--- description: How the book with an evil past made its way to Texas title: This Is Himmler’s Copy of Hitler’s 'Mein Kampf' image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt67ac947b3a50bc27/698852c58e060167b8460c6a/timthumb-php.jpg?branch=production&width=1440&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [History](/section/history/) ## History Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Books](/tag/books/) ## Books Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # This Is Himmler’s Copy of Hitler’s _Mein Kampf_ by [Janine Barchas / Harry Ransom Center](/author/harry-ransom-center/) ## Janine Barchas / Harry Ransom Center Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 3, 2015 6:00 PM CUT  Himmler’s Copy of Hitler’s 'Mein Kampf' Himmler’s Copy of Hitler’s 'Mein Kampf'Harry Ransom Center by [Janine Barchas / Harry Ransom Center](/author/harry-ransom-center/) ## Janine Barchas / Harry Ransom Center Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 3, 2015 6:00 PM CUT  _This post is in partnership with the_ [_Harry Ransom Center at The University of Texas at Austin_](http://blog.hrc.utexas.edu/ "undefined")_. A version of the article below was originally published on the_ [_Ransom Center’s Cultural Compass blog._](http://budurl.com/9rhf "undefined") This year marks the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. I grew up in Holland where the fifth of May is celebrated as “Bevrijdingsdag,” named for the liberation from German occupation that my father, who was 14 years old in 1945 when he stood by the side of the road and cheered a stream of Allied tanks and trucks into The Hague, still vividly recalls. The Ransom Center holds one unique war trophy “liberated” by an American G.I. that weighs in at 23 pounds of evil: a giant vellum-bound copy in heavy boards of Adolf Hitler’s _Mein Kampf_. Emblazoned on the front with a golden eagle atop a swastika, this large-format edition of Hitler’s manifesto is likely one of fewer than a hundred such lavish presentation copies specially produced in München for Nazi leaders during the war. The book is now kept in a large box, along with two typed letters from the Red Cross nurse-turned-army-wife, Carmel White Eitt, who donated it in 1988\. She writes of its being “liberated by a lad named Willie, a cook in the headquarters company of the 143 regiment” (she could not recall the spelling of his Polish surname), during the search of Heinrich Himmler’s residence in Tegernsee, Bavaria, by the 36th division after the signing that ended the war. Once Stateside, this G.I. showed up at her doorstep to give her his war trophy as a thank-you. I get chills every time I read her letter; even now the hairs on my arms tingle a bit. A rare wartime survivor, the book has physical features and injuries that tell tales. The battered copy suffers from a slightly “cocked spine,” which makes it want to open to the pages where in 1945 it was stepped on and bayonetted by members of the 36th. Those pages still bear the imprints left by muddy army boots and the ragged cuts and punctures made by bayonets. There is something visceral about the damage left behind—a muddy snapshot of a violent history more compelling than the braggadocio of Hitler’s lavishly printed pages. This particular copy of this particular book is a powerful object that brings up important questions about why a library or archive painstakingly preserves even the ugly aspects of history. When I show this book to my students, the cover alone is usually enough to solicit disgust from them. Yet in 1988 the former Red Cross nurse wrapped this copy of _Mein Kampf_ in “swadling clothes” \[sic.\] to protect it on its journey to the Ransom Center. Using language more suitable for a fragile and treasured infant rather than Hitler’s 23-pound screed, this army wife who had witnessed the horrors of war first-hand wanted to preserve her enemy’s book because, as she says, she held a “very deep and abiding affection for the 36th Division and those men who fought so long and so well.” Himmler’s copy of Hitler’s ideas had, over time, become a testament to something else entirely. _Read the rest of this article and see more photos of the book_ [ _here_](http://budurl.com/9rhf "undefined") _at the Harry Ransom Center blog_ ### After the Fall: Photos of Hitler's Bunker and the Ruins of Berlin  Not published in LIFE. Oberwallstrasse, in central Berlin, saw some of the most vicious fighting between German and Soviet troops in the spring of 1945 William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  A new view of a photograph that appeared, heavily cropped, in LIFE, picturing Hitler's bunker, partially burned by retreating German troops and stripped of valuables by invading Russians. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. In typed notes that William Vandivert sent to LIFE's New York offices after getting to Berlin, he described his intense, harried visit to Hitler's bunker: "These pix were made in the dark with only candle for illumination ... Our small party of four beat all rest of mob who came down about forty minutes after we got there." Above: A 16th century painting reportedly stolen from a Milan museum. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  With only candles to light their way, war correspondents examine a couch stained with blood (see dark patch on the arm of the sofa) located inside Hitler's bunker. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Abandoned furniture and debris inside Adolf Hitler's bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Papers (mostly news reports dated April 29, the day before Hitler and Eva Bruan killed themselves) inside Hitler's bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  A Russian soldier stands in Adolf Hitler's bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Desk inside Adolf Hitler's bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. An SS officer's cap, with the infamous death's-head skull emblem barely visible. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  A ruined, empty and likely looted safe inside Hitler's bunker. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. LIFE correspondent Percy Knauth, left, sifts through debris in the shallow trench in the garden of the Reich Chancellery where, Knauth was told, the bodies of Hitler and Eva Braun were burned after their suicides. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. In the garden of the Reich Chancellery, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Bullet-riddled sentry pillbox outside Hitler's bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. An unidentified hand on the destroyed hinge of the door to Hitler's bunker, burned off by advancing Russian combat engineers, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Empty gasoline cans, reportedly used by SS troops to burn the bodies of Hitler and Eva Braun after their suicides in the bunker, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Russian soldiers and a civilian struggle to move a large bronze Nazi Party eagle that once loomed over a doorway of the Reich Chancellery, Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. An American soldier, PFC Douglas Page, offers a mocking Nazi salute inside the bombed-out ruins of the Berliner Sportspalast, or Sport Palace. The venue, destroyed during an Allied bombing raid in January 1944, was where the Third Reich often held political rallies. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. At the Reichstag, evidence of a practice common throughout the centuries: soldiers scrawling graffiti to honor fallen comrades, insult the vanquished or simply announce, I was here. I survived. Berlin, 1945. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. An image almost too perfectly symbolic of Berlin in 1945: A crushed globe and a bust of Hitler amid rubble outside the ruined Reich Chancellery. William Vandivert—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  The first of the approximately 20 pages of notes that William Vandivert typed for LIFE's editors in New York, describing not only the pictures he took but also the atmosphere pervading his examination of Hitler's bunker and the Reich Chancellery grounds. (An example of Vandivert's terse, vivid notations: "... view of chancellery palace ... completely bombed, burned and shelled to hell.") 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