Oskar von Hindenburg

Who was Oskar von Hindenburg?

Generalleutnant Oskar von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg was the politically powerful son and aide-de-camp to Field Marshal and President of Germany Paul von Hindenburg.

Born in Königsberg, East Prussia, Hindenburg followed his father into the German Army. Initially, his career did not prosper, as Hindenburg's superiors considered him to be of low intelligence. One of the units Hindenburg served in was the Third Guards Regiment, where he was befriended by Kurt von Schleicher. After his father became a German war hero in World War I, Oskar von Hindenburg's career started to advance, thanks to his surname. During the war, Hindenburg acted as his father's liaison officer. After his father became President of the Weimar Republic in 1925, Major von Hindenburg acted as his father's aide-de-camp. As his father's closest friend and advisor, Oskar von Hindenburg exercised considerable power behind the scenes as he largely controlled access to the President. It was in large part due to his friendship with the younger von Hindenburg, that von Schleicher became Chancellor and one of the elder von Hindenburg's closest advisors. Because of this influence on the President beyond any control by constitutional means, the publicist and writer Kurt Tucholsky ironically spoke of him as "... the son of the president, not designated by the Reich's constitution ...".