cyanide Karl Dönitz Magda chancellor Red Army de Joseph Goebbels Reich Chancellery
On 30 April 1945, Soviet troops were within five hundred metres of the Reich Chancellery when Hitler shot himself in the head and Braun bit into a cyanide capsule. In accordance with Hitler’s wishes, their corpses were carried outside to the garden behind the Reich Chancellery, where they were placed in a bomb crater, doused with petrol, and set on fire as the Red Army shelling continued. Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz and Joseph Goebbels assumed Hitler's roles as head of state and chancellor respectively. On the evening of 1 May, Goebbels and his wife Magda committed suicide in the Reich Chancellery garden, after having poisoned their six children with cyanide.
