Those are questions that have always intrigued me about Adolf Hitler and questions that I'm probably no nearer answering after years of reading books on Nazi Germany.
How was a socially inept man allowed to become so powerful? How was a lowly corporal in the German army in the First World War allowed to be responsible for murdering millions of innocent people? Here was a man who in his younger days was only too happy to sell his paintings and artwork to Jews. Where did his hatred come from? I guess we will never really know. But ultimately it came from inside him, along with some of the tracts and texts that helped to fuel his anger and hatred. Hitler was always looking for somebody to blame and the Jews fitted the bill nicely.
As I mentioned yesterday there is a tenuous link between Hitler and my home city of Norwich. There is a suggestion that he chose Norwich City Hall as the place to announce his victory against the British people. There seems to be no basis in fact to this idea but Hitler certainly tried to wipe Norwich off the map with a series of deadly raids named after the Baedecker travel guides which were used to pick out places of historical importance for bombing.
Looking at Norwich City Hall with its balcony, it is very easy to imagine Hitler up there shouting at the masses. But that's all pure conjecture. There is a much stronger link between Hitler and the city and it comes from way back in the 12th century. We are talking about blood libel or ritual murder libel which accused Jews of murdering Christian boys in order to use their blood for religious rituals.
The idea is so ridiculous as to be completely laughable but it was something that would echo down the centuries. Blood libel claims that Jews required human blood for the baking of matzos eaten during Passover.
There have been about 150 recorded cases of blood libel, but this figure may be much higher. Most of these took part in the Middle ages with Jews being murdered, often by a mob.
One of the earliest examples of blood libel followed the killing of a young boy who became known to history as William of Norwich. It was 1144 and 12-year-old William's body was found in the woods. He had been stabbed. An author by the name of Thomas of Monmouth started the whole blood libel thing off by claiming that every year there was an international council of Jews at which a country was chosen for a child to be killed during Easter.
The premise was that the death of a young person would help the Jews to be restored to the Holy Land. It was alleged that Norwich was chosen and the Jews of Norwich abducted and crucified William who acquired the status of martyr. The legend was turned into a cult. William's actual murderers were never found and there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that he was killed by Jews.
Hitler believed in the concept of Blood Libel in the same way that he believed that every ill in the world was caused by Jews, despite the fact that the Jews had never caused him any harm. He was aware of the murder of William of Norwich and it fitted in very well with his anti semitic stance and views.
The murder of William was not the only violence affecting Jews living in Norwich. They had a pretty torrid time of it in our neck of the woods.
In 2004, work was being undertaken on what would become a shopping mall in Norwich. Construction workers found the skeletons of at least 17 people, most of them children, dumped in what appeared to be the remains of a Medieval well.
The site was excavated and the skeletons examined. It was found that the 11 children and six adults were related to each other and at least three of them were sisters. Their deaths were dated to about 1190 or just under 50 years after William's body was found. It was established that they were killed at the same time and their bodies, along with household items, were dumped in the well.
It is almost certain that those who died were murdered during horrific anti Jewish pogroms in England during the late years of the 12th century. It is likely that many other Jews were killed both in Norwich and across England at that time.
I will take a closer look at Jews in Norwich in a coming blog. At least there was some comfort in the end to this story of 12th century violence and murder. In 2013 after it was established that the bodies found were those of Jews, the skeletons were taken to Earlham Cemetery in the city and given a Jewish burial.
Thankfully the same fate didn't befall others who came to live in Norwich and were renowned for their weaving and other skills. The Strangers as they were called were fleeing from Religious persecution from the lowlands of Europe and were generally welcomed to Norwich and made it a very rich city. They settled in Norwich and became an integral part of City life with many rising to prominent positions. Today in the city we still have a Strangers' Club and a Strangers' Museum which is on the site of their first house in the city.
More about this as well in a coming blog.