Nothing could convince Gudrun Himmler of her father’s crimes during the Holocaust. No amount of evidence—not a tour of Dachau concentration camp nor testimony during postwar trials—changed her mind.
To her death, she defended Heinrich Himmler, one of the cruelest and most notorious Nazi leaders.
Gudrun was born in 1929, the same year that Adolf Hitler appointed her father to lead the SS, then a unit of bodyguards for the Nazi Party leader. After Hitler became chancellor, Himmler eventually rose to become one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany.
Himmler transformed the SS into a deadly institution that ran the concentration camp system and carried out the mass murder of Europe’s Jews.
After Germany's surrender, Himmler was captured by Soviet soldiers. He was wearing a disguise, and the Soviets turned him over to the British, not realizing who he was. After confessing his identity, Himmler killed himself on this day in 1945, biting into a cyanide capsule he had concealed.
After the war, his daughter contributed to an organization that aided Nazis attempting to escape prosecution. She denied the Holocaust until her dying day.
Photo: USHMM, courtesy of James Blevins
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