Editing Georg Elser (section)

==Background==
===Family and early life===
Georg Elser (the name normally used to refer to him) was born in [[Hermaringen]], [[Württemberg]], to Ludwig Elser (1872–1942) and Maria Müller (1879–1960). His parents married one year after his birth, and Maria moved to [[Königsbronn]] to live with Ludwig on his [[smallholding]]. His father was a timber merchant, while his mother worked on the farm. Georg was often left to care for his five younger siblings: Friederike (born 1904), Maria (born 1906), Ludwig (born 1909), Anna (born 1910) and Leonhard (born 1913). He attended elementary school in Königsbronn from 1910 to 1917 and showed ability in drawing, penmanship and mathematics. His childhood was marred by his father's heavy drinking.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wichmann |first=Manfred |date=14 September 2014 |title=Johann Georg Elser 1903-1945 |url=https://www.dhm.de/lemo/biografie/johann-georg-elser |access-date= |website=Deutsches Historisches Museum |language=de}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite web |title=Georg Elser – Die Dokumentation |url=https://www.georg-elser-arbeitskreis.de/index.htm |access-date= |website=Georg-Elser-Arbeitskreis Heidenheim}}</ref> Elser recalled in his interrogation by the [[Gestapo]] in 1939 how his father habitually came home late from work drunk.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939">Gestapo Interrogation Report (November 1939) Bundesarchiv Koblenz, signatur R 22/3100</ref>{{primary source inline|date=November 2020}}{{dubious|date=March 2018}}

===Career and social life===
In 1917, Elser worked for half a year assisting in his father's business. Seeking independence, he started an apprenticeship as a lathe operator at the smelter in Königsbronn, but had to quit for health reasons. Between 1919 and 1922, he was apprenticed to master woodworker Robert Sapper in Königsbronn. After topping his class at [[Heidenheim an der Brenz|Heidenheim]] Trade School, he worked in the furniture factory of Paul Rieder in [[Aalen]]. In 1925, he left home to briefly work at the Wachter woodworking company in the small community of [[Bernried]], near [[Tettnang]]. Exploring along Lake Constance on foot, he arrived at [[Friedrichshafen]], where he found employment shaping wooden propellers for the fledgling aircraft-manufacturer [[Dornier Flugzeugwerke|Dornier]].<ref name=":0" /><ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>

[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 102-12963, Flugboot "Do X".jpg|thumb|left|[[Dornier Flugzeugwerke|Dornier]] flying boat, 1932]]
In August 1925, a work-friend enticed Elser to go with him to [[Konstanz]] to work in a clock factory. Due to lack of work, the clock factory closed down, was sold, then reopened as the Schuckmann Clock Factory. Elser was re-employed, but, along with the other employees, he was dismissed when the factory mysteriously burned down after the owner had unsuccessfully tried to sell the failing business. During this period, Elser shared a room with a [[Communist]] co-worker who convinced him to join the [[Roter Frontkämpferbund|Red Front-Fighters League]]. He also joined traditional dress and dance groups ({{langx |de| Trachtenvereine}}). In 1929, he found work with Schönholzer, a small woodworking company in [[Bottighofen]]; this required Elser to cross the border daily into Switzerland. The work ran out within six months, however, and he was let go.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/><ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

Around this time Elser met a waitress, Mathilde Niedermann. When she became pregnant, he drove her to [[Geneva]] in Switzerland. Mathilde was found to be in the fourth month of pregnancy, precluding a legal abortion. The child was born, a boy named Manfred. When Elser left Mathilde, he was left with child-support payments that often surpassed his weekly wage.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>

In 1930, Elser began commuting daily by ferry from Konstanz to work in the small Rothmund clock factory in [[Meersburg]] where he made housings for wall and table clocks. At the [[Kreuzlingen]] Free Temperance Union he started a friendship with a seamstress, Hilda Lang. Between May and August 1932, after Rothmund closed down, he lived with several families in Meersburg doing odd carpentry jobs.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/><ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

In August 1932, Elser returned to Königsbronn after receiving a call for help from his mother. His alcoholic father, often violent and abusive towards her, was now heavily in debt. Elser assisted his parents in their work and supplemented his income by making furniture in a home workshop until his father was forced to sell the family property in late 1935. Elser escaped the grim family situation with music, playing [[flute]], [[accordion]], bass and the [[zither]]. He joined the Zither Club in Königsbronn in early 1933.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>

At around this time, Elser joined a hiking club where he met Elsa Härlen. He moved to lodge in the Härlens' basement, building kitchen cabinets, kitchen chairs and a doll's house for Elsa. Their love affair in the spring of 1936 led to her separation from her husband in 1937 and divorce in 1938.<ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

In 1936, Elser worked with a carpenter named Grupp in Königsbronn, making desks and installing windows, but soon gave up the job, believing the pay was too low. He began working as a labourer at the Waldenmaier armament factory in Heidenheim, commuting by train or by bike from Königsbronn. While working there, he began a friendship with a fellow employee, Maria Schmauder.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>

In 1938, Elser's parents bought half of a double house together with their son Leonhard and his wife. Elser felt cheated, and was forced to move out of the house, severing ties with his family except for his sister Maria in Stuttgart. In May 1939, he moved in with the Schmauder family in nearby [[Schnaitheim]].<ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

At Waldenmaier, Elser worked in the shipping department and had access to many parts of the plant, including the "special department" where fuses and detonators were produced. After his arrest and confession, Elser told the Gestapo: "Before the decision to take my action in the fall of 1938, I had stolen neither parts nor powder from the factory."<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>

===Ideology and religion===
Elser, a carpenter and cabinet-maker by trade, became a member of the left-leaning Federation of Woodworkers Union. He also joined the [[Rotfrontkämpferbund|Red Front-Fighters' Association]], although he told his interrogators in 1939 that he attended a political assembly no more than three times while a member. He also stated that he voted for the [[Communist Party of Germany|Communist Party]] until 1933, as he considered the KPD the best defender of workers' interests.<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/> There is evidence that Elser opposed [[Nazism]] from the beginning of the [[Third Reich|regime]] in 1933; he refused to perform the [[Hitler salute]], did not join others in listening to Hitler's speeches broadcast on the radio, and did not vote in the elections or referendums during the Nazi era.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Georg Elser |url=https://www.gdw-berlin.de/vertiefung/biografien/personenverzeichnis/biografie/view-bio/georg-elser/ |access-date= |website=Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand}}</ref><ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

Elser met Josef Schurr, a Communist from Schnaitheim, at a Woodworkers' Union meeting in Königsbronn in 1933. Elser had antifascist views, supported by a letter that Schurr sent to a newspaper in [[Ulm]] in 1947 which stated that Elser "was always extremely interested in some act of violence against Hitler and his cronies. He always called Hitler a 'gypsy'—one just had to look at his criminal face."<ref name="Hellmut G 2013"/>

Elser's parents were Protestant, and he attended church with his mother as a child, though his attendance lapsed. His church attendance increased during 1939 – after he had decided to carry out the assassination attempt – either at a Protestant or Roman Catholic church. He claimed that church attendance and the recitation of the [[Lord's Prayer]] calmed him. He told his arresting officers: "I believe in the survival of the soul after death, and I also believed that I would not go to heaven if I had not had an opportunity to prove that I wanted good. I also wanted to prevent by my act even greater bloodshed."<ref name="Gestapo Interrogation Report 1939"/>