gument, Hitler pushed through to the front of the hall again,
mounted the rostrum, and delivered a speech that was described
by historian Alexander von Müller, who witnessed it, as a mas-
terpiece of rhetoric. “It turned that vast assemblage inside out,”
said Professor von Müller, “smoothly as a glove.”
The triumvirate, Hitler announced, were all but won over.
He proposed that General von Ludendorff become the “reor-
ganizer” of the national army, and that Lossow and Seisser take
command of the Reich’s army and police. Hitler pronounced
the dismissal of the Bavarian government, and loftily threw in
the dismissal of Reich President Ebert and Chancellor Strese-
mann for good measure. “I therefore propose,” he concluded,
“that I take over political leadership of this provisional national
government.” He appealed to them all to fall in behind Kahr,
Lossow, and Seisser if they backed the revolution.
This did the trick. Frenzied cheers greeted the announce-
ment. Hitler had the three men brought back in to renewed
frenetic applause as though they were a vaudeville act.
Their faces were a picture. Professor Müller described
Kahr’s as like a mask, Seisser’s as agitated and pale, Lossow’s as
“mocking and foxy.” Kahr spoke a few brave words of accep-
tance, stuttered something to more storms of applause
about taking over the destiny of Bavaria as regent for the mon-
archy that “disloyal hands” had struck down five years before.
Seisser also spoke a few words, and then Lossow nudged into
reluctant oratory by Hitler.
By this time war-hero Ludendorff had arrived, fetched by
Scheubner-Richter in Hitler’s Mercedes. The audience rose to
its feet to cheer the general. Up on the stage, Hitler shook each
man’s hand as he clasped Gustav von Kahr’s right hand the
latter dramatically placed his left hand on top, to seal their bar-
gain. As if conducted by an unseen baton, five thousand throats