Lot 261

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Description:

JOACHIM VON RIBBENTROP
(1893 - 1946) Nazi foreign minister. First of the Nuremberg defendants to hang on October 16, 1946. VON RIBBENTROP REQUESTS EDWARD VIII, DUKE OF WINDSOR, TO BE A DEFENSE WITNESS AT NUREMBERG Outstanding partly-printed D.S. ‘J v Ribbentrop' in pencil, 1p. legal folio, Nuremburg, Jan. 25, 1946, a ‘Defendant's Application for Summons of Witness', in which von Ribbentrop requests that Edward VIII, Duke of Windsor, be called for a witness testifying on his behalf. It states further: ‘When presenting his credentials in 1936, von Ribbentrop expressed to then-King Edward VIII the desire of the Reichs Chancellor for the closest cooperation between Germany and England. In the course of this audience, King Edward VIII declared that he, too, deemed such a cooperation necessary…'. Further, von Ribbentrop hopes that Edward's testimony will ‘disprove counts I and II of the General Indictment and the respective counts of the special indictments filed up until now…'. Countersigned by DR. BERNARD MARTIN HORN (1911-1960), defense counsel for von Ribbentrop who also defended ex-chief of staff Franz Halder and Heinrich Hoffman (known as ‘Adolf Hitler's photographer'). It has been widely speculated that Edward VIII (1894-1972) secretly collaborated with the Nazis and that the British government covered up his actions after the war – an accusation that makes the scandal of his abdication pale in comparison. Many historians have suggested that Hitler was prepared to reinstate Edward as King in the hopes of creating a fascist puppet government after ‘Operation Sea Lords'. Edward's wife Wallis was also thought to be a Nazi sympathizer and supporter of fascism in general; the FBI was even informed that she an affair with von Ribbentrop in 1936. In 1937 Edward and Wallis visited Nazi Germany, whence Edward declared the Nazi economic model to be a 'miracle' and was infamously photographed giving Nazi salutes during the trip. Andrew Lownie, author of ‘Traitor King: The Scandalous Exile of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor', writes: [‘The Nazis'] knew they were pushing an open door because Edward believed in the Fuhrer Principle and was very sympathetic: He'd already been lobbied by his cousin, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg [who] was a very active Nazi, at the funeral of George V on January 1936; and in March, he tried to play down the remilitarization of the Rhineland…'. Very good condition, with a blank copy of the same document.

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November 29, 2023 10:00 AM EST
Chesapeake City, MD, US

Alexander Historical Auctions LLC

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