Hitler’s ‘English girlfriend’ says she was bullied by Goebbels because she didn’t like Mussolini

The revelation follows the discovery of secret diaries from the British socialite, who was the fourth child of Lord Redesdale, the peer, soldier and landowner.

Hitler allegedly used Mitford as a mouthpiece to ensure the British believed he had reservations about Mussolini, according to reports.

In other entries, Mitford describes Hitler as “gay” and “amazing”, and reveals how Hitler had gifted the besotted British socialite with two signed gold swastika badges.

Her leather-bound journal, which has been found after more than 80 years and serialised by the Mail Online, revealed how not all of Hitler’s most senior confidants shared the same infatuation that Mitford and Hitler appeared to have for each other.

A number of high-ranking Nazi officials thought Hitler might “blurt out” secrets to Mitford when they were alone together, according to the outlet’s podcast series about the diaries.

In a diary entry labelled Thursday, April 27, she wrote about having tea alone with Hitler, after which he showed her around “his birthday presents”.

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Lucy, the sister of writer Robert Byron and a friend of Mitford, recalled: “Unity came to see us just after Hitler’s birthday. They had been looking at Hitler’s presents together and she described him ‘in fits’ over a life-sized picture some admirer had sent him.”

The present is described in the entry as a portrait of Hitler in the nude, standing on top of a diamond, while holding a sword above his head.

Before Hitler’s birthday, Mitford also wrote about how she and her friends had been in Germany on April 1 for a visit to Dachau concentration camp.

Following the annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland in 1938, more than 11,000 Jews were sent to Dachau, alongside Roma travellers and political opponents of the Nazis.

By the end of the war, the death toll exceeded 32,000, one-third of them Jews. For Mitford, Dachau was described as “merely an interesting excursion”.

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When Britain declared war with Germany, Mitford was so distraught that she shot herself in the head in Munich’s English Garden park. Hitler reportedly paid for the 33-year-old’s treatment after the suicide attempt. But she was left brain-damaged, with the bullet lodged in her skull. She returned to Britain and died in 1948.

The Mail said Mitford’s journal had been subjected to handwriting, ink and paper authenticity tests by experts to avoid a repetition of the 1983 “Hitler diaries” debacle. Stern magazine and The Sunday Times were duped into publishing forged journals supposedly written by the Nazi leader.