Alleged doubles of Adolf Hitler

(right) and his chauffeur Julius Schreck (left) in 1925; both wore a toothbrush mustache. The 1939 book The Strange Death of Adolf Hitler alleges that the Nazi Party used four people as doubles for Hitler, including the author, who claims that the real dictator died in 1938 and that he subsequently took his place. The book is not remotely reliable, being regarded as farcical even in the year of its release. In 1939, the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA), while admitting that the book has "practically no direct evidence of authenticity", defended it by dubiously citing the purported death of Julius Schreck in 1938 as support for Hitler's use of doubles. The NEA claimed that after Schreck had ceased to be Hitler's chauffeur (in 1934), On 26 April, Stockholm's Free German Press Service circulated a rumor that a Hitler double named August Wilhelm Bartholdy, supposedly a former grocer from Plauen, was called to Berlin to be filmed by Hitler's photographer, Heinrich Hoffman, dying on the battlefield in Hitler's stead. The Germans émigrés stated, "He will act as Hitler's trump card, creating a hero legend around the Führer's death, while Hitler himself goes underground." This prompted a Stockholm journalist to speculate that Hitler's manner of death would most likely be suicide in his bunker. Allied officials cautioned against prematurely accepting presumptions of Hitler's death, noting that it would be exactly what he wanted. By 27 April, the London Star asked, Additional remains of himself or his wife of one day, Eva Braun, were never provably discovered. ==Supporting claims==

On 2 May 1945, the day Berlin fell, an official Soviet newspaper declared the German report of Hitler's death to have been a Nazi trick. On 9 May, The New York Times reported that a body was claimed by the Soviets to belong to Hitler. This was disputed by an anonymous servant, who stated that the body was that of a cook who was killed because of his resemblance to Hitler, and that the latter had escaped via a faked death. On 6 June 1945, Western correspondents cited the statements of Soviet Marshal Georgy Zhukov's staff that four bodies resembling Hitler had been found in the Führerbunker, purportedly burnt by the Red Army's flamethrowers; one body was considered most likely to be Hitler's, chemically determined to have died by poison. A few days later, on Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's orders, Zhukov presented the official narrative that Hitler had escaped, stating, "We have found no corpse that could be [his]." In mid-1945, a Soviet major told American sources that Hitler had survived and claimed his body was not found burned in the Reich Chancellery garden, stating, "Our experts have established that the man found here didn't look like Hitler at all." Similarly, the British Daily Herald cited a major who was reputedly the first Soviet to enter the garden, where he saw the body of "a double—and not even a good double". During their Soviet captivity, Heinz Linge, SS guard Josef Henschel, and Hitler's pilot Hans Baur were interrogated about whether Hitler escaped by leaving a body double. Baur later told American journalist James P. O'Donnell that although he never saw a double, Hitler's security detail may have kept one or more "on tap" in case Hitler "decided to take part in a breakout ... to camouflage or facilitate his escape". O'Donnell opined that after Hitler's death, any imposter would have been killed to save face. According to the dubious 1947 American book Who Killed Hitler?, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler previously employed several Hitler doubles as political decoys and knew of one in the Führerbunker. This unnamed double was "about 54" or perhaps younger, been groomed for public functions in the earlier years" when Hitler was healthy; thus, he could not deceive those familiar with the elder Hitler but might fool the public, being able to "pass as Hitler at a distance of fifty feet" by styling his hair and donning a prop toothbrush mustache. He supposedly began appearing in the kitchen by mid-April 1945, known to only a few of Hitler's servants as a helper to his chef, Constanze Manziarly, said to be exclusively aware if he performed kitchen duties. He was not allowed above ground nor seen outside the kitchen except by an SS escort (undercover as a servant) with whom he shared a room in an area "neither visible nor accessible" to other staff. The kitchen servants reputedly pitied the duplicate, sensing that "whatever fate overtook Hitler also would overtake" him. Himmler supposedly had to reckon with the double's existence after hatching a plan to assassinate Hitler via the dictator's physician Ludwig Stumpfegger. Besides Hitler's use of living decoys likely being false, the story about Hitler being murdered on Himmler's orders has, in the words of historian Richard J. Evans, "never been taken seriously". According to a 8 May 1945 Soviet report, Hitler's body was found on the bunker grounds, bullet-riddled and seemingly beaten before and after death; it was captured in a series of photographs and identified as Hitler by several members of his staff, except for a chauffeur and maid, the former saying it was the body of a staff cook he knew intimately and was apparently killed to help Hitler escape. In November 1945, the Federal Bureau of Investigation received a claim that Hitler was living with two doubles in a sub-hacienda complex around northeast Argentina. From 1951 to 1972, the American tabloid National Police Gazette ran stories alleging Hitler's survival, with plots like Stumpfegger employing brain surgery to paralyze the double, switching him or her in for Hitler. Richard Evans notes that tabloid magazines such as the Gazette have made a "career" out of sensational stories about Hitler. In 1963, author Cornelius Ryan interviewed General B. S. Telpuchovski, a Soviet historian who was allegedly present during the aftermath of the Battle of Berlin. Telpuchovski claimed that on 2 May 1945, a burnt body he thought belonged to Hitler was found wrapped in a blanket. ostensibly from an oral gunshot. In his 1965 biography of Stalin, English Robert Payne claimed that this body was Hitler's, as did Ryan in his 1966 book, The Last Battle, saying the corpse had been found "under a thin layer of earth". According to Telpuchovski, a total of three Hitler candidates had been burnt, apparently including a body double wearing mended socks which he described as being in "remnants". The Death of Adolf Hitler, which novelly provided details of Hitler's dental remains while implying they were found in the mouth of a different body. Bezymenski quotes Ivan Klimenko, the commander of the Red Army's SMERSH unit, as stating that on the night of 3 May 1945, he witnessed Vizeadmiral Hans-Erich Voss seem to recognize a corpse as Hitler's in a dry firefighting water tank filled with other bodies in the Reich Chancellery garden. Although Klimenko had some doubts because the corpse was wearing mended socks, he briefly speculated that it belonged to Hitler. On 4 May, Soviet officers had the body double filmed. In the 1982 edition of his book, Bezymenski cites the cameraman behind the footage as saying that the body had been brought inside the Chancellery for identification by Germans, most of whom thought it was not Hitler; the body was then brought outside to be filmed in better lighting. The footage shows the double with an apparent gunshot wound to the forehead. The right temple is battered and traces of dark liquid appear around the mouth and nostrils, as well as a (potentially fake) toothbrush mustache. Certain upper teeth are visible and a portrait of Hitler sits on the torso. According to Klimenko, later on 4 May, Hitler and Braun's true remains were discovered buried in a crater outside the Chancellery, wrapped in blankets and reburied, then the next day after the double was debunked as being Hitler. A 1945 Soviet television documentary implied the footage showed Hitler, with the tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda later saying it was Hitler's double. In 1992, journalist Ada Petrova found the footage in the Russian state archives; the body double had reputedly been identified as Gustav Weler. In their 1995 book, Petrova and Peter Watson opined that 'Weler' may have worked a menial job in the Reich Chancellery and occasionally stood in for Hitler as a political decoy. == Arguments against ==

According to a purported Soviet biography dated January 1946, Gustav Weler was born in Pomerania in 1886 and later lived in Berlin. In 1924, he was sentenced to three years in prison for counterfeiting banknotes. In January 1932 he joined the Sturmabteilung, but was expelled after two months for failing to cut his hair. In 1933–34, due to Hitler's rise to power, the Gestapo summoned Weler and implored him to cut his hair and mustache to keep him from resembling the chancellor; the repeated summons prompted Weler's attempted suicide via illuminating gas. In 1934, Himmler offered Weler 1,000 Reichsmarks to shave, asserting that Weler would "disappear forever" if he continued to resist. He was not a Nazi Party member and in 1944 moved to a village in Bernau, where he was still alive, working as a roofer. Hitler's pilot Hans Baur wrote in his memoir that , Johann Rattenhuber, then head of the Reichssicherheitsdienst, had found a potential doppelgänger for Hitler and asked Baur to see if Hitler wanted to employ him for that purpose. This prompted the dictator's laughter, saying it was a trick more befitting of Stalin. While in Soviet captivity and being questioned about Hitler's possible escape via a body double, Baur told the Soviets that Rattenhuber might be able to help them contact the man; the Soviets dubiously claimed that they successfully contacted him. In 1955, SS guard Hans Hofbeck said that during his Soviet captivity, he was asked about Hitler's alleged body double; he told the Soviets about a porter—who worked in the Reich Chancellery—with similar facial features, hairstyle, and mustache, but was slightly shorter and thinner. Hofbeck stated that the man wore his brown office uniform, that was the same color as the Party one and comrades sometimes jokingly called him "Führer". Hofbeck also stated that in 1946 he witnessed Baur telling the Soviets that the Nazis had once found a baker from Breslau (modern Poland) who strongly resembled Hitler, but the dictator refused to employ him as a doppelgänger. Contradictorily, Hofbeck also claimed that he learned about the Breslau man from Rattenhuber. During his Soviet captivity, Heinz Linge argued that a double could not have died in Hitler's stead because the dictator did not use doubles and would have been seen if he had fled. Presiding judge at the Einsatzgruppen trial at Nuremberg Michael Musmanno wrote in 1948, "There is not a shred of evidence to show that Hitler ever had a double." Musmanno further states that "the several score immediate associates of Hitler whom I questioned expressly stated that Hitler never had a double." In his 1995 book on Hitler's death, historian Anton Joachimsthaler implies that the Soviets may have falsified the body double because they failed to find Hitler's body; Musmanno opined that Hitler's body must have been burnt to near-ashes. Joachimsthaler concluded there would be little more than calcified bones and charred tissue left that was then subjected to intense artillery bombardment in the end. Certain scientific studies opine that the open-air burning would not have disintegrated bone. Historian Mark Felton further surmises that after the cremations failed, the Germans planted the dental remains on other cadavers, perhaps taken from the nearby hospital—explaining certain defects—and expertly concealed Hitler and Braun's real bodies. Historian Peter Hoffmann, a specialist on Hitler's security units, similarly doubts that he ever used doubles. Historian Sjoerd deBoer also states that the stories of a double are highly suspect and found no evidence to support that one was used in Berlin in April 1945 or that Hitler escaped. He concludes that these stories were part of the post-war Soviet disinformation campaigns regarding Hitler's fate. == Legacy ==

chief Heinrich Müller (missing in action as of May 1945) had survived the war and told the U.S. that a double was used to help Hitler escape. The false implication that footage of a body double showed Hitler's corpse in a 1945 Soviet documentary was corrected in a 1966 documentary. In September 1992, Ada Petrova edited a still of the footage into a Russian television broadcast, which was criticized for implying the body was Hitler's. A few days later, Bezymenski claimed that the double was unique from the body identified as Hitler, which he reaffirmed that the Soviets had found elsewhere in the Chancellery garden. {{multiple image|total_width=314 In a 2009 episode of History's MysteryQuest, a bone-specializing archaeologist collected samples from a skull fragment in the Soviet archives believed to be Hitler's. DNA and forensic examination indicated that the fragment, which had an exit wound on the right parietal bone, On the same program, fringe author H. D. Baumann asserts that Hitler increased his use of doubles after a 1944 assassination attempt. Baumann claims that the darned-sock-wearing double, whose ears he points out are different than Hitler's and allegedly was two inches shorter, was killed by the Germans on 30 April 1945. Citing all these details, as well as the implication that the bodies of Hitler and Braun were never found and Stalin's assumption that Hitler escaped to Spain or Argentina, Baumann concludes that Hitler faked his death. Greek conspiracy theorist Peter Fotis Kapnistos, author of 2015 fringe book ''Hitler's Doubles'', claims that Hitler was replaced by a double after he was hospitalized near the end of World War I, citing personality changes and his increased nose width in later photographs. (In fact, there is only evidence of Hitler's enlarged nose close to the end of World War II in Europe.) Kapnistos claims that Hitler had four doubles: Schreck, stenographer Heinrich Berger (who was killed in the 20 July 1944 attempt to kill Hitler), Gustav Weler (whom controversial author W. Hugh Thomas said was found alive after the war), and English occultist Aleister Crowley. == See also ==