Lubbe himself—is over- whelming, but in a world which every day produces proof that nothing is impossible a tiny pigeon-hole of credulity must be reserved for it. The German counsel who represented the accused, in understanding with their clients, only defended them against the charge of personal guilt or responsibility for the fire, or for specific acts of terrorism. They did not defend the Communist Party or Communism. When the moral responsi- bility of Communism, or the question whether it is the policy of Communism to encourage or to prevent isolated acts of terrorism were under discussion—as under German rules of evidence they frequently were—it was left to the accused men to defend themselves and their party, if they wished. The author of this book does not aspire to defend or attack anybody, but only to tell the story of the events which began on the night of February 27, 1933, as far as it is known, fe) THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG A coherent narrative of developments which began from the assumption that Communism was the culprit cannot avoid reference to this question of guilt, for the arguments directed against this assumption, and the counter-accusations with which everyone is familiar, played an important part in the trial. CHAPTER I GERMANY AT THE CROSSROADS “Tue REICHSTAG IS ON FIRE!” These words, hum- ming over the telegraph and telephone wires to the further- most ends of the earth, set an already expectant world agog on the night of February 27, 1933, and on the succeeding days. Herr Adolf Hitler, one-time corporal in a Bavarian regiment and now leader of the urgent National Socialist movement, having long been denied the Chancellorship by the veteran President, Field Marshal von Hindenburg, had at length received this post from his hands but twenty-seven days before. Elections called by him, at which his National Socialists and their Nationalist allies could not hope to obtain a majority of the votes, impended but six days hence. What did the future hold ? Were the National Socialists, clamorous to build a new Germany, to remain the prisoners of the small Nationalist group in a Nazi-Nationalist coalition, just as the Socialists, when in coalition, had always been the prisoners of other parties ? Were they to be for ever baulked in their plans by the danger that their allies would desert them, or even combine with the Socialists to thwart them ? The world was intently watching. Fifteen months of recurrent elections—and for that matter fourteen years of Republican Parliamentarism—had shown that in Germany, other things being equal, no one party could ever obtain a clear majority, far less the two-thirds majority necessary to override the Constitution and impose on the country any one particular doctrine. Parliamentary politics in Germany could only be a thing of coalitions. The Socialists, irresolute from the start, had long since resigned themselves to a future of alternating coalition and opposition, 12 THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG The Communists, far more impotent against the forces of State authority than the National Socialists, who claimed the moral advantage of patriotism, were working for “ the dictatorship of the proletariat,” but had no perceptible prospects of bringing it about. Absolute power was essential if the National Socialists were to build the “‘ Third Reich” of their dreams, in which Nationalism was to be the better half of Socialism. Absolute power could not be gained at the polls : power could not be seized by force, in normal conditions, against the other parties, the steadfast police and the Reichswehr. The Reichstag fire broke the spell. The conflagration that then shed its glow over Berlin was soon extinguished : but its effects for Germany, Europe, and the world are still in- calculable, for the absolute Hitlerist State, with all that it yet may mean, was built on the ashes of the Reichstag session chamber. “A sign from Heaven!” said Herr Hitler, as he surveyed the smoking ruins. The fire, indeed, was a signal—not for a rising of the Communists, but for their suppression. Immediately attri- buted to the Communists, all the things were done in the public consternation following the fire that could not with any semblance of legality have been done in normal times. During the night from 4,000 to 5,000 Communist leaders and local secretaries, whose addresses had been carefully listed, were arrested by police or by Nazi Storm Troopers, the latter acting either at the orders of General (then Captain) Goring or of their Berlin leader, Count Helldorf —both claimed responsibility in court. On the day after the fire the President gave his signature to a decree “for the protection of the nation from the Communist danger,” which authorized arrest and imprison- ment without trial, the suppression of newspapers, the seizure of property, domiciliary visitation, and the like. These powers—their grant again justified by the assumption of Communist guilt—were wielded not only by the police but by the Nazi Storm Troopers, who quickly established GERMANY AT THE CROSSROADS 13 and filled concentration camps with political captives. The elections, held under the immediate influence of the fire, brought an enormous accession of votes to the National Socialists, and even, after the elimination of the Com- munist Party, a bare majority in Parliament. But the elimination of the Communist Party, as the alleged culprit, was only the beginning of a process which overtook all other political parties, until, in July, a Bill, promulgated by Herr Hitler under the four-year power of attorney vested in him by the subdued Reichstag of March, laid down that only one party, his own, existed in Germany, and made the formation of other parties illegal. By the autumn, Herr Hitler was the virtual dictator of Germany, and the seven- teen States Governments had been practically superseded by Governors appointed by him. Who fired the Reichstag? The question has no longer any practical importance, for in November nine Germans in every ten voted confidence in Herr Hitler’s policy at home and abroad, and thus indemnified him for everything that had been done in the struggle to gain absolute power, including the attribution of guilt to the Communists. But historically the question is justified, and is important. Whose brain conceived the exploit that has had such momentous consequences for the world—for the world is now asking what the absolute National Socialist State portends for the future—and whose hands laid the match? Did van der Lubbe do it alone, as he insisted, and as the experts insisted he could not have done ? Was he responsible for his actions ? Did he even know who his accomplices were, if he had accomplices, as General Géring was convinced ?Who were these accomplices, and why did he shield them? Was he anarchist, mental deficient, or dupe? It is a problem that is likely to baffle students of history for long to come. The assumption of Communist guilt, as is well known, did not find universal credence in Germany, and met almost universal scepticism abroad. The Socialist Vorwdrts, on the morning after the fire, said, ** Tf this was I4 THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG arson, then the culprits must be sought in circles which wished by their deed to give expression to their hatred for the parliamentary system.” Vorwdrts never appeared again. The Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, which was nearly National Socialist, said it was incomprehensible that a Communist could have been found who was so foolish as to commit the crime: “ We fear that closer examination of the presup- positions for the well-known statement made by the Minister of the Interior will show that the charge he made cannot be maintained. If that is the case, it would have been better not to have raised it.” Abroad the suggestion was made, explicitly and impli- citly, that the National Socialists had fired the Reichstag. These suggestions found their most explicit form in the Brown Book of the Hitler Terror, issued by a World Committee for the Victims of German Fascism. Any case this book may have set out to prove was weakened by the inclusion of demonstrable mis-statements among much matter worthy of consideration. Its arguments rested largely on a memoran- dum stated to have been prepared by Dr. Oberfohren (the Nationalist Parliamentary leader, who was found dead in his dwelling on May 7). This alleged that Dr. Goebbels, then the Nazi Propaganda Chief, had conceived the idea of the fire ; that General Goring, as Acting Minister of the Interior in Prussia, had supervised its execution ; and that Herr Heines, the Nazi Storm Troop leader for Silesia, Lieutenant Schulz, who like Herr Heines had figured in a “* patriotic’ murder case, and Count Helldorf, the Nazi Storm Troop leader for Berlin, had carried it out, taking their tool, van der Lubbe, with them by way of the under- ground passage into the Reichstag and leaving him there to be captured. In the trial it was irrefutably shown that Herr Heines at any rate was on F ebruary 27 electioneering in Gleiwitz, and that Herr Schulz was taking medical advice in Bavaria. The authenticity of the Oberfohren Memoran- dum was not established. It was further stated that van der Lubbe would confess to everything that his employers desired, GERMANY AT THE CROSSROADS 15 that he would give such evidence against his fellow defendants as he was told to give, and that he would inculpate everyone whom his National Socialist friends wished to destroy. Actually van der Lubbe stubbornly refused to inculpate anybody but himself: he denied alike all knowledge of his Communist co-defendants and all connexion with National Socialists ; and insisted that he fired the Reichstag un- prompted, unaided, and alone. An “International Commission of Enquiry into the Burn- ing of the Reichstag” heard many refugee witnesses in London, and came to the conclusion that van der Lubbe’s four co-defendants had no connexion whatsoever with the Reichstag fire. The Commission went further : it found that no connexion could be traced between the Communist Party and the burning of the Reichstag, and expressed the suspicion that the Reichstag was fired by, or on behalf of, leading personalities of the National Socialist Party. With this direct clash of charge and counter-charge the stage was set for an enthralling political drama when, nearly seven months after the fire, the five men charged with causing it came for trial before the Supreme Court of the Reich at Leipzig. National Socialism was on its mettle. Its innocence must be vindicated, and the guilt of Com- munism had to be demonstrated to a sceptical world. CHAPTER Il THE FIRE A LITTLE AFTER NINE 0’CLOCK, and a cold, raw night, with a crust of caked snow lying in patches on the asphalt of the great thoroughfare which traverses Berlin from east to west. Driving through the Tiergarten in these conditions demands especial care, and I slowed to a walking pace as I came to the narrow arches of the Brandenburger Tor, the great gateway beyond which the Charlottenburger Chaussee 16 THE BURNING OF THE REICHSTAG changes its name to Unter den Linden. Suddenly I became aware that something was afoot : there was a man running, a small group of people gazing fixedly in the same direction, the distant clangour of a fire-engine. Putting my head through the open window of my car, I saw the great four-square mass of the Reichstag, a hundred yards to my left, surmounted by a ball of fire. Flames were leaping high through the glowing metal framework of the central cupola ; clouds of sparks and ashes rose into the air and were distributed by the wind over the snow-clad Tiergarten, its trees bathed in a sombre red glow. A meagre throng of Berliners, the accumulation of a few minutes, watched the fire from a respectful distance. Quickly turning my car to the left, I parked it at the kerb- stone a few yards from the Reichstag, and using the tele- Phone in the lodge of a friendly concierge, called the office of my newspaper in Berlin to tell London that the Reichstag was burning and that I was about to enter the building. These words—“ The Reichstag is burning ! ” travelled over the telephone wires scores of thousands of times that night : but this call must have been among the first to Carry them. They were uttered with mingled feelings : the apprehension of the average individual for what this fire might mean, and the exhilaration of the journalist who by chance finds him- self an eye-witness of great events, Running across the road, I came to Portal Two—the Deputies’ entrance—just as a massive figure in a voluminous trench-coat and a soft hat turned up in front passed, with several companions, into the building, and I added myself to them. There were already one or two policemen inside, and firemen were bringing a hose through the doorway. The energetic man in the trench-coat was of resolute mien, know what he was doing there. This man, a newspaper man telephoning to his office, went through an unpleasant