Germany WW2 Restaurant Kannenberg Wellner Silver Plate Serving Platter

Large silver plated platter with decorative boarder. The edge engraved “Restaurant Kannenberg”. The reverse well marked with Wellner and Son maker mark.

Approx 400mm Diam.

Overall age tone consummate with age.

The Hotel Kannenberg was a popular restaurant frequented by leading Nazi officials during the 1930’s and during the war.

Arthur 'Willy' Kannenberg 23.02.1896 - 26.01.1963 Main-cook andHitler's house manager at Reichs-Chancellery, began an apprenticeship in his father Oskar Kannenberg's catering business in 1912. From 1915 he served in Telegraph Battalion I and was discharged as a private in 1918. From 1924 he ran his father's businesses, the Kannenberg restaurant, Hotel Stadt Berlin and the Onkel Toms Hütte excursion restaurant in Grunewald, which went bankrupt in 1930.

As managing director of Pfuhl's Wein- und Bierstuben, where well-known Nazi personalities such as Joseph Goebbels and Hermann Göring also frequented, he met Hitler, who asked him to manage the casino at the Braunes Haus party headquarters in Munich. He took up this activity in 1931. As a result, he was also given charge of the canteen of the NSDAP Reichsführerschule on Schwanthalerstrasse.1

After Hitler became Chancellor in 1933, Kannenberg became in-house director of the Reich Chancellery. With the support of his wife Freda, he organized the running of the Führer's household. This included in particular the hiring of staff, the supply of food and drinks and the development of menus, but also the organization of catering at state receptions both in the Reich Chancellery and occasionally at the Berghof; During the war he worked in the Führer Headquarters (FHQ) Wolfsschanze and finally in the bunker of the Reich Chancellery in Berlin.2

He was interned by the Americans in May 1945 and released on July 25, 1946. Der Spiegel reported in issue 39/1948 that after his denazification, Kannenberg had managed to become head of reception and head chef in the American officers' mess at Stein Castle near Nuremberg.3 In 1957 he took over the “Schneider-Wibbel-Stuben” in Düsseldorf. According to contemporary accounts, he “kept an excellent kitchen” and entertained his guests by playing the accordion and singing. During his interrogation by the CIC, he said that he had often entertained Hitler with the accordion.

Code: 649