NUREMBERG, 1938

ROBERT Byron had long realised the danger to peace of the Nazi ideology, and from March 1938 he was engaged in volun- tary preparation of war propaganda for the Director-Designate of the future Ministry of Information. By persuading Unity Mitford to include him as a guest at the 1938 rally he hoped to observe the impact of the Nazis on parade.

On his return from this visit Byron wrote: `There can be no compromise with these people — there is no room in the world for them and me, and one has got to go. I trust may be them.' He did not live to see them go. While on an intelligence mission he was lost at sea by enemy action on his way back to Meshed, Afghanistan, early in 1941. As German pressure mounted on Prague for political self-determination for three 'nation Sudeten Germans resident in Czechoslovakia, Byron went first to Munich to meet Unity and the Milford parents, Lord and Lady Redesdale.

3 September SITTING in a train between Ansbach1938 and Munich, in the heart of the enemy country so to speak, I recall the unfolding of the danger to me personally. I am not talking of philosophical considerations — a pre- scient man might have foretold the present situation when Mussolini bombarded Cor- fu ('23) and the Nazis came to power in '33.

These were the concrete stages as I felt them

1. 1929-35. Another war 'impossible'. 2. Summer 1935. Another war 'possible'. 3. Autumn 1935. War with Italy likely. 4. Autumn 1936 (on my return from China). Ashamed of my country and wor- ried that she should have thrown away her moral strength. Felt, as a person of military age, that I should now be called on to fight, not for any apprehensible purpose, but because Baldwin, [Samuel] Hoare, Eden had made a muddle.

5. February 1938. Eden's resignation robs our foreign policy of last vestige of direction. Wonder if it is possible to bring the Government to its senses by organising boycott of state services on part of all people under 40 (not a practical idea, but that is what I thought). 6. March 1938. The rape of Austria. Too late. War now inevitable. But pray I may be wrong and Chamberlain's policy of appeasement may work out.

7. May 21 1938. Ray of hope. H.M.G. (accidentally I believe owing to the train- myth and Ribbentrop's [German foreign secretary] skill in antagonising Sir Nevile Monday 29 August While I was lunching at Arthur's [club] with Tom [Mitford] worm Halifax [Foreign Secretary], worm Simon and worm Hen- derson all came and sat down at the next table looking very contented. I could hard- ly go on with my food. Meanwhile, with Franco's reply and proposal for withdrawal of troops and consequent evaporation of the Anglo- Italian 'agreement', worm [Neville] Chamberlain's policy of 'appeasement' has vanished into a wisp of fog; it has not only failed and in the process accelerated the prospect of war; it has vanished altogether, leaving us rudderless as before but now in much narrower waters.

Now I am on my way to the Parteitag at Niirnberg to see if I can find some evidence 1. Signed in April 1938, conditional on the withdrawal of Italian troops from Spain.

Henderson [British ambassador in Berlin]) warns Germany not to expect English neutrality if she invades Czechoslovakia. A salutary effect on German public opinion. (I am in Berlin for Whitsun.)

8. August 1938. Vast German man- oeuvres, interpreted as prelude to invasion of Czechoslovakia.

9. August 22 1938. The worm [Sir John] Simon [Chancellor of the Exchequer] in a speech at Lanark reminds Germany of England's inability to be neutral, though in as minor and unconvincing a key as possi- ble. But snarls of rage from Berlin press show that this was more effective than I expected. to modify the above opinions. I was to have gone straight out with Tom, but at the last moment he could not get away, owing to the Advocate General [Sir Henry MacGeagh] being ill and rather than arrive at Nurnberg alone, I have come on in advance to join Unity and the Redesdales in Munich. Whether I shall be welcome at Nurnberg or even find a bed, I don't know. Both at the Embassy in London and at the Amt fur Ehrengaste in Berlin I am on the list of Ehrengiiste [honoured guests]. But I have had no invitation. On the other hand neither has Tom.

The stations along the line are all deco- rated against the festival. But in general I seem to observe a shabbiness and de- terioration very different from the Ger- many of 12 years ago. (I was last in Bavaria in 1926.) Some say this is my imagination. The total absence of colour in the land- scape strikes me again vividly.

5 September Reached Regina Palast 1.40. Bobo [Uni- ty Mitford] had gone to the station to meet me, but was soon back. Found Redesdales lunching at Haus der Deutschen Kunst, one of the Fiihrer's new buildings. Very plain classical, but I can't make out about the stone — whether it is of the stone here, a porous flaky stuff like compressed white gravel, that marks very uglily — or of concrete.

Then motored out to Nymphenburg to see the Amalienburg, the blue and silver room and the yellow and silver one adjoin- ing are masterpieces. Dined, with our food on our knees, at the Platzl — fearful crowd — Lord Redesdale and Bobo had to go an hour in advance to claim the table, or rather four places at it, that they had ordered the day before. Bobo said the only time she had ever been comfortable there was when she was with [Julius] Streicher [mayor of Nuremberg]. Very amusing per- formance, yodellers, playlets etc. Very Bavarian, the whole playlet making fun of Prussian visitors and jokes at the regime, but impossible to understand, being in such broad dialect, a song ending up with the word gouffa — meaning drunk, at which everyone linked arms and rocked. Then looked in at the gigantic Hofbrau opposite, where everyone was a good deal drunker (it was Saturday evening), scene of the Party's early exploits, and so to bed. I spent an hour in the Regina bar watching the jeunesse dor& sipping sweet cocktails through straws.

In the afternoon we looked into an Altdorfer exhibition of appallingly bad paintings — either forgeries or he was an appallingly bad painter, but the ugliness and cruelty of German painting of that period, when not redeemed by art, is horrible — and explains much. Yesterday, Sunday, I was out early and went a round of the churches, the Frauenkirche very fine — vast Gothic — in every one sermons going on, or rather announcements from the pulpits in which I heard frequent references to schools — churches all pack- ed, gigantic as they are.

Back to hotel to find all English papers confiscated. Bobo drove me to Pina- kothek. But first we made a detour to see if the Fiihrer is back. No — she can tell by there being no one outside the very unpre- tentious building in which his flat is situ- ated. Then to gallery. A lot of familiar Raphaels — acres of gigantic Rubens fine Filippo Lippi and an unattractive Botticelli pieta. A fine El Greco 'Divest- ment', smaller than the Toledo one and less colour — fine Titians of woman and

4 Bobo says she is confident there will be no general war, because it would be the ruin of the Fiihrer's whole life and policy

Charles V in a chair — lovely Tiepolo. But all in bad condition, varnish dull and spotty, colours obscured.

To lunch at the Osteria [Bavaria], a little biirgerlich restaurant which the Fiihrer got into the habit of using when the Party headquarters were nearby and where Bobo first met him by staring (story of hat peg not true). Bobo took her seat in the Fiihrer's place. Otherwise ordinary middle-class families having their midday lunch.

Bobo said [Dr Ernst] Hanfstaengl's [formerly in charge of foreign Press rela- tions] escapade was due to her. He was always such a bore saying he had a much more dangerous time in the war by staying in America, where people threw bricks through his window, that sitting in the Reichskanzlei in Berlin one day she sug- gested to the Finger to send him to Spain. So he was popped into an aeroplane as a practical joke and they landed at Leipzig — but got into his head they were trying to murder him, rushed back here, tried to get hold of his sister, failed and fled to Zurich.

Lord and Lady Redesdale came in and found us, she saying she had been to church. Bobo disgusted — but confident she will not behave in such a way after the Parteitag.

Delicious sweet wine en carafe — lunch off blue trout — Redesdales drive off to Nurnberg. Bobo and I go for walk in English Gardens and have tea in the Chinese Tower. I start on Foreign Policy, saying that it is up to Germany to obey the principles of Mein Kampf, one of which is to keep England sweet while expanding in East. On this view, German diplomacy very poor. Bobo takes the view, it is all England's fault. I say it may be, but that is not the point — conditions are deteriorat- ing. She says she is confident there will be no general war, because it would be the ruin of the Fiihrer's whole life and policy — if one of his new buildings was bombed, i it would nearly kill him. War hate n England due entirely to the fact that England (and the rest of the world for that matter) is the wholesale victim of prop- aganda, and this run by Jews who have every reason for wanting to make was on Germany. Also partly fault of Conserva- tive Party who had to create a war feeling in order to get re-armament. We agree (though for different reasons) on subject of present government: though whereas I SO I should be glad to press a button and feel they had vanished, but not actually shoot them myself, Bobo wants to shoot them personally. She now has a gun which she keeps by her bed loaded and when she was in hospital the other day, they were all frightened lest she should get delirious and fire it off — she wants to shoot a man. I said I thought she should shoot a woman first, so as not to be accused of being a feminist — then she said she would be accused of being a lesbian. I said that though Eden may have been the greater enemy of Germany, I thought from the German point of view his resigna- tion a pity, because he was the only pers." who rendered English policy slightly cal- culable. I did not blame Germans for not knowing what English policy is, because no one ever takes the trouble to explain

it to

them — all they hear is Lord Londonderry [Minister for Air 1931-1935]. Bobo hates him, so agreed. I said I thought relations would be better if they could calculate what they were dealing with and read her the preliminary passages of Sir Eyre Crowe.2 She was impressed by this last but still said it was all our fault for rejecting overtures and offers of German alliance• She says Fiihrer may be risking a few years temporary estrangement with England by doing what he knows to be right over Austria and Czechoslovakia, but alliance will come in the end, the whole racial doctrine postulates it, and anyhow Ger- many will now be so powerful that England will sue for an alliance. She admitted Fiihrer had made one mistake by sending Ribbentrop to England [as ambassador] — she said that, though she was certain there would be no war, it wouldn't matter to her (as a German) if it did, because she knew Germany was 'destined' to win. 'All wri- ters since [Houston Stewart] Chamberlain'3 had said so and felt this: didn't I feel the same? I said 'What about the last war?' She said, that was just a tempering. Now, within lifetime of Fiihrer, they were destined to become top nation and poor old England (she was sorry to say, being fond of the place) would become 2. 1907 Memorandum on the present state of British relations with France and Germany, exposing German ambitions to make Britain a subordinate ally to Germany, and estrange her from France.

3. Author of the pan-German, anti-semitic The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century.

a second-rate power unless it saved itself by proffered alliance. Finally she would not admit and could not even begin to see that a diplomacy which in two or three years has raised up the whole world in potential coalition against Germany is from the German point of view faulty. I called her view short term, accusing her of thinking only of Austria, Rhineland etc. She called mine short term, because in a few years the estrangement would be over and the Anglo-German alliance to domin- ate the world would be either a reality or England would go under. Of course what England was really waiting for was a man with a brain — though she admitted it might take 100 years to find one. Diana [Unity's sister, wife of Sir Oswald Mosley], she said in passing, has staked her life on being linked with the dictator of England. If he fails to attain dictatorship. she will commit suicide.

When we got back to the car, there was an anonymous note in it saying it made a

4 This morning's ceremony has left me with the impression of a people doomed on earth and in heaven decent Englishman feel positively unwell to see two Hakenkreuz [swastika] flags in an English car. Then we drove off to the Fiihrer's flat and seeing a drove of cars outside it, unloading luggage, knew him to be there. So we dined at the Hotel and then went to the Osteria in the hope of finding him, but he didn't come. The Redesdales telephoned from Nurnberg they had been given a sitting-room in the gasthaus and were comfortable.

6 September Saw the Glyptothek, a wonderful collec- tion of sculpture including the new marble of the Discus-thrower which must be one of the finest in existence. Bobo says the Fiihrer was overcome with the buildings in Rome and regretted he didn't have time to see them properly. He said to her two or three days ago '[Konrad] Henlein [leader of the Sudeten German party] wants to come and see me, I can't imagine what about.'

She and I left about 12 in her car and striking the autobahn were in Nurnberg about 2 or 2.30. The autobahn looked very fine in rolling country — fits the landscape so well. Bavarian pastoral country is charming — I don't care for the forests no colour — the same petunias every- where, but the old arms of light blue lozenges has largely disappeared. On arriv- ing here, Bobo told the hotel commandant that the Flihrer had told her she could invite five people (actually it was five members of her family) so I was able to have Tom's room, a great blessing, as otherwise I should never have got in and should have had to go off and sleep in a train. The English consist of Redesdales, Bobo, self, Clive, [Lord] Brocket, Ward Price [of the Daily Mail] (other journalists in a train), Lord Stamp [member of Young Committee for German reparations], Lord McGowan [chairman of ICI]. We walked out and saw the Fiihrer in his diarrhoea- coloured uniform standing up in a black car on his way to the Rathaus. Nurnberg very prettily decorated — municipal banners, green wreaths tied with gold — but the swastika, black and white on a lot of scarlet everywhere, rather monotonous.

I went to an organ recital in the church of St Lawrence and it came to me, perhaps for the first time, how very deeply our civilisation is bound up with Christianity, how it is Christian and how valuable are the principles with which Christianity has infused it. They are life, the others death.

We didn't get tickets for the Meister- singer (they always open proceedings with

this). Bobo was ill when the application should have gone in. We sere sitting in the hall before dinner, when suddenly Lord Redesdale appeared among the surging mob of Fascists, Phalangists in red berets, Germans in every kind of uniform, all covered with orders and medals and badges, with his head bowed, walking slowly this way and that. He was looking for a needle Lady Redesdale had dropped from her tatting.

I went on a briiu crawl after dinner first struck up with two Hanoverian S.A.

men who grew quite maudlin over Water- loo and my race cousinship and were genuinely horrified at any prospect of war between the two countries, a prospect which honestly did not seem to have occurred to them until I mentioned it. We parted on terms of warmest friendship.

Then I found an obscure brau in a passage full of S.A. men with their arms round the

barmaid and one of them thumping on a

piano — a real Teniers scene — then another big briiu where I talked to an

airman, local, who thought any possibility of war was entirely due to the Jews and could hardly be persuaded that Eden wasn't of that race. To bed at two.

This morning in a bus to the Luitpold- halle, a vast hangar or similar building all draped for the opening ceremony. Vast band and choir. The Ftihrer and all the familiar faces walk in, tear up the main

aisle to the sound of 'Neils', then the standards to a march — the Rienzi over- ture, which sounded curiously unsuitable and intellectual, then a hymn about God. Then the deathroll of the old fighters, including [Horst] Wessel and Planetta -

the Fiihrer looked as if he really felt this.

Then greetings. Then Streicher made a speech. Then the Fiihrer's speech was read by [Rudolf] Hess [Deputy Fiihrer]. Points which scored most applause: 'The Fiihrer is always right.' What he does is always necessary.'

He read in an English paper that he was going to make a pact with the major powers as he couldn't face the Congress without. Instead of any pact, he faces them with nine new, gaus [districts]. He leaves unemployment to the democracies. A good many jokes. Bobo says 'he has a charminS sense of humour' — he nearly died of laughing when Lord Redesdale told him he didn't care for Berlin because he couldn t get any skating. All was well managed, and should have been impressive. I was waiting and expect- ing to be impressed but wasn't. Artistically the endless scarlet with black and white circles on it, combined with hordes of diarrhoea uniforms, ugly. But one has a feeling of death — of the absence of the vital spark. I don't mean of anti-mind, or anti-freedom, but something even more negative. Quite different from Russia in this respect — there the effort is intelligi- ble, the emotions vivid or even sharable.

4 Looking at Goring, Ribbentrop, Goebbels (who is a dwarf), Streicher was like looking at so many automata Here one feels this can't last because there is nothing to make it last, a perfect vacuum of ideas. I don't say this is true, but it j5 what I felt. Looking at Goring, Ribben- trop, Goebbels (who is a dwarf), Streicher was like looking at so many automata, in whom the attributes that define a human being have been lost. The Ffihrer did not give one that impression — nor Hirnmier- His proclamation didn't mention Czechoslovakia, or even touch on it in- directly. Even with my little knowledge of German I could distinguish the quality of his speech from the others. It wasn't all cliches. The others teemed with things We have been hearing for years — how people can go on listening to them is extraordin- ary.

I didn't think the enthusiasm remark- able, though the general theme of Gross Deutschland (i.e. Austria) obviously had everyone's approval. The poverty of women's clothes most noticeable. The general crowd in this town is uglier than anything I have ever seen, even in Russia. It makes Altdorfer, Bosch and Breughel seem quite photographic. Everyone stares with horror, envy and resentment at Bobo's really very mildly painted face.

This morning's ceremony has left me with the impression of a people doomed on earth and in heaven. I never got that feeling in Russia. I expected to get the impression of a vigorous evil which must be destroyed at all costs — and perhaps I do. But that is subordinated to the negative-

ness and vacuity of it all. It is not so much intellectual poison as intellectual and spir- itual death — a greater death than physical death — the death of Byron's 'Darkness' (look this up). I wonder if I am right, or if not, what has given me this impression.

I am now going for a walk with the Redesdales.

7 September

The Reichsarbeitsdienst [Reich labour service] parade — in the stadium — a much finer building of granite, marble stairways, mosaic ceilings, lack of refinement — but good. We had five places on the middle tribune just behind the Fiihrer, Goring etc. Sir Nevile Henderson spent most of the morning in conversation with Goring. [Andre] Francois-Ponces [French ambassa- dor] with Ribbentrop. Forty thousand men on parade — with spades — and 2,000 women. Former took a. n hour parading past the Fiihrer standing In his motorcar — they were divided into 10 lots — goosestepping, which when really finely done by a bandleader is akin to ballet dancing. The essential is to keep the body rigid and point the toes and seem to spring from the toes. After marching Past they all ran about a mile and re- al?Peared at the end of a gigantic vista. Finally about 2,000 naked men (it was very cold and wet) came to the front. Then songs as per programme — a sort of religious service — with intonations from different parts of the field. I found it uncomfortable to see human beings thus volatised and in a purely civil matter. But the whole proceedings were far more intelligible than yesterday's. A lot

of cant and cliches etc, but a sense of the land, die Deutsche Erde:

Mogen Wasser, Moor und Bruch, mag der Sturm auch schnauben, Unser Junges Werk gelingt, well wir daran glauben, (Let the waters, marsh and fen in the tempest toss and turn, Our young men their work complete, our creed to work and learn]

First line has genuine ring, second awful. But what really rang true was: `Wir sind die

4 Blood is stronger than enemy might. What Germans desire is Germany's right Fahnentriiger der neuen Zeit' — ['We are the standard-bearers of the new age'] as the standards at either corner of the field were waved the while. One could see what Christopher Sykes has often told me, but what is hard for anyone that did not know Germany in the Twenties to realise, into what fearful confusion and mental anarchy the ideas of that period must have thrown Germany and how natural and spon- taneous is the present reaction against them. Bobo was greeted by Goebbels and Streicher on the way out.

Party now increased by Lord and Lady Hoilenden, Thelma Cazalet [MP for East Islington]. Last night Bobo talking to a serious young MP called [Norman] Hulbert called him a Marxist liberal. It is amusing to see people take her so seriously.

It is also curious that Houston Chamber- lain should have been translated by Lord Redesdale's father. Lord Redesdale said as a boy he couldn't bear the word `Grund- lagen. . .' (Foundations of 19th Century). Now he has just brought the damned book for his library.

No mention of Czechoslovakia, unless the following verse:

Mauern und Grenzen von Menschen erdacht KOnnen das Reich nicht zerstOren.

Blut ist starker, als feindliche Macht, Und was Deutsch sein will, muss Deutschland gehOren.

[Stone walls and frontiers invented by men Cannot destroy our glorious Reich.

Blood is stronger than enemy Might,

What Germans desire is Germany's right.] Sung with great fervour.

Of course German diplomats see our attitude as merely strengthening the Czechs to resist. To read the English papers one would suppose war due any hour now, French reservists called up etc.

My bedroom has a boot-jack.

Spent a charming evening yesterday walking about with Lady Redesdale before dinner — drank beer and ate sausages up at the castle, overlooking the town and all its lovely steep old tiled roofs as lights came out. Saw exquisite baroque interior very sane and non-florid, the Aegidien Kirche.

Ward Price gloomy about war at lunch. How one could ever get out of this place I don't know. Not much chance of a train with 600,000 extra people here.