Creepy Nazis – 9 Occult Fanatics Who did Their Best to Help Hitler Rule the World

Erik Jan Hanussen (middle) conducting an illuminated séance.
Erik Jan Hanussen (middle) conducting an illuminated séance.

Ambitious individuals draw all kinds of talented and interesting people along in their wake as they rise to power. Hitler and key members of his team were no different. There were nine occultist men who had a surprising level of influence upon the upper echelons of the Nazi elite.

Erik Jan Hanussen was a clairvoyant. Hitler visited him in January 1933 after reading a prediction by Hanussen that Hitler would become Chancellor of Germany later that year. In order to ensure success, Hanussen buried a mandrake root in the town of Hitler’s birth during the next full moon. While there is a record that Adolf Hitler made an initial visit to Hanussen, the clairvoyant claimed that he was visited privately by the Führer many more times.

Hitler during a meeting at the headquarters of Army Group South in June 1942.Photo: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-B24543 / CC-BY-SA 3.0
Hitler during a meeting at the headquarters of Army Group South in June 1942.Photo: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-B24543 / CC-BY-SA 3.0

Wilhelm Gutberlet met and made friends with Adolf Hitler soon after the end of the First World War. Gutberlet had a mystic power that enabled him to discover ‘secret’ Jews with the aid of a pendulum. He was one of Hitler’s first followers and headed up the Nazi propaganda machine until Goebbels took over. Gutberlet was still detecting secret Jews for the Führer right up until the end of the war.

Karl Ernst Krafft was a Swiss astrologer who made an uncannily accurate prediction regarding an attempt on Adolf Hitler’s life. In 1939, he wrote a letter to his friend, Dr. Heinrich Fesel, who worked for Heinrich Himmler. The letter was ignored until after the explosion on 8th November 1939 at the Burgerbraukeller in Munich. After that, he was hired by Himmler to go through the predictions of Nostradamus, looking for positive news.

Dietrich Eckart was a leading light of the Thule Society, which believed that the Aryan race would produce a “White Messiah.” It is reported that Eckart once told Hitler that he was the one foretold to take the German people into a new promised land. In return, Hitler dedicated Mein Kampf to Eckart and raised monuments to him.

Himmler (front right, beside prisoner) visiting the Dachau Concentration Camp in 1936. By Bundesarchiv Bild  CC-BY-SA 3.0
Himmler (front right, beside prisoner) visiting the Dachau Concentration Camp in 1936. By Bundesarchiv Bild  CC-BY-SA 3.0

Hanns Horbiger had a vision of a creation myth that centered on the universe being formed from massive blocks of ice. It was called the World Ice Theory and came to Horbiger the day he noticed that the moon was made of ice and also realized that Newton had been wrong about gravity. Hitler set up a planetarium dedicated to the theory while also rubbishing Jewish science.

Ludwig Staniak was another professional pendulum swinger who stunned the Nazis when he was able to pinpoint the location of a sunken battleship. An office was set up on the back of reports that the British were discovering battleship positions in the same way and a team of German pendulum swingers was set in motion. Of course, it had nothing to do with the fact that the British had cracked the Enigma code by that time and were listening in on the Nazi’s communications.

Eckart as a young man
Eckart as a young man

Wilhelm Wulff was Himmler’s personal astrologer. Himmler was so convinced of the power of astrology that he banned its use, claiming it was too powerful. However, he is reported to have confided in Wulff that every major decision and every order he had given the army had been based upon “certain, little-known moon constellations.”

Karl Wiligut was another of Himmler’s associates. He had an entire mythos built up around the German Nation: it was nearly 230,000 years old, and when it had all begun, there were three suns in the sky, and dwarfs and giants roamed the land. On top of that, Jesus was also German and called “Krist.” Wiligut was reportedly hired to find the perfect location for the construction of a new German Camelot.

Rudolph Hess. By Bundesarchiv Bild  CC-BY-SA 3.0
Rudolph Hess. By Bundesarchiv Bild  CC-BY-SA 3.0

Read another story from us: How did Hitler Dismantle the German Republic? Could it Happen Again?

But it wasn’t just Hitler and Himmler who had the occult friends. Rudolph Hess had a friend named Karl Haushofer who was an astrologer. Haushofer had a fateful dream that he should travel to the UK on the tenth of May 1941. His thousand-mile solo flight in order to broker peace resulted in his arrest by the Home Guard and his early retirement from the war.

With such a team of occult specialists behind them, the senior officers of the Nazi party were convinced they had their hands on the levers of destiny. History, and plain common sense, has shown us otherwise.

Ian Harvey

Ian Harvey is one of the authors writing for WAR HISTORY ONLINE