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Giles MacDonogh (born 1955) is a British writer, historian and translator.
| This biography of a living person needs additional citations for verification .(November 2010) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) |
Giles MacDonogh (born 1955) is a British writer, historian and translator.
MacDonogh has worked as a journalist, most notably for the Financial Times (1988–2003), where he covered food, drink and a variety of other subjects. He has also contributed to most of the other important British newspapers, and is a regular contributor to The Times . As an historian, MacDonogh concentrates on central Europe, principally Germany.
He was educated at the City of London School and Balliol College, Oxford, where he read modern history. He later carried out historical research at the École pratique des hautes études in Paris.
MacDonogh is the author of fourteen books, chiefly about German history; he has also written about gastronomy and wine. In 1988 he won a Glenfiddich Special Award [1] for his first book, A Palate in Revolution (Robin Clark) and was shortlisted for the André Simon Award.[ citation needed ] His books have been translated into French, Italian, Bulgarian, German, Chinese, Slovakian, Spanish, Russian and Polish.
Reviewing 1938: Hitler’s Gamble in Spectator Magazine , Graham Stewart said: "Giles MacDonogh has repeatedly shown himself to be in the front rank of British scholars of German history. The depth of his human understanding, the judiciousness of his pickings from source material and the quality of his writing make this book at once gripping and grave." [2]
MacDonogh criticised the 2004 German film Downfall for sympathetic portrayals of Wilhelm Mohnke and Ernst-Günther Schenck. Mohnke was rumoured, but never proven, to have ordered the execution of a group of British POWs in the Wormhoudt massacre near Dunkirk in 1940, while Schenck's experiments with medicinal plants in 1938 allegedly led to the deaths of a number of concentration camp prisoners. [3] In response, the film's director stated he did his own research and did not find the allegations as to Schenck convincing. Mohnke strongly denied the accusations against him, telling historian Thomas Fischer, "I issued no orders not to take English prisoners or to execute prisoners." [4]
His latest book is The Great Battles (2010).[ citation needed ]
Downfall is a 2004 German-language historical war drama film directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel from a screenplay by its producer, Bernd Eichinger. It is set during the Battle of Berlin in World War II, when Nazi Germany is on the verge of defeat, and depicts the final days of Adolf Hitler. The cast also stars Alexandra Maria Lara, Corinna Harfouch, Ulrich Matthes, Juliane Köhler, Heino Ferch, Christian Berkel, Alexander Held, Matthias Habich, and Thomas Kretschmann. The film is a German-Austrian-Italian co-production.
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician who was the leader of the Nazi Party, Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and Führer ('Leader') of Nazi Germany from 1934 to 1945. He committed suicide by gunshot on 30 April 1945 in his Führerbunker in Berlin. Eva Braun, his wife of one day, committed suicide with him by taking cyanide. In accordance with his prior written and verbal instructions, that afternoon their remains were carried up the stairs through the bunker's emergency exit, doused in petrol, and set alight in the Reich Chancellery garden outside the bunker.
Blondi was Adolf Hitler's German Shepherd, a gift as a puppy from Martin Bormann in 1941. Hitler kept Blondi even after his move into the Führerbunker located underneath the garden of the Reich Chancellery on 16 January 1945.
Wilhelm Mohnke was one of the original members of the SS-Staff Guard (Stabswache) "Berlin" formed in March 1933. From those ranks, Mohnke rose to become one of Adolf Hitler's last remaining generals. He joined the Nazi Party in September 1931.
Hans Otto Georg Hermann Fegelein was a high-ranking commander in the Waffen-SS of Nazi Germany. He was a member of Adolf Hitler's entourage and brother-in-law to Eva Braun through his marriage to her sister Gretl.
Ernst-Günther Schenck was a German doctor and member of the SS in Nazi Germany. Because of a chance encounter with Adolf Hitler during the closing days of World War II, his memoirs proved historically valuable. His accounts of this period are prominent in the works of Joachim Fest and James P. O'Donnell regarding the end of Hitler's life, and were included in the film Downfall (2004).
Constanze Manziarly was born in Innsbruck, Austria. She served as a cook and dietitian to Adolf Hitler until his final days in Berlin in 1945.
Otto Günsche was a mid-ranking officer in the Waffen-SS of Nazi Germany during World War II. He was a member of the SS Division Leibstandarte before he became Adolf Hitler's personal adjutant. Günsche was taken prisoner by soldiers of the Red Army in Berlin on 2 May 1945. After being held in various prisons and labour camps in the USSR, he was released from Bautzen Penitentiary on 2 May 1956.
The Wormhoudt massacre was the mass murder of 80 British and French POWs by Waffen-SS soldiers from the 1st SS Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler during the Battle of France in May 1940.
Werner Haase was a professor of medicine and SS member during the Nazi era. He was one of Adolf Hitler's personal physicians. After the war ended, Haase was made a Soviet prisoner of war. He died while in captivity in 1950.
Johann Rattenhuber, also known as Hans Rattenhuber, was a German police and SS general. Rattenhuber was the head of German dictator Adolf Hitler's personal Reichssicherheitsdienst bodyguard from 1933 to 1945. In January 1942, Rattenhuber's RSD units participated in the mass shooting of 227 Jews at Strizhavka. After the war, he was released from Soviet prison on 10 October 1955 and allowed to go to West Germany. He died in Munich in 1957.
Eva Anna Paula Hitler was the longtime companion of Adolf Hitler and, for less than 40 hours, his wife. Braun met Hitler in Munich when she was a 17-year-old assistant and model for his personal photographer Heinrich Hoffmann. She began seeing Hitler often about two years later. She attempted suicide twice during their early relationship. By 1936, she was a part of his household at the Berghof near Berchtesgaden and lived a sheltered life throughout World War II. Braun was a photographer, and she took many of the surviving colour photographs and films of Hitler. She was a key figure within Hitler's inner social circle, but did not attend public events with him until mid-1944, when her sister Gretl married Hermann Fegelein, the SS liaison officer on his staff.
The Führer Headquarters, abbreviated FHQ, were a number of official headquarters used by the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and various other German commanders and officials throughout Europe during the Second World War. The last one used, the Führerbunker in Berlin, where Hitler committed suicide on 30 April 1945, is the most widely known headquarters. Other notable headquarters are the Wolfsschanze in East Prussia, where Claus von Stauffenberg in league with other conspirators attempted to assassinate Hitler on 20 July 1944, and Hitler's private home, the Berghof, at Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden, where he frequently met with prominent foreign and domestic officials.
Edda Carin Wilhelmine Göring was the only child of German politician, military leader, and leading member of the Nazi Party Hermann Göring, by his second marriage to the German actress Emmy Sonnemann. In English-language sources the name is often spelled Goering.
Fritz Tornow was a Feldwebel in the German Army who served as Adolf Hitler's personal dog-handler. He was one of the last people to occupy the Führerbunker when the underground complex was captured by Soviet Red Army troops.
Willy Johannmeyer was a German officer during World War II who served from 1939 to 1945. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, and at the time of the dissolution of Nazi Germany, the last adjutant to Adolf Hitler of the army (Heeresadjutant).
Benno Martin was a German SS functionary during the Nazi era. He served as Gestapo chief and Higher SS and Police Leader in Nuremberg. Martin was a member of the Nazi Party, joining in 1933.
The Hitler Book: The Secret Dossier Prepared for Stalin is the English-language title of the translated 2005 publication of a long-secret Soviet report on the life of Adolf Hitler written at the behest of Joseph Stalin. It was edited and translated into German by Matthias Uhl and Henrik Eberle.
Conspiracy theories about Adolf Hitler's death contradict the accepted fact that he committed suicide in the Führerbunker on 30 April 1945. Most of these theories hold that Hitler and his wife, Eva Braun, survived and escaped from Berlin. While these theories have received some exposure in popular culture, these viewpoints are regarded by historians and scientific experts as disproven fringe theories.
