Prince August Wilhelm of Prussia - Weimar Republic

Weimar Republic

After the end of the war, the couple separated and formally divorced in March 1920. August Wilhem was awarded custody of their son. After his divorce and the marriage of his friend Hans Georg von Mackensen to Winifred von Neurath, the daughter of Konstantin von Neurath, August Wilhelm lived a reclusive life in his villa in Potsdam. He took drawing lessons with Professor Arthur Kampf, and the sale of his pictures secured him an additional source of income.

August Wilhelm joined the nationalist veteran's group "Stahlhelm". In the following years he had increasing contact with the National Socialists. Finally, to the discomfort of his family and against his father's will, he joined the "dangerous, revolutionary" NSDAP on 1 April 1930, whereupon he received the low membership number 24, for symbolic reasons. In November 1931, he was accepted into the SA with the rank of "Standartenführer". Due to his ingratiation with the National Socialists and his adoration of Adolf Hitler, August Wilhelm was often the subject of mockery by the left-wing press ("Braunhemdchen Auwi", i.e. "Auwi the Little Brown Shirt), politicians ("Hanswurst" i.e. "Hans the Brown Sausage" by André François-Poncet), and from National Socialists themselves (Goebbels called him a "good-natured but slightly gormless boy").

As a representative of the erstwhile Prussian royal dynasty and German imperial dynasty, August Wilhelm was deliberately used by the National Socialists to gain votes in elections, for example as the lead candidate of the NSDAP for election to the Prussian Landtag in April 1932 or as an election speaker alongside Hitler, whom he accompanied on flights across Germany at the same time. Through his appearances at mass rallies of the National Socialists he addressed himself to sections of the population that were lukewarm towards National Socialism, and convinced them, "that Hitler was not a threat, but a benefactor of the German people and the German Empire".