By way of reward,
Göring invited the Gestapo
to celebrate at his expense at
the Hubertusstock, the old imperial hunting lodge around
which Carinhall was taking shape, on July . A whole page of
photographs in his private album shows him surrounded by
Heydrich’s staff, signing autographs for eager hands. Busloads
of informers, jailers, and lawyers, with their female secretaries
and girlfriends frisking at their sides, debouched into the special
beer garden that Göring jovially erected for them at Carinhall.
But this was not Otto Horcher’s gourmet restaurant, nor were
these the dignified, middle-aged veterans of the Richthofen
Squadron. The celebration deteriorated into an orgy. Across the
lake, to Carin’s silent mausoleum, drifted drunken cheers and
the sound of breaking glass and furniture.
Göring may well have feared what Carin would have
thought of his new friends at any rate he discouraged future
sightseeing excursions by Himmler’s Gestapo to his hallowed
heath. When he rewarded the Gestapo in the future for in-
stance, after what he called “an exceptionally important investi-
gation” in he would send over an envelope containing
one hundred thousand marks to be distributed to “particularly
meritorious” officials.After the Röhm massacre, Göring’s
rivals for power had been elimi-
nated. Officially prime minister of
Prussia (seen here addressing the
Prussian parliament), he soon
dropped the words “of Prussia.”