With their thirst for information, people also picked up the millions of leaflets which the RAF dropped that winter, although they did not necessarily believe what they read. In Essen, Carola Reissner was outraged. ‘They are apparently trying to inflame the population,’ she wrote to her relatives, adding forcefully, ‘these are obviously Jewish ploys.’ The suspicion came naturally, for she had heard for years how the Jews had manipulated and tricked their way to power and influence in Germany.
