Magda Goebbels

Johanna Maria Magdalena "Magda" Goebbels (11 November 1901 – 1 May 1945) was the wife of Joseph Goebbels, propaganda minister of Nazi Germany, and a close associate of Adolf Hitler. On May 1, 1945, she and her husband killed their six children, and then committed suicide.

Magda Goebbels in 1933

Quotes

• Love is meant for husbands, but my love for Hitler is stronger. I would give my life for it.
  • Knopp, Guido, Hitler's Women Page number needed

• My God, what a lot of rubbish.
  • Magda's remarks after switching off the radio on 9 November 1942 during a gathering with friends to listen to a speech by Hitler ^{[citation needed]}

• He no longer listens to voices of reason. Those who tell him what he wants to hear are the only ones he believes.
  • Magda's opinion of Hitler in 1944 ^{[citation needed]}

• The Führer wants it thus, and Joseph must obey.
  • Magda's response when she was asked about her husband's anti-Jewish hatred ^{[citation needed]}

• I would rather have my children die, than live in disgrace, jeered at. My children stand no chance in Germany after the war.
  • Magda's remarks to Traudl Junge, Hitler's secretary, in the Führerbunker ^{[citation needed]}

• We will take them with us, because they are too good, too lovely for the world which lies ahead... no, no I must also take the children, I must! ...they will be given a strong sleeping draught. Afterwards, I mean when they are fast asleep, they will be given an injection of Evipan or something sufficient to...to...
  • From a discussion with Ello Quandt, spring 1945
  • Meissner, Hans Otto, Magda Goebbels, First Lady of the Third Reich, pp.242-243

• We have demanded monstrous things from the German people, treated other nations with pitiless cruelty. For this the victors will exact their full revenge...we can't let them think we are cowards. Everybody else has the right to live. We haven't got this right—we have forfeited it. I make myself responsible. I belonged. I believed in Hitler and for long enough in Joseph Goebbels...Suppose I remain alive, I should immediately be arrested and interrogated about Joseph. If I tell the truth I must reveal what sort of man he was—must describe all that happened behind the scenes. Then any respectable person would turn from me in disgust. It would be equally impossible to do the opposite—that is to defend what he has done, to justify him to his enemies, to speak up for him out of true conviction...That would go against my conscience. So you see, Ello, it would be quite impossible for me to go on living. We will take the children with us, they are too good, too lovely for the world which lies ahead. In the days to come Joseph will be regarded as one of the greatest criminals that Germany has ever produced. His children would hear that said daily, people would torment them, despise and humiliate them. They would have to bear the burden of his sins and vengeance would be wreaked on them... It has all happened before. You know how I told you at the time quite frankly what the Führer said in the Café Anast in Munich when he saw the little Jewish boy, you remember? That he would like to squash him flat like a bug on the wall...I couldn't believe it and thought it was just provocative talk. But he really did it later. It was all so unspeakably gruesome...
  • From a discussion with Ello Quandt, spring 1945
  • Klabunde, Anja, Magda Goebbels Page number needed

• Harald! My beloved son! By now we have been in the Führerbunker for six days already—daddy, your six little siblings and I, for the sake of giving our national socialistic lives the only possible honourable end ... You shall know that I stayed here against daddy's will, and that even on last Sunday the Führer wanted to help me to get out. You know your mother—we have the same blood, for me there was no wavering. Our glorious idea is ruined and with it everything beautiful and marvelous that I have known in my life. The world that comes after the Führer and national socialism is not any longer worth living in and therefore I took the children with me, for they are too good for the life that would follow, and a merciful God will understand me when I will give them the salvation ... The children are wonderful ... there never is a word of complaint nor crying. The impacts are shaking the bunker. The elder kids cover the younger ones, their presence is a blessing and they are making the Führer smile once in a while. May God help that I have the strength to perform the last and hardest. We only have one goal left: loyalty to the Führer even in death. Harald, my dear son—I want to give you what I learned in life: be loyal! Loyal to yourself, loyal to the people and loyal to your country ... Be proud of us and try to keep us in dear memory ...
  • Magda's April 1945 farewell letter to her eldest son Harald, who was in a POW camp in North Africa ^{[citation needed]}

Quotes about Magda Goebbels

• We have made a solemn vow to each other: When we have conquered the Reich, we will become man and wife. I am very happy.
  • Joseph Goebbels' diary, April 1931

• My father and step-mother were left behind in Germany but, two days before the War started, they were asked to come to Gestapo Headquarters and given an exit visa. There is a story in the family which goes back to the First World War when my step-grandparents were asked to give shelter to a young woman who'd been displaced by the war in Belgium. Although she had a Jewish step-father, she eventually married Joseph Goebbels! My stepmother believes she may have acted as a sort of protecting hand and was involved with the exit visa. Certainly, the night before Kristallnacht, they got an anonymous phone call warning my father not to go home that evening but to go somewhere safe. My step-mother swore it was Magda Goebbels.
  • Felix Franks (a German Jew who later became a British soldier)'s claim that his grandparents got an exit visa from Germany with the help of Magda Goebbels ^{[citation needed]}

• Straight after Hitler's death, Mrs. Goebbels came down to the bunker with her children. She started preparing to kill them. She couldn't have done that above ground—there were other people there who would have stopped her. That's why she came downstairs—because no-one else was allowed in the bunker. She came down on purpose to kill them.
  • Rochus Misch (the last survivor of Hitler's bunker)'s account of these events ^{[citation needed]}