Born in
Essen,
Germany, Hamann studied history in
Münster and Vienna. She worked as a journalist in Essen for some time. In 1965, she married a historian Günther Hamann (1924–1994), moved to Vienna and obtained Austrian citizenship in addition to her German. The couple had three children; one of them is journalist and feminist
Sibylle Hamann. Brigitte Hamann worked with her husband at the
University of Vienna and in 1978 obtained a doctor's degree on the basis of a thesis on the life of
Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria. The thesis was published as a book the same year. She described her working method as follows: "(Coming from Germany) I had a different view of Austria, and I began to write with a certain detachment". examined how societal attitudes at the time shaped Hitler's
anti-Semitic views during his time in Vienna between 1908 and 1913, and the effects of his inordinate fear of both infection and women. Following the publication of
The Hidden Hitler by historian and
University of Bremen professor
Lothar Machtan, Hamann investigated claims about
Hitler's homosexuality and appears in the 2004
HBO documentary film, ''
Hidden Fuhrer: Debating the Enigma of Hitler's Sexuality'', by American documentarians
Fenton Bailey and
Randy Barbato. In 2005, Hamann released ''Winifred Wagner: A Life at the Heart of Hitler's Bayreuth
, a biography of Winifred Wagner, the British-born woman who became a founding member of the Nazi Party and a close friend of Hitler. The publication earned her "Book of the Year" honors by Opernwelt (Operaworld) magazine and "Historical Book of the Year" honors from Damals'' history magazine. That same year she received the "" in recognition of her work. Hamann died on 4 October 2016 in Vienna at the age of 76. ==Honors==