Good intentions are not enough. Rudolf Hess, who decided to shorten World War II on his own, found out about it. His secret mission to Great Britain turned out to be a spectacular flop. Not only did he end up in a psychiatric hospital, but also British spies took his ... underpants.
Rudolf Hess took off from Augsburg-Haunstetten on the evening of May 10, 1941. He did not have a lot of luggage with him. He stuffed everything he needed into the pocket of his flight suit:navigation maps, a wallet with family photos, and a set of homeopathic remedies.
Hitler's deputy and one of the most important officials of the Third Reich set off on his way to Great Britain to present a peace proposal there. He himself called this expedition "mission for humanity."
The Disregarded Emissary
Unfortunately for himself, Hess was not greeted with a warm welcome when he landed a parachute in a lowland part of Scotland that evening. A local farmer noticed him and notified a nearby unit of the National Guard. The German was taken to the police station where he was searched and most of the items he had with him confiscated.
When he finally revealed his true identity, he stated that he needed to deliver an urgent message to Prince Hamilton, whose mansion was nearby.
After his "mission to humanity" failed, Hess spent the rest of his life in prisons.
This confession did not change much. Hess was still treated more of a curiosity than an emissary with an important mission. He was interrogated, also by Prince Hamilton, but continued to be ignored. While the news of his expedition made Hitler helplessly furious, Churchill was not about to change his plans and went to see the latest film by the Marx brothers.
In time, Hess was transferred to the Tower of London and then to the Mytchett Place country estate in Surrey, near Farnborough. Shortly after the arrival of the former Hitler's deputy there was another insult:his woolen underpants were confiscated.
State weight pants
The Ministry of Economic War has asked the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, also known as MI6) for permission to check the underwear of an atypical prisoner in hopes of discovering "something of propaganda value."
An interesting fact is a fragment of Roger Moorhouse's book "The Third Reich in 100 Objects", published by the Znak Horyzont publishing house.
Perhaps it was hoped that the German was wearing something luxurious or ridiculous . The permit was issued and the pants were confiscated, but they turned out to be completely ordinary and uninteresting, as the head of the SIS put it, they belonged to the "cheapest sort". Their manufacturer, the Benger-Ribana company from Stuttgart, did not sew ruffled underwear for the German elite, but field uniforms for the Wehrmacht. The propaganda plan to use the pants was abandoned, and they themselves disappeared somewhere in the archive.
Hess himself fell into a deep depression and began to show signs of unbalance and mental illness. He became paranoid, complained of stomach cramps, and constantly accused his guards of poisoning attempts. In mid-June, even tried to commit suicide by jumping over the railing on the stairs but only managed to break his left leg.
During this time, a month after his landing, Hess realized, despite his delusions, that his mission had failed. Instead of gaining the glory of a mediator who restored peace, he has become a prisoner and a helpless tool of British propaganda. Not only was he stripped of his underwear, he was also mocked as a madman.
Source:
The above text originally appeared in Roger Moorhouse's book The Third Reich in 100 Objects , which was published by Znak Horyzont.
The title, illustrations with captions, boldface text, explanations in square brackets and subheadings come from the editors. The text has undergone some basic editing to introduce more frequent paragraph breaks.