I BURNT Adolf Hitler. Now, that's grabbed your attention, hasn't it?
Today's extraordinary tale first caught the world's attention with that same headline in a Hunter newspaper in 1973. And I, and others, have never forgotten it.
The eye-grabbing headline (and story) first appeared in the old Newcastle Sun.
It's about a Warners Bay man - then a Newcastle State Dockyard worker - who said he decided to break his silence after 28 years. He revealed an insider's view into the dying hours of the Third Reich in WWII and the death of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler in besieged Berlin.
His name was Bruno Koch, then aged 51 and an assistant boilermaker-foreman at the now defunct dockyard. The German-born Koch initially decided to speak out to end countless rumours swirling for years about the fate of Hitler's deputy, Martin Bormann.
With Red Army soldiers closing in on Berlin's centre in April 1945, rumours quickly spread that Bormann, Hitler's 'gatekeeper' in the Fuhrerbunker 30ft (9m) deep underground, had somehow managed to escape Europe.
With his body not found, Bormann's fate became one of WWII's great mysteries for almost three decades. Had he survived to possibly help set up a Fourth Reich in the South American jungles?
Koch's reported comments followed the discovery in 1973 of a human skull near a Berlin railway yard and suspicions it could be that of Bormann.
According to Koch, Bormann died in a hail of Russian bullets just metres from him as the Nazi deputy tried to cross a bridge over Berlin's River Spree.
Koch told the Sun he had lived with the secret since WWII because he had wanted to simply forget.
"All this talk about Bormann . . . makes me want to say once and for all that he died on May 1, 1945," Koch said.
"I saw him die. I was only a few yards behind him, taking cover from bullets.
"I wanted to forget the shame and horror and misery of the war and its aftermath, but it is hard to forget when there is still doubt and still people looking for answers."
Koch said he was hiding behind a pillar as shooting "got very heavy" in the early morning and watched as Bormann was shot.
"He jerked and fell flat. Major (Erich) Kempka, who was Hitler's driver, ran back and shouted Bormann was dead."
A little later, German forensic tests on the skull confirmed it was Bormann, so authorities could finally declare him dead.
Koch then added the startling claim he had been living in the Fuhrer's final hideout. After fighting the Russians in Finland and holding two Iron Crosses, he was recalled to join Hitler's household (with its staff of almost 200) as an extra bodyguard.
As a warrant officer, he was put in charge of accommodation in the household.
Koch, who had been living in Newcastle for almost 18 years, then gave his account of Hitler's last days.
"On the Fuhrer's last birthday, on April 20, 1945, he at last realised he was going to lose the war. Until then, he had never conceded this," Koch told the Sun.
A depressed Hitler refused a last-minute escape by air and then, on April 30, he married his wartime mistress Eva Braun. A broken man, haggard with a glassy, hollow-eyed stare, Hitler made his final preparations for the end, telling staff to escape if they wished.
Hitler's doctor then handed out cyanide capsules to remaining staff, but Koch declined thinking he would somehow survive the hell of the surrounded German capital.
"It was nearly midnight and Hitler retired to his personal quarters with Eva. He turned and said goodbye.
"Soon after we heard a gunshot. I was the third person to go into the room. Hitler had shot himself in the mouth (others said later it was his temple). Eva was dead. It appeared she had swallowed the poison," Koch said.
"Major Kempka grabbed a big carpet and I helped wrap his body in it. We left Eva on her bed and carried the dead Fuhrer to a small park off the bunker.
"There I helped the others pour petrol over the carpet and we set it alight. But it took too long to burn. We had to get out before it was too late. About 20 of us left. Hitler's body was still burning, but I didn't think it would be enough to (totally) destroy his remains."
Germany soon surrendered. Hitler's planned 1000-year-old Reich had lasted only 12 years, with World War II costing 65 million lives, including the brutal extermination of six million Jews.
Koch was held prisoner by the Russians for more than a year, but said he never revealed his role in Hitler's bunker for fear of his life. He migrated to Australia in 1953.
In 1973, after Koch's disclosures, the German State Prosecutor Dr Metzner said Koch's story of Bormann's death closely matched that of Erich Kempka, Hitler's chauffeur. Koch's story about Hitler's last days also appeared to tally with known facts.
But a Soviet intelligence report listing all people known to have been in Hitler's bunker at the time of his death did not contain the name Bruno Koch. (It contradicted another report though alleging authorities had a record of Koch being on Hitler's personal staff for about 12 months.)
After Koch's story first appeared in the Newcastle Sun one of the paper's reporters later spent months on a follow-up, a proposed book on Koch's recollections. It should have been a bestseller, offering an insider's vivid account to possibly aid future historians. Yet, it was never published. Why?
One sensational "revelation", if I remember correctly, was Koch's suspicion that Hitler didn't actually commit suicide, but was secretly killed by someone else, possibly a bodyguard.
We'll never know, as the reporter sadly died after a fruitless search for a publisher, and I believe that Koch (who never changed his story to my knowledge) apparently moved interstate.
Koch's 1973 public revelations even sparked a bit of an outcry at his workplace, the State Dockyard, because of so many WWII veterans, like Poles and Russians and former prisoners of war, were employed there. All were trying to forget the past.
I was even briefly the custodian of the reporter's precious manuscript when he was beginning to lose heart in the project. He'd asked me to consider taking it over.
But his enthusiasm returned, and I handed back the manuscript.
My interest in the saga was recently renewed by the sudden spate of SBS TV programs on Adolf Hitler, the publication this month of a glossy 114-page magazine on 'Der Fuhrer' and this week's news of the Australian Army investigating 'soldiers of hate' (neo-Nazis) within its ranks.
All very strange.
And wasn't there once a ban on photos of Hitler in past decades for fear of inciting extremists? The same cult-like devotion to a departed dictator also appeared about 20 years after the death of Napoleon.
Another possible explanation of why Koch's story never saw the light of day as a book came in late 1973 when the reporter claimed he'd been confidentially told by a senior West German official that: "No one is interested today in Koch's story, or similar ones, if they didn't remain in Germany after the war to help out with the nation's rebuilding."
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