He also probably read some of the widely circulated racist and anti-semitic literature that was easily available in the city. Hitler observed the success of the city’s popular mayor, Lueger, who was regularly re-elected on a virulently anti-semitic program. It was also a hotbed of ethnic conflict, as members of all the different populations of the Austrian Empire (Czechs, Poles, Croats, Hungarians) migrated to the rapidly growing capital. Vienna had a large Jewish minority (about 10% of the population when Hitler lived there). The Vienna years (1909-1913): Hitler later claimed this was when he developed his antisemitic outlook.Discussions of Hitler’s antisemitism focus on three periods in his life: Prejudice against Jews was widespread in the early 20 th century, but there is no evidence that Hitler’s family was particularly anti-semitic.

His own account, in his book Mein Kampf, is not entirely accurate: by the time he wrote it, he wanted to make it appear that he had adopted anti-semitic ideas quite early in his life. Sources of Hitler’s anti-semitism: Because we have very little reliable information about Hitler’s early life, it is hard to determine exactly when he became a confirmed anti-semite. He wanted to study art, and moved to Vienna after his mother’s death in hope of being accepted to art school, but was turned down for lack of talent.

As a young man, he showed no special talents. He had a closer relationship with his mother, and her death from cancer when he was 17 was traumatic for him.

Hitler’s father was an illegitimate child and it is uncertain who his father was, but there is no evidence for the legend that this unidentified grandfather was Jewish. He was the son of a local customs official and his much younger third wife. Hitler’s origins: Hitler was born in a small town in Austria in 1889. It was the combination of his virulent hatred of Jews and his success in creating a political movement that was able to seize control of Germany that made the campaign to exterminate the Jews possible. Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) is unquestionably the central figure in the story of the Holocaust.

Hitler by Joachim Fest