dor, Lipski, and Göring were now as thick as thieves. (Göring,
charged by Hitler to take special care of German-Polish affairs as
from April , had invited Lipski to a shoot that month and
once more hinted that Poland should join an alliance against the
Soviet Union.) Roosevelt’s urbane roving ambassador, William
C. Bullitt, took a strong dislike to the general, however, calling
him “quite the most unpleasant representative of a nation that I
have ever laid eyes on.”
Unofficial British visitors came to the same conclusion.
Learning that the Prince of Wales shortly to become King
Edward had urged closer links between the British Legion
and comparable German ex-servicemen’s organizations, Göring
cabled him from Berchtesgaden: “As a front-line soldier, I thank
Your Royal Highness from the bottom of my heart for the up-
right and chivalrous words... With humble duty to Your
Royal Highness, Hermann Göring.” He received the prince’s
“warm thanks,” but when a British Legion delegation did come
to Nazi Germany that July, they were profoundly impressed by
Adolf Hitler and not at all by Göring. Out at Carinhall he talked
to them only about himself. “He can be described,” reported
Captain Hawes, RN, who had been naval attaché in Berlin, “as a
mountain of egotism and pomposity.”