Editing Ernst Hanfstaengl

{{Short description|German American businessman (1887–1975)}}
{{More citations needed|date=February 2020}}
{{use dmy dates|date=May 2023}}
{{Infobox person
|name        = Ernst Hanfstaengl
|image       = Ernst Hanfstaengl (cropped).jpg
|caption     = Hanfstaengl in 1934
|birth_name  = Ernst Franz Sedgwick Hanfstaengl 
|birth_date  = {{birth date|df=y|1887|2|2}}
|birth_place = Munich, German Empire
|death_date  = {{death date and age|df=y|1975|11|6|1887|2|2}}
|death_place = Munich, West Germany
|nationality = [[German American]]
|known_for   = Being a Nazi and close friend of [[Adolf Hitler]]
|alma mater  = [[Harvard University]]
|occupation  = Former Nazi and later Businessman
|spouse      = Helene Hanfstaengl
|children    = 2, including [[Egon Hanfstaengl|Egon]]
}}

'''Ernst Franz Sedgwick Hanfstaengl''' ({{IPA|de|ˈɛʁnst hanfˈʃtɛŋl̩}}; 2 February 1887 – 6 November 1975) was a [[German Americans|German American]] businessman and close friend of [[Adolf Hitler]]. He eventually fell out of favour with Hitler and defected from [[Nazi Germany]] to the United States. He later worked for [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] and was once engaged to the author [[Djuna Barnes]].

==Early life and education==
Hanfstaengl, nicknamed "Putzi",<ref>A nickname (which may have been acquired in youth) meaning "little fellow"; as an adult Hanfstaengl was {{convert|1.93|m|ftin}} tall.
{{Cite book
| author-link = John Toland (author)
| first = John
| isbn = 9780385037242
| last = Toland
| pages = 128
| publication-place=Garden City, New York
| publisher = Doubleday & Company
| title = Adolf Hitler
| url = https://archive.org/details/adolfhitler02tola
| url-access = registration
| year = 1976
}}
(''Toland'')</ref> was born in [[Munich]], [[Bavaria]], [[German Empire|Germany]], the son of a German art publisher, [[Edgar Hanfstaengl]], and an American mother. He spent most of his early years in Germany and later moved to the United States. His mother was Katharine Wilhelmina Heine, daughter of [[Wilhelm Heine]], a cousin of [[American Civil War]] [[Union Army]] general [[John Sedgwick]]. His godfather was [[Ernest II, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha|Duke Ernst II]] of [[Saxe-Coburg and Gotha]]. He had an elder sister, [[Erna Hanfstaengl|Erna]],<ref>Some authorities suggest that Hitler was romantically involved with Erna, a tall and stately woman, or had romantic affections for her.
{{Cite book
| author-link = William L. Shirer
| first = William L.
| isbn = 9780671624200
| last = Shirer
| page = 131
| publication-place=New York
| publisher = Simon and Schuster
| title = The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
| url = https://archive.org/details/risefallofthirdr00shir/page/131
| url-access = registration
| year = 1960
}}
("''Shirer''"). ''See also'' Wikipedia article on [[Geli Raubal]]. While some historians have written that Hitler was nursed by Erna (and her mother) at Uffing following the Beer Hall putsch, Toland claims that this is a myth, resulting from the misinterpretation of the American journalists who interviewed the three Hanfstaengl women (the mother, sister and wife of Ernst) immediately after Hitler's arrest by the authorities. ''Toland'', p. 181 (footnote).</ref> two elder brothers Edgar and Egon, and a younger brother Erwine.<ref>''See A Sedgwick Genealogy: Descendants of Deacon Benjamin Sedgwick'' (p. 143) at sedgwick.org ([http://www.sedgwick.org/na/library/books/sed1961/sed1961-143.html Sedgwick Genealogy]). His elder brother Egon served in the German Army in World War I and was killed in 1915; his younger brother Erwine died of [[typhoid]] in the [[American Hospital of Paris|American Hospital]] in Paris in 1914.</ref>

He attended [[Harvard College]]<ref>{{Cite web |title=Fiendens fiende |url=https://www.axess.se/artiklar/fiendens-fiende/ |access-date=2024-10-27 |website=Axess |language=sv-SE}}</ref> and became acquainted with [[Walter Lippmann]] and [[John Reed (journalist)|John Reed]]. A gifted pianist, he composed several songs for Harvard's football team. He graduated in 1909.

He moved to [[New York City]], where he took over the management of the American branch of his father's business, the Franz Hanfstaengl Fine Arts Publishing House. Many mornings he would practice on the piano at the [[Harvard Club of New York City]], where he became acquainted with both [[Franklin D. Roosevelt|Franklin]] and [[Theodore Roosevelt]]. Among his circle of acquaintances were the newspaper baron [[William Randolph Hearst]], author [[Djuna Barnes]], to whom he was engaged, and actor [[Charlie Chaplin]].

At the outbreak of [[World War I]], he asked the German military attaché in New York City, [[Franz von Papen]], to smuggle him back to Germany. Slightly baffled by the proposal, the attaché refused, and Hanfstaengl remained in the U.S. during the war. After 1917, the American branch of the family business was confiscated as enemy property.

==Career==

===Admirer and confidant of Hitler===
[[Image:Bundesarchiv Bild 102-14080, Berlin, Hitler, Göring und Hanfstaengl.jpg|thumb|Hanfstaengl with [[Adolf Hitler|Hitler]] and [[Hermann Göring]] in [[Berlin]] in 1932]]
[[Image:Putzi Hanfstaengl and Diana Mitford in 1934.jpg|thumb|Hanfstaengl with [[Diana Mitford]] at a 1934 [[Nazi Party]] rally in [[Nuremberg]]]]
Hanfstaengl returned to Germany in 1922. While living in his native [[Bavaria]], he first heard [[Adolf Hitler]] speak in a [[Munich]] beer hall.<ref>The initial encounter was on 22 November 1922 at the Kindlkeller, a large L-shaped beer hall. ''Toland'', p. 128.</ref> A fellow member of the Harvard's [[Hasty Pudding club]] who worked at the [[Embassy of the United States in Berlin|U.S. Embassy]] asked Hanfstaengl to assist a military attaché sent to observe the political scene in Munich. Just before returning to Berlin, the attaché, Captain [[Truman Smith (officer)|Truman Smith]], suggested that Hanfstaengl go to a [[Nazi]] rally as a favor and report his impressions of Hitler. Hanfstaengl was so fascinated by Hitler that he soon became one of his most intimate followers, although he did not formally join the [[Nazi Party]] until 1931. "What Hitler was able to do to a crowd in 2½ hours will never be repeated in 10,000 years," Hanfstaengl said. "Because of his miraculous throat construction, he was able to create a rhapsody of hysteria. In time, he became the living unknown soldier of [[Nazi Germany|Germany]]."

Hanfstaengl introduced himself to Hitler after the speech and began a close friendship and political association that would last through the 1920s and early 1930s. After participating in the failed Munich [[Beer Hall Putsch]] in 1923, Hanfstaengl briefly fled to [[First Austrian Republic|Austria]], while the injured Hitler sought refuge in Hanfstaengl's home in [[Uffing]], outside Munich. Hanfstaengl's wife, Helene, allegedly<ref>{{Cite book|last=Hanfstaengl|first=Ernst|title=Hitler: The Memoir of a Nazi Insider that Turned Against the Fuhrer|publisher=Arcade Publishing|year=1957|location=New York, New York|pages=108|quote=My wife hurried up to the attic and found Hitler in a state of frenzy. He had pulled out his revolver with his good hand and shouted, ‘This is the end. I will never let these swine take me. I will shoot myself first.’ It so happened that I had taught my wife one of the few ju-jitsu tricks I know, for wrenching a pistol out of someone’s grasp. Hitler’s movements were awkward with his dislocated shoulder and she managed to get the thing away from him and fling it into a two-hundredweight barrel of flour we kept up in the attic to combat the recurrent shortages.}}</ref> dissuaded Hitler from committing suicide when the police came to arrest him.

For much of the 1920s, Hanfstaengl introduced Hitler to Munich high society and helped polish his image. He also helped to finance the publication of Hitler's ''[[Mein Kampf]]'', and the [[NSDAP]]'s official newspaper, the ''[[Völkischer Beobachter]]'' (People's Observer). Hitler was the godfather of Hanfstaengl's son Egon. Hanfstaengl composed both [[Sturmabteilung|Brownshirt]] and [[Hitler Youth]] marches patterned after his Harvard football songs and, he later claimed, devised the chant "[[Sieg Heil]]". Included among Hanfstaengl's friends during this period were [[Hanns Heinz Ewers]] and fellow Nazi Party worker and journalist [[Kurt Lüdecke]].

When [[Winston Churchill]] was staying at the Hotel Regina in Munich in late August 1932, Hanfstaengl introduced himself and said he could easily arrange a meeting with Hitler there since he came to the hotel every evening around five o'clock. At the time, Churchill said he had no national prejudices against Hitler and knew little of his "doctrine or record and nothing of his character."

In the course of the conversation with Hanfstaengl, Churchill asked, "Why is your chief so violent about the Jews? I can quite understand being angry with the Jews who have done wrong or who are against the country, and I understand resisting them if they try to monopolise power in any walk of life; but what is the sense of being against a man because of his birth? How can a man help how he is born?" Hanfstaengl, according to Churchill, must have relayed this to Hitler because the next day, around noon, he came to the hotel to tell Churchill that Hitler would not be coming to see him after all. In addition, Hitler may not have wanted to meet with Churchill, who was then not in power and thought to be of no importance.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://winstonchurchill.hillsdale.edu/meeting-hitler-1932/|title = Meeting Hitler, 1932|date = 5 March 2015}}</ref> Churchill declined to meet with Hitler on several subsequent occasions.<ref>''[[The Second World War (book series)|The Gathering Storm]]''. By Winston S. Churchill. Chapter V. 1948</ref>

During the [[Reichstag fire]], Hanfstaengl was staying at Göring's official residence, noticed the fire, and alerted members of the Nazi Party.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://spartacus-educational.com/GERreichstagF.htm|title=The Reichstag Fire|work=[[Spartacus Educational]]|date=March 15, 2014|access-date=April 23, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230423073649/https://spartacus-educational.com/GERreichstagF.htm|archive-date=April 23, 2023|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Fall from power===
As the [[Nazi Party]] consolidated its power, several disputes arose between Hanfstaengl and Germany's [[Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda|Propaganda Minister]], [[Joseph Goebbels]]. In 1933, Hanfstaengl was removed from Hitler's staff. He and Helene divorced in 1936. Hanfstaengl fell completely out of Hitler's favour after he was denounced by [[Unity Mitford]], a close friend of both the Hanfstaengls and Hitler.

In 1937, Hanfstaengl received orders to parachute into an area held by the [[Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War)|nationalist]] side of the [[Spanish Civil War]], to assist in negotiations. While on board the plane he feared a plot on his life and learned more details from the pilot about the mission, who eventually admitted he had been ordered to drop Hanfstaengl over [[Republican faction (Spanish Civil War)|Republican]]-held territory, which would have meant almost certain death. The pilot eventually landed on a small airfield near [[Leipzig]] after claiming an engine malfunction following a brief talk with Hanfstaengl, which allowed him to escape.

That version of the story was related by [[Albert Speer]] in his memoirs, who said that the "mission" to Spain was an elaborate practical joke, concocted by Hitler and Goebbels, designed to punish Hanfstaengl after he had displeased the [[Führer]] by making "adverse comments about the fighting spirit of the German soldiers in combat" during the Spanish Civil War. Hanfstaengl was issued sealed orders which were not to be opened until his plane was in flight, which specified that he was to be dropped in "Red Spanish territory" to work as an agent for [[Francisco Franco]]. The plane, according to Speer, was merely circling over Germany containing an increasingly disconcerted Hanfstaengl, with false location reports being given to convey the impression that the plane was drawing ever closer to Spain. After the joke had played itself out, the pilot declared he had to make an emergency landing and landed safely at [[Leipzig-Altenburg Airport|Leipzig Airport]].<ref>[[Albert Speer]], ''[[Inside the Third Reich]]'', (Sphere Books, 1971), Chpt.9, pp. 188-9.</ref> Hanfstaengl was so alarmed by the event that he defected soon afterward.

In a late 1960s interview at his home in [[Schwabing]] in [[Munich]], Hanfstaengl said that he was convinced he was to be tossed out of the plane and parachute over northern Germany.{{citation needed|date=September 2011}}

===Imprisonment===
He made his way to [[Switzerland]] and, after securing his son Egon's release from Germany, he moved to [[Great Britain]], where he was imprisoned after the outbreak of [[World War II]]. He was later moved to a prison camp in Canada.

===Cooperation with United States===
In 1942, Hanfstaengl was turned over to the U.S., worked for U.S. President [[Franklin Roosevelt]]'s "S-Project" and revealed information on approximately 400 Nazi leaders. He provided 68 pages of information on Hitler alone, including personal details of Hitler's private life. In 1943, he helped [[Henry Murray]], the director of [[Harvard University]]'s psychological clinic, [[Walter Charles Langer]], a psychoanalyst, and other experts create a report for the [[Office of Strategic Services]], titled ''[[Analysis of the Personality of Adolph Hitler]]''.

In 1944, Hanfstaengl was handed back to the British, who [[repatriation|repatriated]] him to Germany at the end of World War II. [[William Shirer]], a [[CBS]] journalist who resided in Nazi Germany until 1940 and was in frequent contact with Hanfstaengl, described him as an "eccentric, gangling man, whose sardonic wit somewhat compensated for his shallow mind."<ref>[[William Shirer]], ''[[Rise and Fall of the Third Reich]]'', (Simon & Schuster, 1960), Chpt.2, pp. 47.</ref>

Hanfstaengl wrote ''Unheard Witness'' (1957), which was later re-released as ''Hitler: The Missing Years'', about his experiences. In 1974, Hanfstaengl attended his 65th Harvard reunion, where he regaled the [[Harvard University Band]] about the authors of various Harvard fight songs.

==Personal life==
On 11 February 1920, Hanfstaengl married Helene Elise Adelheid Niemeyer of [[Long Island]]. Their only son, [[Egon Hanfstaengl|Egon Ludwig]], eventually enlisted in the [[United States Army Air Corps|U.S. Army Air Corps]]. A daughter, Hertha, died at the age of five.

==Death==
Hanfstaengl died in [[Munich]] on 6 November 1975. In 2004, [[Peter Conradi]] authored a biography of Hanfstaengl, ''Hitler's Piano Player: The Rise and Fall of Ernst Hanfstaengl, Confidante of Hitler, Ally of FDR''.

==In popular culture==
Hanfstaengl was portrayed by [[Liev Schreiber]] in the 2003 Canadian television miniseries ''[[Hitler: The Rise of Evil]]''. American actor [[Randy Quaid]] played him in the 1982 television film ''[[Inside the Third Reich (film)|Inside the Third Reich]]''. [[Ronald Pickup]] played him in the 1989 miniseries ''[[The Nightmare Years]]''.
In the 1964 fiction novel, ''[[Herzog (novel)|Herzog]]'', written by ''[[Saul Bellow]]'', a Putzi Hanfstaengl is mentioned as being Hitler's personal pianist.<ref>{{cite book |last=Bellow |first=Saul |author-link=Saul Bellow |date=2003 |title=Herzog |location=80 Strand London, England |publisher=Penguin Group |page=23 |isbn=0142437298}}</ref> This fact was confirmed by Hanfstaengl himself, who said in 1969 that he was able to soothe Hitler to sleep with his piano playing.

In his story "The Sacred Grove", collected in "While Rome Burns", [[Alexander Woollcott]] refers to an encounter with an uncooperative attendant in a New York picture store in 1916, whom he later identifies as Hanfstaengl.

In chapter 3 of “Munich Wolf” (2024) by [[Rory Clements]], the fictional main character Detective Sebastian Wolff is introduced on page 20 to the non-fictional person of Ernst ‘Putzi’ Hanfstaengl.

==See also==
{{Portal|Biography|Germany}}
* [[List of books by or about Adolf Hitler]]
* ''[[Hitler: The Rise of Evil]]''

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Hanfstaengl, Ernst 'Putzi'. ''Hitler: The Missing Years''. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1957. Arcade Publishing, reprint 1994 {{ISBN|1-55970-278-8}}
* [[Conradi, Peter]]. ''Hitler's Piano Player: The Rise and Fall of Ernst Hanfstaengl, Confidant of Hitler, Ally of FDR'', Carroll & Graf, 2004 {{ISBN|0-7867-1283-X}}
* Metcalfe, Philip. ''1933''. New York, The Permanent Press, 1988. {{ISBN|0-932966-87-X}}
<!-- Image with unknown copyright status removed: [[Image:Hanfstaengl.jpg]] -->
* Hanfstaengl, Ernst. "Zwischen Weißem und Braunem Haus". R. Piper und Co. Verlag Muenchen

==External links==
* {{Commons category-inline}}
* {{Wikiquote-inline}}
* [https://archive.today/20010305122212/http://www.zmag.org/ZSustainers/ZDaily/1999-06/june_4raptis.htm "Hitler's Americanization" by Nikos Raptis (Z Magazine)]
* [http://www.sedgwick.org/na/library/books/sed1961/sed1961-143.html Sedgewick Genealogy]
* [http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=504501 Historian: Harvard Was Tied to Nazis] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091106194204/http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=504501 |date=6 November 2009 }}
* {{PM20|FID=pe/007071}}

{{NSDAP}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hanfstaengl, Ernst}}
[[Category:1887 births]]
[[Category:1975 deaths]]
[[Category:Businesspeople from Munich]]
[[Category:Defectors to the United States]]
[[Category:Franklin D. Roosevelt administration personnel]]
[[Category:Harvard University alumni]]
[[Category:German defectors]]
[[Category:Emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States]]
[[Category:German people of American descent]]
[[Category:German people of English descent]]
[[Category:Historians of Nazism]]
[[Category:German Nazi propagandists]]
[[Category:Nazis who participated in the Beer Hall Putsch]]
[[Category:People from the Kingdom of Bavaria]]