The Strange Death of Heinrich Himmler: A Forensic Investigation

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Description

On 22 May 1945, in the immediate aftermath of World War II, the Allies celebrated the capture of crucial member of the Nazi hierarchy, Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler. The SS leader used to be arrested and interrogated but committed suicide in Allied custody by ingesting poison from a capsule concealed in his mouth. Then he used to be buried at a secret site on Lüneberg Heath. But Himmler did not rest in peace, if Himmler it used to be who used to be buried there. Months later the British disinterred, re-examined, and cremated his body. Yet in 1946 MI6’s most talented, if treacherous, agent, Kim Philby, used to be still not convinced that the story of Himmler’s death made any sense at all. Philby realized that a man of Himmler’s organizational genius, a plotter of great intricacy and sophistication who recognized Germany’s inevitable defeat as early as 1943, used to be unlikely to have just blundered into the arms of the Allies. What actually happened? Hugh Thomas set out to answer Philby’s question and uncovered a maze of corruption, high finance, political gambles, and international intrigue. The Abnormal Death of Heinrich Himmler unearths not just Himmler’s grave, but reveals secrets that have long remained buried, and shadowy figures who would relatively stay that way.
On May 23, 1945, SS leader Heinrich Himmler committed suicide at the same time as in British custody, thus escaping trial and execution for war crimes. Or did he? British surgeon and forensics expert Hugh Thomas looks at the evidence and offers a surprising–and controversial–scenario.

Available evidence is sketchy, and it doesn’t help that the British government is keeping the files on the Himmler case sealed until 2045. Still, Thomas suggests, on the strength of forensic evidence and eyewitness testimony, that Himmler’s presumed corpse used to be actually that of another person. And as for Himmler? It is unlikely, Thomas believes, that Himmler could have fallen accidentally into Allied hands; Thomas suggests that he may have gone underground, aided by parties unknown, to direct the SS in its postwar guise, the stuff of Frederick Forsyth’s novel, The Odessa File. Thomas’s argument is plausible and every so often persuasive, especially when he discusses the negotiations Himmler’s agents conducted with the Allies, well before the war’s end, offering to provide a Nazi buffer state against the Soviet Union in exchange for clemency. Highly speculative but well reasoned, Thomas’s book must intrigue readers inclined to question received wisdom. –Gregory McNamee

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