Venturing into Podcast land

Over the past six months, along with my amazing producer Sam Loy, I have been recording a podcast.

It tells, in truncated form, the story of the German resistance to Hitler, and calls on the research I have done for my book TREASON.

The process has been fascinating for someone like me, who did not know what was involved. 

First, the scripts had to be written, edited, debated, settled.

Then, we recorded. We did this for a morning a week over about 3 months.

With the words recorded, Sam would work on the sound edit, which included writing music, sourcing sound effects and music, mixing – and a lot more that I don’t understand. 

He would send a first draft, and I would provide feedback, and then a final draft would emerge.

I had to select a podcast platform, and after research I chose Buzzsprout. I’ve been very happy with their service. With their help, I am now on all the hosting platforms.

As well as sound, a podcast needs graphics, and I engaged my friend and design guru Mike Vernon – known for his MakeBooks Australia business – to produce artwork for the podcast. He has done a great job, producing generic artwork as well as artwork for each episode.

Selling a podcast is pretty hard. I had great help from my daughter Georgia, who researched an approach to this, and filmed and edited a number of film clips for promotion.

We released a trailer in late June, and then on 6 July dropped the first three episodes – 1, 2 and 3. The fourth went out on 13 July, and they’ll be once a week from now on.

The 80^th anniversary of the July plot is upon us, and this seems a fitting tribute to mark the occasion.

launch of Treason

Thanks to Georgia for this clip of the recent launch of Treason.

 

The great people at Northern Books are organising a launch for Treason.

It will be at the Taproom, Shedshaker Brewing, at the Mill in Castlemaine, on Tuesday 10 January at 6 pm.

I will be in conversation with the wonderful Helen Symon KC.

You will need to book your attendance here.

Look forward to seeing you there!

Treason is now available around the world

Last year, during the pandemic, the hard copy of Treason was published here in Australia. 

However, postage costs made it awkward to distribute this internationally. 

This has now been sorted, and Treason is now available internationally through Blurb.

If you live in Australia, the Blurb version will not be cheaper, but anywhere else, it is.

Incidentally, I was very pleased with the endorsements given on the back cover!

The Best Books on the Plot to Kill Hitler

 I was asked to compile this list on Shepherd.

See what you think.

Anschluss

In 1938, threatened with a Nazi takeover, and without international support, Austrian chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg called for a national plebiscite on the nation’s future. It was to be held on Sunday 13 March. He expected a vote to keep Austria independent, and there can be little doubt he would have received overwhelming support.

Kurt von Schuschnigg, Chancellor of Austria

Hitler learned of the proposal on Wednesday 9 March – just four days before the plebiscite. He was furious about this ‘dirty trick’. The last thing he wanted was a popular expression of support for Austrian independence. He summoned his advisers (many of whom were out of the country). He sent a message to Mussolini asking for his support. Despite the lack of any plan of attack, Hitler sent tanks and troops rolling towards the border.

Before dawn, on Friday 11 March, the Germans closed the border with Austria.

Hitler delivered an ultimatum: postpone the plebiscite for three weeks, or the Wehrmacht will invade. Early that afternoon, the Austrians agreed. Then the Germans sent a further ultimatum demanding the resignation of Schuschnigg and his entire government, and the appointment of Dr Arthur Seyss-Inquart (the Nazi leader in Austria) as Federal Chancellor, otherwise the German Wehrmacht would march in that very evening.

Shortly after four in the afternoon, the Austrian government resigned.

Dr Arthur Seyss-Inquart

But President Miklas did not wish to appoint a Nazi as Chancellor. Göring bellowed at Seyss-Inquart over the telephone to go with the German military attaché and threaten Miklas with immediate invasion by the troops massing along the Austrian border.

The German radio delivered a stream of hysterical propaganda. There had been a bloody communist revolt, the reports asserted, which the Austrian government was powerless to control. There were hundreds of casualties. In reality, everything was calm except for Nazis beginning to show themselves on the streets.

At about eight that evening, from the room where Dollfuss had bled to death, Schuschnigg broadcast to the nation:

The German government today handed to President Miklas an ultimatum with a time limit attached, ordering him to nominate as Chancellor a person to be designated by the German government and to appoint members of a cabinet on the orders of the German government; otherwise German troops would invade Austria. I declare before the world that the reports issued about Austria concerning disorders created by the workers and the shedding of streams of blood, and the allegations that the situation has got out of control of the government were lies from A to Z. President Miklas asks me to tell the people of Austria that we have yielded to force.

Shortly before midnight, President Miklas appointed Seyss-Inquart chancellor.

President Miklas

 Göring now told Seyss-Inquart to request the assistance of German troops to restore order in Austria. Seyss-Inquart, still not aware of the part he was required to play, protested: ‘Well, that’s one thing I need not do because everything is quiet here in Austria, so far.’

The Germans ignored him, announcing that he had invited German troops to enter the country.

At dawn on 12 March 1938, at many points along the frontier, German troops crossed into Austria.

Austrian officials raise barriers to let German troops cross the frontier

Soldiers drove past cheering crowds throwing out Nazi salutes.

German troops march into Austria

That day Hitler drove across the Austrian border to his home town, Linz. In Vienna, the SS arrested Schuschnigg – he was not freed for more than seven years, by which time many proud European cities were smoking ruins. He was fortunate to survive.

Seyss-Inquart was chancellor of Austria for less than two days. The new Austrian government passed a law that made Austria ‘a province of the German Reich’. On Monday 14 March, Hitler made his triumphant entry into Vienna. The Anschluss ('union') was complete.

Hitler's entry into Vienna - 14 March 1938

Even as the celebrations took place, the new regime began its mass arrests, and the former Austrian Minister for War was assassinated.

This is an edited extract from TREASON: Claus von Stauffenberg and the Plot to Kill Hitler

Reoccupation of the Rhineland

On the morning of 7 March 1936, Hitler’s foreign minister, Konstantin von Neurath, convened a meeting of the French, British, Italian and Belgian ambassadors. He proposed a twenty-five-year non-aggression pact, including demilitarisation on both banks of the Rhine and limitations on air forces of all parties.

At noon that day, Hitler announced that Germany would reoccupy the Rhineland – the area west of the Rhine and bordering France and the low countries which had been demilitarised since the Versailles Treaty. By then, German columns were already streaming across the border of the zone. Hitler bamboozled the western leaders by announcing that the occupation was purely symbolic.

German troops march into the Rhineland

Hitler’s generals knew Germany was not ready for military confrontation with the major powers. Had there been the slightest show of force from Britain or France, they would have forced Hitler to withdraw. In the end, apart from solemn hand wringing and protests from the Western Powers, nothing was done.

Hitler commenced fortifying this area, leaving him free to pursue other adventures to the east – and providing him a focal point for attack more than 150 kilometres closer to Paris. It was from the Rhineland that the German attack on France would develop most powerfully in 1940.

Hitler had shown that the western powers would not stand against determined action. He greatly enhanced his prestige and that of the Nazi regime. To the world he proclaimed: ‘All Germany’s territorial ambitions have now been satisfied.’

This is an edited extract from TREASON: Claus von Stauffenberg and the Plot to Kill Hitler

The White Rose

Sophia Magdalena Scholl

9 May 1921 – 22 February 1943

Hans Fritz Scholl

22 September 1918 – 22 February 1943

Christoph Hermann Probst

6 November 1918 – 22 February 1943

Hans Scholl was a medical student. 

His sister Sophie was horrified by her boyfriend Fritz Hartnagel’s accounts of atrocities committed by Nazis on the eastern front.

She was a committed Christian, and her religious beliefs were an important motivation in her opposition to the Nazi regime.

Between June 1942 and February 1943, together with a group of their friends, they distributed anti war leaflets which also opposed Nazi rule. They called themselves 'The White Rose'.

On 18 February 1943 – shortly after the collapse at Stalingrad - Hans and Sophie Scholl brought a suitcase full of leaflets to the University of Munich and distributed them around the corridors for students to find at the change of lectures. Realising they had some left, they returned and climbed the stairs to the top of the atrium. Sophie spilled the remaining leaflets into the void.

The university porter saw this and came after them shouting ‘You’re under arrest!’ and rather than run, they decided to submit.

Sophie and Hans were interrogated by the Gestapo. 

Christoph Probst was a medical student and a member of the White Rose resistance group.

He was married with three children.

When Hans and Sophie Scholl were arrested, Hans carried a draft of a further leaflet designed by Christoph Probst. The leaflet referred to Hitler as a ‘military conman’ and said that the war must be lost so that Germany could live on. 

The handwriting matched the letters Probst had sent Hans Scholl.

Christoph Probst was arrested by the Gestapo on 19 February 1943 as he was on his way to visit his newborn daughter Katja and his wife, who was unwell following childbirth. He underwent extensive interrogation. 

All three were charged with treason, while the People’s Court hurried down to Munich to try them.

  

At their trial on 22 February 1943 the Scholls' parents Robert and Magdalene were not permitted entry. When they tried to enter the courtroom. Magdalene said to the guard: ‘But I'm the mother of two of the accused!’ The guard responded: ‘You should have brought them up better.’

Robert Scholl forced his way into the courtroom and told the court that he was there to defend his children. He was seized and forcibly escorted outside. The entire courtroom heard him shout: ‘One day there will be another kind of justice! One day they will go down in history!’

Sophie told Roland Freisler:

Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don't dare express themselves as we did.

Later she said to him:

            You know the war is lost. Why don’t you have the courage to face it?

Freisler sentenced all three defendants to death - and the sentence was carried out that day.

Sophie walked to the guillotine a few hours later, with great courage. Confronting death, she said:

How can we expect righteousness to prevail when there is hardly anyone willing to give himself up individually to a righteous cause? Such a fine, sunny day, and I have to go, but what does my death matter, if through us, thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action?

Christoph Probst was also guillotined that day, before his family knew that he had even been arrested.

He never saw Katja.

Helmuth von Moltke smuggled a copy of the offending pamphlet to the Allies, who distributed millions of them over Germany.

This is an edited extract from TREASON: Claus von Stauffenberg and the Plot to Kill Hitler