543. Death in the Amazon: Aguirre, the Wrath of God

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Rest Is History - Episode 543: Death in the Amazon: Aguirre, the Wrath of God

Introduction

In episode 543 of The Rest Is History, titled "Death in the Amazon: Aguirre, the Wrath of God," hosts Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook delve into one of the most infamous chapters of Spanish exploration in the 16th century. Centered around Lope de Aguirre, a conquistador whose ambition and madness led him to become one of the most notorious figures in the annals of colonial history, the episode intertwines historical facts with cultural interpretations, including insights from Werner Herzog's cinematic portrayal.

Historical Context: The Spanish Empire in the 1550s

The episode opens with a comprehensive overview of the Spanish Empire during the mid-16th century. Following the conquests of the Aztec and Inca empires, Spain was flush with silver flowing from the New World. However, the empire faced significant internal challenges:

• Weak Colonial Authority: Despite the riches, Spanish control was tenuous, primarily confined to coastal regions with only about 4,000 Europeans residing in Peru amid ongoing civil wars and rebellions.

• Economic Struggles: Emperor Charles V abdicated in 1556, passing the empire to his son, Philip II, who inherited a financially strained Spain plagued by inflation due to silver influx and costly wars in Italy and the Holy Roman Empire.

• Viceroy's Mission: A new viceroy, the Marquess of Ca, arrived in Lima with the imperative to stabilize the colony and seek additional wealth to support the empire. This backdrop sets the stage for the ambitious but ill-fated expedition to find El Dorado.

The Expedition Begins: Assembling a Motley Crew

Tom Holland (00:57) introduces the expedition’s leader, Pedro de Assua, a seasoned knight from Navarre with prior unsuccessful El Dorado missions. Assigned to command a formidable force of 400 Spaniards and thousands of indigenous laborers, Assua's team predominantly consisted of mercenaries, ex-cons, and hardened men ill-suited for disciplined exploration.

Dominic Sandbrook (05:15) highlights the expedition’s dual focus: the mythical quest for El Dorado and the practical need to extract wealth from the New World to aid Spain’s faltering economy. The expedition's composition and underlying motives reflect the tumultuous and often chaotic nature of Spanish colonial ventures.

Challenges and Mutiny: Rise of Lope de Aguirre

Shortly after setting sail on September 26, 1560 (16:32), the expedition encounters immediate difficulties:

• Shipwreck and Raft Survival: Massive leaks force the abandonment of most ships, leaving the crew to survive on rafts battered by incessant rain (16:59). The harsh conditions foster resentment and dissent among the men.

• Aguirre’s Opposition: Lope de Aguirre emerges as a vocal critic of Assua’s leadership and the elusive quest for El Dorado, deemed a myth (19:04). Known for his ruthlessness and vengefulness, Aguirre advocates abandoning the futile search to plunder existing Peruvian treasures instead.

Aguirre’s growing influence culminates in September 1560 (17:00) when he begins plotting against Assua. Despite warnings of department and dissent (14:26), Assua remains oblivious, leading to increasing tensions and eventual chaos.

The Mutiny: Assua’s Downfall

On New Year's Day 1561 (23:19), Aguirre orchestrates a mutiny by murdering Assua (24:46), thereby seizing control of the expedition. This pivotal moment is marked by chaos and brutal purges, including the slaughter of Assua's lieutenants (24:44). The aftermath sees Don Fernando de Guzman appointed as the new leader, though his rule is short-lived.

Aguirre’s Ascendancy and Madness

Under Aguirre’s command, the expedition’s focus shifts entirely to seizing El Dorado’s supposed riches from Peru:

• Strategic Plans: Aguirre formulates an audacious plan to sail to the Atlantic, commandeer a Spanish base on Margarita Island, and then launch an invasion to overthrow Spanish authorities in Peru (30:55).

• Escalating Violence: As the journey progresses, Aguirre’s paranoia and cruelty intensify. He orders the execution of dissenters and even his own daughter, Elvira, as he tightens his grip on the remaining crew (36:21; 59:26).

• Leadership Style: Featuring Nietzschean nihilism, Aguirre dismisses any notions of loyalty to Spain, citing his rebellion as a necessary act against ungrateful and corrupt officials (42:26). His leadership becomes increasingly tyrannical, characterized by sadistic acts meant to enforce loyalty and eliminate threats.

Capture of Margarita and Betrayal

In July 1561 (43:02), Aguirre and his dwindling band reach the Atlantic coast, capturing Margarita Island (43:56). Here, they seize the local governor, loot the treasury, and burn account books to cover their rebellion. However, their victimless formal approach to conquest is abruptly interrupted by the arrival of Montesinos, who spreads the news of Aguirre's betrayal across Spanish colonies, stripping Aguirre of his element of surprise and further isolating him (46:28).

The Final Downfall: Aguirre’s Death

Aguirre’s relentless pursuit leads to his eventual downfall in October 1561 (55:16):

• Betrayals and Executions: Internal strife and constant purges weaken his command. His brutal executions, including the murder of his daughter Elvira and fellow officers (59:38), erode any remaining support among his men.

• Final Confrontation: Cornered in the town of Barquisimeto, Aguirre faces a siege by royalist troops. Despite moments of vulnerability, his men swiftly turn against him, culminating in his gruesome death and the dismemberment of his body as a post-mortem punishment (60:21).

Interpretations and Legacy

Throughout the episode, Holland and Sandbrook explore various interpretations of Aguirre’s actions:

• Embodiment of Human Evil: Drawing parallels to literary figures like Mr. Kurtz from Heart of Darkness, Aguirre is often portrayed as the personification of unbridled ambition and moral decay (61:56).

• Revolutionary Figure: Recent scholarship, notably by Evan Balkan, reframes Aguirre as an early revolutionary against oppressive Spanish bureaucratic control, suggesting his actions were driven by deeper political motives rather than mere madness (62:41).

• Cultural Impact: The episode touches on how Aguirre’s legacy persists in cultural memory, including references in modern media and academic discourse, highlighting his complex portrayal as both a traitor and a symbol of resistance against imperial tyranny (63:58).

Notable Quotes

• Dominic Sandbrook (00:57): "I am the great traitor...I am the Wrath of God."

• Tom Holland (05:01): "Aguirre is the single most villainous figure in the annals of the Spanish conquest."

• Dominic Sandbrook (14:26): "Great evils will follow than you can possibly suppose."

• Tom Holland (22:22): "Aguirre is a madman in many ways and we shall see."

• Dominic Sandbrook (27:06): "He's the only sane person in a world of fools."

• Tom Holland (53:44): "Aguirre's letter is a mixture of rebellious defiance, megalomania, and self-pity."

Conclusion

Episode 543 offers a riveting exploration of Lope de Aguirre’s ill-fated expedition into the Amazon, blending historical analysis with cultural narratives. Holland and Sandbrook adeptly navigate the complexities of Aguirre’s character, presenting him as both a product and perpetrator of his tumultuous times. Through detailed recounting and critical interpretations, listeners gain a nuanced understanding of Aguirre's legacy as a symbol of colonial ambition, personal madness, and revolutionary defiance.

For those intrigued by the intertwining of history and its dramatic representations, this episode provides a thorough and engaging examination of one of the Spanish Empire’s most enigmatic figures.

Transcript

[Tom Holland]

Thank you for listening to the Rest is History. For weekly bonus episodes, ad free listening, early access to series and membership of our much loved chat community, go to thereestishory.com and join the club that is thereestishistory.com this episode is brought to you by Lifelock. During tax season, your personal info travels to a lot of places between payroll, your tax consultant and the IRS. If your W2 gets exposed, that's just the ticket for identity thieves. That's why LifeLock monitors monitors millions of data points every second. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Don't let identity thieves take you for a ride. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com podcast terms apply.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I am the great traitor. There must be no other. Anyone who even thinks about deserting this mission will be cut up into 98 pieces. Whoever takes one grain of corn or one drop of water more than his ration will be locked up for 155 years. If I, AGI Ray, want the birds to drop dead from the trees, then the birds will drop dead from the trees. I am the Wrath of God. The earth I pass will see me and tremble. Whoever follows me on the river will win untold riches. We will control all of New Spain and we will stage history as others stage plays. I, the Wrath of God, will marry my own daughter. And this have found the purest dynasty ever known to man. Together we will rule the whole of this continent. I am the Wrath, the Wrath of God. So that was Klaus Kinski, the great German actor as Lope de Aguirre in the film Aguirre the Wrath of God, which was made in 1972, directed by Funster Werner Hertz Song and loosely based on, I mean, one of the most remarkable episodes of European exploration in history. A 16th century Spanish band of conquistadors venturing into the Amazon rainforest in search of El Dorado. And it doesn't end well. And it's one of the maddest films ever made, partly because, of course, the conquistadors speak in German and we know that they would have spoken in English, obviously, but also Dominic, I guess, because it ranks alongside Francis Ford's Coppola's attempt to finish Apocalypse now as a kind of cinematic foley de grandeur, doesn't it? It does indeed, because they go into the jungle and it's all terrible. And Herzog tries to kill Kinski. Kinski's going mad. He's got his great bulging eyeballs.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

The making of the film is carnage.

[Tom Holland]

It is.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And it's holding a mirror up to the carnage of the original 16th century. Exped.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. It's very like Apocalypse now in that sense. So they shot it in the early 70s, as you say. They shot it on location in the Peruvian Amazon. And Herzog at one point threatened to shoot Kinski, his lead actor, and then turn the gun on himself. And that's sort of been reported as he was basically forcing Kinski to film scenes at gunpoint, which I think is a slight exaggeration. But the filming of it was demented. But that actually, of course, reflected the subject matter, which is. It's this, as you say, this expedition that's very, very Heart of darkness, actually, the 16th century expedition. It's about European colonizers, colonialists, conquistadors. In Heart of Darkness, which we did a podcast on a few weeks ago, you know, they go up the Congo. Joseph Conrad, his narrator, Marlow, goes up the Congo. He's in search of this guy Kurtz, who's lost his mind, when in this story, it's the people who are going up the river who lose their minds. And particularly this bloke Aguirre, who I think it's fair to say is one of the strangest and most unsettling characters we've ever done on. On this podcast. It's really interesting. The books about him, often written by some of them are by professional historians, but one of the best, for example, is by a guy called Robert Silverberg, who's actually a science fiction writer.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah. He did so all those books with kind of giant spaceships.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Cover.

[Tom Holland]

And he wrote an absolutely brilliant book called the Golden Dream, a history of quests for El Dorado. Like, very scrupulously researched, very serious book. And he describes Aguirre in this book. He says he's the single most villainous figure in the annals of the Spanish conquest, which is, you know, it's quite a high bar to clear.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yes, it is.

[Tom Holland]

And then there's the great historian of Amazon, John Heming, who wrote a brilliant book about the fall of the Incas. And he says of a geary, simply cruel, psychopathic, a man of unmitigated evil. Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So people are going to enjoy this. Yeah, yeah.

[Tom Holland]

It's always good to have a character like that on the podcast.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, it is very Heart of Darkness. So very reminiscent of the series we just did on the Congo. But we've also just done an episode on Dr. John Dee. Elizabeth, the first's kind of great magus.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And his great ambition is to track down secrets that will unleash untold wealth.

[Tom Holland]

Right.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And the whole El Dorado quest.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

This sense that there is a golden ruler, a golden city lost somewhere in the jungle, and that if only you can find it, then you will be unspeakably rich. This also is part of the Aguirre story. So it's a kind of fusion of the two, isn't it?

[Tom Holland]

It's absolutely part of the Aguirre story. And yet the mad thing about it is there's pretty much only one person in this story who thinks that El Dorado is a complete myth and a nonsense, and that's Aguirre. Yeah, yeah. There's an argument, possibly he's the only sane man on the expedition.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Isn't there some historian who says that he's the only man in history to look for El Dorado who didn't want to find it?

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. Exactly. Well, we'll come to that. In fact, he tries to dissuade other people from trying to find it. So let's give everybody a bit of context because there'll be lots of people who are not familiar with this story at all. So we're in the Spanish Empire in the late 1550s. So that means the Aztecs and the Incas have been conquered a generation ago. Loads of silver is flowing back to Europe from Mexico and Peru. But if in your mind you're thinking, okay, well, South America has been conquered by Spain. The story is over, that's not right at all. Spanish rule is very fragile, and it's really just confined to the coasts. And Spain itself, although it's very rich and powerful, it's in a kind of world of trouble. So the Emperor Charles v abdicated in 1556, and Spain and its empire passed to his son, Philip ii. He appears to be very rich and powerful, but he inherits a great mess. There's huge inflation, thanks to all of the silver. Spain has been fighting all these wars in Italy and the Holy Roman Empire. He has to default on Spain's loans straight away. He's got no money. He's struggling to raise taxes in Spain itself. And the obvious place to look is the New World. Let's get more gold and silver from the New World. But the problem is that his authority, and this is going to be really important in explaining the political context to this story, his royal authority is very weak in the Spanish colonies. So in Peru, for example, you know, the Incas have, as it were, fallen, but there are still only about 4,000 European Spaniards in Peru, in Lima and Whatnot. And they are fighting these endless civil wars and there are little rebellions and feuds and things. And in 1556, a new viceroy called the Marquess of Ca arrived in Lima from Spain.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And Dominic, when he arrives in Lima, does he find the lilting of a Spanish guitar?

[Tom Holland]

He doesn't actually, Tom. He hears the sound of screams and chaos because law and order have slightly broken down in Lima. This is not the world of Paddington Bear, it's fair to say it's a much darker world. The place is in chaos. There are unemployed soldiers and ruffians everywhere. Total sort of feuds and vendettas. And he has to try to sort this out. You know, he wants to find money to impress Philip ii.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And you can see why this scenario would appeal to a science fiction writer. Yeah, it's a kind of staple, isn't it? The new colony on a distant planet.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Full of gun runners and smugglers and desperados.

[Tom Holland]

That's exactly what it is. All. I think we should assume that almost everybody in this story who we mentioned at this point onwards has an enormous scar running from their eyebrow right down to their chin or something.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

A weapon with a personal nickname.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly, yeah. Gut Splitter. Yeah, The Widow Weeper or something of that kind. Anyway, at about this point, when the Marcus of Kinete arrives in Lima, an Amazonian Indian chieftain arrives in Peru from the east. And it's very like the sort of barbarians on the periphery of the Roman Empire. There are all kinds of movements of people who are pushing other people because of the arrival of the Europeans. So it's caused kind of chaos among the tribes. And this bloke is taken, the leader of this tribe is taken to see the Spanish authorities. And he says, we've traveled a long way. We've traveled along the Amazon and I have seen lands rich in gold. And the Marcus of Cagiete's eye, you know, he raises his eyebrows at this. Yeah, he's. Oh, brilliant. And this tallies with two things that people in the two great colonial cities of the western side of the continent, which are Lima and Quito now in Ecuador. This tallies with two things that they believe. First of all, 10 years or so earlier, a man called Francisco de Orellana had led one of the great expeditions in all history, the first European expedition along the whole length of the Amazon. And he had traveled for 4,000 miles. And he, Orellana, reported that he had seen very large, very rich settlements, people who lived in towns, people who wore fine woven clothes with great pottery and loads and Loads of silver. And for centuries, people have assumed since then that this was all nonsense and just a fable. But actually, now the trend among historians of Amazonia is to say, actually Amazonia probably was more built up than we think, and there were more people there and they were more sophisticated, and they were all killed in the long run, a lot of them by disease and things. So they've been discounted ever since. But archaeologists now think there's a lot of truth in this. And then the second thing is that in Lima and Quito, people have been swapping stories about this place called El Dorado. And this seems to have originated as a very garbled and exaggerated and confused report of what the Spanish were doing on the other side of the continent in Colombia, where they were conquering a people called the Muisca. And these Muysca were quite rich. And this basically became embellished and garbled into a story of a land so rich that the king could sort of paint himself in gold dust, throw a load of gold into the lake every year in a religious ritual. And there's gold everywhere, and there's a lake full of gold and all of this kind of business.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Because El Dorado is literally the golden man, isn't it? The golden one.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. So the Marcus de Canietta. Anyway, he arrives in Lima and there's all of these different rumors hanging around, all the stuff out there in the Amazon, who knows? And his great brainwave is. And it's a really smart, I'll get rid of all these ne'er do wells with their scars by saying to them, lads, why don't you go off on a massive expedition to go and find El Dorado? Because if they do find it, he'll be the man who saved Spain's finances. He can send all the gold back to Philip ii. And that's great, if they don't find it. And they'll die.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Brilliant.

[Tom Holland]

Brilliant. He's rid of them. It's win, win. So to command the expedition, he appoints a fellow called Pedro de Assua, who is a knight from Navarre, from Pamplona. Everyone says he's very brave, he's very gallant, he's very headstrong. He's actually not without experience. He has been serving in New Granada, which is Colombia, for about 10 years. He's already gone on some El Dorado expeditions. No joy, really, but he's not a complete idiot. So he is appointed to lead the expedition. He is told, when you conquer the province of Amagua and Dorado, you will rule it. As governor. And he thinks, well, brilliant, because this is, of course, what conquistadors want. They want a slice of territory and they want an official appointment so that they can make money out of it. That's what all this is about. It's what Cortes, Pizarro, all of these people. So a sewer. Over the next year or so, he gathers his team. He gets a very, very large expedition by the standards of the day. About 400 Spaniards and thousands of Peruvian Indians, native Peruvians I suppose people might call them now. And it's the largest European force for the next two centuries to enter Amazonia. I have to say, most of the people on this expedition are not people with whom one would choose to go on holiday. They're kind of gangsters, mercenaries, ex cons. They're hard men, I think it's fair to say, Tom. And they start building all these rafts and brigantines on the edge of Amazonia that they will use to go into the kind of river network.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

It's kind of a spaghetti Western. Only in a jungle.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly, It's a spaghetti western. Or so we're going to be doing some episodes about Harold Hardrada going into the lands of the Rus, and I think there's a slight Viking element to this kind of slightly terrifying men who would be no strangers to a facial tattoo.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

Kind of, kind of venturing in search of gold and hopefully some slaughter.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

A lot of stubble, though.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. Yeah. This is a slightly sweatier version, I think it's probably. Probably fair to say. Anyway, in the summer of 1560, before he sets off a sewer, gets a letter from a friend. And the friend says to him, look, you're making two dreadful mistakes. Mistake number one, you are taking your mistress. What? Donya in? Yes, De atienza.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Please tell me she is incredibly ugly. Please tell me she's not absolutely gorgeous, Tom.

[Tom Holland]

So gallant. Well, but it's for her own good.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And for the good of the expedition, so.

[Tom Holland]

No, she's said to be the most beautiful woman in all of Peru.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That is mad.

[Tom Holland]

Disastrous.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

400 desperados and one woman.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, so she's a young widow. She's probably mixed race, the mestizo. There are like four or five eyewitness accounts written after the event on this issue. They're frustratingly inconsistent. So some say she's a woman of unimpeachable honor, others say she's a little bit free with her affections. It's hard to say. So it's hard to know the truth there, Tom. I think the listeners must just make up their own minds. Anyway, Asua's mate says you are mad to take her with you. Nothing good will come of it. And I quote, greater evils will follow than you can possibly suppose.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And I have a sense they're not wrong.

[Tom Holland]

Yes, well, especially as the friend also says, you're not just taking quite bad men, some of the men you're taking are unbelievably bad men. And he says the worst is a man called Lope de Aguirre. So we know from a letter that Aguirre later wrote to Philip ii, which we shall come on to. Aguirre had been born in 1510 in the Basque Country. He'd come to Peru in his early 20s. He'd worked as a horse breaker and a general enforcer.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That's a terrifying cv, isn't it?

[Tom Holland]

There's a wonderful account based on other accounts by Franciscan monk Fray Simon. And Simon said of Agir, he was of short stature and sparely made ill featured. The face small and lean, beard black, the eyes like a hawk. And when he looked, he fixed his eyes sternly, particularly when angry. So he's generally a slightly unsettling presence.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

All the chroniclers agree that he talks a lot, he's very roughly spoken, he's incredibly bad tempered and he's incredibly vengeful. And when you think this is in the context of the combat of South America. Yeah. And people are saying, now this bloke, you know, he's across the line, that's very disturbing. So he's always been, you know, kicked out of towns. He really is a spaghetti Western character. And as Frey Simon says, he has a limp, which I always think is an unsettling sign in a conquistador because he's been shot in the leg phrase. Simone says he was driven from one province to another and was known as Aguirre El Loco the madman. Right. So he's signed up to this expedition and the other thing is, he's brought with him his daughter. So his daughter. He had a daughter with an Indian woman. And his daughter is called Elvira.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And how old is she?

[Tom Holland]

Thirteen. Thirteen years old.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Oh, so he's taking her out of school?

[Tom Holland]

Well, she always travels with him and apparently he is completely devoted to her. Like, this is his real soft spot.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Right.

[Tom Holland]

You know, he takes Elvira very seriously.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

But I mean, you know, should anyone be listening and think you've taken their.

[Tom Holland]

Children out of school, don't.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Just don't do it.

[Tom Holland]

You have to pay a fine, don't you? In England, this is salutary.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Warning, I think, of what could happen, what could go wrong.

[Tom Holland]

Certainly don't go to the Amazon with a group of ne'er do wells.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

No.

[Tom Holland]

Pedro de Assua, the commander of the expedition, completely ignores this letter, which is madness. And on 26 September 1560, he sets off with his expedition into the tributaries of the Amazon. And right from the start, surprise, surprise, things start to go wrong. They've built all these ships, but there are massive leaks on them and he has to leave all but one of them behind.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

What? So he's setting off and he's got all these ships built and then he can't take any of them except for one.

[Tom Holland]

He can take one brigantine and then loads of rafts.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Why doesn't he wait to fix them?

[Tom Holland]

Because it takes ages and you know, because the people are getting very impatient and to be honest, I've had to cut out already a lot of feuding. Okay. There's been a lot of shooting already.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

A really bad feeling about this.

[Tom Holland]

Right. So they all cram into these rafts, but Asua insists on keeping one cabin just for himself and Donya in. Yes. And that does not go down well with the other people in the expedition. As Frey Simon says, the people were in such a state of ill humor that they almost mutinied.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And this is before they've left.

[Tom Holland]

This is before they've left. Anyway, they set off. After a few weeks they reach a river called the Maranon, which is the main source of the Amazon. So that runs from the Andes sort of down and eastwards deep into the jungle.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So if they follow it, they will be swept along ultimately towards the Atlantic.

[Tom Holland]

Yes. They're going from west to east. Yeah, from left to right. Exactly. I mean it's a heck of a way. It's 4,000 miles.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

They're not intending to go to the Atlantic by any means. They think they'll go into Amazonia and there'll be a sort of Aztec style kingdom.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

And they can seize its gold, make themselves the masters of it, then go back to Peru and say, brilliant, we've done it, you know.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And so they're not particularly worried about how they're going to go to get back. Coming up river against the current.

[Tom Holland]

They have not thought this through, I think it's fair to say, because we shall see. Quite quickly they start to, some of them say, how, how are we getting back?

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah. Right.

[Tom Holland]

I think for some of them it probably is always an option that they may have to continue all the way and then loop around the Top of South America. And we shall return to this idea anyway, after a while they find their first native villages. Fraserman reports that, you know, the people were very impressive. They had woven cloth, sort of shirts and things. So they had, you know, this is not a totally unsophisticated civilization by any means. But they don't find any gold. And the Spaniards become increasingly restless. Surprise, surprise. As the weeks go by and they go deeper and deeper into the jungle. There's a lot of muttering that Asuer is more interested in dallying with Donya in Yes. Than finding gold. There's no hint of gold. What's going on? Clearly Assure finds it very difficult to impose his authority on all these hundreds of kind of ex cons.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

What is the structure of control? Just depend on his charisma or.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah. And he has a series of lifts, tenants that he employs who are constantly bickering and feuding among themselves. I mean, these are people who. It's not a military expedition. These are not people who are used to following orders. These are people who are used to being. They're mercenaries. They're kind of adventurers. I don't want to speak out of turn, Tom. I feel that you would be very uncomfortable in this environment.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I wouldn't like it at all.

[Tom Holland]

No.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I'd stand on the margins wringing my hands.

[Tom Holland]

I mean, I've been on tour with you when there was just four of us.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

And I just can't see you enjoying this atmosphere, the sweating, the lack of shaving, if nothing else, because you're always a clean shaven man.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I am.

[Tom Holland]

Anyway, they proceed down the river. Fraserman says of us here, he's too merciful and at times his acts savored of weakness. But then he does that classic thing that quite weak leaders do, which is from time to time he kind of lashes out and inflicts severe punishments on people randomly. And so people say, well, you don't know where you stand with him. You know, he's not consistent. So they're not happy. They capture an Indian girl at one point and they say these people that Oriana met, who are called the Amagwa, you know, all these years ago when he went down the Amazon, where are they? And she says, well, I've never heard of these people. And they realize with a sense of horror, we could be hundreds of miles from where these people live. If El Dorado exists, he could be 2,000 miles away.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Because I suppose in, in a, in a jungle where you have no idea what the landmarks are, distance just becomes.

[Tom Holland]

An abstraction and no proper map. Yeah, no sense of anything really, but just the sort of the green vastness and the sound of. The sound of snakes slithering in the undergrowth and strange monkeys screaming in the night, you know, that's basically what's snoring. Exactly. Now after a while, this other brigantine, their shipwrights are clearly massively incompetent because this other brigantine springs a leak and they have to move everything out of there onto these rafts. So the German film version bears very little resemblance to reality. But the one thing it does have is a lot of raft action and that is true to life because they are on these rafts starts pouring with rain. So in the rainy season that by Christmas 1560, it's the rainy season, it's constantly raining, they've got no shelter, they're soaked, they've run out of food, they're really miserable and they are totally and utterly lost. And this is when Aguirre really enters the story. He and one of his mates, who's a man called Sal Duendo, are going around and muttering to the others. First of all, Aguirre says this business about El Dorado is clearly absolute total tosh. Like this is just a stupid children's story. We should go back to Peru and just start rampaging through Peru and steal the gold of Peru if we really want gold that badly. And secondly, he says Ursuer is a terrible leader. He spends all his time with his mistress, Dona Ines, who's basically the real mistress of the expedition. He is selfish and I quote, an enemy of giving away and a friend to receiving, which I quite like as an expression. And he is going to force us to stay in the jungle until we're grey haired old men. And you know, if we don't act, we're going to get deeper and deeper and we're going to be just completely lost and we'll all die.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean he, he's got a point with both, hasn't he? I mean he's not wrong there.

[Tom Holland]

Aguirre is a madman in many ways and we shall see. He does behave unbelievably badly, even by rest his history standards. But in this he's not actually wrong.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

So when he goes around saying this, people say, well, who's going to be in charge? And Aguirre, to his credit, he doesn't say myself. He says there's a young nobleman who's traveling with us called Don Fernando de Guzman. His birth and merits are worthy of greater honors. And he says To Guzman. He goes to Guzman. He says to him, look, if we get rid of Ursuer and you take over the leadership of the expedition, Philip II may well initially be annoyed, but when he hears the circumstances, he would consider it a good service and he will specially reward you. And he says to Don Fernando, at this point, look, we won't kill us. You will just leave him by the side of the bank or something. I mean, by the way. I mean, that would be effectively to kill him, I'd imagine. I mean, it's not like he's going to make a new life for himself in the jungle anyway. Don Fernando, as I think is you can expect with the man who goes around calling himself Don Fernando. He's a very vain man, right? And he is, and I quote, swelled up by the wind of ambition. He gave thanks for what they offered him and assented to all their projects.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

There was something in the air that night.

[Tom Holland]

There was. Alan Partridge's son is called Fernando. Yeah, I imagine these people has been very similar, right? So Don Fernando says, right, I'm in. Okay, let's get this plot started. And at that point, Aguirre says, yeah, there's one slight change, actually. We probably will kill a sewer after all. And Don Fernando is shocked by this, but he's in too deep. He's implicated in the plot, so he can't back out.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

But, I mean, it's ridiculous to be squeamish, as you said, because to just dump him on the side of the river. I mean, here's a death sentence anyway, probably more merciful to kill him. That would be my attitude. I would have hardened up by this point.

[Tom Holland]

You and I are completely on the same page on this. So on New Year's Day, 1561, they're camped in this village by the side of the river. Asura has sent some of his key lieutenants to scout ahead. And that gives his opponents the perfect opportunity. And as darkness falls, a group of Aguirre's men gather outside. Asuer's hot. And they find him lying in his hammock talking to a page boy. And he says to them, sort of in a friendly but suspicious way, caballeros, what seek ye here at this hour? And they kind of, I imagine there's a lot of cackling. They draw their knives and swords, plunge them in. And that is the end of Pedro de Issua. He is dead. And then they start shouting. It's interesting what they shout, actually. They start, liberty, Liberty. Long live the king. The tyrant is dead. So at this point, they're trying to dress it up. Up, yeah, as an act of loyalty to Philip ii. They've had a bad leader, they've got rid and the King will be very happy.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Six semper tyrannis.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. The camp is in total uproar because people can hear the shouting, screaming. They butcher enough of Ursua's lieutenants, who's a man called Vargas, who's come out in his cotton armor. So this is one thing the German film gets wrong. They're all wearing enormous metal armor in the German film, but in reality they'd have worn sort of Aztec or Inca style cotton, padded quilted armor.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

But the metal makes them look sweatier. I mean, it's a good, good for the visuals, I think.

[Tom Holland]

And wearing a quilt in a film just looks ridiculous.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That's not intimidating.

[Tom Holland]

No, no, no. So then, of course, with staggering predictability, they immediately break into the wine stores, they all drink this wine, get absolutely wasted, they round up Ursua's other mates, they kill them as well. They don't kill Donya Ines.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I was going to ask about her, what's her fate?

[Tom Holland]

So she's just hanging around in her own hut. She's not mentioned at this point, but we know she's mentioned later on. So she's just presumably quaking in her heart, very anxious.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, these don't seem the kind of guys who would necessarily be 100% chivalrous towards the mistress of someone they've just killed.

[Tom Holland]

I have to tell the listeners, if they've already formed a great attachment to her as a character, the second half will make. Will make challenging listening. So they then assemble the next day with massive hangovers. And Don Fernando is the new leader and he says, I've decided we'll continue the search for El Dorado because when we find all this gold, the King will forgive the murders and he will give us handsome rewards. So we should draw up a document explaining. The Spanish are so legalistic, aren't they? They did this all the time in the Conquest of Mexico. Do you remember when we did that series? They're always drawing up requirements and reading out legal documents to people who don't understand them and things.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So I've got a question, which is this is a highly dangerous expedition. Everyone knows that there's disease and wild animals and people with blowpipes and all that kind of stuff. Why would they ever confess to having murdered this guy? Why don't they just say, oh, he died of, you know, some disease or something? I mean, it just seems A bit odd.

[Tom Holland]

There's a lot of them that remember they were travel with 400 people. I suppose they think the news will come out, I suppose, yes, I suppose. And because some of the people there were not party to the plots and perhaps a little bit displeased about it, so they think it's better to have an excuse. So they draw up this legalistic document. Don Fernando signs first, and then Aguirre steps up and he signs his name as follows. He writes, lope de Aguirre, the traitor. Wow. And there's great gasps and shock and Aguirre laughs.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And how does he laugh, Dominic?

[Tom Holland]

I imagine a demonic laugh at this point. So I'll do a variety of laughs later on. There'll be a lot of opportunities, put it that way.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That was terrifying.

[Tom Holland]

He says, you have killed the King's governor, one who represented his royal person clothed with royal powers. We have all been traitors. We have all been a party to this mutiny.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, again, he's not wrong, is he? No.

[Tom Holland]

See, again, there is an alternative explanation, which is the only sane person in a world of fools.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, there is a kind of Shakespearean quality to this, where it's the villain who speaks the truth, like kind of Richard III or Iago or whoever.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, well, because of what he says next, he then says to the assembled company, this business about El Dorado is demented. Even if we found it, there is no way Philip II would allow us to keep it. He would send in viceroys and governors and bureaucrats. It's madness to be wasting our time on this. We should go back to Peru. There's a load of treasure there. Let's kill everybody in Peru and take the treasure. That's just a much more sensible way of proceeding. There's a huge argument, the council breaks up and this issue is unresolved. So they set off downstream again, deeper and deeper into the Amazon. Now, by this point, Aguirre has clearly realized what perhaps some of the others have not yet woken up to. There is no way, actually, that they're going to be able to get back.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Upstream, because by now the current is getting stronger and stronger.

[Tom Holland]

It's really, really strong. You know, the Amazon, these are big rivers. There is no way with these terrible rafts that they're going to be able to go back the other way.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

You know, at. The more I hear about him.

[Tom Holland]

The more you like him.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

The more I like him and the more I think I would have rallied behind him.

[Tom Holland]

Well, we'll see if you could maintain that position in the second half, I'm.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Aware that it doesn't end well.

[Tom Holland]

So they now discover they've got massive holes in their rafts. They have to stop by the side of the river and build new ships. That takes them them three months. I mean, day after day hammering and stuff, you know, cutting down trees to make nails and planks and things. They've got no food, they're living off wild fruit and I have to say, their own horses, because they had horses on these rafts, so they're now eating them. And Aguirre actually is quite pleased about this because he thinks if we eat all our animals, there's no way we can sort of settle down or be tempted to capture towns and, you know, all this stuff. We'll just have to keep going all the way to the Atlantic and get out of here, which. Which is basically what I want to do. And I think it's about this point that the mood really, really starts to darken.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

What do you mean, starts to darken?

[Tom Holland]

Yeah. Oh, no, because that was all prelude. That was all quite jolly. Because previously, when they'd got on reasonably well with the native population, they had done a bit of trading, of course, there'd been a bit of violence, but nothing completely off the scale. Now there's a lot of fighting and basically the word spreads. The Spaniards are bad guys and whenever they go out to look for food, they're often ambushed by Indians. There's also a huge row, one of endless huge rows inside the camp. Some of Don Fernando's friends say, look, you actually need to get rid of Aguirre. But he doesn't have the guts. He demotes him as second in command. And the problem is Aguirre, as we've established, is a very vengeful man. So Aguirre just notes this slight. He hides his fury and resentment, but he's determined one day that he will get his revenge. So we come to March 1561. Don Fernando and Aguirre call another meeting. You can sense that the mood is getting very paranoid. They begin by demanding that every man pledge his loyalty to Don Fernando, by God and the Virgin. And then Aguirre addresses the men and he says, look, we've been talking. The plan has changed. We are going to forget about El Dorado now. We are going to seize the wealth of Peru and we will crown Don Fernando Guzman our General, by the grace of God, Lord and Prince of Peru, the main and Chile, to whom by right these kingdoms belong.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Wow, there's a twist.

[Tom Holland]

He says, we forswear our allegiance to the King of Spain. And Aguirre makes this huge pronouncement. He says, from this day forward, I pledge myself to my prince, king and natural lord, Don Fernando. And I swear and promise to be his faithful vassal and to die in his defense.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So that's a death sentence, isn't it?

[Tom Holland]

And then he turns to Fernando, he bows, and in front of everybody, he kisses his hand as the new Prince of Peru. And Tom, I hate to tell you, but with that traitor's kiss, the real nightmare begins.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Brilliant, Dominic. Okay, so it's been an absolute pleasure jaunt up until now, but in the second half, we will find out how. As Dominic just said, the nightmare begins. Hello. Welcome back to the Rest Is History. We are with Aguirre, the wrath of God, the traitor, El Loco, the madman. The epithets are piling up. And Dominic, none of them are good and none of them are looking good. For Don Fernando, who is in nominal charge, has just been proclaimed by Gear, a basically lord of the whole of South America. So he must be feeling pretty pleased. But I'm guessing just something telling me he's not going to be around for long.

[Tom Holland]

Guess what? The clock is ticking for Don Fernando. I think it's fair to say, Tom. So he's the Prince of Peru, but they're lost in the middle of the jungle, so it's fair to say his title is purely nominal at this point. And Aguirre says, look, this is how we're going to get out. I've got my plan. We'll finish building these brigantines, these ships. When they're ready, we will sail all the way down the Amazon, another 2,000 miles or whatever to the Atlantic. Dead easy. Then we will head to an island called Margarita, which is off the coast of Venezuela. There, there's a Spanish base. We will take that base, we'll get supplies, we'll recruit people there. Then he says, we'll sail up to Panama. We'll seize the capital, we'll kill all the royal officials, we'll take control of the Spanish fleet based in Panama. We will rally the colonists of Central America, and we will cross the Isthmus of Panama and launch a seaborne invasion of Peru and seize the gold of Peru. Now, if you were standing in the middle of the jungle, soaked with rain, you've only eaten kind of overripe fruit for the past month and a horse.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And Dominic, I'm imagining a lot of leeches.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, loads of leeches. When someone outlined this plan to you, which involves a lot of travel, a lot of Capturing of implausible. Capturing of fleets. Crossing of isthmuses and. And multiple South American countries. You might say, I find this an implausible.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

You might equally say, well, what's the alternative?

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, well, that's what they say. They say, fine, let's give it a go. Why not? What's the worst that could happen? I think it's fair to say they haven't really thought that through because the worst that can happen is probably a lot worse than they're imagining.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Well, I'm not sure about that actually. I mean, being proactive is better than just sitting there and being eaten by leeches and dying in the middle of nowhere there.

[Tom Holland]

That's true.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

At least to try.

[Tom Holland]

And there's muscular. Maybe they had a few laughs along the way. So they set off, they go into the river network again of Amazonia. Eventually they built the ships. We're in April 1561. This is the point at which Robert Silverberg says in his book, in all the records of South American conquest, Aguirre stands out as the only man who ever went to great lengths to avoid finding El Dorado. Because whenever they see a tribute, an interesting looking tributary, he says, don't even look at it, like, keep going. He's got his plan. He doesn't want anything to interfere with it. But again, he's right. Of course he is. They don't want to get lost in this maze of rivers. It's a terrible sort of labyrinth, sort of riverine labyrinth. They're eating fish. They are living off turtles and manatees.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That's terrible. Manatees are endangered.

[Tom Holland]

Perhaps this is why El Loco. They're all incredibly emaciated. They're all going a bit mad. After a few weeks, Don Fernando, who's still hanging around, some of his friends say to him, this is mad. I mean, the El Dorado thing was pretty mad. But this idea about looping around and conquering Peru is absolutely bonkers. It's never going to work. Let's get rid of Aguirre. But they delay too long. They talk about it, but they don't do it. They have a sort of complicated plan. They're going to invite him aboard a ship and stab him and all this. And in the meantime word leaks out. And so Aguirre finds out about it and he decides he will strike first. So the first person that he gets rid of is his friend Senor Salduendo, who had been his ally earlier on. He's started sleeping with Donna in Yes. And Aguirre finds that disgraceful and he denounces his former friend as a traitor. He sends his men to overpower him and to butcher him with knives, which they do. He says, actually, Donnie Ness is a massive drain on this expedition and a distraction. She's got to go. And he sends two of his henchmen, who are called Carry on and Yamoso. Yamoso will be reappearing in the story in a colorful manner. These two guys turn up with daggers to kill Donya in. Yes. And the various chroniclers and eyewitness accounts really go to town on this. They're said to have stabbed her so ferociously that she drowned in her own blood. One account says they took an unnatural delight in mangling what had once been so beautiful. Another, even the most hardened men in the camp, at the sight of the. Mangled. That word again. The mangled victim were broken hearted, for this was the cruelest act that had ever been perpetrated.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

But Aguirre, he doesn't mind.

[Tom Holland]

He just thinks it's great. I mean, it's what he wanted. It's what he ordered.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So that's not true, because he's clearly the most hardened man in the camp and he doesn't care.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, that's true. Actually, you're quite right. And you've pointed out a terrible discrepancy in the sources.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I have.

[Tom Holland]

Oh, Tom. This is the kind of forensic detail that marks us out as a great history podcast. So Don Fernando has been sort of watching all this impotently and is horrified, but as our sources say, he now has just become a quivering jelly of a man. He became fearful and changed in appearance, but he didn't protect his person with more care, nor take Aguirre's life, nor seek to rally more friends. For he had become so timid and listless that for care of his own life, he took but little note. It seemed that he carried death in his eyes. So the end comes for him. A few days later, they're camped on an island in the middle of the river. Aguirre's men burst into his hut. They kill his chaplain first, stabbed him so ferociously that the sword pinned him to the mattress. Then they go by Don Fernando's kind of hammock, and he wakes. And Aguirre said him very gently, don't be alarmed, your excellency. And then they killed all Don Fernando's friends while he was just sort of lying there in his hammock, looking mournful. And then they shot Don Fernando with their arquebuses and hacked him to pieces with their swords. And Threw him in the river.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So that's the end of him. So he never becomes King of Peru?

[Tom Holland]

He never became King of Peru at all. He just floated down the Amazon in bits.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

It's a warning never to have dreams above your station. That's what it is.

[Tom Holland]

That's exactly what it is. It should always be kept in check. Check.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Except your lot. Don't aim high. Don't follow your dream.

[Tom Holland]

So the next morning, everybody wakes up and Aguirre addresses the whole camp, and he says, look, I did this for the safety of the army, because if Don Fernando had been allowed to live, we'd all have perished. He says, please, everybody. He says, please consider me, from now onwards, your friend and companion. You will not be disappointed, for you can scarcely conceive how much I desire to. To administer to your pleasure and contentment.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Of course he does.

[Tom Holland]

And he says, to maximize everybody's pleasure and contentment. A few quick ground rules. From now on, all private conversations are outlawed, and you can no longer go around in groups to stop conspiracy, to stop conspiracies. We can have no more of this plotting. I mean, that's rich given from the chief plotter. But he says, look, there's been far too much plotting. And he also appoints a kind of Praetorian guard for himself of Basques with arquebuses. So, actually, behind that, I think there may be a sort of serious point, which is that there are clearly internal feuds and rivalries. Aguirre is a Basque himself, and it may well be that very hard for us to detect. There is perhaps an issue here between Castilians and Basques or something like that.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And the sources, are they Castilian or Basque?

[Tom Holland]

They are Castilian, by and large. And as we will see, the sources. I do believe that a lot of this happened, that a lot of what is being reported is true, But I think the spin they are putting on this is very particular, as we shall see, because these are eyewitnesses who have been part of a rebellion against the King of Spain and want to excuse themselves by explaining how they were being misled by a madman.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So it may be that Aguirre isn't less mad. Less mad? I mean, more like Unai Emery, the Basque manager of Aston Villa.

[Tom Holland]

Right. Not a madman.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Not a madman at all. A very good manager.

[Tom Holland]

But you would follow him into the jungle, Tom, would you not?

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I absolutely would. I'd do whatever he said. But, I mean, if it all went.

[Tom Holland]

Wrong, would you then smear him as a loco and claim that he had a limp and stuff.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I'd like to think I'd stay loyal.

[Tom Holland]

Right. Well, some of Aguirre's people did say Lord right to the end.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That would be me. I mean, if he was that Unai Emery. I mean, not if he was like Klaus Kinski.

[Tom Holland]

Yes.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Just putting that on the record.

[Tom Holland]

Fine. Yeah. You wouldn't follow a German is what you're saying.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I wouldn't follow a very sweaty guy with bulgy eyeballs who's wearing too much armor, but I would follow a twinkle eyed, charismatic leader of men in a tracksuit. Or actually, Emery's very kind of dapper.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, he never wears a tracksuit.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

No, he doesn't. Very kind of dapper. Coat and scarf.

[Tom Holland]

Do you know what he is? He's courtly. Yeah. He is a word one would often use of a Spaniard.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah, courtly's absolutely the word.

[Tom Holland]

You're right.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

He actually has kind of quite a 16th century face, I think like a kind of Cavaliero in a. An El Greco painting.

[Tom Holland]

Right. They're now in, I guess. Where are they? They are in Northern Brazil. They've got completely lost.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Do we know how far they've got to get to the Atlantic now?

[Tom Holland]

They're well over halfway. They are now probably go round about a river called the Rio Negro. So they're heading across the border into what is now Venezuela.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And just to ask, no one has ever done this before?

[Tom Holland]

No, they have no idea where they are now, actually, at one point they see campfires, they saw lights burning on the horizon. And they have a few guides left, a few native guides. And some of the guides say, God, this could be it. This could be the land of the Amagwa, these people who are very rich. And Aguirre is furious at this. He says on pain of death, nobody is to look at this town or talk about it or mention the Amagua again, because he's really wedded to this plan of sailing around the top of South America in some way and then crossing the Isthmus of Panama and then seizing the gold of Peru.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

He's right.

[Tom Holland]

Well, he's also at this point, very, very paranoid. So Frey Simon says so many were the fears that disturbed the wicked conscience of Aguirre, that although he had killed those whom he feared, he never felt secure from the survivors. And I. That's definitely true. At this point, he really starts getting into his garroting. So there hasn't been a lot of garrotting so far. But now, I mean, I can't stop the narrative. Every Five minutes for all the garroting. Just assume that it's constant.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, it's a more merciful way to go than stabbing someone to death. So perhaps he's coming round to him.

[Tom Holland]

Well, this I think you would disagree with Tom, because I think there's a hint of a kind of satanic nihilism.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I love a satanic nihilist.

[Tom Holland]

So Frey Simon says that Aguirre at this point banned his men from praying king. And he said, throw away your rosary beads, you don't need them. He said, if you're worried about your souls, you should play dice with the devil. It's a good phrase. And then he says he's very Friedrich Nietzsche actually. He said he told his men that God had heaven for those who chose to serve him, but that the earth was for the strongest. He knew for certain there was no salvation and that being in life was to be in hell and that he would commit every species of wickedness and cruelty so that his name might ring throughout the earth, Earth and even to the ninth heaven.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

He's like the judge in Blood Meridian.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, Blood Meridian or the Marquis de Sade or something. There's a kind of ideological sadism to him, I think at this point, if this is to be believed. They now enter the Orinoco river and the river is widening, which is, you know, which is great news for them because it means that they're clearly approaching the Atlantic. It's really hot and humid in Venezuela in July, which is weather there. And Aguirre is very hot tempered. He says, we've got all these porters and guides with us, let us abandon them here. So they abandon them on the riverbank and they're crying and they're desperate and there's nothing there. I mean, it's nothing there at all.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Kind of dangerous animals and mud flats.

[Tom Holland]

And a couple of the Spaniards say, come on, this is a bit harsh. I mean, we've been traveling with these guys for months. And Aguirre says, right, you've got to go. And he has them garrotted or shot, people who try to protest. And then at last, on the 1st of July 1561, they enter the Atlantic. This incredible voyage. They've covered 4,000 miles in nine months. They've lost about half of the original party at this stage, but they're still alive 17 days later, they glimpse the island of Margarita. When they see the island, Agraria says, brilliant. And he celebrates by garrotting two more of his men who he thinks could conceivably betray him to the authorities when he gets there. And then they. They sail to the island and he sends a messenger ashore to ask for help with the words, we are ordinary sailors lost at sea.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

And presumably this is quite convincing because they must look an absolute mess after.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

How long have they been in the jungle?

[Tom Holland]

Nine months.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Nine months?

[Tom Holland]

They've been there nine months. They're emaciated, they're sodden, they're. They're filthy. The governor completely believes this, so he turns up with his officials. It's all very, very friendly. And Aguirre says, you know, would it be all right if we came on shore? War. Can we take some exercise and bring our weapons, just to practice? And the governor says, yeah, great. So they march ashore as though they're kind of on parade. It's very well planned. And then they sort of unsheathe their swords and level their guns, and they take the governor and his officials hostage. So this is obviously not a huge place. You know, you're talking about hundreds of people rather than thousands. But because as we said at the beginning, the Spanish presence is quite thin. It's quite thinly spread. Spread. So they march into the main town of Margarita, they seize the fort, they lock up the governor and all the other bigwigs, they break into the treasury, they steal all the gold that's been stored, ready to be shipped to Spain, they burn the account books, which to me is sign that there is clearly some kind of serious political motive behind all this. It's not just kind of insane nihilism, because clearly there, this is an attack on the idea of authority and royal authority. And what I think was, we'll see runs through this is Aguirre and some of the others clearly have a deep resentment. He's already said, if we capture El Dorado, Philip II will take it from us and give it to aristocrats and viceroys and bureaucrats. And of course, that had, you know, for Cortez, in Mexico, when we did that episode, that. That series a couple of years ago, that had kind of happened to him. He'd conquered it all and then been sort of pushed out. And so I think that's at the back of their minds.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I wonder, also, is there a kind of element of Basque. A nationalism would be anachronistic, because the Basques are proud mountain people.

[Tom Holland]

I mean, a lot of these people are from a kind of Spanish periphery. So, you know, famously, Cortez and his allies in Mexico, a lot of them had come from Extremadura, the sort of borderlands. And again, Aguirre is from a borderland. He's not from metropolitan Spain, Castile, from, you know, one of the great cities. And I think there probably is a fair bit of resentment actually of kind.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Of royal officials, but also Spanish, Castilian kind of authority.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. And actually we'll see there'll be more proof of this in a second. One great problem for them is that a missionary is visiting Margarita, has stopped at Margarita. While they're there, a man called Montesinos, a guy from Santo Domingo, and he has a big ship and he gets away in this, in this, in the chaos.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Bad news for Aguirre.

[Tom Holland]

It's very bad news. He goes off to the mainland. And this is the point at which word of Aguirre's return and his kind of misconduct begins to spread across the Spanish colonies. So from this point onwards, he has lost the element of surprise that I think was so important to him. And I think this is the point at which, dare I say, he really does begin to lose the plot. So up to this point, with all the garroting, I think there has still been an element of rationality. But we're told at this point, some of his men tried to defect and he was, quote, furious and raved like a madman, foaming at the mouth with rage and passion. He has them captured, he garrots them, their bodies are displayed with the message, these men were executed because they were faithful vassals of the king of Castile. Perhaps another bit evidence for your point.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Tom, or of kind of class resentment, perhaps?

[Tom Holland]

I think there definitely is a bit of class resentment and actually sort of jumping ahead. In the 20th century, in particular, some Latin American historians said, this guy's not a madman, he's a class warrior, he's a socialist, he is a Marxist. Avon, Lalette. Right.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Possibly going a little bit far, is it based on the evidence so far.

[Tom Holland]

But he issues orders. He says we must round up all the, and I quote, bishops, viceroys, presidents, auditors, governors, lawyers and procurators, as well as the caballeros of noble blood, in other words, the gentlemen. These people have been sucking the Indies dry. What he, and he doesn't mean from the native inhabitants, he means from us. We have won this, you know, through our sweat and our violence, we have won this land and this gold. And it is being sucked from us by pen pushing bureaucrats, you know, elitist establishment types, chinless toffs. And I think that is definitely there. So at this point, there's a bit of a reign of terror in Margarita. The richer citizens are locked up, their Money is stolen, the governor is garrotted and his officials are garrotted. Aguirre is now ruling with a kind of rod of iron. So if anybody hesitates to garrotte somebody, he garrotes them as well. He says, you know, if you. You've got to be in on this. And now there's a really, really terrible moment. We talked about this on stage, didn't we? And I always used to really enjoy this part of the story.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Story.

[Tom Holland]

He hears a rumor that the royal troops have landed, which is not true, and he goes out to face them, and he leaves his chief lieutenant, who's a guy called Martin Perez, in charge of the fort. And when he gets back after this false alarm, one of his other men, they're all feuding the whole time. One of his other men says, martin Perez has been plotting against you, which is not true. Aguirre says, right, bring him in. He comes in. Aguirre's men kind of leap out from behind the furniture or something and stab this man and shoot him with an arquebus. But Perez is not killed. He's hideously wounded. And a blood and entrails are everywhere. And he manages to, like sort of Frankenstein's monster. He lurches out of the room. Then it's going to imagine this lovely colonial mansion.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

Holding in his guts, wooden balustrade. Leaving this. And he's like lurching like a monster down the corridor. People screaming and running in terror and stuff. And Aguirre's men are chasing. I shouldn't laugh. It's a terrible scene. Agaria's men are chasing him, like, still trying to stab him and shoot him and stuff. And eventually they corner him, I mean, literally in a corner. And they managed to finish him off. They cut his throat. And it's a terrible scene. I mean, his entrails are everywhere. Aguirre spots one of the men, clearly looking a little bit green.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah.

[Tom Holland]

And this is a guy called Anton Yamoso, who had been one of the murderers of Don. And Aguirre says, you don't look like, you know, you don't seem to be enjoying this. Were you part of his conspiracy? Do you hold so lightly the love that I feel for you? And Yamoso is terrified, and he protests his innocence. And Aguirre seems completely unmoved. And, you know, he's kind of reaching for the garrote. And Yamoso drops to his knees by the disemboweled body of Martin Perez. You know, he basically wants to prove his loyalty. He shouts Curse this traitor. I will drink his blood. And then, as Fray Simon reports, putting his mouth over the wounds in the head with more than demoniac rage, he began to suck the blood and brains that issued from the wounds and swallowed what he sucked as if he were famished dog. And Aguirre says to him, oh, brilliant. You know, you and I are very much on the same page. Like you're clearly on the side of the angels. And so Yamoso has proved his loyalty, which is great.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

On the one hand, it seems so grotesque as to be an exaggeration, and on the other hand, so kind of revoltingly unspeakable that you'd think someone wouldn't make that up.

[Tom Holland]

They wouldn't make it up. And it's a very detailed story. It's a very detailed story with names, kind of dates, places. So it's so hard to tell what the truth of this is. But undoubtedly there is a lot of very genuine violence. And I don't think there's any doubt that they have gone. Because he would often say to his men, if you're thinking now the King of Spain can take us back, you are greatly mistaken. We are in so deep now that we just have to keep going.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Well, that signature, the traitor, I mean, that's really what kicks it off, isn't it?

[Tom Holland]

It is. I mean, he's not wrong. He recognized, I think, straight away, there's no way back from this. When we're in, we're all limb. So now he decides, right, we're going to have to carry on with the rest of the plan. We'll cross to the mainland. He has an exciting new flag which he's had specially made, a pirate flag. Of course, it's black with red crossed swords on it.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, honestly, if you were. You were in some New World port and you saw a ship with that.

[Tom Holland]

Flag sailing towards you, I don't want to be having to either have my brains drunk by somebody or drinking somebody else's brains. No, I mean, I wouldn't even drink your brains, Tom, to be frank.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Oh, I'm glad that's on the record.

[Tom Holland]

So they cross to the mainland. It takes them eight days. On 7th September, 1561, they arrive on the coast to what's now Venezuela. And it's deserted. The word has spread that he's coming, and the people have been told, evacuate the towns, we're sending troops, that this madman is on the loose. We'll sort this out. He burns his ships a very kind of, you know, Alexander the Great Alexander the Great detail. Exactly. He burns his ships and he says. He orders. He's got heralds and he says, go and proclaim a war of fire and blood against the king of Castile and his vassals. He marches on this town called Valencia. And he's in a very sort of Mr. Kurtz mode at this point. So he's been carried in a hammock. It's incredibly hot. He's got a fever. He's completely emaciated. We're told by the sources he was reduced to a skeleton at the point of death. And I suspect at this point, some of his men are thinking, I really hope he dies. If there's some way we could get out of this. But he doesn't die, unfortunately. He recovers from the fever madder than ever.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

You keep saying this, that he gets madder than ever.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah. You don't think he was mad before?

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I think he's reached a certain level of madness a few pages back, to be honest. I think he's reached a certain level of madness several minutes ago.

[Tom Holland]

I think there's still some way to go, frankly.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, the whole drinking brain stuff.

[Tom Holland]

The drinking brains is poor. I agree with that.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I think you have to be pretty mad to be madder than that.

[Tom Holland]

He let the bass country down there. I think Tom is fair to say.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah, he did.

[Tom Holland]

So he celebrates his recovery by executing a man called Gonzalo, and that Gonzalo's crime is that he'd gone off without permission to catch some parrots. That's the laugh. I think at this point, there's a lot of. There's a lot of crap as parrot fancy as slaughtered around him. They get to Valencia and he writes this mad letter to Philip ii, which many historians have written about. This, say, is one of the maddest letters in Spanish history.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Well, all history, you might say. I mean, let's pick it up. It is properly mad.

[Tom Holland]

He says, king Philip, son of Charles the Invincible, I, Lope de Gire, thy vassal, am an old Christian of poor but noble parents of the town of Onyate in Biscay. Actually, an old Christian is an interesting line, because it's a reminder that actually Spain was not entirely Christian until rel. Relatively recently.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah. So he's contrasting himself with the Jews and the Muslims who've converted.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. So his identity, he's saying, I am of loyal, you know, Spanish stock. And he says, For 54 years, I did the great service in Peru in the conquest of the Indians, and I did all this in your name, and I Didn't ask your officers for payment, but you have been very cruel and ungrateful to me and my companions for such good service. Again, the hint of the political resentments that may lie behind this. We won these lands, while you remember, remained quietly in Spain. Remember, King Philip, that thou has no right to draw revenues from these provinces, since their conquest has been without danger to thee. Again that point he complains a lot about the cruelties which thy judges and governors exercise in thy name. The oppression of thy ministers who give places to their nephews and their children, who dispose of our lives, our reputations and our fortunes. So, you know, there are all these kind of Nepo babies coming over here and taking the big job. Also a very 16th century theme. Resentment of the religious orders, the corruption of the morals of the monks is so great. They pretend, they tell you that they're converting Indians, but actually they are enemies of the poor. They're avaricious, gluttonous and proud.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

The poor. By that he's again not speaking about the Indians, he's speaking about Aguirre and his compadres.

[Tom Holland]

Yes, exactly. And then there's an ending which I very much enjoy, because the great thing about this is he lurches from one thought to another in the same sentence. So he says, my comrades and I pray to God that thy strength may ever be increased against the Turk and the Frenchman and all others who desire to make war against thee. But because of thy ingratitude, I am a rebel against thee until death. Signed Lope de Gire, the Wanderer. So, as John Hemings says, an extraordinary document. A mixture of rebellious defiance, megalomania and self pity. Robert Silverberg says few kings had ever received such a message from a subject shifting kind of attitudes within the space of sometimes the same sentence. And the tragedy years. Philip II probably never even got to read it because there's no evidence that he did read it. It must have been intercepted by a royal official and who filed it under M for mad.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, to be fair to Philip though, I mean, he does love reading a letter. That's basically all he's doing, isn't it?

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, he's sitting in a very gloomy. In El Escorial. Yeah, this would have livened up his day, I think.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

No, just endless stuff about tax returns and things and suddenly you get that.

[Tom Holland]

Let's get to the end of the story. Aguirre ends up cornered in this town called Bar Kisimet in Venezuela. A lot of his men have deserted. There's an awful lot of foaming at the mouth there's a very famous incident while he's marching into Barquisimeto. It's pouring with rain and their horses are slipping and sliding in the mud. He shakes his fist at the heavens and he shouts, does God think that because it rains in torrents, I am not going to reach Peru and destroy the world? Then he does not know me.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Brilliant. I compared him to a Shakespeare hero, but actually he's now turning into a kind of Marlowe hero hero.

[Tom Holland]

He totally is, isn't he? So he gets to Barkiti Mehto. They're surrounded by royalist troops outside the town. I mean, they are literally, Tom, they're literally eating the dogs. They're like the people of Springfield, Pennsylvania. Supposedly, the local governor issues, promises an amnesty to Aguirre's men. So some of them start to slip away. He says, the time has come. I think we should garrotte some more of my men, the sick and the unwilling. Let's have a little purge. We'll be a leaner, more efficient outfit. His lieutenants, his loyalists say to him, oh, come on, that's going too far.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

What about the bloke who drank the blood?

[Tom Holland]

The bloke who drank the blood actually stays there. Well, you'll see. He literally is the last person with him. So actually the drinking of the blood.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yeah, it was a genuine sacrament.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, it kind of was. Aguirre has a massive meltdown in the middle of October. He summons all his men, what remain of them. He puts a dagger to his chest. He says, why don't you cut out my heart? He says, I have killed a lot of people. But I quote, I want you to understand that I did it in order to protect your lives and for the benefit of all. It's real kind of self pity here. This does not unfortunately impress them, so most of them defect. And on the morning of Monday 27 October 1561, those who are left say, could we please go out and make a last stand against the royalist army? He says, fine. They go out of the town. As soon as they get out of the town, they kind of drop their weapons and start shouting, long live the king. God save the king. And they defect as well. Aguirre is gutted by this. The only person who's left is this boat, Yamoto, the blood and brains, ma'am. And Aguirre says, why are you still here? You know, why haven't you left me? And Yamoso says, so moving. He says, we were friends in life. I will live or die with you. And Aguirre, we're told, made no reply. He was crestfallen and lost. So that, I think, is lovely. What follows, perhaps less so, Aguirre goes to his room and he gets out his arquebus, his gun, and he goes to find someone we haven't mentioned, Elvira, who has been there the whole time. Age, what she now? 14.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

God, she must be so embarrassed.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah, dad, as he's really let her down. And he goes in and he says to her, my daughter, my love, I thought I should see you married and a great lady, but my sins and my great pride have willed it otherwise. Commend yourself to God, my daughter, and make your peace with him, for I can't bear that you would be called the daughter of a traitor. And that's quite moving. Perhaps a little more prosaic, is he then also says, I don't want you to become a mattress for the unworthy. Which you know. We know what that means.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Yes, of course.

[Tom Holland]

Elvira is extremely disturbed by this, falls to her knees and starts pleading. She says, father, Father, Satan is misleading you. And she's got a maid called Juana who manages to wrestle the gun from his hands. But then he really lets himself, Elvira and the Basque country down because he pulls out a dagger and stabs Elvira through the heart.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

That's his daughter.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah. It kills his daughter. There's a twist.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I thought that he was going to kill himself.

[Tom Holland]

No. Well, you would think it would be a more satisfying story in a way, if he now turned the dagger on himself, but he doesn't actually. What happens is, moments later, royal troops burst into the apartment. Aguirre picks up the arquebus again, but he's shaking so much that he can't fire it. And he bursts into tears. After all that, he has a soft heart after all. The soldiers lead him outside. There is talk of a trial, but actually his important thing, loads of his old cronies who defected are there and they say, oh, no, no tr. No trial. We should just kill him straight away.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Because they don't want the truth to come.

[Tom Holland]

Because of course they don't want the truth to come out of their own complicity. And two of his old gunners volunteered to do it. You talked about Shakespeare or sort of Jacobean drama or something. So in true Jacobean drama style, the first shot doesn't quite kill him, but he's still able to talk and he says that has done the business, even though it hasn't. So then they have to shoot him again. He's now dead. They cut off his head and they put it in an iron cage. Age. They cut off his hands. They wanted to send his hands on a kind of tour, so they sent his hands to the towns of Merida and Valencia. But the soldiers got bored of carrying them. One of the hands ended up being thrown in a river and the other one was thrown to the dogs to eat.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

So that's payback for his men eating all the dogs.

[Tom Holland]

Yes, I suppose so. So the dogs have had the last laugh, which is nice.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

They have, yeah.

[Tom Holland]

So that's the end of Lope de Geerion. I guess the question very briefly at the end is what it actually means.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Does it have to mean anything? Anything?

[Tom Holland]

I think it does. I like a bit of a meaning. Do you not like a meaning, Tom? You love a meaning. What? That this is very out of character.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

It's just the random madness.

[Tom Holland]

But maybe it isn't, you see. So for some people, so I guess for Werner Herzog in that film, it's not random madness. You could say it's Joseph Conrad style. Heart of Darkness, you go into the heart of the jungle. Your complicity in colonialism leads you into evil. I mean, that's how some people have interpreted the story. Alternative explanation, of course, is that it's rather like Mr. Kurtz. It's about the human condition and it's about, you know, we've all got a Lope de gira, a brain sucking daughter murdering madman inside us, whether we like it or not. And that's actually how most historians, they have said he represents human evil in its purest form.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Or there's the he's a revolutionary.

[Tom Holland]

Well, that's I think, the more interesting explanation. And there's a very recent book by an American writer called Evan Balkan. I think it was his PhD called Wrath of God and he argues he was the first revolutionary. I mean, South America has loads of revolutionaries. Che Guevara most famously. He argues that Aguirre makes sense politically, that you put him into the context of mid century Spanish America. Very flimsy colonial control, endless feuds, endless revolts, huge resentment of royal authority. And Balkan points out all the accounts we have of him are from people who were complicit in the revolt. And what they needed to do afterwards was to convince the Spanish authorities that it hadn't been political, that they had been coerced by a uniquely demented and demonic leader.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Well, the demonic, presumably, because then it would explain how they had been seduced, that effectively they've been the victims of witchcraft.

[Tom Holland]

Exactly. That Aguirre Represents. This is why that point, the thing about, oh, he, he doesn't want to go to heaven. He's determined to throw himself into this kind of Sardian pursuit of all that is cruel and brutal and all of this. That's why I think that was very important to them to make that point, to say there was no political context to this at all. It was an exercise in pure demonic evil by a. A madman.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

But there clearly was a political context. It's the signing his name as a traitor that kicks off the whole, well, I mean, it's a coup, isn't it? It's an attempted coup.

[Tom Holland]

It is. And as Evan Balkan says in his book, Latin American history is a saga of rebels and populists and strong men who appeal to the common man against overweening royal or state authority. You know, Simon Bolivar or whoever it might, or Juan Peron or whoever it might, might be Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, the country with which Aguirre is most closely associated. So Hugo Chavez's culture ministry, I read in Evan Balkan's book, I think, had a section on its official website praising Aguirre as a, quote, soldier, traitor, pilgrim, father, lover, dreamer. I think father is about a bit of an ironic one there.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

I mean, you could say that he kills her to preserve. Preserve her honor and say that she, you know, a fate worse than death. I mean, I guess that's how you could frame it. I mean, that's how he's casting it. And there is clearly a very magical realist quality to the whole story.

[Tom Holland]

There definitely is a magical realist. And maybe this would be our last, our closing point. The most famous of all European travelers who went to Latin America was a guy called Alexander Humboldt, German. He went to Venezuela in 1799 and he reported that the locals there said to him that at night strange, ghostly fires danced over the plains. Means he wrote this fire, like the willow, the wisp of our marshes, does not burn the grass. The people call these reddish flames the soul of the traitor Aguirre. And the natives believe that the soul of the traitor wanders in the savannas like a flame that flies the approach of men.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Well, Dominic, what an eerie note on which to end. And what a week it's been. We've had angelic voices and we have had the fires of demons. And in a sense, we will be having both next week because we are back with season three of the French Revolution.

[Tom Holland]

And of course, Tom, members of the rest is History Club will get all four episodes of that series on Monday. And if you want to Join them. You merely have to sign [e-mail] Adios.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Very exciting. Hasta.

[Tom Holland]

There we go.

[Dominic Sandbrook]

Goodbye.

[Tom Holland]

Foreign.

[C]

Hi there, I'm Al Murray, co host of we have ways of making you talk the world's premier Second World War history podcast from Goal Hanger.

[D]

And I'm James Holland, best selling World War II historian. And together we tell the best stories from the war. This time we're doing a deep dive into the last major attack by the Nazis on the west, the Battle of the Bulge.

[C]

And what's so fascinating about this story is we've been able to show how quite a lot of the popular history about this battle is kind of the wrong way round, isn't it, Jim? The whole thing is a disaster from the start. Even Hitler's plans for the attack are insane and divorced from reality.

[D]

Well, you're so right. But what we can do is celebrate this as an American success story for the ages. From their generals at the top to the gis on the front line. Full of gumption and grit, the bold should be remembered as a great victory for the usa.

[C]

And if this sounds good to you, we've got a short taste for you here. Search we have ways wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[D]

Anyway, so who is Overstone Van Furer? Joachim Piper.

[C]

But I see his jaunty hat and I just think crossbones. Well, I see his reputation and I think, you know, you might be a handsome devil, but the emphasis is on the devil bit rather than the hand.

[D]

Anyway, be that is May. He's 29 years old and he's got, he's got a very interesting career really because he comes from a, you know, a pretty right wing family. Let's face it. He's joined the SS at a pretty early, early stage. He's very. International socialism. He's also been Himmler's adjutant. Yeah, he took a little bit of time off in the summer of 1940 to go and fight with, with the 1st Waffen SS Panzer Division.

[Tom Holland]

Yep.

[D]

Did pretty well. Went back to being Himmler's adjutant, then went off and commanded troops in, in the Eastern Front. Rose up to be a pretty young regimental commander. I mean it's not many people that age are no ber Stern van Fuhrer, which is Colonel.

[Tom Holland]

Yes, I.

[C]

You see, what must it have been like if you're in, if, if Himmler's adjutant turns up and he's been posted to you as an officer, do you think? Well, he only got that job because of, because of his connections. It for Piper, it must have been always, he's always having to prove himself, surely, because he's, he has turned up. He's not worked his way through the ranks of the Waffen ss. He's, he's dolloped in having come from head office, as it were. It must be a peculiar position to be in. Right. He's got lots to prove. Move. Right, that's what I'm saying.

[D]

Yeah. And he's, he's, he's from a sort of middle class background as well.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

But he's got an older brother who's had mental illness and attempted suicide and never, never really recovers and actually has died in of TB eventually in 1942. He's got a younger brother called Horst who's also joined the SS&TOTEN cop for banda and died in a never really properly explained accident in Poland in 1941. Right. Piper gains a sort of growing reputation on the Eastern Front for being kind of very inspiring, fearless, you know, obviously courageous, you know, all the guys love him, all that kind of stuff. But he's also orders the entire, the destruction of entire village of Krasnaya Polyana in a kind of revenge killing by Russian partisans. Yeah. And his unit becomes known as the Blowtorch Battalion because of his penchant for touching Russian villages. So he's got all the gongs. He's got Iron Cross, second class, first Class Cross of Gold, Knight's Cross, did very well at Kursk briefly in Northern Italy actually, then in Ukraine, then in Normandy. He suffers a nervous breakdown.

[Tom Holland]

Yeah.

[D]

And he's relieved of his command on the 2nd of August and he's hospitalized from September to October. So he's not in command during Operation Lutech. And then he rejoins 1st SS Panzer Regiment as its commander again in October 1944. It's really, really odd.

[C]

I mean, but isn't that interesting though, because if you're a lancer, if you're an ordinary soldier, you're not allowed to have a nervous breakdown. You don't get hospitalized, you don't get tied time off. How you could interpret this is. This is a sort of Nazi princeling, isn't. He is Himmler's adjutant. He's demonstrated the necessary Nazi zeal on the Eastern front and all this sort of stuff. It comes to Normandy where they, where they're losing. Why else would he have a nervous breakdown? He's shown all the zeal and application in the Nazi manner up to this point and they're losing, you know, and because he's a knob, you know, because he's well connected. He gets to be hospitalized. If he has a nervous breakdown, he isn't told like an ordinary German soldier. There's no such thing as combat fatigue. Fatigue, mate, go back to work.

[D]

Yes, and it's a nervous breakdown, not combat fatigue.

[C]

Well, yes, of course, but.

[D]

But, you know, what's the one SS soldier said of him? Piper was the most dynamic man I ever met. He just got things done.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

You get this image I have of him of having this kind of sort of slightly manic energy. Yeah, kind of. He's virulently National Socialist. He's got this great reputation. He's damned if anyone's going to tarnish it. You know, he's a. He's a driver. You know, all those things.

[C]

He's trying to make the will triumph, isn't he? He's working towards the Fuhrer. He's imbued with. He knows what's expected him. Extreme violence and cruelty and pushing his men on. I mean, he's sort of. He's the Fuhrer Princip writ large, isn't he, as a. As an SS officer.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

Which is why cruelty and extreme violence are bundled in to wherever he goes, basically.