Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 in the small Austrian town of Braunau near the German border. Perhaps history's most notorious and ruthless dictator, this Austrian-born corporal in the German army became the head of the National Socialist German Workers' ("Nazi") Party in his early thirties. Imprisoned in 1923 for leading a failed "putsch" or coup d'etat against the Bavarian government, he was released after serving 15 months of a five-year sentence. He finally gained German citizenship in 1932, at the age of 42. That same year, the Nazis became the largest party in the Reichstag, the German assembly. In 1933, German President Paul von Hindenburg appointed Hitler Chancellor and, in 1934, von Hindenburg died while still in office. Hitler immediately declared himself the "Führer," or "leader" of Germany. Hitler's army invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, a morning that commenced what would later be called "Blitzkrieg" ("lightning war"), and which plunged Europe and eventually much of the world into a war that lasted six years, spanned four continents, and claimed the lives of over 50 million people. Hitler's rule over Germany lasted until April 30, 1945 when, realizing the war was lost, he committed suicide, ten days after his 54th birthday.
Adolf Hitler and his regime are responsible for the systematic extermination of approximately six million European Jews, which included men (2,300,000), women (2,200,000) and children (1,500,000). He is also responsible for the murders of 3,000,000 Soviet prisoners of war, 3,000,000 Polish Catholics, 700,000 Serbians, 222,000 Roma, Sint and Lalleri (also known colloquially as "Gypsies"), 80,000 German political and religious leaders as well as resistance fighters, 70,000 handicapped Germans, 12,000 homosexuals and 2,500 Jehovah's Witnesses.
Robert Carlyle's feature film credits include "The Full Monty," for which he won The London Critics Circle Film Award for British Actor of the Year and shared in The Screen Actor's Guild Award for Outstanding Peformance by a Cast. Other film credits include "Trainspotting," "Black and White," "The Beach," "Once Upon a Time in the Midlands" and "To End All Wars."
Adolf Hitler and his regime are responsible for the systematic extermination of approximately six million European Jews, which included men (2,300,000), women (2,200,000) and children (1,500,000). He is also responsible for the murders of 3,000,000 Soviet prisoners of war, 3,000,000 Polish Catholics, 700,000 Serbians, 222,000 Roma, Sint and Lalleri (also known colloquially as "Gypsies"), 80,000 German political and religious leaders as well as resistance fighters, 70,000 handicapped Germans, 12,000 homosexuals and 2,500 Jehovah's Witnesses.
Robert Carlyle's feature film credits include "The Full Monty," for which he won The London Critics Circle Film Award for British Actor of the Year and shared in The Screen Actor's Guild Award for Outstanding Peformance by a Cast. Other film credits include "Trainspotting," "Black and White," "The Beach," "Once Upon a Time in the Midlands" and "To End All Wars."