Did Hitler kill his niece?

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Newly uncovered archival documents have raised questions over whether Adolf Hitler could have murdered his half-niece, whose death in his Munich apartment in 1931 was officially ruled a suicide.

Angela ‘Geli’ Raubal, 23, was found dead with a gunshot wound to her chest in Hitler’s Munich apartment in September 1931. The weapon was a pistol belonging to Hitler, who is understood to have had an unusually tight-knit and controlling relationship with his young relative.

For 95 years, the accepted account has been that Raubal’s body was discovered on September 19, the date recorded in the Munich police investigation into her death. That morning Georg Winter, Hitler’s personal servant, is understood to have forced open Raubal’s room, which was locked from the inside, and found her body on the floor, according to Munich police records.

Official documents show Hitler – who was gaining prominence but had not yet seized power in Germany – had already left Munich for Nuremberg the previous afternoon, a timeline that would prove that he could not have been involved in her death.

But German historian Harold Sandner says he has uncovered an entry in Munich’s official death register giving the date and time of the discovery of Raubal’s body as 10.15 a.m. on September 18, 1931. Two death notices found in the archives also carried that date.

If those records are authentic, they would place Raubal’s death around 24 hours earlier than previously believed, and put Hitler in Munich when her body was discovered. Official records show he did not leave for Nuremberg until the afternoon of September 18.

Sandner has suggested the conflicting records could point to a possible murder cover-up by police officials sympathetic to the Nazi Party. His findings were first published by German news magazine Der Spiegel and will be detailed in his upcoming book, “The Death of Angela ‘Geli’ Raubal: Suicide or Foul Play?” due for publication next month.

Thomas Weber, an expert on Nazi Germany and history lecturer at the University of Aberdeen, said Sandner, who he has known for many years, presented his findings to him and that he believes the documents are credible.

Describing Sandner as “extremely meticulous and fastidious,” Weber told CNN he initially approached their meeting with skepticism but concluded that the new documents appear to seriously undermine the established chronology of Raubal’s death.

Sueddeutsche Zeitung Photo/Alamy

“Assuming that the photocopies of the documents that Sandner shared with me are authentic – and I have no reason to doubt that – it seems clear that Raubal died a day earlier than we all have assumed over the last almost one hundred years, and thus that Hitler was still in Munich when she died,” he said. As there are three newly-unearthed documents that put her death as September 18, some sort of clerical error seems unlikely, he added.

However, Weber was reluctant to conclude that meant Hitler therefore murdered his niece.

He said the Nazis could have had other reasons for wanting to conceal what happened. At the time, the party was seeking mainstream right-wing support, while Hitler was attempting to present himself “for electoral reasons as the embodiment of trust and virtue,” Weber said — something that “any scandal” could have put at risk.

Raubal was the daughter of Hitler’s half-sister, Angela Hammitzsch (née Hitler). She lived in her half-uncle’s close proximity for years while her mother served as his housekeeper, before eventually moving into his Munich apartment in 1929.

Many historians believe Hitler was infatuated with Raubal and that his behaviour towards her became intensely controlling and possessive in nature. Some have suggested their relationship turned sexual, although this is disputed. He is understood to have exercised considerable control over her life.

“The speculation has been that Hitler had an unhealthy obsession with Raubal, that he loved her, and that his interest was incestuous in nature, and that he murdered her out of jealousy because she wanted to leave him, or that he realized that she loved someone else,” Weber said, adding that there were many variations of this speculation.

Weber said that while he personally finds it difficult to believe Hitler’s relationship with Raubal was incestuous, his patterns of behaviour certainly suggest he felt a “deep bond” with her.

Shortly before her death, Hitler and Raubal are believed to have argued over her desire to leave Munich for Vienna to pursue musical studies.

The newly uncovered records do not settle the mystery of how Raubal died. They do, however, reopen questions that have persisted for nearly 100 years about what exactly happened inside his Munich home on the day of her death.

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新近发现的档案文件引发了人们的质疑：阿道夫·希特勒是否有可能谋杀了他的侄女？他的侄女于 1931 年在慕尼黑的公寓中死亡，官方认定为自杀。

1931 年 9 月，23 岁的安吉拉·“格莉”·劳巴尔被发现死于希特勒位于慕尼黑的公寓内，胸部中枪。凶器是希特勒的手枪，据了解，希特勒与这位年轻的亲戚关系异常密切且控制欲极强。

95年来，人们普遍接受的说法是，劳巴尔的尸体于9月19日被发现，这一日期也被慕尼黑警方记录在案。据慕尼黑警方记录，当天早上，希特勒的私人仆人格奥尔格·温特强行打开了劳巴尔从里面锁上的房间，并在地板上发现了她的尸体。

官方文件显示，希特勒——当时他虽然声名鹊起，但尚未在德国夺取政权——前一天下午已经离开慕尼黑前往纽伦堡，这一时间线证明他不可能参与她的死亡。

但德国历史学家哈罗德·桑德纳表示，他在慕尼黑官方死亡登记册中发现了一条记录，显示劳巴尔的遗体被发现的日期和时间为 1931 年 9 月 18 日上午 10 点 15 分。在档案馆中发现的两份死亡通知书也记录了这一日期。

如果这些记录属实，那么劳巴尔的死亡时间将比之前认为的早约24小时，而希特勒在发现她的尸体时身在慕尼黑。官方记录显示，他直到9月18日下午才启程前往纽伦堡。

桑德纳认为，相互矛盾的记录可能指向同情纳粹党的警官掩盖谋杀案。他的发现最初发表在德国新闻杂志《明镜周刊》上，并将详细收录于他即将出版的新书《安吉拉·“格莉”·劳巴尔之死：自杀还是谋杀？》中，该书预计下月出版。

阿伯丁大学历史讲师、纳粹德国问题专家托马斯·韦伯表示，他认识桑德纳多年，桑德纳向他展示了自己的研究成果，韦伯认为这些文件是可信的。

韦伯在接受 CNN 采访时形容桑德纳“极其细致严谨”，他最初对桑德纳的会面持怀疑态度，但最终认为这些新文件似乎严重动摇了劳巴尔死亡的既定时间表。

南德意志报 照片/Alamy

“假设桑德纳与我分享的文件复印件是真实的——我没有理由怀疑这一点——那么很明显，劳巴尔的去世日期比我们近百年来一直认为的要早一天，因此希特勒在她去世时仍在慕尼黑，”他说。他还补充道，由于新近发现的三份文件将她的去世日期定为9月18日，因此出现某种文书错误的可能性不大。

然而，韦伯不愿就此得出结论，认为希特勒因此杀害了他的侄女。

韦伯表示，纳粹分子可能还有其他原因想要掩盖真相。当时，纳粹党正寻求主流右翼的支持，而希特勒则试图“出于选举目的，将自己塑造成信任和美德的化身”——任何丑闻都可能危及这种形象。

劳巴尔是希特勒同父异母的妹妹安吉拉·哈米茨施（娘家姓希特勒）的女儿。她的母亲曾担任希特勒的管家，因此她多年来一直住在希特勒家附近，直到1929年才搬进希特勒位于慕尼黑的公寓。

许多历史学家认为希特勒对劳巴尔十分着迷，他对她的行为表现出极强的控制欲和占有欲。有人认为他们的关系发展成了性关系，但这一点尚存争议。据了解，希特勒对劳巴尔的生活拥有相当大的控制权。

韦伯说：“人们猜测希特勒对劳巴尔有着不健康的迷恋，他爱她，而且他的兴趣本质上是乱伦的，他因为劳巴尔想离开他而嫉妒她，或者因为他意识到她爱上了别人，所以才杀害了她。”他还补充说，这种猜测有很多不同的版本。

韦伯表示，虽然他个人很难相信希特勒与劳巴尔的关系是乱伦的，但希特勒的行为模式无疑表明他与劳巴尔之间有着“深厚的感情”。

据信，在她去世前不久，希特勒和劳巴尔曾就她想离开慕尼黑前往维也纳学习音乐一事发生争执。

新发现的记录并未解开劳巴尔的死因之谜，但却重新引发了近百年来一直困扰人们的疑问：在她去世当天，他慕尼黑的家中究竟发生了什么？