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Product Identifiers

PublisherOxford University Press, Incorporated

ISBN-100199233209

ISBN-139780199233205

eBay Product ID (ePID)84247466

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Book TitleHitler's First War : Adolf Hitler, the Men of the List Regiment, and the First World War

Number of Pages416 Pages

LanguageEnglish

TopicMilitary / World War I, Presidents & Heads of State, Europe / General

Publication Year2010

IllustratorYes

GenreBiography & Autobiography, History

AuthorThomas Weber

FormatHardcover

Dimensions

Item Height1.7 in

Item Weight42.3 Oz

Item Length6.3 in

Item Width9.5 in

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Intended AudienceTrade

Dewey Edition22

Reviewsan intelligent, informative and absorbing book that has to be required reading for anyone seriously interested in the history of modern Germany, or in the effects of war on politics in general., "Fascinating from start to finish, Weber's painstaking research and lively writing style are bound to make this a seminal work, one as informative as it is engaging." --The Canada Post, 'A well-researched exploration, raising some interesting questions about Hitler's beliefs and attitudes during the First World War.'Advance Praise from Sir Ian Kershaw'Once in a while a truly original book comes along, forcing us to rethink our understanding of the past. Weber's book is such a work. He has ferreted out a wealth of new evidence from the archives and turned received wisdom on Hitlers life story and the wider impact of the Great War on its head. This is essential reading for specialists and a fascinating tale for the general reader.'Advance Praise from Conan Fischer

Dewey Decimal940.41343092

Table Of ContentPart I1. A Crowd in Odeonsplatz2. Baptism of Fire3. Two Tales of One Christmas4. Dreams About a New World5. Of Frontline Soldiers and 'Rear Area Pigs'6. Towards the Somme7. Exhaustion8. Delusion and DoomPart II9. A Field Wide Open10. Divided They Stand11. Private Hitler's ReichConclusionFurther ReadingIndex

SynopsisPerhaps no individual in modern history has received more intensive study than Adolf Hitler. His many biographers have provided countless conflicting interpretations of his dark life, but virtually all agree on one thing: Hitler's formative experience was his service in World War I. Unfortunately, historians have found little to illuminate this critical period. Until now. In Hitler's First War , award-winning author Thomas Weber delivers a master work of history--a major revision of our understanding of Hitler's life. Weber paints a group portrait of the List Regiment, Hitler's unit during World War I, to rewrite the story of his military service. Drawing on deep and imaginative research, Weber refutes the story crafted by Hitler himself, and so challenges the historical argument that the war led naturally to Nazism. Contrary to myth, the regiment consisted largely of conscripts, not enthusiastic volunteers. Hitler served with scores of Jews, including noted artist Albert Weisberger, who proved more heroic, and popular, than the future F hrer. Indeed, Weber finds that the men shunned Private Hitler as a "rear area pig," and that Hitler himself was still unsure of his political views when the war ended in 1918. Through the stories of such comrades as a soldier-turned-concentration camp commandant, veterans who fell victim to the Holocaust, an officer who became Hitler's personal adjutant in the 1930s but then cooperated with British intelligence, and the veterans who simply went back to their Bavarian farms and never joined the Nazi ranks, Weber demonstrates how and why Hitler aggressively policed the myth of his wartime experience. Underlying all Hitler studies is a seemingly unanswerable question: Was he simply a product of his times, or an anomaly beyond all calculation? Weber's groundbreaking work sheds light on this puzzle and offers a profound challenge to the idea that World War I served as the perfect crucible for Hitler's subsequent rise., The story of Hitler's formative experiences as a soldier on the Western Front - now told in full for the first time, presenting a radical revision of Hitler's own account of this time in Mein Kampf., Hitler claimed that his years as a soldier in the First World War were the most formative years of his life. However, for the six decades since his death in the ruins of Berlin, Hitler's time as a soldier on the Western Front has, remarkably, remained a blank spot. Until now, all that we knew about Hitler's life in these years and the regiment in which he served came from his own account in Mein Kampf and the equally mythical accounts of his comrades.Hitler's First War for the first time looks at what really happened to Private Hitler and the men of the Bavarian List Regiment of which he was a member. It is a radical revision of the period of Hitler's life that is said to have made him. Through the stories of the veterans of the regiment - an officer who became Hitler's personal adjutant in the 1930s but then offered himself to British intelligence, a soldier-turned-Concentration Camp Commander, Jewish veterans who fell victim to the Holocaust, or of veterans who simply returned to their lives in Bavaria - Thomas Weber presents a Private Hitler very different from the one portrayed in his own mythical account. Instead, we find a Hitler who was shunned by the frontline soldiers of his regiment as a 'rear area pig' and who was still unsure of his political ideology even at the end of the war in 1918. In looking at the post-war lives of Hitler's fellow veterans back in Bavaria, Thomas Weber also challenges the commonly accepted notion that the First World War was somehow a 'seminal catastrophe' in twentieth century German history and even questions just how deep-seated Nazi ideology really was in its home state., Perhaps no individual in modern history has received more intensive study than Adolf Hitler. His many biographers have provided countless conflicting interpretations of his dark life, but virtually all agree on one thing: Hitler's formative experience was his service in World War I. Unfortunately, historians have found little to illuminate this critical period. Until now. In Hitler's First War , award-winning author Thomas Weber delivers a master work of history--a major revision of our understanding of Hitler's life. Weber paints a group portrait of the List Regiment, Hitler's unit during World War I, to rewrite the story of his military service. Drawing on deep and imaginative research, Weber refutes the story crafted by Hitler himself, and so challenges the historical argument that the war led naturally to Nazism. Contrary to myth, the regiment consisted largely of conscripts, not enthusiastic volunteers. Hitler served with scores of Jews, including noted artist Albert Weisberger, who proved more heroic, and popular, than the future Führer. Indeed, Weber finds that the men shunned Private Hitler as a "rear area pig," and that Hitler himself was still unsure of his political views when the war ended in 1918. Through the stories of such comrades as a soldier-turned-concentration camp commandant, veterans who fell victim to the Holocaust, an officer who became Hitler's personal adjutant in the 1930s but then cooperated with British intelligence, and the veterans who simply went back to their Bavarian farms and never joined the Nazi ranks, Weber demonstrates how and why Hitler aggressively policed the myth of his wartime experience. Underlying all Hitler studies is a seemingly unanswerable question: Was he simply a product of his times, or an anomaly beyond all calculation? Weber's groundbreaking work sheds light on this puzzle and offers a profound challenge to the idea that World War I served as the perfect crucible for Hitler's subsequent rise.

LC Classification NumberD534.1

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Hitler's First War : Adolf Hitler, the Men of the List Regiment, and the First World War by Thomas Weber (2010, Hardcover)

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