Himmler visited the camp at Sobibor in early 1943, by which time 250, 000 people had been killed at that location alone.

Himmler was close to his first daughter, Gudrun, whom he nicknamed Püppi (" dolly "); he phoned her every few days and visited as often as he could.

He visited Hitler's mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden and interviewed many leading Nazis, including Hitler himself, Schutzstaffel or " SS " leader Heinrich Himmler and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels.

Reichsfuhrer Himmler visited Zamość in August 1942 and ordered that the buildings of the old city be demolished immediately and replaced by a " German town ".

Kolo remained a transfer point for Jews deported to Łódź, and Nazi officials, including Heinrich Himmler, visited the town.

Höss testified that Himmler visited the camp in 1942 and " watched in detail one processing from beginning to end ".

On 30 June 1941 Himmler visited the newly-formed Bezirk Bialystok district and pronounced that more forces were needed in the area, due to potential risks of partisan warfare.

Before and during World War II, he was sympathetic to Nazi Germany, which he visited in 1937 at the invitation of Heinrich Himmler.

Heinrich Himmler visited Norway in 1941.

Wiligut supposedly predicted to Himmler that the Wewelsburg would be the " bastion ".

Nevertheless, it is sure that Himmler knew the apocalyptic saga of the " Battle at the birch tree ", which takes place in the Wewelsburg region.

Since 1936 Himmler ( who was often present at the castle ) wanted more and more to expand the Wewelsburg to be a representative and ideological center of the SS Order.

Towards the end of the war Himmler ordered that Wewelsburg castle should become the " Reichshaus der SS-Gruppenführer " ( Reich-House of the SS-Gruppenführer ).

Meantime, at his headquarters in Brenzlau, Himmler ordered adjutant SS Maj. Heinz Macher, with 15 of his men, to destroy the Wewelsburg.

The town and castle of Wewelsburg, the Reichs SS Leadership School, as also some of the castle's illustrious patrons and visitors like Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler, Karl Maria Willigut, SS-Obengrupenführer and chief of the SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt ( including the Gestapo and Kripo ) Reinhard Heydrich, and SS-Gruppenführer Arthur Nebe play a prominent part in the 1990 novel The Pale Criminal by Philip Kerr.

* 22 September 1934-Takeover of the Wewelsburg by Heinrich Himmler

There the disillusioned Rasch attempts to capture vital files from Schloss Wewelsburg, the Black Camelot that Himmler assembled as a Teutonic perversion of King Arthur's court.

In 1938 Himmler ordered the return of all rings of dead SS-men and officers to be stored in a chest in Wewelsburg Castle.

After all further awards of the ring were halted in 1944, Himmler ordered all the remaining rings blast-sealed inside a mountain near Wewelsburg Castle.

All rings were to be returned to Himmler upon the bearer's death or when they left the SS, to be kept at Wewelsburg as a kind of individual memorial to the holder.

* 1942 – Holocaust: Porajmos – Heinrich Himmler orders that Roma candidates for extermination be deported to Auschwitz.

The new Volkssturm was also to become a nation-wide organization, with Heinrich Himmler, as Replacement Army Commander, responsible for armament and training.

Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and one of the persons most directly responsible for the Holocaust.

In 1923 – 24, Himmler, while searching for a world view, moved away from Catholicism and furthered his interest both in the occult and in antisemitism.

Convinced that Himmler was the man for the job, Hitler appointed him Deputy Reichsführer-SS, with the rank of SS-Oberführer.

When Hitler and his army chiefs asked for a pretext for the invasion of Poland in 1939, Himmler, Heydrich, and Heinrich Müller masterminded and carried out a false flag project code-named Operation Himmler.

On 21 June 1941, the day before invasion of the Soviet Union, Himmler commissioned the preparation of the Generalplan Ost ( General Plan for the East ); the plan was finalised in July 1942.

Himmler, declaring that the war in the east was a pan-European crusade to defend the traditional values of old Europe from the " godless Bolshevik hordes ", attracted volunteers from all over Europe for the Waffen-SS.

On 9 June, after discussions with Himmler and Karl Hermann Frank, Hitler ordered brutal reprisals for Heydrich's death.

As Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood, Himmler was deeply involved in the Germanization program for the East, particularly Poland.

By November 1944 Himmler had merged the army officer recruitment department with that of the Waffen-SS and had successfully lobbied for an increase in the quotas for recruits to the SS.

By this time, Hitler had appointed Himmler as Minister of the Interior and Plenipotentiary General for Administration ( Generalbevollmächtigter für die Verwaltung ).

As head of the Reserve Army, Himmler was now responsible for prisoners of war.

Himmler and Hitler met for the last time on 20 April 1945 — Hitler's birthday — in Berlin, and Himmler swore total loyalty to Hitler.

The Ahnenerbe, a research society founded by Himmler in 1935, conducted research all over the globe to look for proof of the superiority and ancient origins of the Germanic race.

As second in command of the SS and then Reichsführer-SS, Himmler was in regular contact with Hitler to arrange for SS men as bodyguards ; Himmler was not involved with Nazi Party policy-making decisions in the years leading up to the seizure of power.

Himmler was constantly away on party business, so his wife took charge of their efforts — mostly unsuccessful — to raise livestock for sale.

Margarete, by then living in Gmund with her daughter, learned of the relationship sometime in 1941 ; she and Himmler were already separated, and she decided to tolerate the relationship for the sake of her daughter.

In 1942, the Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler ordered the Lublin District SS-und Polizeiführer Odilo Globocnik to build the first extermination camps during Aktion Reinhard ( 1941 – 43 ), the operation to annihilate every Jew in the General Government ( occupied Poland ).

In March 1933, less than three months after the Nazis seized power, Himmler set up the first official concentration camp at Dachau.

There are indications that Heinrich Himmler saw himself as the reincarnation of the first king of Germany.

50 stills from the filming in Krün near Mittenwald were later found and from these, surviving prisoners were able to identify 29 camp inmates who worked for Riefenstahl and were then deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau in the first weeks of March 1943 following Himmler ’ s December 1942 decree.

The Gestapo, which would eventually become a semi-integrated part of the SS security forces, was at first a large " thorn in the side " to Himmler as the group was originally the Prussian state political police under the control of Hermann Göring and commanded by his protege Rudolf Diels.

The SD was one of the oldest security organizations of the SS and was first formed in 1931 as the Ic-Dienst, operating out of a single apartment and reporting directly to Heinrich Himmler.

On the other hand, Tresckow and the inner circle of plotters had no intention of removing Hitler just to see him replaced by the dreaded and ruthless SS chief, and the plan was to kill them both if possible – to the extent that Stauffenberg's first attempt on 11 July was aborted because Himmler was not present.

In the first edition of Hitler's War, Irving footnotes, " I cannot accept the view … there exists no document signed by Hitler, Himmler or Heydrich speaking of the extermination of the Jews ".

On 13 October 1941, Heinrich Himmler gave SS and Police Leader Lublin, SS Brigadeführer Odilo Globocnik, two orders which were closely connected with each other: to start Germanizing the area around Zamość and to start work on the first German Nazi extermination camp in the General Government near Bełżec.

Equipped with a shiny bald head and a quiet but intense voice to go with his trademark penetrating gaze, he specialised in portraying insane or evil characters, including the violent alcoholic Doc Tydon in Wake in Fright ( 1971 ), the mad Doctor in the Bud Spencer-Terence Hill film Watch Out, We're Mad ( 1974 ), Heinrich Himmler in The Eagle Has Landed ( 1976 ), and the Bond arch-villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld in You Only Live Twice ( 1967 ), the first film in which the villain's face is clearly seen.

On 13 October 1941, SS and Police Leader Odilo Globocnik ( headquarters in Lublin ) received a verbal order from Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler to start immediate construction work on the first Aktion Reinhard camp at Bełżec, in the General Government, Poland ( operational March 1942 ).

The vault allegedly dubbed the Himmler Crypt, was ( allegedly ) dedicated to Heinrich I, founder and first king of the medieval German state ( see East Francia ), of whom Himmler reportedly believed himself to be the reincarnation, and where he hoped to be interred after his death.

Heinrich Himmler, then Chief of Police of Munich, officially described the camp as " the first concentration camp for political prisoners.

Heinrich Himmler, Chief of Police of Munich, officially described the camp as " the first concentration camp for political prisoners.

Also during the same month, Himmler set up the first official concentration camp at Dachau.

" Höss first met Himmler in 1929.

The first attempt was in March 1943, when both Hitler and Heinrich Himmler were coming to the front to participate in a strategy meeting with Kluge's troops.

The first transport arrived a few weeks later, and Greiser sought and received permission from Himmler to kill 100, 000 Jews in his area.

Heinrich Himmler, then Chief of Police of Munich, officially described the camp as " the first concentration camp for political prisoners.

On October 13, 1941, Globocnik received a verbal order from Himmler to start immediate construction work on Belzec extermination camp, the first labor camp in the General Government.

Himmler was one of the first SS officers appointed to the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer, and held the rank while simultaneously serving as the Reichsführer-SS.

In 1929, under new Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler, the SS codified its first uniform regulations: the signature black color was extended to breeches, boots, armband edges, and belt and crossbelt ; the shirt collar was edged in black-and-white twist cord except for those of senior leaders, which were trimmed in silver.