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Johanna Maria Magdalena Goebbels (November 11, 1901 - May 1, 1945) was the wife of Joseph Goebbels and First Lady of the Third Reich.
Magda was born in Berlin to Auguste Behrend and Oskar Reitschel. As a child, Magda was sent to convents where she found it difficult to make any friends with fellow pupils until by adolescence she was drawn to Zionist ideas after a relationship with Victor Arlonsoroff, who eventually left her for another woman. She, suffered this heartbreak with many more to come by escaping into marriage with the German entrepreneur Günther Quandt, a widower with two sons, who made her change religion from Catholicism to Protestantism. She married him on January 4, 1921, and soon bore him a son Harald on November 1. As an opportunist, she felt the social need to enter high society and by after divorcing Quandt, found benefits in joining the Nazi party and meeting Hitler and Joseph Goebbels who would both change the course of her life. Hitler found in Magda a close, devoted friend and his support, and could rescue him and turn him into a human being. The marriage of convenience to Joseph Goebbels was most beneficial to her and she was now in what she deemed high society. She married Goebbels on February 19, 1929. They subsequently had six children:
- Helga († 12)
- Hilde († 11)
- Helmut († 9)
- Holde († 8)
- Hedda († 6)
- Heide († 4)
On the morning of May 1, 1945, they poisoned all their children with cyanide. They were found on the afternoon of May 2, 1945.
Quotes
- "I hold it as my duty to appear as beautifully as I possibly can.In this respect, I will influence German women. They should be beautiful and elegant. One has assigned to me the highest leadership of a German fashion institute. In this capacity, I will try through my own example, to make the German woman into a true, genuine type of her race. The men are very masculine in Germany; therefore the women must be as feminine as possible. The German woman of the future should be stylish, beautiful and intelligent. The Gretchen type is finally conquered" from 1933 Newspaper interview
References and further reading
- E. Ebermayer, Hans Roos: Gefährtin des Teufels - Leben und Tod der Magda Goebbels, Hamburg 1952
- Joseph Goebbels: Tagebücher 1945 - Die letzten Aufzeichnungen, Hamburg 1977, ISBN 3-40401-368-9
- Anja Klabunde: Magda Goebbels - Annäherung an ein Leben München 1999, ISBN 3-57000-114-8
- Hans-Otto Meissner: Magda Goebbels - Ein Lebensbild, München 1978
- Erich Schaake: Hitlers Frauen, München 2000
- Wolfgang Schneider: Frauen unterm Hakenkreuz, Hamburg 2001
- Anna Maria Sigmund: Die Frauen der Nazis. Band 1, Wien 1998, ISBN 3-80003-699-1
- Spiegel Nr35/04 Hitlers Ende Spiegels (H. 35, 2004)
- Robert Wistrich: Wer war wer im dritten Reich. Frankfurt a.M. 1987
- Dieter Wunderlich: Göring und Goebbels, Regensburg 2002