Hitlers flat: Prinzregentenplatz 16

[Binford]

No, he died in early 1992. For many years he was reluctant to talk about his World War II experiences but, sometime in the 1980s when he sensed that I had an academic interest, he opened up to me and I began taking notes to put them book form. We lived 100 miles apart and I was working 80 hours a week or more so it was a slow process. I did not see him that often. He had emphysema and, sometimes when I visited him, he struggled to communicate. I eventually abandoned the project. I do not remember him mentioning Herr Winter. He did elaborate on some things Anni Winter told him though I do not have all of them clear in my mind. She idenified the origin of some of Hitler's and Geli's personal belongings. Apart from the photo in the 45th Division News, the only photo taken inside of the apartment that I remember is one of him sitting at a desk using a bowl Hitler had received from Japan at the time of the signing of the Tripartite Pact as an ashtray. I think I may still have that photo. Though I purchased much memorabilia from him I did not get a lot of photos. His wife and son presumably got those but they are both dead.

[Geli]

Sorry to hear that your family members are no longer with us.

He did elaborate on some things Anni Winter told him though I do not have all of them clear in my mind. She idenified the origin of some of Hitler's and Geli's personal belongings .

That's interesting. Do you remember what items he told you about? And what became of them?

The only photo taken inside of the apartment that I remember is one of him sitting at a desk using a bowl Hitler had received from Japan at the time of the signing of the Tripartite Pact as an ashtray. I think I may still have that photo. Though I purchased much memorabilia from him I did not get a lot of photos.

If you feel like posting the photo, that would be a cool thing to add to this thread, since the apartment's interior would have still had its original furntiture. Did you get any memorabilia from him that relates to Prinzregentenplatz 16? (I'm sure everything he gave you is fascinating, but we don't want to go off-topic.

[Steve Hoog]

Geli, here is an interesting article if you haven't already seen it. http://www.germaniainternational.com/gunofdestiny.html

I'm headed to the Berghof in May and will fly out of Munich; so I too will take a visit by this building.

[Alpenfestung]

This link was posted by Helge in a different thread on this forum (http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 7&t=186627):

http://hitlerpages.com/pagina16.html (pictures of the Prinzregentenplatz building, including Geli's room)

Peter

[roddersw]

This message is for Antikoeper:

How can I humbly obtain your approval to use one of your photos for a publication?

PLease advise. Rodders

[Antikoerper]

Hi everybody,

after nearly three years of absence, I returned to this forum. I can´t exactly tell you, what was the reason for this long time period, but I think, it were all those private things, that bothered me. Just let me say, that I´ll be active again from this day on, I just need to arrange everything I´ve missed so far

[Geoff Walden]

Welcome back, Antikoerper!

Here is a photo I had not seen before. It is supposed to show Hitler waving from the "balcony" of his Prinzregentenplatz apartment. But it must be from one of the main front windows. You can see these same buildings across the street (Prinzregentenstrasse) on Google Maps. He could be looking out of the balcony window of the left side "turret" room (as viewed from inside the apartment).

It comes from this page http://www.focus.de/panorama/welt/repor ... 55498.html , where it is credited to the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München.

[Geoff Walden]

I had the good fortune to visit Hitler's former apartment on a special arranged tour yesterday (I'm sorry, but please don't ask me for details of this tour ... it's not available to the public). Here are two plans that show the configuration in 1935 (given to me by our Polizei guide, the same plan that "Geli" mentioned earlier), and today. I cleaned up the original plan, removing some extraneous labeling and crease marks.

1935: 1. Schlafzimmer (Hitler's bedroom), 2. Bad (bath shared by Hitler's bedroom and the guest room, and another small bath at the opposite end of the apartment), 3. Fremdenzimmer (guest room), 4. Speisezimmer (dining room), 5. Hall, 6. Wohnzimmer (living room, with the bow windows overlooking Prinzregentenplatz), 7. Hitler's desk and work area, 8. Bibliothek (library), 9. Zimmer (rooms), 10. Vorplatz (forecourts), 11. Küche (Kitchen), 12. Garderobe (cloak room), 13. Mädch. [Mädchen] Diene (female servant's room).

2013: Many changes have taken place. Specifically, the bath that was shared by Hitler and the guest room is now just a closet room; the dining room and the large living room have been subdivided with added walls and doorways (marked in red); the wall between the living room and the adjacent room (what I call the trophy room, as the book shelves are full of trophies today) has been extended from what it shows on the 1935 plan, so that this is more of a separate room today (although our Polizei guide told us that this doorway and the wood framing around it were original remains from the 1930s, and the walls do look the same in period photos, so I think the 1935 plan is misleading here); the former cloak room with toilets and the servants quarters are now all one large room, which is the kitchen and break room today; the former kitchen is now a storage room; the former servants staircase is now completely gone and the toilet / bath / shower room is there now (this is directly opposite today's fitness room). I don't know if the little bath at this end of the hall is still there (we did not open any closed doors).

The 1935 plan shows a doorway into the hall from the room adjacent to the living room (today's trophy room), but there is no doorway there today (and not on other period plans either). The 1935 plan shows the doorway from Hitler's bedroom into the bathroom at the end near the window, but the doorway now is at the opposite end of the room, near the main entry doorway. There is no doorway today from the guest room into the closet that used to be the bathroom. There is now a double doorway between Hitler's former bedroom and the former dining room, which does not show on the 1935 plan.

The 1935 plan shows a Kamin (fireplace) in the main hall, but this must not have been a built-in fireplace. At any rate, there is no trace of one there today. However, the original historic fireplace is on the other side of the wall from there, in an office part of the subdivided former living room. When Neville Chamberlain had a private conference with Hitler during the Munich Accords meetings, they met around a table in front of this fireplace.

The 1935 plan is, I believe, misleading in another area. It shows no wall - just the "stubs" of walls - separating the living room into two parts. However, the sketch maps earlier in this thread show walls extending from either side into the room, but not meeting in the middle in a doorway, and indeed, you can see today where the space between these short walls was filled up to make one solid wall, so the 1935 plan is inaccurate here.

The wood parquet floors certainly look original, and they squeak like they are that old too. The lift (elevator) still works, but we didn't use it.

I was not able to solve the mystery of which room Geli Raubal reportedly shot herself. The room configurations have changed, with both walls and doorways added and removed. The police physician Dr. Müller reported that "Die Leiche lag in dem Zimmer, das nür einen Eingang und Fenster auf den Prinzregentenplatz hat" - "The body lay in the room, that has only one entry and window to the Prinzregentenplatz." This statement is sufficiently vague that it apparently described at least two rooms in the apartment - the current fitness room, and the office next to the current trophy room (and possibly other rooms). The current fitness room is a large room at the opposite end of the apartment from Hitler's room, with an adjacent bath and access to the servants' stairwell (in the 1930s configuration). There has been speculation that this room was actually Geli's bedroom, not the guest room that shared a bath with Hitler's room. I showed the doctor's statement to our Polizei guide, and he said that was wrong - Geli's room was the guest room that shared a bath with Hitler's room, and that was where she shot herself. Certainly, this room is on the opposite side from Prinzregentenplatz, so this does not square with Dr. Müller's report made at the time.

However, Georg Winter, husband of housekeeper Anni Winter, said Geli's room had a double door (this and the Doctor's statement are from Anna Maria Sigmund's book Des Führers bester Freund, Munich, 2003). It's probably not safe to judge from the current doors, because they may not all be the original configuration, but the guest room next to Hitler's room has only a single door today. However, the three rooms at the opposite end, that overlook Prinzregenteplatz, all have double doors. I believe there is still good reason to think that the far room in the northwest corner (today's fitness room), looking out onto Prinzregentenplatz, was actually Geli's bedroom. As has been stated before, Geli reportedly had a lot of antique furniture in her room, and this end room is considerably larger than the guest room. But I can't make a definite statement on which was her room.

I reread this thread, and found where Antikoerper had posted a passage from Sigmund's book, saying that Geli had a corner room (Eckzimmer) ... it seems to me, that only the room at the far end from Hitler's - the current fitness room - could properly be called a corner room. So we're back to that room ... (Oberhessin posted this also, in another thread - http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 7&t=186627 )

See also this thread - http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 7&t=187706 . I think we are coming to the same conclusion ... Geli did not reportedly shoot herself in the guest room near Hitler's room, nor in the living room, but in the far corner room overlooking Prinzregentenplatz ... the room where the Polizei have their exercise equipment today.

[Geoff Walden]

Here is a photo I had not seen before. It is supposed to show Hitler waving from the "balcony" of his Prinzregentenplatz apartment. But it must be from one of the main front windows. You can see these same buildings across the street (Prinzregentenstrasse) on Google Maps. He could be looking out of the balcony window of the left side "turret" room (as viewed from inside the apartment).
It comes from this page http://www.focus.de/panorama/welt/repor ... 55498.html , where it is credited to the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München.

This picture was taken at the right-hand window of the two middle bow windows, on the right side of the living room (where Hitler's desk was located).

[acslater]

Wow, VERY cool, Geoff! Will we get to see pictures (I hope!)?

[Geoff Walden]

I got to thinking about the "double doors" ... maybe what was meant was not a 2-piece door, that opens in the center, but two actual doors - one on the hall side and another on the room side. The interior walls are thick in this building, and there is evidence on at least the doors for Hitler's bedroom and the guest room next door, that they originally had double doors like this - the current single doors are now mounted on the room side, but the hinge pins for the second doors on the hall side are still there.

Other doorways in the apartment may have also been like this, as the walls are thick enough, but I didn't notice any other hinge pins or evidence that there may have been other 2-door arrangements. But many changes have taken place in there over the years.

Here are a few views that I don't think have been shown before on other websites or in guidebooks.

This is the original fireplace in the Wohnzimmer, on the side where Hitler's desk was located. When British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain visited Hitler in this apartment on 30 September 1938, after the Munich Accords conference, to get Hitler to sign the agreement that Chamberlain later said meant "peace for our time," they sat in chairs arranged in front of this fireplace.

IMG_5336.JPG (42.18 KiB) Viewed 2772 times

This view is looking into the current fitness room, the corner room overlooking the Prinzregentenplatz on the opposite end of the apartment from Hitler's bedroom, which may have actually been Geli Raubal's room.

IMG_5339.JPG (54.78 KiB) Viewed 2772 times

A view of the original wooden parquet flooring. This is at the threshold from the Wohnzimmer into the adjacent "trophy room," which has a different parquet pattern.

IMG_5299.JPG (71.87 KiB) Viewed 2772 times

[Steve Hoog]

Geoff, excellent visit you were allowed there. A very lucky man!

[palaisfan]

Geoff Walden,

Thank you so much for posting not only these plans that explain some of the confusing indications over the years, but your detailed running narrative of the rooms and what changed today. I was wondering if in the translation "double doors" could sometimes mean had two different doors in different locations? I am sure you know the difference, but it is a problem of architecture descriptions have sometimes run into in English, to wit "The room had double doors" really just meant - had two doors total, not necessarily in the same wall area. But I think that take is VERY unlikely in this context. Just wanted to mention it.

All this makes one really wonder about LIFE's photographer's visit to the apartment, and whether a cache of fuller pictures exists somewhere. You have to wonder about the immediate post-war occupation. Geli's room and others would have been more obvious then.

I have an assemblage of random pictures of the apartment accumulated (no reason to believe any unusual though) which I will match up to this plan now again. (I had tried once before with the earlier plan). I will post it when get it put together, as enjoy such puzzles.

thanks again,

- palaisfan

[Nautilus]

As of 2013 (late August) the building - which still holds the police station - got repainted and refurbished:

[Annelie]

Nice photos, thanks for sharing.