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The ''Blutfahne'' (), or Blood Flag, is or was a
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious and cultural symbol, predominantly in various Eurasian, as well as some African and American cultures, now also widely recognized for its appropriation by the Nazi Party and by neo-Nazis. It ...
flag that was carried during the attempted coup d’etat
Beer Hall Putsch The Beer Hall Putsch, also known as the Munich Putsch,Dan Moorhouse, ed schoolshistory.org.uk, accessed 2008-05-31.Known in German as the or was a failed coup d'état by Nazi Party ( or NSDAP) leader Adolf Hitler, Erich Ludendorff and othe ...
in
Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...
, Germany on 9 November 1923, during which it became soaked in the blood of one of the SA men who died. It subsequently became one of the most revered objects of the
NSDAP The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
. It was used in ceremonies in which new flags for party organizations were consecrated by the Blood Flag when touched by it.


Beer Hall Putsch

The flag was that of the 5th SA ''Sturm'', which was carried in the march towards the ''
Feldherrnhalle The Feldherrnhalle (Field Marshals' Hall) is a monumental loggia on the Odeonsplatz in Munich, Germany. Modelled after the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence, it was commissioned in 1841 by King Ludwig I of Bavaria to honour the tradition of the ...
''. When the Munich police fired on the National Socialists (Nazis), the flagbearer Heinrich Trambauer was hit and dropped the flag.
Andreas Bauriedl The Beer Hall Putsch, also known as the Munich Putsch,Dan Moorhouse, ed schoolshistory.org.uk, accessed 2008-05-31.Known in German language, German as the or was a failed coup d'état by Nazi Party ( or NSDAP) leader Adolf Hitler, Erich Lu ...
, an SA man marching alongside the flag, was killed and fell onto it, staining the flag with his blood.
Hilmar Hoffmann Hilmar Hoffmann (25 August 1925 – 1 June 2018) was a German stage and film director, cultural politician and academic lecturer. He founded the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen. He was for decades an influential city councillor in Fr ...
, ''The Triumph of Propaganda: Film and National Socialism, 1933-1945, Volume 1'', pp. 20–22.
There were two stories about what happened to the flag in the aftermath of the Putsch: one was that the wounded flagbearer Heinrich Trambauer took the flag to a friend where he removed it from its staff before leaving with it hidden inside his jacket and later giving it to a Karl Eggers for safekeeping. The other story was that the flag was confiscated by the Munich authorities and was later returned to the Nazis via Eggers. In the mid-1930s, after a myth emerged that Bauriedl had been carrying the flag, an investigation by Nazi archivists concluded that Trambauer was the standard-bearer and that the flag had been concealed by an SA man, not taken by the police, though they had confiscated other flags which they later returned. Regardless of which story was the correct one, after
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
was released from
Landsberg prison Landsberg Prison is a penal facility in the town of Landsberg am Lech in the southwest of the German state of Bavaria, about west-southwest of Munich and south of Augsburg. It is best known as the prison where Adolf Hitler was held in 1924, a ...
(having served nine months of a five-year prison sentence for his part in the putsch), Eggers gave the flag to him.


Sacred Nazi symbol

After Hitler received the flag, he had it fitted to a new staff and
finial A finial (from '' la, finis'', end) or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a d ...
; just below the finial was a silver dedication sleeve which bore the names of the 16 dead participants of the putsch. Bauriedl was one of the 16 honorees. In addition, the flag was no longer attached to the staff by its original sewn-in sleeve, but by a red-white-black intertwined cord which ran through the sleeve instead. In 1926, at the second Nazi Party congress at Weimar, Hitler ceremonially bestowed the flag on
Joseph Berchtold Joseph Berchtold (6 March 1897 – 23 August 1962) was an early senior Nazi Party member and a co-founder of both the (SA) and (SS). Berchtold served in World War I and upon Germany's defeat joined the German Workers' Party (DAP), a small ex ...
, then head of the SS. The flag was thereafter treated as a sacred object by the Nazi Party and carried by SS-''
Sturmbannführer __NOTOC__ ''Sturmbannführer'' (; ) was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank equivalent to major that was used in several Nazi organizations, such as the SA, SS, and the NSFK. The rank originated from German shock troop units of the First World War ...
''
Jakob Grimminger Jakob Grimminger (25 April 1892 – 28 January 1969) was a German Nazi Party and Schutzstaffel (SS) member. As the official standard-bearer of the ''Blutfahne'', an iconic flag of the Nazi movement that had become bloodstained during the Munich P ...
at various Nazi Party ceremonies. One of the most visible uses of the flag was when Hitler, at the Party's annual
Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...
rallies, touched other Nazi banners with the ''Blutfahne'', thereby "sanctifying" them. This was done in a special ceremony called the "flag consecration" (''Fahnenweihe''). When not in use, the ''Blutfahne'' was kept at the headquarters of the Nazi Party in Munich (the Brown House) with an SS guard of honour. The flag had a small tear in it, believed to have been caused during the Putsch, that went unrepaired for a number of years.


Disappearance

The ''Blutfahne'' was last seen in public at the ''
Volkssturm The (; "people's storm") was a levée en masse national militia established by Nazi Germany during the last months of World War II. It was not set up by the German Army, the ground component of the combined German ''Wehrmacht'' armed forces, ...
'' induction ceremony on 18 October 1944 (''not'', as frequently reported, at ''
Gauleiter A ''Gauleiter'' () was a regional leader of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) who served as the head of a ''Administrative divisions of Nazi Germany, Gau'' or ''Reichsgau''. ''Gauleiter'' was the third-highest Ranks and insignia of the Nazi Party, rank in ...
''
Adolf Wagner Adolf Wagner (1 October 1890 – 12 April 1944) was a Nazi Party official and politician who served as the Party's ''Gauleiter'' in Munich and as the powerful Interior Minister of Bavaria throughout most of the Third Reich. Early years Born in ...
's funeral six months previously). This ceremony was conducted by
Heinrich Himmler Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...
and attended by
Wilhelm Keitel Wilhelm Bodewin Johann Gustav Keitel (; 22 September 188216 October 1946) was a German field marshal and war criminal who held office as chief of the '' Oberkommando der Wehrmacht'' (OKW), the high command of Nazi Germany's Armed Forces, duri ...
,
Heinz Guderian Heinz Wilhelm Guderian (; 17 June 1888 – 14 May 1954) was a German general during World War II who, after the war, became a successful memoirist. An early pioneer and advocate of the " blitzkrieg" approach, he played a central role in t ...
,
Hans Lammers Hans Heinrich Lammers (27 May 1879 – 4 January 1962) was a German jurist and prominent Nazi politician. From 1933 until 1945 he served as Chief of the Reich Chancellery under Adolf Hitler. During the 1948–1949 Ministries Trial, Lammers was f ...
,
Martin Bormann Martin Ludwig Bormann (17 June 1900 – 2 May 1945) was a German Nazi Party official and head of the Nazi Party Chancellery. He gained immense power by using his position as Adolf Hitler's private secretary to control the flow of information ...
, Karl Fiehler,
Wilhelm Schepmann __NOTOC__ Wilhelm Schepmann (17 June 1894 – 26 July 1970) was an SA general in Nazi Germany and the last ''Stabschef'' (Chief of Staff) of the Nazi Stormtroopers. Schepmann was an ''Obergruppenführer'' in the Nazi Party para-military branch ...
and Erwin Kraus. After this last public display, the ''Blutfahne'' vanished. Its current whereabouts are unknown, but it is generally assumed to have been destroyed amidst the Allied bombing of Munich in 1945. Historian
Mark Felton Mark Felton (born 1974) is a British historian of the Second World War and author of more than twenty books. His most recently published work is 2019's ''Operation Swallow: American Soldiers' Remarkable Escape From Berga Concentration Camp'', wh ...
has stated he believes the ''Blutfahne'' was most likely taken as a souvenir by U.S. forces, and thus may still exist somewhere in the United States today.


See also

*
Nazism Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...
*
Glossary of Nazi Germany This is a list of words, terms, concepts and slogans of Nazi Germany used in the historiography covering the Nazi regime. Some words were coined by Adolf Hitler and other Nazi Party members. Other words and concepts were borrowed and appropriated, ...
*
Personal standard of Adolf Hitler The personal standard of Adolf Hitler (german: Führerstandarte or ''Standarte des Führers'') was a square red banner of arms with a black swastika on a white disc inside a central wreath of golden oak leaves and four Nazi eagles in the corners. ...
*
List of German flags This list of German flags details flags and standards that have been or are currently used by Germany between 1848 and the present. For more information about the current national flag, see flag of Germany. National flags Standards Presiden ...


References


Further reading

* * Orth, R: „Von einem verantwortungslosen Kameraden zum geistigen Krüppel geschlagen.“ Der Fall des Hitler-Putschisten Heinrich Trambauer. in: Historische Mitteilungen der Ranke-Gesellschaft 25 (2012), p. 208–236. *


External links


''Blutfahne''
at Flags of the World. {{Authority control 1923 establishments in Germany Special events flags Lost objects Beer Hall Putsch Flags of Nazi Germany Swastika