NERVE CENTRE

Hokitika Guardian, 21 September 1937, Page 2

NERVE CENTRE

OF NEW GERMANY HITLER’S RETREAT'. Once the little Bavarian town of Berchtesgaden was a quiet peasant eommunity in the Bavarian Alps, 'mat was before Adolph Hitler became “Der Fuehrer.”

‘‘Now his choice of this spot as the retreat from which he directs the policy of Germany has made of Berchtisgaden a town of strangers, of a mountainside an armed camp, and of his dwn once-simple chalet an impregnable fortress.

From this remoto chalet Hitler has dictated his policy to Europe.

Not long ago the only industry of the little town was toy-making. To-day it. is the real capital of Germany. What is this mountain chalet at Berchtesgaden like ? From the few official photographs that are allowed to be published, nearly all Germany—outside Berchtesgaden —and most people outside Germany believe it to be. a small residence in which Hitler with a few picked friends can find peace and solitude, a simple refuge from routine work and social activity in Berlin—both of which Hitler hates.

Tsnce it was so —a small mountain hut, suitable only for a man cf simple means—but Hitler has transformed it in the last year.

Here it was that Hitler came when released from prison in 1924. after the Munich putsch. Here, looking down to Salzburg, in his native • Austria, he

wrote many chapters of lrs book, ‘‘Mein Kampf.”

But now the Berghof has become a palatial mansion, able to accommodate forty or more guests in large bedrooms, sumptuously furnished like a luxury hotel. The little mountain road has given way to a broad, speedy highway connecting the Berghof with Mun ch, 120 miles away.

Just off the highway, close to the Berghof. is a new airfield. A special building houses a branch of the Reich Chancellery. New homes have been, built for the staff and officials. Barracks have just been finished for Hitler’s private bodyguard of black-

shirted S.S. men. Wings have been added to the berghof for Hitler's personal secretarial staff.

The building is in two storeys with a wooden balcony, with flower-boxes all along the railings. It has its own internal telephone system, a telephone in every room. One button is labelled .simply ‘‘Her Fuehrer.” In theory any guest can speak to Hitler at any moment. In tact-, of course, it is not quite so simple.

Hitler’s rooms are in a wing of their own, so that in his mountain home he can isolate himself it he wishes to do so. And he usually does.

At first, when the Berghof was still a simple mountain chalet. Hitler had as housekeeper his widowed sister, Frau Angela Raubal.

Apart from luxury inside the Berghof has become, without most people knowing it. an impenetrable fortress. At, one time it lay directly on the road. The road lias been diverted yards away and made te dip and bend in such a manner that only a small corner of the mansion is ever visible iroiri it.

The entire mountainside for about eight square miles has been lonced iu with electrified wire eight feet high, with five lines of barbed wire on top.

Inside this estate are other chalets ol Nazi leaders, including that ol General Goering, which is higher up the mountain.

The scores of peasants homes and a children's sanatorium which were oive 011 this mountain side, have been re--1110 veil.

, Dotted here and there in the wooded landscape are little turrets, which look quaint, romantic and very Bavarian. They are defence posts for the bodyguards. fort died by machine-guns. Right 011 the roadside, also built in is a log cabin. This guards tin* heavy gates leading to the estate, and loom it the sentries have a commanding Few of all the curves of the approa-hing road.

In the sides of all the mountains for miles around tin* Berghof auti-aircralt guns are embedded. These would be able to pul up a concentrated barrage and bring down any enemy aeroplane.

To muive doubly certain, bomb and gai-proof ('('liars are built deep under the Berghof in the mountainside. The secret police keep a hard eye on Berchtesgaden. and the little toy town lias been repentedlv “cleansed of undesirable elements.”

Every hotel has a list of questions far ! more searching than in any other part of Germany, and tourists have to answer them all. The local peasants, shopkeepers, porters, and waiters strangely do not speak German with the soft round Bavarian dialect. Tney watch strangers closely. No one may walk or drive along the road towards the Berghof without a special permit, and no motor cats arc allowed to stop on the road. And the road is always cleared when one of the fast four-wheel-drive cars from the Berghof brings some special guest from Munich. 'Three hours is t'e average time for this journey ; the train takes at least three and a half hours. These special cars, which have been built for safe and speedy travel in all -Itjiids of weather, are housed in speci d garages built into the mountainside below the Berghof. Above this basement, level with the rising ground at the hack of the mansion, are the central hall and other so •- ! ial rooms. It was in these luxuriously furnished apartments that Hitler received Lloyd George and Italy’s I'oreign Minister, Count Ciano.

On this floor is the lolt-y dining-room, which opens on to a spacious balcony.

'The second floor is entirely taken up by the bedrooms. Masses of flowers are in every room, contrasting strikingly with the woodwork, stained dark brown in the Bavarian style.

In the hanging pine forests of his great estate Hitler has come more and more to formulate his policy in informal walks and talks.

His days are as simple as his diet he is a vegetarian and does not drink or smoke—a walk in the morning, then official business, an afternoon devoted to his favourite hobby, arohite't;;re—and an evening round the fireside with his guests, when he feels inclined llmt way.