Explore the latest books of this year!
Bookbot

Helmut Ortner

    January 1, 1950
    Wenn der Staat tötet
    Der Einzelgänger
    Widerstreit
    The lone assassin
    Hitler's executioner
    Hitler's Henchmen
    • 2022

      An examination of how many key personnel in Hitler's Nazi Germany survived the war and went on to enjoy successful peacetime careers.

      Hitler's Henchmen
    • 2018

      Hitler's executioner

      • 248 pages
      • 9 hours of reading
      3.6(20)Add rating

      Roland Freisler, a little-known figure, is closely associated with the judiciary in Nazi Germany. He served as the State Secretary of the Reich Ministry of Justice and was the infamous president of the People’s Court, responsible for over 2,200 death sentences, with cases almost always resulting in predetermined guilty verdicts. Freisler notably tried three members of the White Rose resistance movement in February 1943. Arrested for their anti-Nazi leaflet and graffiti campaign, Christoph Probst, Sophie, and Hans Scholl were found guilty of treason and sentenced to death by beheading, executed the same day. In August 1944, Freisler was pivotal in the show trials following the failed assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler, known as Operation Valkyrie. Many conspirators faced trial in the People’s Court, with proceedings filmed for propaganda purposes. Freisler's courtroom demeanor ranged from clinical interrogations to theatrical outbursts of rage directed at defendants. Almost all were sentenced to death by hanging, often within hours of their verdicts. His legal expertise and dramatic courtroom presence made him the most feared judge in the Third Reich. This examination delves into the workings of the Nazi tribunal and Freisler's career, which ended when he was killed during an Allied air raid in February 1945.

      Hitler's executioner
    • 2012

      The lone assassin

      • 183 pages
      • 7 hours of reading
      3.5(28)Add rating

      Living as a carpenter who had spent time working in a watch factory, Georg Elser was just an ordinary member of society living in Munich. That is, however, until he took it upon himself to attempt to assassinate the Führer, Adolph Hitler. Being a common man who opposed the Nazi regime, Elser took the skills from his craft and worked to assemble his own bomb detonator. Every night, he snuck out to the Munich Beer Hall, where he worked on assembling the bomb that he planned to use to kill Hitler. Hidden in a hollowed-out space near the speaker’s podium, Elser’s bomb went off successfully, killing eight people. Hitler was not one of them. This is the story, scene by scene, of the events that led up to Georg Elser taking justice into his own hands, his attempt to murder the Führer, and what happened after the bomb went off. The Lone Assassin is a powerfully gripping tale that places the reader in the dark days of Munich in 1939, following Elser from the Munich Beer Hall, across the border, and sadly, to the concentration camp where his heroic life ended.

      The lone assassin