Adolf Hitler The World's Most Photographed

In 1927, a young Munich photographer, Heinrich Hoffmann,

was preparing his studio for a particularly difficult shoot.

His subject, a nervous local politician, was notoriously camera-shy.

But when Hoffmann began to play a recording of an impassioned

political speech, the man in front of the camera was transformed.

The photographs Hoffmann took that day would capture the awakening

of one of the most brutal dictators the world has ever seen.

Adolf Hitler.

The face of Adolf Hitler has become synonymous with fascism, terror and genocide.

But in the 1930s, photographs of Hitler helped to hypnotise and inflame a nation.

Hitler had an extraordinary awareness of the visual significance of power.

The notion of imagery was very important to Hitler.

Hitler was the first state leader to have an almost totally

manufactured image.

Photographs of Hitler were at the heart of the Nazi campaign for power.

But the politician who would soon become the most photographed man in the world

started out with a completely different strategy.

At first, Adolf Hitler refused to be photographed at all.

In 1921, Adolf Hitler was elected party chairman of a small extremist faction

called the National Socialist German Workers' Party, otherwise known as the Nazis.

As the leader of a subversive organisation, Hitler didn't want to be recognised by the opposition.

He began to use the pseudonym Wolf and vetoed the taking of any photographs.

Hitler didn't initially appreciate how important photography was going to be,

so in the early phase it was extremely difficult,

in fact impossible, to get a picture of Hitler.

But this only increased people's curiosity, and not just in Germany.

In 1923, the American Associated Press offered 100 to anyone

who managed to photograph the right-wing rabble-rouser known as the Wolf.

When a press photographer succeeded, later that year, Hitler was furious.

Now that his image had been made public, he decided to take control by posing for an official portrait.

He turned to Heinrich Hoffmann, a founding member of the Nazi Party

who was also an established portrait photographer.

This was the beginning of a powerful alliance between the photographer

and the politician that would change the course of history.

At the beginning, this relationship between Hoffmann and Hitler was characterised by a large insecurity.

Hitler was posing in a...severe, er...rigid

and almost aggressive pose. Hitler was not really sure about his image.

Hitler was still uneasy in front of the camera,

but Hoffmann was already starting to convince him of the importance

of photography in the creation of his image as a leader.

With mass unemployment and hyper-inflation, Germany in the 1920s was in turmoil.

The Nazis wanted to exploit the chaos and establish a right-wing nationalistic government in Bavaria.

In November 1923, Hitler attempted to seize power in Munich.

The coup was a disaster.

The Nazi Party was banned, and Hitler was arrested and imprisoned.

Heinrich Hoffmann saw an opportunity to mythologise Hitler as a heroic

rebel leader and came to photograph him in his cell.

Hitler spent his eight months in prison writing his personal manifesto, Mein Kampf.

He now set his sights on becoming the next political leader of Germany.

Within a year of his release, the ban on the Nazi Party was lifted.

They quickly began to organise and regroup.

They had no obvious headquarters, so the initial headquarters was actually located

in Heinrich Hoffmann's studios in his house in Schelling Strasse in Munich.

One day, Hitler chanced upon a photograph in Hoffmann's studio.

It had been taken in 1914 and showed a patriotic crowd

celebrating Germany's declaration of war on Russia.

Hitler told Hoffmann that he too had taken to the streets of Munich that day in support of the war.

Hoffmann was curious.

He set about making a series of enlargements of faces in the crowd.

To his amazement, he managed to find the face of the young Adolf Hitler.

Hoffman encircled and enlarged the portrait of Hitler

just to show that there was a kind of invisible secret relationship

between Hoffman and Hitler already in 1914.

The friendship between the photographer and the politician was sealed.

They would now set out to strengthen Hitler's image as a powerful leader.

Hitler does become, as time goes on, obsessed with the creation of his own image

and plays a great role in the shaping of that image himself.

He was well aware of the role of photography,

the part played by photographs of Hoffman in particular,

in helping to shape this heroic image, which was crucial also to the popularity of Hitler

and to the stability of the regime itself.

Hitler and Hoffmann were now ready to produce the set of photographs

that would help to intensify the Nazi campaign of mass-manipulation.

HITLER SPEAKS IN GERMAN

Hitler would use these dramatic images to study his own body language,

to see which gestures would be most effective in his speeches and party rallies.

Hoffmann's photographs of Hitler were mass-produced

as propaganda postcards and sold in shops all over Germany.

As the party expanded, and as Hitler's popularity grew, this turned into a fantastic trade for Hoffman,

who later on, through all his photography, became a multimillionaire many times over.

The Nazi Party was now becoming a significant political force.

In May 1928, they won a foothold in the Reichstag with 12 seats out of 491 in the national elections.

At this time, Hoffmann had a 17-year-old photographic assistant.

Her name was Eva Braun.

Working late one evening, she saw Hoffmann talking to Hitler.

When she approached, Hoffmann introduced her as "our good little Fraulein."

She was fascinated by Hitler.

When he next visited the studio, she slipped a love letter into his coat pocket.

In September 1930, the Nazis became the second largest party in the national government with 107 seats.

Joseph Goebbels became the head of Nazi propaganda.

He and Heinrich Hoffmann now embarked on a ground-breaking propaganda strategy.

Instead of simply taking formal political photographs,

Hoffmann began to take a series of more relaxed, personal photographs in Hitler's mountain home,

the Berghof in Southern Germany.

These carefully constructed glimpses of Hitler's private life

were published in 1932 in a book called The Hitler Nobody Knows.

It was the most successful book Hoffman ever did, with more than 420,000 copies until 1941.

It was so successful because it showed Hitler

in his privacy, something absolutely new in politics.

These books were created not just to spread Hitler's popularity, which was by this time in any case immense,

but to create particularly a different image of Hitler.

Not just the Hitler who was the martial leader of his troops, but now the human Hitler.

But Hitler was determined to keep the real story of his private life from the public.

He insisted that his affair with Eva Braun should remain a secret and refused to marry her.

You know, Hitler wanted to be married with Germany.

There was no place for a wife.

He needed all these women crying to him, "Heil, heil, heil!"

and he couldn't have a wife, then maybe they wouldn't love him any more.

The image that he had created for himself was that of the great leader who stood above society - and outside

it in a way - and to have now, erm...a mistress alongside him would really have dented that image.

Hitler placed a total ban on any official photographs with Eva Braun at his side.

In the national elections in July 1932, the Nazi Party won 230 seats.

Six months later, Hitler was appointed chancellor by the ageing German president, Hindenburg.

Most of the people who voted for him - there were 13.5 million of these in 1932 - hadn't actually seen Hitler in

person, so they were dependent upon the manufactured image which they saw, for the most part, in magazines.

When Hindenburg died on 2nd August 1934, Hitler assumed absolute power over Germany.

He called on Heinrich Hoffman to become the Nazi regime's official photographer.

He now wanted every public appearance to be photographed.

There are pictures of Hitler opening the new autobahn system,

visiting the Volkswagen factory,

and addressing members of the Hitler Youth.

And ten years after his release from prison,

Hoffmann and Hitler even went back to his cell in Munich to commemorate the time when he wrote Mein Kampf.

So these photographs were part of the cult of the Hitler image and his

representation as a charismatic figure in the German state.

At the Nuremberg Rally that year, Hitler would orchestrate the most

dramatic display of Nazi power ever seen.

His image as the great leader had to be constructed as one where he would stand supreme over all parties, over

all society, over every aspect of German life, and would dominate it.

Over the next ten years, Hoffman and his growing team of official photographers

would take two and a half million pictures of Adolf Hitler, an average rate of 5,000 every week.

The politician who had once refused to be photographed at all

was now the most photographed man in the world.

But there was still one conspicuous omission from the frenzied recording of Hitler's public and private life.

His relationship with Eva Braun was still a closely guarded secret,

and she was becoming increasingly distraught about their clandestine affair.

She tried to commit suicide in '32 and...'35, I think,

because Hitler had no time for her.

She didn't find the attention and the love

she wanted, not from Hitler, I think this man was not able to love.

After her second suicide attempt, she was moved to the Berghof

to be watched over by Hitler's staff and guards.

By 1938, Hitler was preparing Germany for total war.

But the world continued to be manipulated into a false sense of security by Nazi propaganda.

The British magazine Homes & Gardens even offered their readers

a privileged view of Hitler's country home, with numerous photos by Heinrich Hoffmann.

The article gave a glowing account of Hitler's life at his idyllic mountain retreat.

"The colour scheme throughout is a light jade green."

"Here Hitler will read the home and foreign papers

which his own air-pilot brings him every day from Berlin before lunch."

This edition of Homes & Gardens was published in the same month that the Nazis sanctioned Kristallnacht,

a co-ordinated assault unleashed on Germany's Jewish population on November 9th 1938.

In the course of two nights 8,000 Jewish properties were destroyed

and 30,000 Jews were subsequently sent to concentration camps.

Less than a year later, Europe was at war.

Hitler was now at the height of his powers, and his desire to document

the Nazis' progress was becoming an obsession.

Heinrich Hoffman continued his work through the propaganda ministry,

but Hitler had now also appointed a young film cameraman called

Walter Frentz to record his personal daily routine.

Frentz would be granted uniquely intimate access to the Fuhrer.

Hitler liked the way he filmed him.

Hitler trusted him, so he had often the chance to do

rare shots which no-one else would have had the chance to do.

On June 22nd 1940, Frentz was standing next to Hitler

when he heard the news that France had surrendered to Germany.

My father picked up his camera and he just filmed Hitler, who was totally overwhelmed by this new message.

Frentz was also an accomplished stills photographer.

He took these photos of Hitler basking in the glow of his victory.

He would soon establish himself as one of Hitler's favourite photographers.

My father was able to approach Hitler in quite private situations,

so the biggest difference between Hoffmann and my father

was that Hoffmann made official photos and he made the unofficial photos.

Frentz was also brought to the Berghof to show Hitler and Eva Braun

his coverage of the war in evening film and slide shows.

Frentz and Braun became friends.

As Hitler's trusted photographer, she even invited him to take photographs of her with Hitler

and some children who were visiting them at the time.

She asked him to just shoot this so-called family pictures, because this was what she wished

to have, just a man and a family with children.

She was always showing,"Oh, I am happy, I am happy."

But inside she wasn't happy, she couldn't be happy in the situation she was.

As Heinrich Hoffmann's assistant, Eva Braun had always been interested in film and photography.

During her years of seclusion at the Berghof, she became

a keen photographer herself and collected hundreds of pictures in a series of albums.

What should she do?

She likes to take photos.

That was her business.

She was not allowed to work, Hitler stopped her,

and...so she needed something for herself.

And I think this was for herself, this taking photos.

Braun discreetly took photographs from the window of her room, sometimes capturing events outside

that she herself was forbidden to attend.

In one of her albums she placed a photo by an official photographer.

It shows an Italian general looking up at an open window.

Underneath the photo, Eva wrote "There is something upstairs they're forbidden to see,

"me."

By 1942, Hitler's fortunes were turning.

The Americans had entered the war, and the Nazis were facing a powerful alliance of enemies on two fronts.

In February 1943, the Germans suffered

a crushing defeat at Stalingrad and their Russian campaign collapsed.

Walter Frentz captured a shot of the troubled Nazi leader gazing down over Germany from his private plane.

Here we have a very unheroic picture of Hitler,

unaware apparently that the camera is shooting him

and just gazing out of the window.

In his own inner mind he must, even then, have seen that now it was going to be impossible to attain total

victory, and for everyone else now it was obvious that Germany was facing defeat.

Hitler's image, which was at one time one of such strength and such

success, now becomes associated with defeat, looming catastrophe

and with disaster, and so Hitler's own popularity, naturally, slumps massively in those later years.

In July 1944, a group of disaffected German officers set out to assassinate Hitler.

Looking for someone with unique access to him to plant a bomb,

they turned to his most trusted photographer,

Walter Frentz.

Frentz hesitated.

In one way, my father knew that this assassination

would maybe end the war, but he was not able to do this job himself.

For my father at that time, Hitler was still quite an authority, and so later on he told me

that, "It was not my job that I felt I should kill the king."

Frentz refused to take part in the plot,

but he did nothing to expose it.

Hitler escaped unharmed.

The assassins were rounded up and executed.

Hitler had survived, but the Third Reich was collapsing.

In March 1945, as the Western Allies advanced towards Berlin, Hitler was photographed inspecting

an architect's model for the postwar redevelopment of Linz, his childhood home.

A last bit of futile PR by this stage.

How many people saw those pictures at the time we can't tell, but not many.

By that time the Hitler myth had all but totally evaporated.

On 20th March, Heinrich Hoffmann and Walter Frentz recorded Hitler's final public appearance.

Hitler was ill but unwilling to concede defeat.

He walked along a line of Hitler Youth, awarding medals for bravery.

They were about to return to face the Russians, who were advancing on the city.

This would be Heinrich Hoffmann's last photograph of Adolf Hitler.

Soon after this final photo call, he fled Berlin.

On April 22nd, as the Red Army advanced on the centre of Berlin,

Hitler and his inner circle retreated to the leader's bunker.

Walter Frentz was with them.

All people down there at the bunker felt that they never would be

able to leave the city and that they most probably would die or...

or would be caught by the Russians.

And, er...my father was also very pessimistic.

Two days later, Walter Frentz was one of the last people to leave the bunker.

He left Berlin in the plane that had been reserved for Hitler's escape from the city.

On 28th April, Hitler was informed that the Italian fascist

leader, Benito Mussolini, and his mistress had been captured and shot.

A series of photographs had been taken showing their bodies hanging on display in Milan.

Hitler would never have wanted to have pictures of humiliation or pictures where he was in captivity.

He would never have contemplated allowing himself to be shown in such a way.

The next day, with the Red Army engaged in street-to-street

fighting in the city above, Hitler and Eva Braun were finally married.

There were no photographers left to record the occasion.

At 3.30pm, on 30th April, Hitler and Braun went into a small room in the bunker

and closed the door.

Hitler and Braun had committed suicide.

The German public still had no idea of Eva Braun's existence.

Two days later, on 2nd May 1945, the Red Army captured Berlin.

Soon after they broke into the bunker, the Russians released photographs of Hitler's body

to prove that the world's most brutal dictator was dead.

The photographs were published all over the world

but were immediately exposed as fakes.

Even in death, Hitler's image was still being manipulated for political ends.

Subtitles by BBC Broadcast - 2005

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