Free The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz by Erik Larson

who had died in 1931.Paintings hung on the walls, from floor to ceiling, in multiple tiers that emphasized not their beauty and worth but, rather, the acquisitiveness of their new owner. His demand for fine things, especially those rendered in gold, was fed as well by a kind of institutional larceny.Every year, his underlings were compelled to contribute money for the purchase of an expensive present for his birthday.
    Göring designed Carinhall to evoke a medieval hunting lodge, and built it in an ancient forest forty-five miles north of Berlin. He also erected an immense mausoleum on the grounds for the body of his late wife, framed with large sarsen stones that evoked the sandstone blocks at Stonehenge. He married again, an actress named Emmy Sonnemann, on April 10, 1935, in a ceremony at Berlin Cathedral, attended by Hitler, as formations of Luftwaffe bombers flew overhead.
    Göring also had a passion for extravagant sartorial display. He designed his own uniforms, the flashier the better, with medals and epaulettes and silver filigree, often changing clothes multiple times in the course of a day. He was known to wear more eccentric costumes as well, including tunics, togas, and sandals, which he accented by painting his toenails red and applying makeup to his cheeks. On his right hand he wore a large ring with six diamonds; on his left, an emerald said to be an inch square. He strode the grounds of Carinhall like an oversized Robin Hood, in a belted jacket of green leather, with a large hunting knife tucked into his belt, and carrying a staff.One German general reported being summoned for a meeting with Göring and finding him “sitting there dressed in the following way: a green silk shirt embroidered in gold, with gold thread running through it, and a large monocle. His hair had been dyed yellow, his eyebrows were penciled, his cheeks rouged—he was wearing violet silk stockings and black patent leather pumps. He was sitting there looking like a jellyfish.”
    To outside observers, Göring seemed to have a limited grip on sanity, but an American interrogator, General Carl Spaatz, would later write that Göring, “despite rumors to the contrary, is far from mentally deranged. In fact he must be considered a very ‘shrewd customer,’ a great actor and professional liar.” The public loved him, forgiving his legendary excesses and coarse personality. The American correspondent William Shirer, in his diary, sought to explain this seeming paradox: “Where Hitler is distant, legendary, nebulous, an enigma as a human being, Göring is a salty, earthy, lusty man of flesh and blood. The Germans like him because they understand him. He has the faults and virtues of the average man, and the people admire him for both. He has a child’s love for uniforms and medals. So have they.”
    Shirer detected no resentment among the public directed toward the “fantastic, medieval—and very expensive—personal life he leads. It is the sort of life they would lead themselves, perhaps, if they had the chance.”
    Göring was revered by the officers who served him—at first. “We swore by the Führer and worshipped Göring,” wrote one bomber pilot, who attributed Göring’s cachet to his performance in the prior war when he was a top ace, legendary for his courage. But some of his officers and pilots were now growing disenchanted. Behind his back they began calling him “the Fat One.” One of his top fighter pilots, Adolf Galland, came to know him well and repeatedly clashed with him over tactics. Göring was easily influenced by a “small clique of sycophants,” Galland said. “His court favorites changed frequently since his favor could only be won and held by means of constant flattery, intrigue and expensive gifts.” More worrisome, in Galland’s view, was that Göring seemed not to understand that aerial warfare had