Gertraud "Traudl" Junge (née Humps; 16 March 1920 – 10 February 2002) was a German editor who worked as Adolf Hitler's last private secretary from December 1942 to April 1945.
In her old age, she decided to publish her memoirs, claiming ignorance of the Nazi atrocities during the war, but blaming herself for missing opportunities to investigate reports about them.
I deliberately ignored all the warning voices inside me and enjoyed the time by his side, almost until the bitter end.
During Hitler's last days in Berlin, he would regularly eat lunch with his secretaries Junge and Gerda Christian.
[9] Both women recalled that Hitler in conversation made it clear that his body must not fall into the hands of the Soviets.
[10] Junge later wrote that while she was playing with the Goebbels children on 30 April, "Suddenly [...] there is the sound of a shot, so loud, so close, that we all fall silent.
The remainder of the group were found by Soviet Red Army troops on 2 May while hiding in a cellar off the Schönhauser Allee.
The Soviet troops handed over those who had been in the Führerbunker to SMERSH for interrogation, to reveal what had occurred in the bunker during the closing weeks of the war.
On 9 June, after living there for about a week under the alias Gerda Alt, she was arrested by two civilian members of the Soviet military administration and was kept in Berlin for interrogation.
Putnam's Sons (New York) as part of the book Voices from the Bunker by Pierre Galante and Eugene Silianoff.
The 2002 release of her memoirs Until the Final Hour, co-written with author Melissa Müller, describing the time she worked for Hitler, brought media coverage.
[citation needed] She was also interviewed for the 2002 documentary film Blind Spot: Hitler's Secretary, which drew much attention.
[citation needed] Junge died from cancer in Munich on 10 February 2002 at the age of 81,[15] reportedly having said shortly before her death, "Now that I've let go of my story, I can let go of my life."
However, one day, I walked past a plaque on the Franz-Joseph Straße (in Munich), on the wall in memory of Sophie Scholl.