"Promise me you'll shoot yourself" : the mass suicide of ordinary Germans in 1945

Format:

Book

Title:

"Promise me you'll shoot yourself" : the mass suicide of ordinary Germans in 1945

Other title(s):

Promise me you will shoot yourself

Uniform Title:

Kind, versprich mir, dass du dich erschiesst. English

Author:

Huber, Florian, 1967- author

ISBN:

9780316534307

Edition:

First North American edition.

Publication:

New York : Little, Brown Spark, [2020]

Physical Description:

vi, 292 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Contents:

Four days in Demmin. River without bridges ; War without limits ; The eyes of the enemy ; Tower of darkness ; The ghosts of Demmin -- Demmin is everywhere. A voice from the bombed-out temple ; A wave rolling over the Reich ; The teacher and his wife ; Hell machine ; Death in the west ; The waxworks of Leipzig ; City without hope ; The dark figure -- Tumultuous emotions. The wound that was Germany ; Hungry and fanatical ; Torches in winter, violets in March ; Part of something greater ; An inner rift ; The happy years ; In love with the Führer ; The smell of fear ; Victors ; A sense of foreboding ; The shadow of others ; Frozen soul -- The pull of silence. Curtaining off reality ; An inability to feel ; Victims ; Ghosts of the forgotten.

Summary:

"By the end of April 1945 in Germany, the Third Reich had fallen and invasion was underway. As the Red Army advanced, horrifying stories spread about the depravity of its soldiers. For many German people, there seemed to be nothing left but disgrace and despair. For tens of thousands of them, the only option was to choose death -- for themselves and for their children. "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" recounts this little-known mass event. Using diaries, letters, and memoirs, historian Florian Huber traces the euphoria of many ordinary Germans as Hitler restored national pride; their indifference as the Führer's political enemies, Jews, and other minorities began to suffer; and the descent into despair as the war took its terrible toll, especially after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Above all, he investigates how suicide became a contagious epidemic as the country collapsed. Drawing on eyewitness accounts and other primary sources, "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" presents a riveting portrait of a nation in crisis, and sheds light on a dramatic yet largely unknown episode of postwar Germany."--Amazon.com.

Subject(s):

Suicide -- Germany -- History -- 20th century.

World War, 1939-1945 -- Germany -- Psychological aspects.

National socialism -- Germany -- Psychological aspects.

Germany -- Politics and government -- 1933-1945.

Germany -- History -- 1933-1945.

Germany -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945.

Geographic Term:

Germany -- Politics and government -- 1933-1945.

Germany -- History -- 1933-1945.

Germany -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945.

Germany.

Genre:

History.

Added Author:

Taylor, Imogen (Translator)

Holds:

Available:*

Library	Call Number	Status
Searching... Salem Main Library	940.53161 Huber 2020	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

Named a Best History Book of 2019 by The Times (UK)

The astounding true story of how thousands of ordinary Germans, overcome by shame, guilt, and fear, killed themselves after the fall of the Third Reich and the end of World War II.
By the end of April 1945 in Germany, the Third Reich had fallen and invasion was underway. As the Red Army advanced, horrifying stories spread about the depravity of its soldiers. For many German people, there seemed to be nothing left but disgrace and despair. For tens of thousands of them, the only option was to choose death -- for themselves and for their children.
"Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" recounts this little-known mass event. Using diaries, letters, and memoirs, historian Florian Huber traces the euphoria of many ordinary Germans as Hitler restored national pride; their indifference as the Führer's political enemies, Jews, and other minorities began to suffer; and the descent into despair as the war took its terrible toll, especially after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Above all, he investigates how suicide became a contagious epidemic as the country collapsed.
Drawing on eyewitness accounts and other primary sources, "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" presents a riveting portrait of a nation in crisis, and sheds light on a dramatic yet largely unknown episode of postwar Germany.

Author Notes

Dr. Florian Huber was born in 1967 and wrote his PhD on British policy regarding the postwar occupation of Germany. He is the author of several works of history and has also produced award-winning documentaries on contemporary subjects, including the fall of the Berlin Wall, the mysterious end of the writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, and the 1936 Olympic Games.

Reviews (2)

Publisher's Weekly Review

German historian Huber makes his English-language debut with a vivid and disturbing account of the "suicide epidemic" that swept across Germany in the final months of WWII. Drawing on war diaries, published memoirs, letters, and cemetery records, Huber first relates the events of April 30 to May 3, 1945 in Demmin, where advancing Soviet troops--stalled by the German Army's destruction of the town's bridges--looted homes, burned buildings, and committed mass rapes, setting off "an unprecedented wave of suicides" (estimates run from 500 to more than 1,000 deaths in the town). Huber describes mothers drowning their children in the Peene River, a schoolteacher shooting his entire family before firing on the Soviets and then killing himself, and three generations of family members who hanged themselves. From Demmin, Huber moves across Germany, exploring how the "tumultuous emotions" unleashed by Hitler's rise, combined with anti-Soviet propaganda, "the loss of a sense of purpose" as defeat loomed, and a yearslong "devaluation of human life," led to tens of thousands of suicides. Though the topic is relentlessly grim, Huber portrays his subjects with empathy and offers key insights into the German mindset before, during, and after WWII. Readers will be convinced that reckoning with the war's legacy requires studying this underexamined tragedy. (Mar.)

Kirkus Review

A sobering study of the collapse of the Third Reich and the wave of suicides that accompanied its fall.Hitler famously shot himself rather than fall into the hands of the Red Army, and many of his closest associatese.g., Joseph Goebbels and his entire familyfollowed suit. So, too, writes German historian and documentary filmmaker Huber, did countless "ordinary" Germans, whether out of simple despair or certainty that the crimes of the Nazi regime would be laid at their door. The wave of suicide began earlier than 1945; the author quotes a schoolteacher who wrote after the German defeat at Stalingrad in 1943, "the first and last cause of my despair is the hopelessness of victory." Still, beginning in the spring of 1945, as Huber grimly documents, "large quantities of cyanide and prussic acid were circulating in Germany, in response to an explosion in demand." The Nazi regime began to suppress the statistics related to suicide lest they prompt even more destruction. Drawing on existing records, Huber reckons that in Berlin alone, the suicide rate was five times higher than "normal" in April 1945, when the city fell. The victorious Allies were surprised to find among civilian survivors a kind of orderliness and calmthough, as the author notes, many soldiers who had lived through combat were more inclined to withdraw into themselves, none quite "ready for reality." The subtitle of the book is a touch too narrow. The author not only covers suicides, but also those who defiantly refused either to kill themselves or to acknowledge any wrongdoing, such as a Nazi official who disputed the right of a German court to judge her actions in wartime, seeing them "as henchmen of the occupying powers, accusing her not of any crime, but of fighting for a political ideal." Such repudiation joined with a widespread sense of victimhood that "freed the Germans from the need to examine their own consciences." An illuminating examination of a little-known aspect of World War II. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Part I Four Days in Demmin
River Without Bridges	p. 3
War Without Limits	p. 18
The Eyes of the Enemy	p. 28
Tower of Darkness	p. 46
The Ghosts of Demmin	p. 65
Part II Demmin is Everywhere
A Voice from the Bombed-out Temple	p. 75
A Wave Rolling over the Reich	p. 80
The Teacher and His Wife	p. 89
Hell Machine	p. 94
Death in the West	p. 100
The Waxworks of Leipzig	p. 107
City Without Hope	p. 118
The Dark Figure	p. 127
Part III Tumultuous Emotions
The Wound That Was Germany	p. 135
Hungry and Fanatical	p. 145
Torches in Winter, Violets in March	p. 153
Part of Something Greater	p. 168
An Inner Rift	p. 177
The Happy Years	p. 182
In Love with the Führer	p. 190
The Smell of Fear	p. 198
Victors	p. 205
A Sense of Foreboding	p. 211
The Shadow of Others	p. 222
Frozen Soul	p. 227
Part IV The Pull of Silence
Curtaining off Reality	p. 241
An Inability to Feel	p. 248
Victims	p. 254
Ghosts of the Forgotten	p. 260
Notes	p. 269
Sources and Bibliography	p. 289
Illustrations	p. 293

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Summary

Summary

Author Notes

Reviews (2)

Publisher's Weekly Review

Kirkus Review

Table of Contents