Editing Klara Hitler (section)

==Family background and marriage==
Klara was born in the [[Austrian Empire]] village of [[Weitra]] to Johann Baptist Pölzl and Johanna Hiedler. In 1876, 16-year-old Klara was hired as a household servant by her relative [[Alois Hitler]], three years after his first marriage to Anna Glasl-Hörer. Although Alois's biological father is unknown, after his mother, [[Maria Schicklgruber]], married [[Johann Georg Hiedler]], Alois was officially designated as Hiedler's son. Klara's mother was Hiedler's niece, making Klara and Alois first cousins once removed.

Alois's second wife, Franziska Matzelsberger, died in 1884. Klara and Alois married on 7 January 1885 in a brief ceremony held early in the morning at Hitler's rented rooms on the top floor of the Pommer Inn in [[Braunau am Inn]].<ref name="gunther1940">{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.149663/2015.149663.Inside-Europe#page/n43/mode/2up | title=Inside Europe |location=New York| publisher=Harper & Brothers | author=Gunther, John |author-link=John Gunther| year=1940 | page=21}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book | last= Payne | first= Robert | author-link = Robert Payne (author) | title= The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler | url= https://archive.org/details/lifedeathofado00payn | url-access= limited | year=1973 | publisher=Praeger | location=New York | page =[https://archive.org/details/lifedeathofado00payn/page/12 12] | quote = The marriage took place early in the morning, and Klara is said to have complained: 'We were married at six o'clock in the morning, and my husband was already at work at seven.'}}</ref> Alois then went to work for the day at his job as a customs official.

Their first son, Gustav, was born four months later, on 17 May 1885. Ida followed on 23 September 1886.  Both infants died of [[diphtheria]] during the winter of 1887–88. A fourth child, Otto, was born and died in 1892. A third son, [[Adolf Hitler|Adolf]], was born on 20 April 1889.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.thoughtco.com/hitlers-family-tree-1779646|title=Adolf Hitler's Family Tree|last=Rosenberg|first=Jennifer|website=ThoughtCo|language=en|access-date=12 March 2019}}</ref>

In 1892, Klara and her family took the train to [[Passau]], where they lived for the next two years.<ref>Anna Rosmus: Hitlers Nibelungen, Samples Grafenau 2015</ref> Edmund was born there on 24 March 1894. [[Paula Hitler|Paula]] followed on 21 January 1896. Edmund died of [[measles]] on 28 February 1900, at the age of five.<ref>Vermeeren, Mar, ''De jeugd van Adolf Hitler 1889–1907 en zijn familie en voorouders'', Soesterberg, 2007, Uitgeverij Aspekt, {{ISBN|978-90-5911-606-1}} (Note: source carried forward and only presumed reliable)</ref>  Of Klara's six children, only Adolf and Paula survived to adulthood.

Klara's adult life was spent keeping house and raising children, in whom, according to Smith, Alois had little interest. She was very devoted to her children and, according to [[William Stuart-Houston|William Patrick Hitler]], was a typical stepmother to her stepchildren, Alois, Jr. and [[Angela Hitler|Angela]].<ref name="autogenerated116">"The Mind of Adolf Hitler", Walter C Langer, New York 1972 p. 116</ref> She was a devout [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] and attended church regularly with her children.<ref>"[She] was completely devoted to the faith and teachings of Catholicism..." Smith, p. 42</ref>