Munich has many beer halls and beer gardens. I didn’t know that there was a thriving gay bar scene in that city during 1920s and 30s. I always thought Hitler hung out with disgruntled WWI veterans and anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists and anti-Communist street fighters during this period. The one homosexual associate Hitler had who was also a close friend was Ernst Roehm. And yes Roehm’s inner circle was full of homosexuals....this is where I think all of this comes from. There is no proof that Hitler had a sexual relationship with Roehm or any other man that I am aware of. This reminds me of the stories that Hitler had Jewish ancestry. Once again, some circumstantial evidence exists, but no proof and highly doubtful.
The Schwabing district of Munich would have been a likely bohemian (artsy avant-garde) hangout.
I always thought Hitler hung out with disgruntled WWI veterans and anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists and anti-Communist street fighters during this period.
Yes that would describe the occult Thule Society and paramilitary Freikorps. From both groups, Hitler tended to associate with those men who were also artists, writers, publishers, composers, musicians, etc. Some members from both groups would go on to become top nazis.
The Thule Society was largely composed of Munich's uppercrust and may have been the Munich branch of the occultic Germanenorden. Some Thule Society members were veterans whereas the paramilitary Freikorps was for the most part made up of veterans.
Rudolph Hess, a likely homosexual was a member of both the Thule Society and Munich Freikorps. Some historians have linked Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring, the fashion diva with a penchant for wearing womens makeup with the Thule Society. There may have been other top nazis with dual membership but their names don't come to me at the moment.
Depending on which historian you read, the list varies but known members and associates of the Thule Society that would become top nazis were Rudolph Hess, Alfred Rosenberg, Karl Harrer, Anton Drexler, Gottfried Feder, Hans Frank and Dietrich Ekart... Hitler's mentor.
From the Munich Freikorps came Ernst Röhm, Hermann Göring, Heinrich Himmler, Rudolph Hess as well as the founder of Munich based Freikorps Epp -- Franz Ritter von Epp.
Additional top nazis came from other Freikorps units. A Freikorps group in the Berlin area led by the sadistic homosexual Gerhard Rossbach contributed Martin Bormann to the nazi pary and Rudolf Höss, commandant of Auschwitz.
While the Freikorps and similar paramilitary groups existed across Germany, the Munich Freikorps led by von Epp is of greatest interest to our discussion.
Freikorps Epp was to my understanding the largest Freikorps group in Bavaria and is the group Röhm belonged to where he served as Epp's chief of staff.
Viennese historian Brigitte Hamann in her book on Winifred Wagner states that Epp and Röhm had a homosexual relationship... several times in Wagner's home.
Röhm is also reported to have had a homosexual relationship with Berlin Freikorps leader Gerhard Rossbach.
The Thule Society financially supported Freikorps Epp and may have provided material support as well. I'm now speculating but given the other political groups known to have been formed by the Thule Society, might Freikorps Epp have originally been started by the Thule Society? Enough with the speculation and back to what is known.
One political party known to have been formed by the Thule Society was the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (English: German Workers Party, abbreviated DAP) in January 1919. By Feb 1920, the DAP had changed it's name to Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP), commonly known in English as the Nazi party.
So, we have the Thule Society supporting both the Freikorps and establishing what would become the Nazi party.
As for Hitler, his record in 1919 is murky. He seems to have remained in the army through the end of 1918 and early 1919 doing whatever he could to avoid demobilization. By January 1919, he was reportedly assigned to a unit in Munich where he was elected representative of a lower unit of his battalion. He also managed to become a member of a soldier's council. He also reportedly wore a red armband signifying him as a red/socialist. This is all significant given the Socialist government of Bavaria during that time.
In February 1919, Hitler reportedly attended the funeral of Kurt Eisner, Jewish leader of the Bavarian Socialist Revolution and leader of Bavaria.
Hitler during a 1931 speech says he first met Ernst Röhm in a beer cellar on March 7, 1919. At the time of the meeting, Röhm was chief of staff to Epp, the Freikorps commander. Was Hitler being recruited in that meeting by Röhm to spy on Socialist groups, or was he already working for Röhm?
A few months later in Sept 1919, Hitler attended his first meeting of the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (DAP) reportedly as a spy. Hitler subsequently joined the DAP and Röhm joined shortly after Hitler.
So, Hitler and Röhm seem to go back to 1919 when Hitler may have been in a reporting relationship to Röhm.
The one homosexual associate Hitler had who was also a close friend was Ernst Roehm.
One must also remember that by 1948, most of Hitler's close associates were dead. Also, go back to my previous paragraph where in 1919, Hitler may have been in a reporting relationship with Röhm. Given what is known about Röhm, what might he have expected from Hitler? I agree, there is no proof but one can go on and on with this sort of conjecture.
And yes Roehm’s inner circle was full of homosexuals....this is where I think all of this comes from. There is no proof that Hitler had a sexual relationship with Roehm or any other man that I am aware of.
Perhaps but Hitler certainly knew of Röhm's sexuality and tolerated it for a long, long time. Odd for a man portrayed by the left as a rabid homophobe. But then there's the curious entry made by Goebbels in his diary on May 15, 1928 where he wrote of seeing Hitler and Röhm "in cozy comfort". What did Goebbels mean by that? As I've said, the case is circumstantial but when you consider the total body of evidence not only of Röhm and Hitler but of the other nazis, what other explanations are there? We haven't even gotten into discussing lower level nazis such as Baldur von Schirach.
There is no smoking gun but a considerable body of circumstantial evidence exists that Hitler may have been a homosexual and I'm using homosexual as a catch-all for all forms of same sex attraction.
If anything, I suspect Hitler was asexual, and too consumed with megalomania to worry about sexual relations. Eva Braun, in her diaries complained that Hitler barely ever payed attention to her. I suspect Hitler may have been using her as a beard, to cover up his asexuality.