Sunday, November 29, 2009

He said she reminded him of somebody both "beautiful and tragic" in his life. To her horror, she later realised this was Hitler's former lover and half-niece, Angela Raubal, who was found dead in her Munich flat in 1931, aged 23, after shooting herself in the heart with a pistol.


Hitler was quite a lady's man when he wanted to be: Seen here with Lida Baarova

In her autobiography, The Sweet Bitterness of My Life, published posthumously in Germany in 2001, Czech movie idol, Lida Baarova writes of life in the Nazi upper echelons, where elegantly dressed ministers mingled with the film world elite.

The beautiful actress Ledi Baarova for whom Goebbels fell and Hitler was interested in for some time.

It was Hitler who first fell for Baarova, then 20, during a visit in 1934 to a film set in Berlin. Three days later she was summoned to tea at the chancellery. He said she reminded him of somebody both "beautiful and tragic" in his life. To her horror, she later realised this was Hitler's former lover and half-niece, Angela Raubal, who was found dead in her Munich flat in 1931, aged 23, after shooting herself in the heart with a pistol.

WHO WAS LIDA BAAROVA?

Lida Baarova was born Ludmila Babkova in Prague on May 12 1910, and made her first film, The Career of Pavel Camrda in 1931. Three years later she was signed up by a German company and cast in Barcarole as the innocent sexual pawn of squalid male intrigue. Of the other Czech and German films in which she appeared in the 1930s, Vavra's Virginia and Krska's A Fiery Summer are the most notable.

Baarova reminded Hitler of his first love, his cousin, Geli Raubal

Several more meetings followed, despite the protests of Gustav Fröhlich, a jealous actor with whom Baarova was living. But the Führer did not press himself on her.

HITLER AND BAAROVA

She arrived at the wheel of her BMW, which (as she remembered) Hitler seemed to consider rather too liberated. On this occasion, however, he found his tongue to the extent of telling her that she reminded him of Gerri Raubel who, he encouragingly explained, had committed suicide on his account. Another time, Hitler told her that she should become a citizen of the Reich: "You could do well for yourself," he promised. But Lida Baarova remained immune to these blandishments, telling him that she preferred to remain a Czech. The tea invitations ceased.

Source: Sunday Times

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