Bombing Hitler (21 page)

Faced with the increasing manipulation of cultural life by the Nazis, Elser took refuge in music and dancing. Rehearsals were held on Friday or Saturday evening in a side room at the Hecht tavern. Occasionally, dances and concerts were held in a dance hall. In 1934, Konkordia, a glee club with many members, wanted to provide dance music but was lacking a bass. At that point Elser decided to add bass to the list of instruments he could play, so he bought a bass with his own money and started taking lessons. He also became quite accomplished at
Schuhplatteln,
a kind of Bavarian clog dancing.

Elser found yet another way to escape his grim family life by joining a hiking club. The cultural machine had insinuated itself into the club's motto “Strength through joy”, but otherwise there was no evidence of political indoctrination in the organization. It was here in 1933 that he met Elsa Härlen, who by 1936 was to become the love of his short life. There is a group photo taken in the Wental, a beautiful dry valley located in the uplands of the Alb near Steinheim and one of the most popular spots for outings in the area, which shows Elser wearing knickerbockers and standing behind his sweetheart Elsa. He still favored this style of trousers when he was living in Munich, and the investigative branch of the Gestapo made use of this detail in its wanted poster.

The Weisses Rössle in Königsbronn, the most popular place in town during Elser's time.

Georg Elser's work situation was now even more erratic than it was in Konstanz. He moved between the independence offered by his small shop and a regular job in a woodworking shop. This irregularity was brought on by the alimony requirements imposed on him in Konstanz. Whenever he started working at a regular job, the child welfare office soon found out about it from the employment office and moved to seize a large portion of his wages.

When he worked on his own, Elser was extremely conscientious. Paul Bässler of the Stuttgart Gestapo recalled from his investigation: “As a craftsman, he [Elser] produced first-class work. He would prefer to take a loss than have anyone say that his work was not satisfactory. For the most part, he created small boxes as well as grandfather clocks or cases for them.” He produced generally the same items that he had developed in Meersburg.

If orders were slow coming in, Elser would work for a while at Eugen Grupp's woodworking shop in Königsbronn. The first time he worked from July through November 1934, another time from June through September 1935. However, as soon as the child welfare office showed up, Elser would go back to working for himself, sometimes as a subcontractor for his boss. Wages during the Nazi era were of course modest at best, as Elser subsequently recounted in detail to the Gestapo, even after being subjected to brutal treatment. His hourly wage had fallen to fifty-five pfennigs, half of what it had been in Bottighofen—giving him yet another reason to see Switzerland as the promised land. Being thus relegated to the fringes of economic life provided Elser with his most potent criticism of Hitler's government.

When Hitler began to step up arms production for the Wehrmacht, Elser was also affected—Master Grupp received a large order for desks for the Wehrmacht. Since Grupp needed extra help because of the tight deadlines, he rehired Elser, who then left after only six months. He had two reasons for leaving: The pay was too low, and he was tired of having the boss interfere in his work. Elser had distinct pride in his work, and even as an employee he insisted on working independently. There were possibly also questions of ethics and economy involved in his decision to leave. The shop had to deliver desks to the Wehrmacht by a specific date, and the work did not need to be so meticulous. But Elser insisted on delivering top-quality work— meaning of course more expensive work—even to the military.

The continued decline of Elser's father hastened the final breakup of the family. (In a grotesque turn of events, the Elsers would be reunited briefly in November 1939 by the Gestapo, as they were being taken to Stuttgart as prisoners.) Toward the end of 1935, the father had to sell his entire estate to his principal creditor, a cattle dealer named Maurer from Königsbronn. The indebtedness was so great that, despite an appraised value of 10,000 or 11,000 marks, the property brought only 6500 marks. The only parcel remaining in the hands of the family was a fruit orchard on the Flachsberg. There Georg took a shed and converted it into a permanent cottage where his father lived. Gradually the old man lost the ability to walk, so Georg had to take his meals to him. It was here, on the outskirts of town, that Elser would later on carry out tests of his explosive devices.

The orchard and the shed stand out as sad symbols of a family in ruins. This last bit of property became a refuge for what remained of the Elser estate and at the same time the practice field for a bold assassination attempt that, with a bit of luck, might have saved Europe from a mad dictator.

From the sale of the old property, Elser's mother received 2,000 marks for herself. With the balance, Elser's father settled his debts— and continued drinking. He was allowed by the new owner to have a room in his former house; Elser's mother moved in with daughter Friederike in Schnaitheim; and brother Leonhard went into the Reich labor service. This time at least, Georg had it a little better. He became a lodger with the Härlens, so that he was closer to Elsa. In the basement of the house, he once again set up his own shop and worked on his own. He attempted to cover his rent by bartering his skills, building chairs and a cupboard for the kitchen. But Elsa's husband put a stop to this as soon as he began to suspect that the two were having an affair.

Another rift in the Elser family occurred in 1938 when his parents purchased half of a double house on Wiesenstrasse with what money they had left. Georg was present at the notary's office and observed that not everything was entered into the record that had been agreed upon. Appearing as owners were his father, his mother, and Leonhard, who in the meantime had gotten married—each with a one-third interest in the property. Apparently, Georg had been promised part ownership, but in the notary's office this agreement was disregarded. Elser felt that he had been expelled from the family, and his sense of justice had been deeply violated. For nearly his entire life he had contributed the most to sustaining the family. For years he had worked for them for nothing. Now he was not even given the right to a place to live. Since almost everyone in the family stuck together in this matter, Georg Elser abruptly severed his relationships with all of them except his sister Maria in Stuttgart. In so doing, he provided another source for the tenacious legend of Elser the eccentric. One by one the bridges behind him were being burned. He was distancing himself from his surroundings and had nothing more to lose. Before him now lay only Munich, the scene of the assassination attempt, and Switzerland, the land of refuge.

Against the backdrop of these constantly worsening circum-stances, there was no chance for his love with Elsa Härlen to blossom. At first things looked positive; Elsa was relieved that Georg was completely different from her violent and drunken husband. In the six years that she knew Georg Elser, she did not feel that he had behaved badly even once. She considered him “decent, modest, quiet—even taciturn—frugal, very skilled and hard-working.” In all matters he would pour out his heart to her—all matters, that is, except politics. He wanted her to take care of him like a mother; she was his “motherly sweetheart.”

After a few months, Elsa Härlen's husband threw Elser out. The marriage was dissolved around the end of 1938. The commonly held view was that Georg Elser was at fault; the men in the community did not speak of Elsa's suffering. His musician friend Egetemaier offered him a room. But the illicit love affair was now the talk of the town. When Egetemaier saw Elsa leaving Georg's room around four in the morning, he told him, “Georg, this is going too far—not in my house.” Egetemaier was doubtless concerned about the procurement statute, under which toleration of illegal relations could be prosecuted as procurement. The same scenario played out again later; when Georg tried to take Elsa to his room at his parents' house, his mother stepped in and threw him out of the house. The only option he had left was a storage room at the Schmauders' place in Schnaitheim, where he lived almost as a member of the family.

In his memoirs, Egetemaier continued to embellish the myth of Elser as a Casanova. His love for Elsa had put him “on the wrong path,” he wrote. Regarding women, he had been “very impulsive.” “Like music, women were his hobby and his passion.” In Königsbronn and vicinity, however, no one to date has produced names for all these conquests.

Once Elsa was divorced, Georg visited her at her parents' house in Göppingen-Jebenhausen. Her father was impressed with Elser's technical skills and offered to pay for him to study interior design. Elser turned him down, saying that he was put off by the prospect of such a cozy situation.

O
N NOVEMBER
20, 1939, the second day of his interrogation in Berlin, Elser states: “I reached my decision regarding this action in the fall of 1938.” The next day, during the most intense part of the interrogation, Elser is made to lay out in detail the process by which he made this decision. In contrast to his reticence about discussing his background or acquaintances, his responses about the assassination plot are more detailed, firm, and accurate, and he makes no effort to conceal his views about the fundamental dissatisfaction of the working class with the regime. For the first time, we gain insight into his political thinking, which up until this point he has kept to himself. Even in the brutal environment of Reich Security Headquarters, after being tortured several times, Elser remains steadfast—his family would say stubborn—in his rejection of the Nazi regime.

In Elser's testimony he makes it clear that his decision had been thoroughly considered:

The dissatisfaction among the workers that I had observed since 1933 and the war that I had seen as inevitable since the fall of 1938 occupied my thoughts constantly. Whether it was before or after the September crisis of 1938 I can't say. On my own, I began to contemplate how one could improve the conditions of the working class and avoid war. I was not encouraged by anyone to do this, nor was I influenced by anyone regarding this matter.

His mention of “September crisis of 1938” refers to Hitler's threat of war against Czechoslovakia, which was resolved when, in the Munich Pact of September 29, 1938, the Western powers handed him the areas comprising the Sudetenland. In actuality, the Nazi press had been waging a hate campaign against its neighbor since June 3, 1938.

Elser states two goals, but the first one, to “improve the conditions of the working class,” has vanished in the commonly held perception of Elser. Only the second goal, to “avoid war,” has, after years of resistance, made its way into the popular consciousness. The pacifist determined to commit an assassination was accepted; the champion of workers' rights was consciously ignored.

The deliberations regarding the need for the assassination, which are laid out in detail in the transcript, make it appear likely that his decision was made before September 1938. An item in the records of the arms manufacturer Waldenmaier seems to indicate that Elser had been contemplating the assassination for quite a while. In the summer of 1937, apparently at his own request, Elser is transferred to the shipping department, where he is in contact with detonators and explosive material. It is his responsibility to check shipments as they come in for completeness. He remains in this position until March of 1939, and it is here that he has the opportunity to get hold of a detonator. A detonator would be out of place in a woodworking shop.

At Waldenmaier, Elser also learns something about a special division in which powder pellets are pressed into explosive plates and detonators for projectiles are produced. Highly attentive and yet seeming completely harmless, he moves about the arms factory with its thousand employees like a fish in water. He shows interest in everything, asking many questions and having many procedures explained to him. In his first job in the fettling shop, for example, he notices a cart out in the yard loaded with rough-cast parts for detonators. Even though Waldenmaier is an official arms supplier, the carelessness of its factory inspectors works to Elser's advantage. But to the factory owner, the suppressed workers hardly seem to present any potential for danger. It is not until the fall of 1938 in the atmosphere of mounting war hysteria that records are kept on detonators and detonator parts. Elser is so adept at feigning a purely technical interest in things that he even finds someone to explain to him how to assemble a detonator.

The conditions at the factory are ideal for a quiet, circumspect assassin. In early September 1938, a shipment of twenty rough detonators comes his way in a package from the firm Rheinmetall Borsig A.G. Werk in Dusseldorf. While checking the contents, Elser keeps one of the items for himself and writes up a claim slip: “19 steel detonators of chrome-nickel, heat-treated steel . . . one item missing.” This went undetected in part because Waldenmaier was completely preoccupied with expansion plans for his arms factory. He also had little understanding of monitoring procedures and no reason to suspect his workers. Even when he moved Elser into the shipping department—a sensitive area from a security perspective— Waldenmaier didn't bother to have the Gestapo run a background check on him. With typical brazenness, Elser carried the claim ticket for the detonator with him as he attempted to cross the border in Konstanz.