The Memoirs of Ernst Röhm

by Ernst Röhm

Ernst Rohm was one of the key architects behind the rise of the Nazi Party. From 1919 until 1923, following the defeat of Germany in the First World War, Rohm served in the Freikorps and then NSDAP - the Nazi Party. He served as the party's patron, promoter and watchdog, and helped found the SA, the thuggish workforce behind Nazi political activity leading up to 1933. It has been stated that the rise to power of both Hitler and the Nazi Party would not have happened without Rohm's organizational skill, authority and influence. He took part in the Beer hall putsch in 1923, but was sufficiently disillusioned by 1925 with the prospects for Nazism that he stood for the Reichtag instead. Rohm wrote and published his memoirs in 1928 - entitled A Traitor's Story - the year he both resumed working for the Nazis and left to serve in the Bolivian army for two years. Rohm proved to be an eloquent writer and he was candid about his experiences and his relationship with the Fuhrer. He wrote, 'Hitler and were linked by ties of sincere friendship.' Little did Rohm know where that 'friendship' would end.

Genres: History

304 pages, Hardcover

First published March 15, 1928

About the author

German officer in the Bavarian Army and later an early Nazi leader.

He was a co-founder of the Sturmabteilung, the Nazi Party militia, and later was its commander. In 1934, as part of the Night of the Long Knives, he was executed on Hitler's orders as a potential rival.

Reviews

[Da1tonthegreat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ernst Röhm was a major figure in the early history of German National Socialism. However, due to his premature exit from the narrative, he is less well known than such figures as Himmler, Göring, or Goebbels. In the tempest of rivalries swirling around the Führer, these men outmaneuvered and destroyed him years before the outbreak of war. But besides the circumstances of his downfall, who was Ernst Röhm?

These memoirs, written in 1928 by the man himself, give a partial answer. After loyal service to his Fatherland during the First World War, he was outraged to see Germany sabotaged and dismantled by traitors and international forces. Röhm became heavily involved in Freikorps and Völkisch political movements opposing the weak, decadent Weimar Republic. This led to him becoming an early member of the NSDAP under the leadership of his friend Adolf Hitler. He had a major role in the failed Beer Hall Putsch against the state government of Bavaria and was subsequently imprisoned. After his release, Röhm continued to fight for his fatherland, including serving a term as a member of the Reichstag.

The major downside of memoirs like this, written in the thick of history, is that their narratives come to an abrupt end before the subject has played out their role to its conclusion. Here, Röhm ends his story in the 1920s, the present day at the time of writing. But after a sojourn in Bolivia, of all places (the first National Socialist to lie low in South America?), Röhm would return to Germany to lead Hitler's army of brownshirted SA stormtroopers. He would hold a high position in Hitler's government at the beginning of the Third Reich. Röhm's revolutionary politics placed him on the radical Strasserist wing of the NSDAP who wanted to take their program further than Hitler would or could. Ultimately, he fell from power and met his demise during the Night of the Long Knives. None of this is in the book, so we're left with both an incomplete picture and the question of what would have happened if he had lived.

[Monty Milne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Strange and unsettling paradoxes here. Rohm writes with obvious intelligence, and yet also reveals his thuggish violence. He claims to be - and often is - open and honest about what he sees as the faults committed by himself and others in the nascent National Socialist movement, and yet he is silent on what I think is the most interesting thing about him: how he could reconcile his extreme right-wing views with his homosexuality. There is one brief passage which talks about youth rejecting old fashioned bourgeois moral values where we think, oh yes Ernst, we know what you are talking about - but the passage is so guarded and oblique that if you didn't know he liked to share his bed with strapping young stormtroopers, you'd never have guessed it from this.

This failure of nerve on Rohm's part is one of the two big disappointments about these memoirs. The other is that they are just too boring - and too wrapped up in the minutiae of German interwar politics - to be of any real interest, except perhaps to the niche historian (to whom Pen and Sword publishers have, as so often, done a good service with this handsomely produced and illustrated volume).

[Peter Bradley · Rating 5 out of 5]

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Consequently, it offers a snapshot of the state of the movement before National Socialism made its great advance and became the movement of destiny. As a result, we get to see what members of the movement thought was important, which consequently magnifies what we may think is unimportant and minimizes what we might think is important.

For example, General Ludendorff plays a far more important role in Rohm's memoirs than one might have thought based on usual history texts. Normally, Ludendorff gots trotted on stage in time for the Beerhall Putsch and then promptly disappears. Rohm depicts Ludendorff as a leader equivalent to Hitler; Hitler is the Fuhrer but Ludendorff is the War Leader. Rohm was very deferential to Ludendorff. Ludendorff managed the Volkisch parties while Hitler was in prison, according to Rohm. Ludendorff gets more mentions in this text than Hitler.

I did not know any of that.

On the other hand, correspondingly, there is not a lot on Hitler in this text. Hitler does get mentioned, and Rohm is complementary to him, but we don't get much information on his involvement in the Volkisch movement.

It is also interesting that Rohm's version of the Putsch had the Bavarian leadership deeply involved. Rohm's opinion was that the Putsch had a substantial chance of success but for the betrayal of the Bavarian political leaders.

Apart from that, though, and a certain flavor of the period, there is a lot of name dropping in this text. Rohm was also an inveterate memo writer and had no reluctance in quoting from his store of memos when necessary.

This is not particularly engrossing reading, but it is primary historical material from an odd moment in history.

[Bobby Daugherty · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is unfortunate that Rohm is overlooked in modern times when one considers the contributions, he made to the Fatherland. Overlooking his personal shortcomings, he was an admired soldier and respected member of the early liberation of German Volk from the corruption that had exploited them. That said he was German, and he knew that homosexuality was always viewed with distain in Germania.

[C. Denver Mullican · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book on the foundations of National Socialism. Rohm is a complicated man, but not a monster, in this book.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

The English version is abridged from the original German version. It always feels a bit odd to read an English translation when you can understand German. It also seems overly British with using terms as Privy Councillor. I once read parts of it in original German from a scan in Fraktur I found on archive. I might have to revisit that version.

[dude · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5