GHDI logo


Hindenburg and Hitler to the Farmers’ Rescue: National Socialist Election Poster for the Reichstag Election (March 5, 1933)

In the elections of the late 1920s and early 1930s, the NSDAP benefited from a massive surge of support from Germany's rural population, which was continuing to suffer the effects of a persistent agrarian crisis. Above all, it was small and mid-sized farm owners and rural laborers who fell victim to excessive indebtedness, bankruptcy, and foreclosures. Members of these groups were therefore receptive to the Romantic agrarian and autarkic aspects of National Socialist propaganda, which claimed that the traditional basis for rural life was being threatened by the "Jewish-capitalist" market economy, industrialization, and urbanization, or by "Jewish-Bolshevist" expropriation. According to Nazi propaganda, farmers would stand at the core of racial and economic stability under National Socialist leadership and would thus benefit from state protection and support.

The poster consists of three panels, which are labeled at the top and bottom. They read: Foreclosure Auction – This is how it was (left), Bolshevism – This is how it could be (middle), and Free Farmers, Free Soil – This is how it must be (right). The message beneath the panels reads: "Hindenburg and Hitler to the Rescue! All Farmers Vote 1 for Hitler." Photo by Herbert Hoffmann.

print version     return to image list last image in previous chapter      next image

Hindenburg and Hitler to the Farmers’ Rescue: National Socialist Election Poster for the Reichstag Election (March 5, 1933)

© Bildarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz / Heinrich Hoffmann