Adolf Hitler may have sired a son with French woman while serving as a soldier in 1917
Leave it up to time to reveal even the darkest of secrets. New evidence has claimed that Adolf Hitler had a son. His relationship with his mistress and eventual wife Eva Braun (chronicled in docudrama 'Adolf and Eva: Love and War') didn’t produce children, but a claim that he sired a son with a young French woman during the First World War has persisted for years.
The documented history of Hitler may have a new name to add to the books- Jean-Marie Loret, who died in 1985 at the age of 67.
He never met his father but ironic as it may be, he went on to fight Nazi forces during the Second World War. This story has now been backed by a range of compelling evidence, both in France and in Germany, and was later published in the latest edition of Paris's Le Point magazine. According to the article, in June 1917, as Hitler took a break from the trenches, he is said to have had an affair with a French woman named Charlotte Lobjoie who was only 16 at that time.
Although he was fighting the French near Seboncourt, in the northern Picardy region, Hitler made his way to Fournes-in-Weppe, a small town west of Lille, for regular leave. There he met Lobjoie. During her later years, she narrated the story of how they met to her son Loret, "One day I was cutting hay with other women, when we saw a German soldier on the other side of the street. He had a sketch pad and seemed to be drawing. All the women found this interesting and were curious to know what he was drawing. I was designated to approach him."
After this introduction, the pair started a brief relationship, which resulted in the birth of Jean-Marie, who was born in March 1918 after being conceived during a "tipsy" evening in June 1917. Loret in 1981 wrote a book called 'Your Father's Name Was Hitler', which detailed his discovery that he was the Fuhrer's son in the 1950s and which is set to be re-published with all the new evidence that has been unearthed since then of the relationship.
According to the book, Lobjoie told Jean-Marie: "When your father was around, which was very rarely, he liked to take me for walks in the countryside. But these walks usually ended badly. In fact, your father, inspired by nature, launched into speeches which I did not really understand. He did not speak French, but solely ranted in German, talking to an imaginary audience. Even if I spoke German I would not be able to follow him, as the histories of Prussia, Austria and Bavaria where not familiar to me at all, far from it. My reaction used to anger your father so much that I did not show any reaction."
Jean-Marie was not an exception. There were thousands like him. French children with German soldier fathers, badly treated by their peers at school. He was referred to as 'the son of the Boche (German soldier)', and often had fights as he tried to defend his father, who had returned back to Germany. Meanwhile, Lobjoie refused to discuss Jean-Marie's father, and ended up giving her only son away for adoption in the 1930s to a family called the Lorets.
Though Hitler never acknowledge Jean-Marie but, according to a dairy by a British soldier, he kept in contact with Lobjoie.
In a twist of the tale, Loret went on to fight the Germans in 1939, defending the Maginot Line before it was bypassed during the Nazi invasion which resulted in France being occupied from 1940 until 1944. He even joined the French Resistance and was given the codename 'Clement'.
In the early 1950s, just before her death, Lobjoie told Jean-Marie that his father was arguably the most infamous dictator in human history.
"In order not to get depressed, I worked non-stop, never took a holiday, and had no hobbies. For twenty years I didn't even go to the cinema," Loret was quoted as saying by a lawyer whom he had approached in Paris regarding the situation. Loret was determined to find out the truth.
In 2012, French magazine Le Point published compelling evidence that appeared to support his claims. A comparison of Loret and Hitler’s handwriting showed they were similar, and a University of Heidelberg analysis found that they shared the same blood type.
Photographs of the two also reveal an astonishing resemblance. Other elements which support the story are official Wehrmacht, or German Army, papers which show that officers delivered envelopes of cash to Lobjoie during the Second World War.
When Lobjoie died, Loret also found paintings in her attic which were signed by Hitler, who was also an accomplished artist. In Germany, meanwhile, a picture of a woman painted by Hitler looked exactly like Lobjoie.
In early 2012, another piece of sensational evidence appearing to confirm Loret as Hitler's son was released, a diary entry of British soldier Leonard Wilkes who claimed to have met Lobjoie during WW2.
Dated September 30, 1944, it said: “An interesting day today. Visited the house where Hitler stayed as a corporal in the last war, saw the woman who had a baby by him and she told us that the baby, a son, was now fighting in the French army against the Germans.”
Francois Gibault, who is Loret's Paris lawyer, said: " (Loret) He first came to see me in 1979, but was a bit lost and did not know whether he wanted to be publicly recognized as Hitler's son, or to erase all that completely. He had the feelings of many illegitimate children: the desire to find a past, however heavy, but also the fear of returning to the old routine."
"I talked with him a lot, playing the role of psychologist rather than lawyer," Gibault said. The lawyer also added that Loret's own children might now be in a position to claim royalties from Mein Kampf ('My Struggle'), Hitler's famous book which has sold millions of copies around the world.