The 'henpecked' Reichsführer: How a nurse dominated the head of the SS

Wars & Conflicts · Published 16 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Despite her husband’s terrifying status as the leader of the SS, Margarete Himmler was often described as his domestic master. While he orchestrated state-sponsored terror, she managed their private lives with an iron will, navigating a marriage defined by strict domesticity, personal antisemitism, and profound social isolation.

Margarete Boden entered Heinrich Himmler's life in 1927 as his ideal woman: a blonde, blue-eyed nurse who shared his interests in homeopathy and herbal medicine. They married in July 1928, but the union was fraught with social friction. Because she was seven years his senior, a divorcee, and a Protestant, Himmler's family largely shunned her; notably, none of his relatives attended their wedding. Despite this, Margarete became an integral part of the Nazi inner circle, joining the party in 1928 and hosting high-ranking SS wives for tea.

The power dynamic within the marriage was surprisingly lopsided. Historical accounts suggest Himmler was 'henpecked,' yielding to Margarete's will and possessing almost no influence at home. While she managed their unsuccessful livestock farm and oversaw their move to various residences, she also provided a consistent diet of anti-Semitic rhetoric. By 1928, she was already making disparaging remarks about Jewish colleagues in her private correspondence, reflecting a shared ideology that would later underpin the regime's atrocities.

Margarete’s role during the war was both administrative and observational. As a colonel in the German Red Cross, she supervised hospitals in occupied territories, including missions to Poland where she recorded observations of 'Jewish rabble.' However, her personal life remained complicated by Himmler's infidelity; she learned of his mistress in 1941 but chose to tolerate the affair for the sake of their daughter. After the war, her status as a 'beneficiary' of the regime led to a protracted denazification process that eventually stripped her of her voting rights and pension.

Her legacy is one of complex complicity. While she claimed ignorance of her husband's specific official crimes, historians note she was a committed National Socialist who profited from his rise. She lived out her final years in relative obscurity, while her daughter Gudrun remained a devoted, if embittered, keeper of her father's memory.

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