What Really Happened: The Death of Hitler

By: Robert J. Hutchinson

Narrated by: Grover Gardner

Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins

Publisher's Summary

After World War II, 50 percent of Americans polled said they didn’t believe Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun had committed suicide in their bunker in 1945, as captured Nazi officials claimed. Instead, they believed the dictator faked his death and escaped, perhaps to Argentina. 

This wasn’t a crazy opinion: Joseph Stalin told Allied leaders that Soviet forces never discovered Hitler’s body and that he personally believed the Nazi leader had escaped justice. 

At least two German submarines crossed the Atlantic and landed on the coast of Argentina in July 1945. Plus, there were numerous reports of top Nazi officials successfully fleeing to South America, where there was a large German colony. 

So what really happened?

Popular history writer Robert J. Hutchinson, author of What Really Happened: The Lincoln Assassination, takes a fresh look at the evidence and discovers, once and for all, the truth about Hitler’s last week in Berlin. Among the questions the book explores are:

• What did surviving Nazi eyewitnesses really say about the Führer’s final days in the bunker - and could they have been lying to aid Hitler’s escape? 
• If Hitler didn’t escape, why did the Allies not find his body? 
• What about Hitler’s proven use of body doubles? Could Hitler have used a body double in the bunker while he and Eva Braun flew to safety in a long-range aircraft that took off from a runway in Berlin’s Tiergarten? 
• Why did the FBI continue to investigate reports of Hitler’s survival for more than a decade after World War II - reports that were only declassified in 2014?
• What about sensational claims in books such as The Grey Wolf that Hitler and Eva Braun lived in an isolated chalet in the Andes - and that Hitler died in 1962?
• Why were forensic tests on crucial physical evidence only conducted in 2016, more than 70 years after World War II ended? 
• And much more

©2020 Robert J. Hutchinson (P)2020 Blackstone Publishing

This was interesting and I learned a lot!

This was interesting and I learned a lot! At times it was overwhelming because there was so much data collected & shared.Then I calmed down & kept reading. It did unfold in an organized way and I did enjoy finishing the book. The research was well done!

Definitive Demise of Der Fuhrer.

First of all, the narrator is the best ever. Excellent pronunciation of German words and overall delivery is concise. In depth research by the author lays to rest any doubts about the death and remains of a ghoulish monster known as Hitler.

Very good and yet concise!

This is a very interesting book dealing with the history of the end days of Hitler and the Third Reich.

Very informative

Being someone who has taken a shine to history this was a really awesome book to read through, as it gives both sides of all stories involved. Thoroughly enjoyed it

Grover Gardner rocks

Very repetitive. Not many new elements.
Chapters 6, 7, 9 and 10 are better.
Contents: ideal for Senior High School or first year Uni students who don’t know much about WW2 and the monster Hitler.
Very good performance by Grover Gardner, though he mispronounces many German names (same flaw in his excellent reading of “The Kindly Ones” by Jonathan Littell (also available on Audible). I learned much more in Littell’s novel (trigger warning for the sensitive readers: the protagonist is a sexual pervert) than in this book.
All in all, I kept listening for Grover Gardner.

Very informative didn't seem too biased

Regardless regardless Grover Gardner is one of my absolute favorite narrators raiders in fact, I listen to this book because he narrated it

Misleading title

Title leads you to believe this book will spend most of its page count going into the details of Hitler's death and the mystery of his disappeared corpse. Not so at all - - the author felt it necessary to flesh out a miniature "Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" combined with a biography of Hitler and a deep-dive into the 20 July conspiracy (and every other conspiracy to kill Hitler) before getting into Hitler's final days toward the end of the sixth chapter.

When he finally addresses the main issue, the author dedicates a sizeable section to discussing and dismissing the contentions of other authors at length, most of whose suppositions are ludicrous on their face anyway. Fortunately, he wastes little time on each individual theory.

Initially, this book adds scant information to that presented in Trevor-Roper's 1947 masterwork on the subject. No significant alternative theories or explanations are offered. However, if you're the type who wants more than that tome offered and needs all the little details expanded (like me), then this book is for you. You'll just have to wait through all the preamble to hear the part you actually want. Eventually, the author chases down all remaining questions as to Soviet handling of bones and teeth purported to have been Hitler's and makes a definitive statement about his fate. As a bonus, the ends of several other missing Nazis are demystified.

Well read throughout, albeit slowly. I listened at 1.40 speed with ease.

Thanks to Audible for making this book available free of charge.

Nope

What a waste! This whole book is about slamming other authors. Show me DNA evidence of the teeth and you may have something. This case is not closed.

Disappointing

The majority of the subject betrays it's title and synopsis. The vast majority of this work is extensively covered elsewhere. Criticism of other sources is simplistic and at least somewhat dishonest.

Loved this book!

This book is a great listen. It will really open your eyes to the atrocities committed by the Nazi’s-highly entertaining and wonderfully narrated a must listen!! Gets to the facts-but very historically accurate

misleading

it's really the life of Hitler. it only gets to the death in the last chapters. interesting but just a rehash of millions of other books on Hitler

Excellent reading

Brilliant. Puts an end to all conspiracy theories. Well narrated and deals only with facts

Poor editing

Overall a good listen, but I had to mark it down as points were repeated. for example, a statement would be made followed directly by an 'eye-witness account' which said the exact same thing. The choice should have been made as to using either the witness account or making the statement, the use of both on a number of occasions was simply annoying and frustrating just to make the book longer.
Even when this narrative technique was not employed a fact would be mentioned over and over again, I believe the author told us 5 or 6 times that Hitler's secretary, Frau Junge, wrote a book leading to a film.

absolutely brilliant

really well written and narrated. packed with credible information. highly recommended for anyone interested in Hitlers last days.

Disappointing

I'm pretty familiar with the speculation about Hitler's escape, so this book seemed like a good option. It was, however, a real disappointment with what seemed like 80% being nothing to do with the escape theory and more to do with earlier Hitler history. I have come away with the impression that this book was equally about Von Stauffenberg as it's was about Hitler.

Add to that the delivery which was, for me, really grating mainly because of a combination of it being very laboured whilst at the same time being littered with poor pronunciation (Goebbels pronounced Gurrbles for instance) and you are left with a really disappointing book that promised much but which I found to be lacking and frustrating.

I could not get into this book at all

I found the narration difficult to listen too, stilted and not good with German names/places.

It just did not interest me enough to keep listening beyond the intro and first chapter. It read like an academic text rather than something for the general public.

Good info, decent book

I listened to this book eager to hear more information about the death of Hitler. Not far into the first chapter I wondered how much research went into the book when the reader read "Hitler was born on the 20th of August 1889" in fact Hitler was born on 20th of April 1889. Its the one thing I do not forget....Hitler was born on 420. Silly mistake to make by the author I wonder how much more is factual?

Could be half the length

Good story but repeats itself over and over to fill it out. Only problem with the narrater is that he takes time to pronounce the names. No research done on the names beforehand.

Worth a listen tho

Interesting

It is an interesting summary of the last days of Hitler, repeats a bit but certainly covers the events in detail. Worth a chilling listen.

Date of Birth?

I enjoyed the book, lots of know facts and other time lines in one story which I enjoyed, but pretty much at the start, hitler birth date given as August 20th! He was born on April 20th, from all the hard work stated in research of this book that error, intentional or not should have be rectified.