Chapter 15: Shell historians attempt to distance Deterding from Hitler
It is acknowledged in “A History of Royal Dutch Shell” (authored by historians paid by Shell) that “a great deal of public speculation went on about Deterding giving loans or donations, for amounts ranging from four million guilders to a fantastical £55 million, to the Nazi movement. In return, he was rumoured to have obtained promises of special advantages for the Group or even an oil monopoly under a Nazi regime. Such rumours circulated as early as 1931. They regularly resurface even today, but remain unsubstantiated.” Spin is evident from the inclusion of the word “fantastical” in this statement. As we have seen, the rumours were not baseless. In attempting to dismiss what is written off as “speculation”, the historians attach great significance to claims on pages 481 to 485 of “A History of Royal Dutch Shell: Volume 1,”333 that Deterding’s attempts to meet with Hitler were rebuffed. It is stated on page 483 that “Deterding was turned down without further ado” in March 1933. A statement attributed to Deterding himself on page 477, that he met with Hitler in November 1933, is dismissed without comment as being a mere “claim,” thereby placing doubt over his truthfulness or mental capability. I can only surmise that their research did not uncover newspaper articles, as I have, from October 1934 reporting that Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four-day meeting at Berchtesgaden. Based on what Deterding said and taking into account the newspaper reports a year later, far from being rebuffed, Deterding met with Hitler on at least two occasions, one of them at a summit meeting as Hitler’s personal guest lasting four days. Information from a New York Times article, published on 26 October 1934 under the headline:334 “REICH OIL MONOPOLY SOUGHT BY DETERDING”. This article with the sub-headline “Hitler’s Terms for Control of Distribution Unsatisfactory to Royal Dutch and Shell” reported the content and outcome of the four-day summit meeting between Hitler and his guest, Sir “Henry” Deterding, held at Berchtesgaden335, Hitler’s mountain-top retreat known as the Berghof.336 THE CONTENT OF THE NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE LONDON, Oct. 25.-It is reported confidentially from Berlin that the object of Sir Henry Deterding’s recent visit to Chancellor Hitler at Berchtesgaden, where he stayed for four days, was to discuss the conditions for granting a monopoly to the Royal Dutch and Shell Companies of petrol distribution in Germany for a long period of years. Chancellor Hitler’s terms were unsatisfactory and the negotiations have broken down temporarily. Three conditions advanced by the Germans were First-The companies were to supply oil on credit for the first year. Second-The companies were to build a network of distributing stations along strategic motor roads, these buildings to be protected against air attacks. Third-The companies were to invest their money, frozen in Germany, locally. As is clear from the New York Times/Reuters report, Deterding attended the meeting on behalf of the Royal Dutch Shell Group with the objective of securing a long-term monopoly position for Shell in German petrol distribution and retailing. Shell did subsequently offer to supply oil to Germany on long-term credit and did invest huge funds in its German subsidiary projects in Germany. The Montreal Gazette337 and The Daily Gleaner338 also reported the same news story. There was no subsequent retraction or correction by any of these newspapers.
There was a great deal for the two men to discuss. Hitler and Deterding shared an intense interest in Russia, not limited to the Russian oil fields. Both hated communism. The New York Times had reported339 just a few months earlier that Deterding wanted to destroy communism in Russia. The same article also reported on the parlous state of the German economy. Deterding’s objective of securing oil contracts by currying favour with Hitler was mentioned in an article published by Time magazine340 over a year earlier, in May 1933. That same month, Dr Alfred Rosenberg, Hitler’s envoy, had stayed as a guest at the Buckhurst Park home of Deterding in England.341 On 13 September 1935, a U.S. newspaper, the Meriden Record, published an article342 reporting: “Deterding now enjoys a monopoly in the Nazi state.” “Europe’s Oil Napoleon,” as they aptly described him, had achieved his objective. The Deterding/Hitler summit, combined with the personal message sent by Hitler to Sir Henri’s funeral, indicates a close relationship between Hitler and Deterding, the dominant figure within Royal Dutch Shell. Dr. Georg Bell, the mysterious individual said to have been a German spy, had already acted as a joint agent for Hitler and Deterding. Bell was an intimate of Storm Troop leader Capt. Ernst Röhm and, according to reports, was involved with Deterding in a counterfeiting operation against the Russian rouble. A death squad of Nazi Storm Troopers murdered Bell in Austria in April 1933 after Bell had made indiscreet revelations about Deterding and the Nazis. These events sit uneasily with the picture painted in “A History of Royal Dutch Shell” by Shell’s paid historians, who claim that the Nazis repeatedly rebuffed all overtures from Deterding for an audience with Hitler, keeping him firmly at arm’s length. That defence rests on a false premise.
Only an honoured personal guest would be rewarded with a private four-day meeting at Hitler’s mountain-top retreat. In contrast, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s face-to-face meeting with Hitler at Berchtesgaden on 16 September 1938, in an attempt to avoid war, lasted just three hours.343 Further evidence of the high regard Adolf Hitler had for Sir Henri Deterding comes from a former senior officer in German bomber command. It also provides independent evidence of a donation of one million Reichsmarks given to the Nazis by Sir Henri. On 28 April 1945, Lieutenant-Colonel Werner Baumbach,344 “General of the Bombers,” arrived at a country house located at Krakow, near Güstrow in Mecklenburg, for a meeting with Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer of the SS.345 As overseer of the concentration camps and extermination camps, Himmler coordinated the murder of around 10 million people. It soon became apparent to Baumbach, after two portraits in silver frames were drawn to his attention, that the country house in which the SS was located was formerly the home of Sir Henri Deterding. The first portrait, signed by Hitler, contained the following inscription: Sir Henry Deterding – in the name of the German people, for your noble donation of a million Reichsmarks. Adolf Hitler The second photograph was of Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe. The inscription said: To my dear Deterding, in gratitude for your noble gift of Rominten Hunting Lodge. Your Hermann Göring Göring’s hunting lodge at Rominten in East Prussia was known as “The Reichsjägerhof.”346
In 1939, Göring had, as previously stated, sent a wreath to Sir Henri’s Nazi funeral containing the tribute:347 In the name and on the instructions of the Fuhrer, I greet thee, Heinrich Deterding, the great friend of the Germans. As already mentioned, he also sent a group of air corps officers to represent him at the funeral.348 The information from Werner Baumbach comes from pages 235 and 236 of his book “The Life and Death of the Luftwaffe”, first published in 1949 and translated into English in 1960. Although only a passing reference consisting of a few paragraphs in a book devoted to “the story of an officer who served his country with distinction and risked reprisals to speak his mind”, it provides historically important evidence confirming Deterding’s financial support for the Nazis. Baumbach “spent nearly six months in an English interrogation camp. He was told that he would be charged as a war criminal on the ground that he had fired on shipwrecked people. After unending cross-examination and investigation Baumbach was able to prove conclusively that throughout the war neither he nor any unit under his command had committed any violations of the Hague Convention.”349 It is important to remember that Royal Dutch Shell continued its financial relationship with the Nazis after the resignation of Sir Henri350 as Director-General of the company and even after his subsequent death. The fact that he resigned in October 1936, but retained his seat on the board, was reported in a Daily Express front page article published at the time under the headline: “Daily Express: Sir Henri Deterding, Oil King, To Resign.”351
Notes
333. Information from pages 481 to 485 inclusive, of “A History of Royal Dutch Shell: Volume 1” ↩
334. Information from royaldutchshellplc.com webpage containing a New York Times articled published 26 October 1934 under the headline “REICH OIL MONOPOLY SOUGHT BY DETERDING” Source 1 ↩
335. Link to Wikipedia article “Berchesgaden” ↩
336. Link to Wikipedia article “Berghof (residence)” Source 1 ↩
337. Link to royaldutchshellplc.com webpage containing an article published on page 2 of The Montreal Gazette on 26 October 1934 under the headline: “Deterding Is Seeking Reich Oil Monopoly” ↩
338. Link to royaldutchshellplc.com webpage containing an article on page 6 World News published on 29 October 1934 by The Daily Gleaner under the headline “Reich Oil Monopoly Sought by Deterding” Source 1 ↩
339. Link to shellnews.net webpage containing an article published 29 July 1934 under the headline “BRITAIN WILL BAR CREDITS TO REICH” ↩
340. Link to time.com article “GERMANY: Co-ordination” published Monday, 17 April, 1933 ↩
341. Link to shellnews.net webpage containing a New York Times article published 9 May 1933 under the headline “HITLER ENVOY TALKS WITH BRITISH OFFICIAL” and a sub-headline “Rosenberg Sees Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs- Stay at Deterding Home” ↩
342. Link to google.com search webpage containing an article published on page 4 of the Meriden Record on 13 September 1935 under the headline “Europe’s Oil Napoleon Seen Winner Over U.S. Rivals For World Trade As Ethiopian Concession Fades” ↩
343. Link to Wikipedia article “Neville Chamberlain.” See section “Preliminary meetings” Source 1 ↩
344. Link to royaldutchshellplc.com article “Adolf Hitler thanks Sir Henri Deterding for donation of a million reichs-marks” Source 1 ↩
345. Link to Wikipedia article “Heinrich Himmler” Source 1 ↩
346. Link to Wikipedia article “Carinhall” Source 1 ↩
347. Link to royaldutchshellplc.com article “Royal Dutch Shell Nazi Secrets Part 1: The Funeral” Source 1 ↩
348. Link to shellnews.net webpage containing New York Times article “DETERDING HONORED BY NAZIS AT FUNERAL “: Published 11 February 1939 ↩
349. Link to ww2f.com discussion webpage for “Werner Baumbach” ↩
350. Link to November 2010 article on royaldutchshellplc.com “Royal Dutch Shell Nazi Secrets Part 3: Relationship continued after Deterding retirement” Source 1 ↩
351. Link to royaldutchshellplc.com webpage containing a Daily Express article published 28 October 1936 under the headline “Sir Henri Deterding, Oil King, To Resign” Source 1 ↩