Free The Nuremberg Interviews by Leon Goldensohn Page A

depends. Hitler had bad advisers, particularly Himmler, Bormann, and Goebbels. I lost Hitler’s confidence in 1934. I worked closely and confidentially with him only until the Roehm putsch. After that, I was not really in the inner circle of Hitler’s advisers. I’m convinced Roehm did not even want a putsch, but Himmler used it to gain power. From that time forth Himmler became more and more irreplaceable.” Frick states that Himmler was “against” him since 1933, but gives no reason for this other than Himmler’s “great desire for more power.”
    “Hitler’s government, that is to say, the internal policy, worked well in 1933. It did away with unemployment. It worked smoothly as long as Hitler listened to his advisers. After the Roehm putsch in 1934, Hitler’s chief advisers became Goering and Himmler.” Were you ever friendly with Goering? “No.
    “Hitler’s lack of moderation was a fault. He was so stubborn he listened only to Bormann and Himmler, both of whom were criminals of the worst kind. His own ministers wouldn’t be received anymore. I tried to resign because it was an impossible situation, but Hitler refused and said I had to remain. The last time I could see Hitler was in 1937. During the war I saw him only occasionally. I had a home next to Hitler’s in Berlin because the living quarters of the Ministry of the Interior were located in the Foreign Office, which was next door to the Chancellery. Formerly the Foreign Office had been the Ministry of Interior. We retained only our living quarters there. It was Wilhelmstrasse, 74.”
    Family History: Father died in 1918 at age eighty as a result of falling from a wagon. He was a schoolteacher. He was a “good” father, a nationalist politically, and an admirer of Bismarck. He was never a soldier. Mother died in 1893 of pneumonia. At the time Frick was sixteen years old. His father never remarried. The father’s name is the same as the subject’s, that is, Wilhelm. His grandparents on both sides were farmers who lived in the northern Palatinate. He has little comment to offerregarding his mother’s or father’s personality. He believes that he resembles his father in personality.
    Siblings: He is the youngest of four children. (1) Brother, died at age thirty of tuberculosis, in the Canary Islands. His name was Hermann Frick, born 1870. He was a businessman. (2) Sister, died age seventy-two, in 1938 of a weak heart. She was single and kept house for Frick. (3) Sister, Emma, born in 1864, died in 1903 of tumor of the stomach. She was a teacher of English and Latin.
    He did not see the sister who died in 1938 for the last five or six years of her life. She remained in Kaiserslautern, whereas he was in Berlin. He was on good terms with all members of his family, he says, but they were never very intimate.
    Marital: First marriage was to a woman ten years his junior. They were divorced in 1934. The marriage was “satisfactory,” but he wanted more children, “and she didn’t want any more so we were divorced.” They had three children. In the same year of his divorce, 1934, he remarried a woman nineteen years his junior. This marriage yielded two children.
    Children: (1) Hans, born 1911, was a district magistrate in upper Bavaria. He committed suicide on May 3, 1945, together with his wife and children. (2) Walter, born 1913, was killed in action on the Russian front in 1941, at which time he was a first lieutenant. “I saw him on the banks of the Dnieper, wounded as a result of shell fragments. He had an abdominal wound. I had permission from the Führer to visit him. I flew there and next day flew back to Berlin. Later that day I found he had died.” What was your emotional reaction? “It was sad. It’s war. Many others died, too. It’s war.”
    We discussed the business of war. “I am skeptical about preventing wars. I doubt if they can be prevented. There will always be wars. Judging by past experiences, working for peace now would be