March 28, 2013

Finest Hour 155, Summer 2012

Page 45

Curiouser and Curiouser

Royal Flourish, by Christopher Rubinstein. Grosvenor Publishing, softbound, illus., 296 pages, $15.

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By Christopher H. Sterling

Dean Sterling teaches at the Columbian College of Arts & Sciences, George Washington University.

The facts are well known: In May 1941, Deputy Führer Rudolph Hess flew to Britain, parachuted into a field near Newton Mearns, south of Glasgow when his aircraft ran low on fuel, and was taken prisoner. Why he did it, however, was debated until the day he died, decades later in Spandau prison. Most observers concluded Hess was demented, and indeed his antics over the years suggested this was the case. Or… could there have been another reason?

This far-out book contends that Hess’s flight was the result of a purposeful deception by Churchill’s government, designed to embarrass the Nazi regime. Noting that many relevant documents remain classified, Rubinstein argues that Hess could have taken off in response to a “royal letter” from George VI (transmitted under somewhat cloudy circumstances) as an attempt to offer peace terms and end the war.

Churchill appears only in passing. He is perceived largely as an impediment that would need to be removed or otherwise overcome if British peace feelers were to have any real chance. This much is certainly true.

But the theory is as preposterous as the Daily Mail allegation that Hitler approved the Hess flight (demolished in FH 152:9). George VI may have been a “Man of Munich,” but by May 1941 he was firmly in the Never Surrender corner. Reliable eye-witnesses found Hitler furious when he heard of the flight; eye-witnesses across the Channel found Churchill astonished, but bemused: “Hess or no Hess, I’m going to watch the Marx Brothers.” Perhaps only the final release of those still classified official papers will put speculations like this to rest.

The author states that it would be “a profound misconception” were his book to be seen narrowly to “expound yet another theory seeking to explain Hess’s flight.” Yet that is exactly what it is. It would have been better labeled as fiction: an amusing alternative or counter-history or a “what if?” story. By trying to give his theory credence the author gathers a host of facts (oddly footnoted using Roman numerals), to which he adds some suppositions and outright guesses to build his wholly implausible scenario. We do meet some fascinating figures—all quite real—as the author poses the roles they might have played in the drama.