From Bormann's Secretary to British Housewife - Hitler Bunker Escaper Else Krüger

On Friday, May 3, 1985, as part of a series of articles exploring aspects of the 40th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe, the Daily Mirror, a famous British tabloid, published a story titled "This British Housewife "He was in Hit Bunker for a couple of days." Earlier, a report had arrived at the door of the

housewife

in question in a comfortable house in Cambridge and the formidable Mrs. Elsa James paid no attention to it. His 70-year-old Mrs. James had an extraordinary story to tell, a story she resolutely refused to tell anyone and a story I have been trying to piece together for over a year because Mrs.

James was no ordinary

housewife

. and current; in fact, it was Elsa Krueger, chief

secretary

to none other than the sinister Martin Borman, Hitler's personal

secretary

and leader of the Nazi party's chancellery, who rose and disappeared into thin air on May 2, 1945 in devastated Berlin by the war and whose fate remains a mystery even today: Elsa Krueger, who was alleged by two of Hitler's secretaries to be Martin Borman's mistress and that his secretary had been in Hitler's

bunker

in The Bitter. Even more extraordinary was her transformation from Borman's trusted secretary to British housewife and her enigmatic refusal to talk about the final days of Hitler's life, which she had witnessed firsthand, turning away historians and journalists. throughout her life.

Krueger was born in Hurg in February 1915. He joined Borman's staff in late 1942 and towards the end of the war he presided over a group of 30 secretaries and typists who worked for Borman in the final weeks of the war. He spent much time at Borman's side. Borman in fury.

bunker

busy dealing with constant reports and instructions from her boss and working closely with Hitler's remaining secretaries when Hitler began Operation Salio, evacuating much of the staff and files from the bunker to the relative safety of Orasal B in Bavaria, Krueger volunteered to stay in the bunker along with a handful of women from Hitler's staff, his secretaries Gera Christian and Troud Yunga and his dietitian Constanza Manali even as Soviet forces approached the city, in fact, Krueger and Christian were believed to be dead for some time after the war, as they were listed as air passengers on the The last evacuation flight took place on April 23, 1945 after this plane crashed in Bavaria.

The reason was that Krueger and Christian's luggage was recovered from the rubble, however, Krugger remained resolutely at her post, becoming very friendly with Hitler's girlfriend, Ava Brown, and sometimes drinking tea with her. and Hitler in the bunker during the chaotic final days of the war During this period Martin Borman continued his intrigues around Hitler while also arranging for his own Prince of Survival by sending messages to Grand Admiral Carl Dernitz, Hitler's nominated successor in his headquarters. general in Flansburg. in northern Germany, making clear his intention to join him shortly and take a position in the new Nazi government, whose authority would reside in a document that Hitler dictated to his secretary Troud Yunger in the early hours of April 29, 1945. , his policy Testament Krueger was involved in drafting and copying this document and Hitler's private and personal will, which Hitler finally signed after many revisions at 4:00 a.m. m. on April 29.

The political will was in two parts and the second part set out Hitler's intentions for the German government and the Nazi party after his death and detailed his successes during he was appointed President of the Reich and Supreme Commander of the German Armed Forces with Dr. Three couriers of Hitler and Borman's staff sent copies of these legal documents to be delivered personally to Dernitz and three copies made by Yunger with the probable help of Krugger, although none reached Dernitz in the north and these copies were captured. or destroyed, however, we will return to the topic of these Hitler documents later, as I found forgotten archival documents showing the existence of an unknown fourth copy of Hitler's personal and political will and testaments that survived the war.

Elsa Krueger was present at Hitler's marriage to Ava Brown and again shortly before the alleged suicides of Hitler and Brown, she was part of the lineup of Bunker staff to which Hitler and his wife B said goodbye on the afternoon of April 30. 1945, shaking Hitler's hand and hugging him before disappearing into Hitler's study for the last time thereafter, Krueger returned to his work alongside Boran, stressed, exhausted and drinking heavily, when the new Chancellor of the Reich, Gobl, attempted to negotiate a ceasefire with the Soviets. Gobles failed and committed suicide on May 1. Borman was now the highest-ranking Nazi.

Hitler had given permission to an official of the brig fura banker SS fura vilhelm Mona, battle commander of the government district where heavy fighting was still continuing, to organize an escape attempt by the remaining bunker personnel and defense troops attempting to infiltrate through Soviet lines and head northwest. From Berlin, 10 escape groups were organized and Kruger Yunga Christian and Manzali were included in group one led by Mona Borman herself. Curiously, Krueger had been the secretary who had been ordered to draw up the lists of who should go. in which group she had typed them all up and Mona had then taken them to Hitler for his final signature.

Krueger said little about the last few days in the bunker; The only thing she did fairly consistently was tell people that Borman was dead and that he couldn't have survived outside. of the bunker in the sworn statement she gave to U.S. Army Intelligence on June 17, 1946, she describes speaking with Borman for the last time on May 1, 1945 in what she called the Reich Chancellery bunker, which may referring to the bunkers adjacent to the fura bunker she stated that at that time she was no longer working for Borman I quote her last words to me Krueger recalled in 1946 that she said in a chance encounter in the bunker they were so goodbye this does not make much sense Borman referred When the escape attempt was to begin that night, he added: I'll try, but I'm sure I won't finish the final date.

Krueger's statements about Borman's fate were unequivocal at the Nernberg trial, where she appeared as a witness at Borman's trial. In absentia, she said that he must have died he was not StreetWise it was fatal to be in the Berlin of May 1945 in the end she basically spoke ill of Borman a strange position considering that she had volunteered to remain at his side as his main secretary in the Fura bunker refusing to be evacuated to Bavaria, her statements at the Nberg trials were quite damning regarding her former boss. She said Borman was a brutal man, with a violent temper and rude manners.

He was helpless when left alone. She also added: I'm pretty sure Borman was murdered. and the Russians collected his body without realizing who he was. He did not wear any rank insignia and could easily have been mistaken for an ordinary SS soldier. There were countless bodies lying in the streets. If he had escaped, they would have caught him. At this point he was no longer smart enough to last that long. At the end of the quote, both Gerder Christian and Troud Yunger told postwar researcher James P O Donnell, a former US Army intelligence officer, that in their opinion Krueger was Borman's mistress, could the Krueger's damning comments about Martin Borman being a case of the lady protesting too much, more than one author would suggest that Krueger's statements about Borman's fate were designed for Allied consumption and, of course, his complete refusal to discuss what happened in the bunker or Martin Borman deeply suspicious anyway on the night of May 1 to May 2 there was an escape from the ruined Reich Chancellery;

The women who participated wore military uniforms stripped of their insignia and wore steel helmets. A curious incident supposedly occurred before Group One departed when the brig Fura Mona gave Hitler's secretary Gera Christian a small bag of diamonds for safekeeping, later bunker participants told a ridiculous story that the Diamonds had actually been in the hands of General Bergdorf Hitler's army agitator for use in constructing high-end Nazi awards, if so they would have been in the Berlin jewelers who manufactured such medals, not in Hitler's bunker. , clearly small bags of diamonds were some of the best mobile wealth that fugitives could carry when on the run, they were light, easy to conceal and very valuable.

Others have suggested that Christian gave this bag of diamonds to Elsa Krueger to carry in any direction. Although both Christian and Krueger managed to escape to Western Allied lines, the diamonds were never seen again and both denied ever having had them. We will return to this later. It was also alleged by none other than General Moner himself, who survived a decade of Soviet captivity. moving to West Germany and giving many interviews about Hitler's final days that Christian or Krueger received the previously unknown fourth copy of Hitler's Political Testament. If true, then this made one or both of these secretaries official messengers.

Further corroboration of Kruger's alleged Messenger role came from Krugger herself in a letter I discovered in the archives of the famous British historian Hugh Trevor Roper Krueger wrote on February 22, 1977 to Trevor Rer that we meant that Krueger and Christian had a letter from Gobles to bring down the quote if they carried a letter. From the late Reich Chancellor Gbl to the new Reich President Deret sound like messengers to me, however, as we will see later, Krueger took steps to deny having played any official role during the Berlin escape or also being in possession of the fourth copy of Hitler's Political Testament as alleged by Mona, so how did Krueger manage to escape Berlin when almost everyone

else

was captured or killed?

As I said, the leading group one was Brigard Fura Mona and the other prominent male members of this group were Schan Fura Oto Guna Hitler. The personal agitator Reich Foreign Minister of the Ribbon Trop representative at Fura headquarters wavered Huille and Vice Admiral Hans Eric fos Hitler's naval liaison officer, in addition to the four women, including Krugger and Mona Guna huo and fos. The group also included other SS officers and Hitler's SS troops. escort command, all heavily armed, on the night of May 1, 1945, these people in small groups crossed from the court of honor of the Reich Chancellor to Vilhelms Plats under sporadic Soviet fire, ran to the entrance to the Kaiserhof Yuban station and walked along the relatively safe underground tunnels.

At the Friedi Stasa station, a tunnel forced them out onto the street. A part of the group had already disappeared into the crowd at the Friedrich Stasa station, but Mona led most of the group across the Vendem Bridge to the other side of the Shay River and they continued on. Through the courtyards of the charity hospital and through the basements connecting to sha stza, we finally arrived at Ving station, whose number has now been reduced due to desertions and casualties to only 20 to 25 people, including the four women who were attacked with machine guns by two Soviet t34 tanks.

The group became even smaller before, on the morning of May 2, the survivors entered the large air raid shelter next to the Schul Pson Horer brewery in Quinon Alley. The brewery and vendors were filled with hundreds of German troops from many units and the brewery was also At Orar's command post, Harry Herman, commanding what was left of the 9th Fima division, Mona conferred with the senior officers present hoping to continue the escape attempt and many more of the Fura bunker staff also said that the former commanding officer of Hitler's bodyguard unit appeared among them. SS gr furer Johan raten Huber Interestingly, Krueger said at the Newberg trial that Raton Huber had informed him of Borman's death having been a member of Borman's Escape Group.

They told me that his Panza car had been hit while they were crossing the Friedi Stasa bridge over the river. He said that the last time he saw Borman lying face down on the bridge, dead or seriously injured, he ended the appointment at 3 p.m. Soviet officers approached the brewery when a truce was already in effect, demanded that the Germans lay down their weapons and surrender. At this time, Oto Guna spoke to Hitler's secretaries and dietician and advised them to leave the air rage shelter and try to do it themselves. They agreed and one version of the story showsMona giving Gerder Christian the small bag of diamonds.

At this point, anyway, the women left as a group, including Elsa Krueger. It seemed that Krueger intended to go northwest, towards where Grand Admiral Dut's new government was. operation that would take her into British-controlled territory Borman had apparently urged Krueger to fall into British hands only if she were to be captured, stating that the British would behave like gentlemen end of quote don't forget that Krueger came from Hamburg and would have had relations and friends who still lived in the area and Hamburg was effectively captured by the British on 3 May 1945, she probably felt more comfortable with the British as she and her sister had worked as opair in Britain in the 1930s Working for the families of Shelx managers - the work organized by Sir Henry Detering, who heavily financed the Nazi party during its early years and died in 1939 after leaving the brewery - the women spit in two groups, Yer and Constanza Manzali in one and krugger and Gera Christian in the other yunga left Manali. to go and try to find some civilian clothes for both of them and return to see Manzali being led towards the entrance of a Yuban station by two armed Soviet soldiers.

She was never seen alive again. troud yunger continued alone, her intention was to reach the British zone as well, but she lacks money, without papers or luggage, even so she arrived at the countryside on the outskirts of Berlin walking for several days, sleeping in barns or, sometimes, in farms and receiving some pieces of food and clothing on the road incredibly, while fleeing he ran into another fura. fugitive bunker SS oboman furer Eric Kimker Hitler's main driver who was on his way to try to cross the Elbe River, in fact, Kemka reached Beus Garden in Bavaria, being detained by American troops on June 20, 1945, Yunga could not reach the lines Western Allies and eventually returned to Berlin, arriving in June 1945 and was eventually identified and picked up by the Soviets.

She was later released in the British sector of West Barlin in December 1945 suffering from diphtheria, since for Christian and Kruger their trip was somewhat different according to statements made by Krugger and Christian, they managed to reach British Lines by somehow getting on a repatriation train returning French forced laborers from the Soviet zone, themselves posing as French workers, apparently their cover was blown by French officers on the train which caused the Soviets to remove the two women from it, however, After speaking with the commander of the British train, HM smuggled them on board in this way, Borman's secretary and Hitler's secretary disappeared into the chaos of northwestern Germany, if you remember, the two women had in their possession a letter from Dr. devora to Reich President Dernitz, a strange thing to carry in an escape attempt, could such a high-level letter have been a sort of introductory note sent to couriers carrying copies of the latest Hitler's will and testament to reject any purpose? or its contents we will never know, so what became of this fascinating historical object?

In the letter I found in Krueger's archives to Hugh Trevor Roper dated February 22, 1977, she tells us that we received a letter from gobl to dnets and this along with personal papers that we tore into pieces and Flash in a sink a few hours After leaving Berlin end of quote Elsa Krugger settled in Hamburg and began working as an office clerk, but was eventually identified and detained by the British military police for questioning. She was one of the key witnesses to the inner workings of Hitler's government and court and as Borman's chief secretary, she had been privy to immense amounts of information about Boran's activities.

She was also one of the few people who had managed to escape the fura bunka and reach the In the west, most of the others were missing or detained by the Soviets. She was subjected to interrogations by British and American intelligence eager to discover the fate of Hitler and Borman, but things are a little strange here. She spoke at length with the then-major Hugh. Trevor Roper of the Intelligence Corps, who used his recollections as a major part of his best-selling 1947 book, The Last Days of Hitler, but it was the relationship he developed with his other British Army interrogator, Captain Leslie J.

James, of the intelligence core, which is surprising. Still, when she appeared at the Nernberg trial, a newspaper article mentioned Krueger, tall, blue-eyed, and with a big shock of honey-colored hair. Miss Krueger enjoyed Hitler's admiration because she believed she reciprocated his Nordic racial theories. End of quote, Krueger also had the admiration of Captain James. and the two formed a relationship while she was in British custody, a relationship that became official when she was released during her appearance in Nernberg. Krueger was housed in an American-controlled boarding house in the city, run by Hungarian aristocrat Countess Ingaborg Ki. She went on to write a book on this topic, the actual book was published in 1974, however, the Harvard Law School Library is the Countess' original unedited manuscript.

Countess Ki spoke with Krugger frequently, but she felt that he was hiding something from her. Krueger told Ki that Borman was dead. which is what she also told the court. Another witness staying at Kaln Noi's house was Hitler's official photographer, Henrich Hoffman, who despised Borman. Borman had deliberately marginalized him and then excluded him from Hitler's inner circle. Ki claims that, citing Hoffman, she tried to get him to feel sure about the actions of his former boss and his relationship with Hitler, but Phrine Krueger, although always friendly, was very insensitive, the only topic of conversation she avoided was her boss, he told her. has trained like a poodle, was Hoffman's displeased assessment of Fran Krueger, end of quote and this was Krueger's attitude toward the subject of Borman and Hitler for the rest of his long life was an almost complete refusal to talk about it. period of his life and, like Countess Ki and Hinrich Hoffman's man, many others have wondered if he had something to hide after his release.

In British custody in 1947, Krueger moved to England with his former interrogator, Captain James, who had been demobilized, they married at Wy Registry Office on Christmas 1947 and moved to Ivy Cottage Green Lane in Wy, on the outskirts of Liverpool. The locals thought Mrs. James was Danish and accepted her as a war. the bride Leslie James was pursuing an academic career earning her doctorate no one knew of her previous life as Martin Borman's secretary her son Harold was born in 1956 when Krueger was 41, but no other children followed at the time Krueger and her husband lived in Bedford , Dr.

James accepted a teaching position at Cambridge University in the late 1960s and Elsa was unbothered by her past until she was approached by former American intelligence officer James Podonnell, who was researching her now famous book The Berlin bunker. The problems began. Odonnell managed to track Krueger down to Cambridge and she and her husband lived in Lands Down Road, a leafy suburb of the city. She only spoke briefly to Odonnell about the war date. After all these years, she fights tooth and nail to stop the war. "The truth comes out," Odonnell told the Liverpool Echo in May 1985. "Personally, every time I meet her, I find her harsh and not at all pleasant.

I wonder if she feels remorse." OD Donnell's book was due to be published in the UK and Us in 1979, but for a couple of years before Krueger fought tooth and nail to change or remove passages from O'Donnell's manuscript that mentioned her and her activities. , I was able to find three unpublished letters she sent to none other than Hugh Trevor the man who had interrogated her in 1945 describing her legal battles over Donal's book and the help Trevor Roper had given the couple in them. She accused Briard Fura. Mona tried to be a liar about her or Gera Chrisan having been in possession of the mysterious fourth copy of Hitler's last will, but she still confirmed that such a document had existed in a letter dated April 14, 1977 that she wrote to Trevor. laugh.

I believe there were only four copies of the will typed by Friar Yunger in one operation as one original and three copies, as is customary in Germany, sayga, which means one original and three copies. end of quote Mona suggested that she had given a bag of diamonds and a copy of the will to Krueger during the escape on May 1-2, 1945, this was recounted in O'Donnell's book, which Krueger legally disputed through from his Berlin lawyer. Her correspondence with Trevor Roper indicated that she spent some time trying to change this before they were published, as she says here.

I don't see why I should allow Mona to spread completely false statements about me, as these can be taken up again at any time by journalists. My current efforts are aimed at getting the editors to agree as soon as possible not to publish false statements about me in future editions. I hope that Of course, without resorting to legal proceedings, it ends" but Mona refused to withdraw the statement she had made to Odonnell. It should be noted that Gerder Christian supported Krueger's denials regarding both the diamonds and Hitler's will. Krueger was emphatic on this point, quoting Trevor Roper as I said earlier that Friar Christian and I definitely did not receive any copy of the will, but she admitted to possessing and then destroying a letter from GBL to derit Krueger believed the location of the fourth copy of the will had to do with Dr. gbl's attempted negotiations with the Soviets on May 1, 1945 negotiations that failed but took place between General Krebs of Hitler's staff and General Chukov of the Soviets in Kruger Mona's opinion.

He was lying to cover up the fact that he, an SS general, had given the fourth copy of Hitler's last will and testament to the Soviets when he surrendered at the brewery on May 2, 1945, as he explained to Hugh Trevor Roper in a quote from 1977. I think Krebs may have shown Chukov's original Will, but he brought it with him in To return it to gbbl or Borman, it seems extremely unlikely to me that Krebs left this will to Chukov since his mission was not successful. I had long conversations alone with Krebs before and after he left for the Russians and he repeatedly expressed his fundamental confidence in destruction.

After KBS returned, he probably returned the will to Gobbles or Borman. I think he then gave it to Mona so he could take it to Duritz. Monkey. I believe that shortly after his surrender to the Russians, she gave him the will and it took effect. possession of chukov end of quote, however, as Kruger and Christian were in possession of Dr. Gbbl's official letter to Reich President Dernitz, one could also argue that perhaps Mona was right, perhaps he handed over the last will and will to either of these two secretaries to Take this document to the Soviets instead of handing it over after all the secretaries were going to try to escape from the brewery area and it was common knowledge that copies of Hitler's last will had been sent three times before this fourth copy in a The attempt to reach Derit was considered extremely important to the rest of the bunker leadership team never explains why they were in possession of the gbl letter and perhaps this fourth copy of the last will and Hitler's testament followed the same path as that letter torn into pieces and thrown like lightning.

Krueger's relationship with Hugh Trevor Roper was interesting in itself, since the top intelligence corps Trevor Roper, as I mentioned, had interrogated her extensively after her capture in 1945, when she was a prisoner of the British, and her testimony formed a great deal. part of his best-selling book on However, it should be noted that over the following decades Hugh Trevor Roper's book underwent constant revisions as more and more information came out both from the East and from new Witnesses and many things were discovered to be incorrect in the original version raised to the House of Lords as Baron Daker of Glanton in 1979 Trevor Rer was elected Master of Peter House College Cambridge in 1980 while Krueger and her husband lived in the city and Dr James lectured at the University of Cambridge .

James was also a Fellow of Mland College in 1985 in Liverpool. The Echo newspaper, whose reporter had followed Krueger to Cambridge, telephoned Lord Daker at Peterh House. They asked her if she ever met her husband. Former Intelligence Corps Captain Leslie James, who had been in the same small section of the British Army investigating the Nazis in British-occupied Germany. The quote denied any knowledge of Leslie James. End of the quote which, considering the letters exchanged between him and Elsa Krueger on World War II matters, increases credibility. The book of ODDonnell published in 1979 was modified in the UK edition to alter references to Krueger, but not in the US version.

The Jameses decided to move to West Germany. Interest in Elsa Krueger waned once again. Leslie James then suffered a stroke and Elsa cared for her husband until his death in 1995. Elsa James nay Krueger died in Germany on January 24, 2005 at the age of 89 taking her secrets to the grave during the course of the investigation of this project. I tried to contact Krueger's son, Harold James, but a journalist who had had some contact with Harold in the past told me that he, like his mother, has nothing to say about it. his mother's wartime activities, so what are we left with?

Elsa Krueger definitely knew fascinating things about Borman and also about Hitler's final days, perhaps things that could change our entire perspective of what happened in the bunker and what happened to Hitler and Ava Brown and also, of course, what that happened to Borman, but for some unknown reasons he refused, unlike most bunker survivors, to discuss them with historians for posterity. Yes, she gave some information to Trevor Roper while he was a prisoner of the British, but it was not questioned in later decades as new information or versions of stories appeared or were questioned in print and interviews particularly related to Borman and the fate of him.

Most of the bunker survivors wrote books and profited from their experiences, but not Elsa Krueger and, interestingly, her Escape partner Gera Christian also remains silent after the war. The question is why Troud Yer and Gera Christian, when interviewed by Odonnell, said that Krueger was having an affair with Borman and when Odonnell asked Kruger if this was true, she neither confirmed nor denied it. I definitely think there was a lot more to the enigmatic. Then, Elsa Krueger has been released into the public domain. Countess Knoi's assessment that Krueger was probably hiding something seems pretty accurate. If she was hiding something, did she have to do with the fate of the fourth copy of Hitler's last will and that bag of diamonds? that she caused him so much trouble in the late 1970s and early 1980s or because of her alleged relationship with Martin Borman she perhaps had something to do with the Reich Minister and his possible escape from Berlin.

I have presented both sides of the story here and it really comes down to who you believe and the reasoning behind the decisions made by those people in May 1945, or Elsa Krueger was unfairly defamed by General Moner and she and G Christian's careers do not. official or even unofficial and speculation in the press and books about Krueger's role in the death of the Third Reich was little better than a campaign of persecution or she deliberately concealed her role and Mona was right and the suspicions of authors like Odonnell were not without some substance it has to be one of these two scenarios thank you very much for watching, subscribe and share and also visit my audiobook Channel War Stories with Mark Felton.

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