Two Brothers

A Screaming Three-year-old Munich, 1923

THAT SAME MONTH far away in Bavaria another, infinitely more terrible madness was growing stronger. The Nazi Party, that screaming, ranting, violent baby, born on the same day as the Stengel twins, threw a tantrum just before its third birthday. Adolf Hitler, the infant’s voice and psyche, attempted to overthrow the state by force. Kidnapping three local politicians and marching at the head of two thousand armed thugs from a beer hall to the Bavarian Defence Ministry, where he intended to demand dictatorial control not just over Bavaria but over the entire Reich.

Hitler and his gang never reached the ministry. They were instead met by one hundred police officers who blocked their path. Shots were exchanged and four policemen and sixteen Nazis were killed. Hitler fled but another Nazi leader, Hermann Goering, was seriously wounded. He was helped into a nearby bank where first aid was administered. By a Jew.