# Did Hitler actually kill anybody? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 18, 2011, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703 "2011-09-18T08:01:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/21 "2011-09-20T04:18:06Z")
I don’t think so. Though it seems that Himmler never personally killed anyone either: according to the link above, he was curious to witness a “shooting operation” because he had “never seen dead people before.” ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/22 "2011-09-20T09:06:22Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > Yes, in Minsk in August 1941. He apparently turned rather green when a piece of brain matter splattered on his uniform. [Cite](http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/einsatz/himmlerinminsk.html). Just read that whole page. I think it was in the NBC miniseries HOLOCAUST that a scene inspired by this showed Himmler twitching as if on the verge of a seizure. While the page didn’t quote him verbatim, it sounds like a quote I heard attributed to him (paraphrased) “it’s a hard struggle for the SS men to do what they must do & still remain decent men.” What a humanitarian. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/23 "2011-09-20T10:23:43Z")
My grandfather was a runner in WWI. I have his dispatch can. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/24 "2011-09-20T14:40:00Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > What a humanitarian. Indeed! Actually, the page I linked to gives a version of the story that I believe is incomplete. As I recall it, Himmler saw a young “Aryan looking” Jewish man. He then proceeded to quiz him along the lines of: ‘Are you sure you have 100% Jewish blood?’ When the answer was ‘yes’, he replied ‘then even I can’t help you’. It appears he was trying to avoid having an Aryan, even a “part-Aryan”, killed. Some have said his experience there made his quest for alternative killing methods more urgent, i.e. soon seizing on Zyklon B. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/25 "2011-09-20T15:04:00Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > I don’t think so. Though it seems that Himmler never personally killed anyone either: according to the link above, he was curious to witness a “shooting operation” because he had “never seen dead people before.” When I see footage of Himmler and Hitler, I see dead people. But they don’t know that they’re dead. ---
**Author:** ![Fish\_Cheer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fish_cheer/32/17179_2.png) [@Fish\_Cheer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish_Cheer)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2011, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703/26 "2011-09-20T19:50:17Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > While the page didn’t quote him verbatim, it sounds like a quote I heard attributed to him (paraphrased) “it’s a hard struggle for the SS men to do what they must do & still remain decent men.” That’s from his (Himmler’s, that is) [Posen speeches](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posen_speeches), a significant piece of evidence for the systematic state-sponsored nature of the Holocaust. > [@](#): > > It’s one of those things that is easily said: ‘The Jewish people are being exterminated’, says every party member, ‘this is very obvious, it’s in our program, elimination of the Jews, extermination, we’re doing it, hah, a small matter.’ […] But of all those who talk this way, none had observed it, none had endured it. Most of you here know what it means when 100 corpses lie next to each other, when 500 lie there or when 1,000 are lined up. To have endured this and at the same time to have remained a decent person - with exceptions due to human weaknesses - had made us tough. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-hitler-actually-kill-anybody/596703.md?page=1)