On the same platform, before the same audience, the man who prefers to be called Der Reichsfuehrer, three weeks ago had delivered a speech quite different i#tone. Then, bristling with pugnacious, defiant language, and featuring a broad insinuation that Jews were behind the revolt, he defended his purge that resulted in the slaying of upward of seventy-seven party members and others.
Today, Hitler was in a more mellow mood. Voice choking with feeling, he sketched briefly the turbulent times of the Reich in von Hindenburg’s span of eighty-seven years and prayed that peace, freedom and honor might be Germany’s future lot.
“Herr Reichspresident Paul von Hindenburg,” he declared, “is not dead. He is living. For in dying he now wanders above us amidst the immortals of our people surrounded by the great spirits of the past as an eternal patron and protector of the German Reich and the German nation.”
While Hitler was delivering his eulogy, elaborate preparations were going forward in Neudeck, East Prussia, for the burial of Tannenburg, thirty miles away.
The body of the Field Marshal lay in state in a casket placed in his study. Tonight members of the family and servants will observe simple, private services. Immediately thereafter the casket will be removed by officers of the Second. Ninth and Sixteenth Reichswehr Regiments together with officers of the Ninety-first and 147th Regiments of the old Imperial Army in which Hindenburg saw service for year.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
