Rudolf Hess

Rudolf Walter Richard Hess 26 April 1894 17 August 1987 was a German politician and a leading member of the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany Appointed Deputy Führer to Adolf Hitler in 1933 Hess held that position until 1941 when he flew solo to Scotland in an attempt to negotiate peace with the United Kingdom during World War II He was taken prisoner and eventually convicted of crimes against peace He was still serving his life sentence at the time of his suicide in 1987 Hess enlisted as an infantryman in the Imperial German Army at the outbreak of World War I He was wounded several times during the war and was awarded the Iron Cross 2nd Class in 1915 Shortly before the war ended Hess enrolled to train as an aviator but he saw no action in that role He left the armed forces in December 1918 with the rank of Leutnant der Reserve In 1919 Hess enrolled in the University of Munich where he studied geopolitics under Karl Haushofer a proponent of the concept of Lebensraum living space which became one of the pillars of Nazi ideology Hess joined the Nazi Party on 1 July 1920 and was at Hitlers side on 8 November 1923 for the Beer Hall Putsch a failed Nazi attempt to seize control of the government of Bavaria While serving a prison sentence for this attempted coup he assisted Hitler with Mein Kampf which became a foundation of the political platform of the Nazi Party After Hitler became Chancellor in January 1933 Hess was appointed Deputy Führer of the Nazi Party in April He was elected to the Reichstag in the March elections was made a Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party in June and in December 1933 he became Minister without Portfolio in Hitlers cabinet He was also appointed in 1938 to the Cabinet Council and in August 1939 to the Council of Ministers for Defence of the Reich Hitler decreed on the outbreak of war on 1 September 1939 that Hermann Göring was his official successor and named Hess as next in line In addition to appearing on Hitlers behalf at speaking engagements and rallies Hess signed into law much of the governments legislation including the Nuremberg Laws of 1935 which stripped the Jews of Germany of their rights in the leadup to the Holocaust On 10 May 1941 Hess made a solo flight to Scotland where he hoped to arrange peace talks with the Duke of Hamilton whom he believed to be a prominent opponent of the British governments war policy The British authorities arrested Hess immediately on his arrival and held him in custody until the end of the war when he was returned to Germany to stand trial at the 1946 Nuremberg trials of major war criminals During much of his trial Hess claimed to be suffering from amnesia but he later admitted to the court that this had been a ruse The court convicted him of crimes against peace and of conspiracy with other German leaders to commit crimes He served a life sentence in Spandau Prison the Soviet Union blocked repeated attempts by family members and prominent politicians to win his early release While still in custody as the only prisoner in Spandau he hanged himself in 1987 at the age of 93 After his death the prison was demolished to prevent it from becoming a neoNazi shrine