Heinrich Himmler letters found in Israel shed light on leading Nazi
Stash of documents gives an insight into one of the men most responsible for the Holocaust
Lost letters, photographs and diaries by Heinrich Himmler have been discovered in Israel, shedding new light on one of the men most directly responsible for the Holocaust.
The stash of Nazi-era documents is held in a Tel Aviv bank vault, but has been authenticated by the German federal archive, the world's leading authority on material from the period. Its contents are to be published over eight days in the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag, starting yesterday with Himmler's letters to his wife Margarete.
The letters portray a man whose cheerful mood is often at odds with the historical crime he helped to orchestrate. "I am travelling to Auschwitz. Kisses, your Heini," he wrote to his wife before setting off to inspect the concentration camp where he directed the killing of some 1.5 million people, mostly Jews.
Himmler and his wife shared anti-Semitic feelings, as well as a joint dislike of Weimar-era Berlin. "Poor sweetie, has to tussle with those wretched Jews over money," the SS leader wrote to his spouse on April 16, 1928.
In November 1938, after the Kristallnacht pogroms that her husband had directed, Margarete Himmler wrote in her diary: "All this Jew business, when will this pack leave us so that we can enjoy our lives?"