by Alex Constantine
October 23, 2013
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The rise and fall of a small but threatening Nazi movement
Everyone is familiar with Adolf Hitler and the rise and fall of Nazi Germany. Few remember that in the mid- to late-1930s the United States experienced a Nazi crusade of its own, one led by Fritz Julius Kuhn (1896-1951), a radical anti-Semite who dreamed of a fascist America led by a Nazi president. Kuhn never realized his dream, but he did develop a national Nazi movement—complete with propaganda wing, youth group, and its own version of the Schutzstaffel (SS)—that inspired a concerted effort (among politicians, law enforcement and media alike) to destroy him and his organization.
But on February 20, 1939—the day Kuhn’s German-American Bund (Der Amerikadeutsche Volksbund) held a Nuremberg-style rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden—Kuhn and his rabid followers seemed a very real threat to order. Tens of thousands of protestors surrounded the Garden while Bundesführer Kuhn addressed 17,000 enthusiastic supporters—men and women who demonstrated their support by extending their right arms straight out, palms down, in that instantly-recognizable salute, all the while shouting “Free America! Free America! Free America!”
We believe in, and like, the American way of life: the liberty and freedom which generations before us have fought to create and preserve; the freedom to speak, to think, to live, to worship, to work, and to govern ourselves as individuals, as free men; the right to succeed or fail as free men, according to the measure of our ability and our strength.
-- Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, by Wikipedia
Yet that night would mark the peak of the Bund’s reach and influence, as the New York-based group was effectively marginalized later that year when Kuhn was convicted of larceny and forgery and sent to prison at Sing Sing, the state’s infamous maximum-security prison.
In the new book “Swastika Nation” (St. Martin’s Press), author Arnie Bernstein deftly chronicles the rise and fall of the German-American Bund, which emerged from the remnants of a group known as the Friends of New Germany. “Kuhn did a remarkable job of marshaling the movement,” says Bernstein. If Kuhn was running a corporation instead of a Nazi movement he would have been [considered] an astute businessman.”
The Bund maintained a diversified income stream derived from annual dues and various ancillary fees, as well as the mandatory purchase of uniforms, armbands, pins and badges. Uniforms for both the rank-and-file and the group’s Ordnungsdienst (“well-dressed bodyguards who undertook their duties with brutal seriousness,” according to Bernstein) had to be purchased from Bund-approved tailors. In fact, the Bund strongly encouraged its membership to spend their hard-earned dollars at Aryan-owned businesses that were a part of the Deutscher Konsum Verband (D.K.V.), or German Business League.
Fritz Kuhn
Meanwhile, the organization’s publishing arm (the AV Publishing Company, the name derived from the initials of the Bund’s German name, Amerikadeutscher Volksbund), pushed out books and propaganda materials, and also published a weekly newspaper, The German Wakeup Call and Observer (Deutscher Weckruf und Beobachter). Members were obligated to subscribe to the newspaper, and to buy a copy of Hitler’s autobiography/manifesto “Mein Kampf,” among other propaganda materials.
There were various subsidiary organizatoons directly affiliated, or otherwise connected, with the German-American Bund. Among them were --
German-American Business League (Deutscher Konsum Verband): The German-American Business League was a subsidiary of the German-American Bund. Fritz Kuhn was head of both organizations. (See p. 3709 of the committee's hearings.) The committee has a complete membership list of the German-American Business League for New York and New Jersey.
A.V. Development Corporation: The A.V. Development Corporation was also a subsidiary of the German-American Bund. Fritz Kuhn was president of the A.V. Development Corporation. (See p. 3709 of the committee's hearings.)
A.V. Publishing Corporation: The A.V. Publishing Corporation was a subsidiary of the German-American Bund. Fritz Kuhn was president of the corporation. (See p. 3709 of the committee's hearings.) The A.V. Publishing Corporation published the bund's New York newspaper, the Deutscher Weckruf und Beobachter.
Prospective Citizens' League: The Prospective Citizens' League was an auxiliary of the German-American Bund. (See p. 3755 of the committee's hearings.) The ostensible purpose of the Prospective Citizens' League was to provide a method whereby those who had not yet taken out their final citizenship papers could nevertheless be actively associated with the German-American Bund.
German-American Settlement League: The German-American Settlement League was the holding corporation for the German-American Bund's camp at Yaphank, Long Island. This camp was known as Camp Siegfried. Fritz Kuhn was one of the directors of the German-American Settlement League. (See. p. 3758 of the committee's hearings.)
German-American Bund Auxiliary: The German-American Bund Auxiliary was the holding corporation for the bund's camp in New Jersey, Camp Nordland. )See p. 3759 and p. 8265 of the committee's hearings.) August Klapprott, eastern leader of the bund, was president of the German-American Bund Auxiliary.
-- Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part VII: Report on the Axis Front Movement in the United States [Excerpt from pp. 59-85]
But what really drew the ire of the American public were the Bund’s camps and retreats—Camp Siegfried in Yaphank, New York, and Camp Nordland in Andover Township, New Jersey, for example—where thousands of Bund members gathered en masse to picnic and swim. Think summer camp with a Nazi twist.
The retreats were a key component of the Bund’s youth initiative, which was loosely modeled after Germany’s Hitler Youth and female counterpart, the League of German Girls. As in Germany, youth group retreats were sexually charged gatherings. “They encouraged the boys and girls to sleep with each other to produce good Aryan children for the day that they would take over,” notes Bernstein.
How quickly a German-American boy can become a part of the Hitler youth program was explained to a witness who appeared before the committee, by a woman bund member. She said, according to this witness, her youthful cousin scorned the camp idea at first, but after one visit came home singing Nazi songs and remarked that the German scouts were "real kameraden." After another visit, he became a member. Today, at 19, he is a fuehrer and has learned to speak German....
So closely related is the youth movement of the German-American Bund to that of the Hitler youth in Germany that they even sing the songs of the Hitler youth and reprint them in their song books…
Uniforms worn by the members of the youth groups, their camps and program of activities were similar in every respect to those of the Hitler youth movement, and that the Nazi salute was the accepted gesture of greeting.
-- Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part IV: German-American Bund: Three Documents on the German-American Bund, by Special Committee on Un-American Activities
Predictably, neighbors didn’t take kindly to the idea of Bund members goose-stepping the streets of Yaphank or Andover Township in Nazi-styled uniforms, and the pushback against the camps attracted media coverage coast-to-coast. Syndicated newspaper columnist Walter Winchell painted Kuhn and his followers in a particularly unflattering light, the former taking delight in referring to the Bund leader as Phffftz Kuhn, Fritz Kuhnfucious, or simply Fat Fritz Kuhn. In fact, Winchell became Kuhn’s chief antagonist, so much so that The German Wakeup Call and Observer declared Winchell “Kuhn’s worst enemy.” Worse yet, Kuhn promised to “blacken Walter Winchell’s eyes” (promise kept, courtesy of two thugs) and to piss on his grave (promise not kept).
Hitler and the rest of Germany’s Nazi leadership didn’t think much of Kuhn, either. In the summer of 1936, the Bundesführer and his lieutenants visited Germany and, via a mutual connection, managed to gain an audience with the Führer. “It was basically one of those grip-and-grin photo ops. Hitler shook Kuhn’s hand and said, ‘Go over there and continue the fight,’” recalls Bernstein, a statement that Kuhn viewed as an official endorsement. “Of course, Hitler meant nothing by it,” continues the author. In fact, Hitler was embarrassed by Kuhn, and Nazi officials wanted nothing to do with the German-American Bund, viewing the “stupid and noisy” group as damaging to the Third Reich’s image in America.
The German-American Bund followed closely the pattern of treason made familiar by the Nazis in such organizations as those of Norway's Quisling, Czechoslovakia's Henlein, Belgium's Degrelle, and Jugoslavia's Pavelic. Operating under the flimsy pretext of cultural objectives and general German-American welfare, the bund was always and everywhere a Nazi agency working for disruption, espionage, sabotage, and treason. The bund's pious pretenses were so shallow that it is impossible to believe that any considerable proportion of its membership was ever truly deceived concerning its objectives....
the committee found the following things:
1. That the bund was characterized by the same ruthless efficiency of the military set-up which characterized Hitler's machine in Germany.
2. That bund members were subjected to "absolute loyalty" and "blind obedience" to the bund's fuehrer.
3. That the bund demanded that its members be "fanatical fighters" for national socialism.
4. That the bund anticipated the necessity of violence in carrying out its program.
5. That the bund was characterized by extreme religious bigotry.
6. That the bund aimed at the establishment of a new kind of government in the United States, one which should incorporate the principle of Nazi religious bigotry.
7. That the bund kept a systematic record of its enemies.
8. That the bund specified that its meetings should be closed with the following declaration: "To a free, Gentile-ruled United States and to our fighting movement of awakened Aryan Americans, a threefold rousing 'Free America! Free America! Free America!'"
9. That the bund was an absolutely secret organization.
10. That the bund looked upon all Americans of German descent as owing loyalty to the Reich.
11. And that the bund was ideologically and organizationally tied to Nazi Germany....
Fritz Julius Kuhn was born in Munich, Germany, on May 15, 1896. According to his own testimony, he received his education in Munich, completing a university course there.
In the First World War Kuhn was a machine gunner in the infantry of the German Army. He states that he served 4-1/2 years with the German forces, and by the end of the war had attained the rank of lieutenant.
Kuhn's brother, Max, was appointed a member of the German Supreme Court by Hitler — sufficient evidence that the Kuhn family stands in well with the Nazi Fuehrer....
Mr. Fritz Kuhn became a member of the Nazi Party in 1921 and was active under the then Munich police commissioner, one of the first leading Nazi officials, Dr. Poehner....
When on November 9, 1923, in front of the Feldherrenhalle in Munich, Bavarian police shot at the Nazis marching under the leadership of Hitler and Ludendorff, Kuhn was among the marching Nazis....
After his entry into the United States, Kuhn proceeded directly to Detroit, where he obtained employment in the Henry Ford Hospital and later as a chemical engineer in the Ford Motor Co. Kuhn's employment in these Ford institutions lasted about 8 years....
In the Deutscher Weckruf und Beobachter, official bund newspaper, the visit of Kuhn and a delegation of German-American Bund storm troopers to Germany was described with obvious pride in both words and pictures. The accounts of this visit, which took place in 1936, are found in the Deutscher Weckruf and Beobachter for August 6, August 27, and September 10, 1936. When these bund storm troopers paraded in Berlin before Hitler himself, the Nazi Feuhrer stood on the balcony of the Chancellory. As Hitler stood there viewing this parade, Fritz Kuhn went to the balcony and, according to the words of the Deutscher Weckruf und Beobachter itself, "Bund Leader Fritz Kuhn reported to him."... It cannot be denied that Hitler in this manner gave the highest official recognition of the fact that the German-American Bund was a Nazi agency and that Bundesfuehrer Fritz Kuhn was a subordinate of Hitler himself. According to the report which was published in the bund's own newspaper, Hitler replied to Kuhn, "Now you go back and continue your struggle."
-- Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part VII: Report on the Axis Front Movement in the United States [Excerpt from pp. 59-85], Special Committee on Un-American Activities
Meanwhile, back in the U.S., powerful forces began amassing against the Bund. In August 1937 United States Attorney General Homer Cummings launched an FBI probe of Bund camps, and five months later issued his findings in a fourteen-volume report, Nazi Camps in the United States.
But the campaign to bring down Kuhn went into high gear shortly after the Madison Square Garden rally, when New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia and prosecutor Thomas Dewey seized the Bund’s financial records, hoping to put Kuhn away on tax evasion charges. The plan worked: Kuhn was charged with grand larceny and forgery for embezzling from the Bund’s bank accounts. After being found guilty he was sent to prison, first to Sing Sing, then to Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York, where he was incarcerated until being paroled on June 18, 1943. He spent the remainder of the war in the federal internment camp system for wartime enemy aliens, and was subsequently deported to Germany, where he spent the next several years in and out of prison.
Though the Bund attempted to soldier on under the leadership of Bund Führer Gerhard Wilhelm Kunze, “the movement flopped around like a fish on a deck for a couple more years,” quips Bernstein. “Then Pearl Harbor happened and that was that.”
This [financial] report must show also the exact number of persons who may be considered as patrons (Forders).
-- Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part IV: German-American Bund: Three Documents on the German-American Bund, by Special Committee on Un-American Activities
But what might have been lost to history as an ugly curiosity has proven to be a Pandora’s box, as the Internet age has given Ford’s anti-Semitic literature a powerful new life. Today, a century after Ford purchased the Dearborn Independent and 72 years after his death, his legacy of hate is stronger than ever -- it flourishes on the websites and forums of white nationalists, racists and others who hate Jews.
Today, “The International Jew” by Henry Ford plays a significant role in fomenting resentment as the United States grapples with rising numbers of hate crimes and anti-Semitic incidents, ascendant white nationalism and a gunman armed with an AR-15-style assault rifle who massacred 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue in October. When he surrendered, the gunman told police he “wanted all Jews to die.”
An essay posted by the Anti-Defamation League on its website says that by resurrecting decades-old texts such as “The International Jew,” today's anti-Semites demonstrate the longevity of their beliefs, legitimizing them to both dedicated followers and potential recruits.
Because of Ford’s fame, “The International Jew” has been a “particularly powerful tool for haters trying to validate their hostile beliefs,” the essay adds.
Two examples of Ford’s influence online today: On Stormfront, a white nationalist online forum, a contributor has taken the screen name Dr. Ford and uses a photo of Henry Ford as a profile image. On the same forum, a participant whose screen name is AllisonRM wrote last year:“I'm currently reading The International Jew: Essays from the Dearborn Independent (Ford)… Read these great books!...We, the white race, need to encourage ourselves and our children.”
Heidi Beirich, an expert on extremism in the United States at the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center, said extremist websites contain thousands of references to Ford and “The International Jew.”
“In the world of the racist right, Henry Ford is almost a living, breathing human being, “ Beirich said in an interview. She added that extremist leaders use Ford “as an inspiration” and “validator” to impress people while enlisting them to join the movement.
-- 100 Years Later, Dearborn Confronts The Hate Of Hometown Hero Henry Ford, by Bill McGraw
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term refers to U.S. senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) and has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting from the late 1940s through the 1950s. It was characterized by heightened political repression and a campaign spreading fear of communist influence on American institutions and of espionage by Soviet agents.
-- McCarthyism, by Wikipedia
The Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals (MPAPAI, also MPA) was an American organization of high-profile, politically conservative members of the Hollywood film industry. It was formed in 1944 for the stated purpose of defending the film industry, and the country as a whole, against what its founders claimed was communist and fascist infiltration.
-- Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, by Wikipedia
The Cold War was a period of geopolitical tension between the Soviet Union with its satellite states (the Eastern Bloc), and the United States with its allies (the Western Bloc) after World War II.
-- Cold War, by Wikipedia
Operation Paperclip was a secret program of the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA) largely carried out by Special Agents of Army CIC, in which more than 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians, such as Wernher von Braun and his V-2 rocket team, were taken from Germany to America for U.S. government employment, primarily between 1945 and 1959. Many were former members, and some were former leaders, of the Nazi Party.
-- Operation Paperclip, by Wikipedia
Orville Liscum Hubbard (April 2, 1903 – December 16, 1982) was the mayor of Dearborn, Michigan for 36 years, from 1942 to 1978. Sometimes referred to as the "Dictator of Dearborn", Hubbard was the most outspoken segregationist north of the Mason-Dixon line. During his administration, non-whites were aggressively discouraged from residing in Dearborn, and Hubbard's longstanding campaign to "Keep Dearborn Clean" was widely understood to mean "Keep Dearborn White."
-- Orville L. Hubbard, by Wikipedia
As for Kuhn, his death attracted little notice; the news didn’t reach the United States until two years later. “Hitler’s U.S. Bund Chief Fritz Kuhn Died Friendless in Germany,” announced Winchell in his February 6, 1953, column for the Daily Mirror. Kuhn had fallen so far, so fast that the columnist had little to say about the disgraced Bundesführer. Winchell’s final words about Kuhn and his dream of a Nazi America were: “(End of shrug).”
Quotes from "Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part IV: German-American Bund: Three Documents on the German-American Bund, by Special Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives
The three documents which are presented in this report speak for themselves…..
They attest the ruthless efficiency of the military set-up which characterizes Hitler's machine in Germany….
The discipline to which members of the German-American Bund are subject is clearly reflected in the endless rules and regulations which extend to the minute details of the Bund members' lives. The documents speak of "absolute loyalty" and "blind obedience."…
The German-American Bund organization clearly anticipates violence by its assertion that "the OD man gives assurance that our movement will, at the sacrifice of life if necessary, remain the inexorable opponents of Jewish Marxism….
According to Document #3, "anyone who is not filled with this unshakable faith and courage and cannot march along as a fanatical fighter does not belong in the OD; to have embraced the National Socialist view of things means definitively breaking off all ties with liberal halfway measures" (p. 1611). This is a clear espousal of the totalitarian, as opposed to the democratic, way of life….
The following quotations indicate something of the religious bigotry of the Germany-American Bund: "All OD men and OD Leaders in particular are required to procure a certificate of Aryan blood" (p. 1610). "We are looking for men who enter our organization not in order to procure personal advantages or to be allowed to play soldier pleasantly, but who intend with their whole power to eradicate the red Jewish pestilence in America"…
the defensive and offensive movement of the national consciousness of American Germanism dedicated philosophically (Weltanschaulich), national-socialistically, and politically to the service of an actually independent, aryan-governed United States of North America"…
Document #1 reveals the keeping of systematic records on "enemies" of the German-American Bund….Hitler explained to Rauschning his system of keeping just such a card file on "friends" and "enemies."….
Document #1 specifies the manner in which a meeting of the Bund shall be closed, as follows: "To a free. Gentile-ruled United States and to our fighting movement of awakened Aryan Americans, a three-fold rousing 'Free America! Free America! Free America!"….
These Nazi activities in the United States are traceable to and linked with Government-controlled agencies in Nazi Germany…
the official newspaper of the German-American Bund has had advance information on what was about to transpire in Germany and gave every evidence of intimate knowledge of events to come….
all of the Nazi activities here are on lines identical with those used abroad….
the German-American Bund can muster within its own ranks a uniformed force of 5,000 storm troops and it was testified that in time of necessity this force could be augmented with "strong-arm" detachments of allied groups, such as Italian Black Shirts, Silver Shirts, Ukrainians, White Russians, and similar organizations…
this storm-troop division of the Bund is patterned after the Hitler storm troops and its members are the political soldiers of a Hitler-inspired movement in the United States….
from the manpower of this force the Bund, working hand in hand with the German Government, can draft men for a sabotage, machine and spy net….
members of that organization in all parts of the United States have privately admitted that they are not American citizens but are German citizens and in many cases have boasted that they never intend to become American citizens….
elections were conducted along the lines of recent European plebiscites where everything is under such control that no one dares vote against the machine…
crews of German warships have been entertained by the storm troops of the Bund. German World War veterans are active in storm-troop ranks and help train and drill the men….
Members of the Nazi groups have been found to be working in some of the great aviation manufacturing companies of the United States. They were found working in the United States Navy shipyards where they had succeeded in securing positions which placed them in direct possession of secret plans for the construction of United States Navy battleships of the latest type. They have even been assigned to trial runs on the latest type of these ships…
the Foreign Institute of the Nazi Government at Stuttgart was one of the instrumentalities used in assisting the German-American Bund in spreading propaganda in this country…
German consulates in the United States have been the clearing houses for much of the Nazi activity here…
the groups operated in this country are directed by organizations in Germany which get their support and direction from the German Government itself….
In fact, the Foreign Institute at Stuttgart is being conducted by one Fritz Gissibl, a former leader of the Nazi group in this country and whose brother even now is a member and leader of the Nazi group in Chicago….
every effort is being expended by the bund's high command to instill in these boys and girls, most of whom have never even been outside the United States, the doctrines of racial and religious hatreds preached under the pagan German kultur …
a worship of Hitlerism is inculcated in these youthful unsuspecting minds….
Health, Hitler, Heils, and Hatred are the "4-H's" used by United States Nazis…
They must learn to speak fluent German and to understand the Nazi ideology. They listen to lectures on the Hitler philosophy and the policies of the Third Reich….
the camps are completely Nazi Germany….
The scouts eat, sleep, talk, and dream nazi-ism with the same fervor of the regimented youth of Germany. They are taught to avoid outside "contaminating influences."…
Youngsters are thrust into the Jungvolk organization when only 5 and 6 years old. They wear uniforms of brown and blue shorts or skirts, white blouses with Hitler-brown scarfs. Older boys wear brown shirts with Sam Browne belts, military trousers and boots, and are armed with long hunting knives and spears.
Youths graduate into the "Ordnungs Dienst," the storm-troop organization of the bund, and are trained mentally and physically to lead the troops when the often predicted "trouble" comes. Scouts are told they must be prepared to withstand the onrush of the coming "red" revolution….
At Siegfried and at other eastern bund camps, separate tent encampments for boys and girls are set back in the woods, away from the main building and cottages where their parents drink beer and dance…. Visitors — even parents of the scouts — are not permitted in the youth camps proper. Scouts on duty in the camps must come to the entrances to visit with their parents….
Commands and conversations among the scouts are entirely in German…
Heels click together and the right arm goes out in a Hitler salute when a scout, boy or girl, is addressed by a youth leader or any storm trooper in uniform….
the signs over Nazi youth camps: "You were born to die for Germany."…
Nazi propaganda was slyly worked into the public schools of that city in recent months under the guise of summer German-language classes; that ostensibly, the plan was to simply teach the German language and sing German folk songs, but before very long it became apparent this was not at all the real purposes of the classes. Instead, instructions drifted into Nazi doctrines….
After every Saturday class, trucks picked up some 50 of the children and carried them 55 miles to a Nazi camp near Stanton, Mo. This camp site is operated by the Deutsch-Amerikanische Berufgemeinschaft and is under the direction of Eberhard von Blankenhagen, former Consul Secretary of the German Embassy in Washington….
So closely related is the youth movement of the German-American Bund to that of the Hitler youth in Germany that they even sing the songs of the Hitler youth and reprint them in their song books…
One of the most alarming ways of Nazi propaganda along this line has swept through the ranks of exchange students to universities….
Take, for instance, the case of the Committee on American Youth Camp in Germany. This committee arranges trips and stays for American youths in Germany….
Dr. Colin Ross is a Nazi propagandist who spends his time between Germany and the United States. He has been one of the outstanding speakers for the German-American Bund and has been a writer for the Weckruf, official organ of the bund….
children six years old were shown with the swastika, regulation German Army steel helmets and spears…
Denials to the contrary notwithstanding, this committee was greatly impressed with the evidence presented showing that there is a relationship existing between the German Government and the German-American Bund through the activities of Nazi consuls in this country.
Fritz Kuhn, leader of the German-American Bund, informed this committee's investigator at a time when the latter was disguised as a storm trooper that not only did he have power over the Ambassador and consular set-up in the United States but that he also had a special secret arrangement directly with Adolf Hitler, of Germany.
Ramifications of this "arrangement," Kuhn declared, also included a secret relationship between the German-American Bund and Dr. Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff, present German Ambassador to the United States, and German consuls throughout the country. (See vol, 2, p. 1149.)
In his executive office on the second floor of the bund national headquarters at 178 East Eighty-fifth Street, New York City, on the night of August 16, 1937, this committee's investigator testified that he spoke with Kuhn concerning a trip he had made to the Pacific coast and told him of the difficulties the Los Angeles Post had had with the German consul there….You see, I have a certain special arrangement with Hitler and Germany that whenever any of our groups have trouble with the consulates in their districts that they are to report it to me in full detail. I then take it up with the Ambassador. Germany is not to be troubled with it unless I get no satisfaction from the Ambassador.
That is exactly why there is a new Ambassador to the United States, and that is exactly why many consuls have been and still are being removed. All the new consuls are National Socialists and are under special instructions to give us the fullest cooperation in every way.
It should be pointed out that Dr. Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff, present Ambassador, was sent to the United States, May 14, 1938, to replace Dr. Hans Luther, whose policy, bund leaders said, did not coincide with those of the bund and the Nazi Party in Germany. There have been numerous consulate changes during the last 2 years, and bund leaders a year ago predicted that more would follow….
Consul von Killinger was also reported as stating that the activities against certain religious groups in this country, as practiced by the German American Bund, are "for the good of America."
The committee had before it evidence (vol. 2, p. 1151) that certain American citizens residing in California had made trips to Germany for the purpose of being schooled in the art of Nazi propaganda and enlightenment. In one instance the father of one of these men (vol. 2, p. 1151) told this committee's investigator that his son's expenses to Germany had been paid through a secret arrangement between the German-American Bund and the Nazi Government….
American Citizens have received Nazi propaganda by mail in packages carrying the imprint of the Nazi consulate at St. Louis…
Propaganda direct from the German Ministry of Propaganda and Enlightenment is distributed by bund officials and evidence was introduced showing definitely that printed propaganda material was shipped from Germany to United States citizens directly. These packages contained, according to the testimony, considerable Nazi propaganda which was printed in Germany for distribution in the United States, considerable Fascist propaganda which was printed in Great Britain for distribution here, and much material of antiracial and antireligious character which was printed here, shipped to German Government agencies, and then reshipped to the United States for distribution in this country….
The packages coming here from abroad contained printed material from the pen of Ernst Goerner, of Milwaukee, Wis.; pamphlets from the Knights of the White Camellia, an organization founded by George E. Deatherage, of Charleston, W. Va.; leaflets from the Russian National Union; and issues from the Christian Free Press, printed in Glendale, Calif….
many Germans living in the United States go abroad and take an oath of fealty to the Fuehrer of Germany…
Repeatedly we have been told that there is no connection between the German-American Bund and the Nazi Government or its political subdivisions, repeatedly we have been told that no allegiance to Adolf Hitler is required, and yet here we have an officially inspired newspaper published in Germany telling us that an oath of fealty was taken….
A target range was set up at Camp Siegfried, Yaphank, Long Island, and on one occasion Herman Schwarzmann, head of the Astoria, Long Island, group, announced that the men were to be "trained to shoot and to take care of guns"…
Bund fuehrers informed storm troops that the various German World War veterans in their ranks would train the younger men in the use of arms….
Within the past year one section of the Gestapo, service section No. 2, under the direction of Colonel Nicolai, has added three new departments, Nos. 23, 24, and 25, all three specifically devoted to espionage in the United States.
Department 23 specializes in economic espionage — the obtaining of American manufacturing and industrial secrets.
Department 24 specializes in military intelligence.
Department 25 specializes in Nazi propaganda….
the German-American Bund receives its inspiration, program, and direction from the Nazi Government of Germany through the various propaganda organizations which have been set up by that Government and which function under the control and supervision of the Nazi Ministry of Propaganda and Enlightenment….
In 1936 Fritz Kulin accompanied a large delegation of bund members to Germany ostensibly for the purpose of visiting the Olympic games. The group paraded in uniform of the Orderly Division (storm troops), and the parade was reviewed by Adolf Hitler. Following the parade, Fritz Kuhn and other officials of the German-American Bund were received by the German Fuehrer…
It was established through the testimony of Fritz Kuhn that the bund had worked sympathetically with other organizations throughout the United States and cooperates with them. Kuhn testified that some of these groups are the Christian Front, the Christian Mobilizers, the Christian Crusaders, the Social Justice Society, the Silver Shirt Legion of America, the Knights of the White Camellia and various Italian Fascist, White Russian, and Ukranian organizations. Kuhn testified that some of the leaders of these groups had addressed meetings sponsored by the bund and that representatives of the bund in turn frequently appeared as speakers at meetings and gatherings sponsored by the above-named groups. It was also established that the bund cooperated with some of these organizations and their leaders by exchanging literature and publications with them and by publishing material emanating from them in the official organ of the bund. Numerous articles have appeared in the bund newspaper expressing the bund's approval of the activities of the organizations already mentioned….
the following are standard reading in bund camps: Hitler's Mein Kampf, Pelley's booklets and publication, Liberation, the books of Julius Streicher (German propagandist), and the Rev. Charles E. Coughlin's publication, Social Justice….
uniforms worn by the members of the youth groups, their camps and program of activities were similar in every respect to those of the Hitler youth movement, and that the Nazi salute was the accepted gesture of greeting….
a group of 15 boys and 15 girls from various parts of the United States who were selected by the bund to be sent to Germany for special training….
there is a political agent on all German ships and that these political agents maintain contact with the Nazi representatives in foreign countries. They are intermediaries for transmission of instructions to the bund leaders in the United States and they receive reports from these leaders concerning the bund's activities, according to the witnesses….
German agents engaged in espionage activities, contacted bund leaders in the United States and sought and received their cooperation. This witness also testified that he had heard discussions among bund leaders with reference to the manner in which the bund, through its members in various industrial plants, could effectively carry out a program of sabotage in case such action became necessary….
members of the bund had assisted German agents whose arrests were sought by officials in the United States in avoiding apprehension and had helped get them out of the United States with the cooperation of German ships….
Nazi propaganda agencies, through officials of the German Government in the United States, have attempted to propagandize educational institutions in this country. It was testified that a German consul general had offered, on behalf of the German Government to subsidize German departments in American universities provided the professors were "acceptable'' to the Nazis….
in August 1938 a so-called anti-Communist convention was held at the bund headquarters in Los Angeles…
the following persons participated in this convention:
Kenneth Alexander, Southern California leader of the Silver Shirts; J. H. Peyton, of the American Rangers; Chas. B. Hudson, of Omaha, Nebr., organizer and leader of America Awake, who accompanied General Moseley when he appeared before the committee; Mrs. Leslie Fry, alias Paquita Louise De Shishmareff, mysterious international figure who has since fled the country, then leader of the Militant Christian Patriots; representatives of Italian Fascist and White Russian organizations; and a number of others of similar point of view….
Bund literature mingled with that of William Dudley Pelley, Robert Edmondson, Mrs. Fry, and George Deatherage on the tables of this convention.
It is clear to the committee that this convention was in no real sense an anti-Communist convention but rather another of a series of attempts to unite some of the various forces of intolerance, racial hatred, Naziism and Fascism in order to achieve greater influence in the United States….
Allen went to Atlanta, Ga., to attempt to "buy the Ku Klux Klan" for Mrs. Fry for the sum of $75,000. He testified that he talked to Hiram W. Evans, head of the Klan, but that Evans "was not interested in the idea."…
-- Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the United States: Appendix, Part IV: German-American Bund: Three Documents on the German-American Bund, by Special Committee on Un-American Activities
