Wow--cyanide was tested on his dog--

By 27 April, Berlin's communication had been all but cut off from the rest of Germany. Secure radio contact with defending units had been lost; the command staff in the Führerbunker had to depend on telephone lines for passing instructions and orders, and on public radio for news and information.[27] On 28 April, Hitler received a BBC report originating from Reuters: it stated that Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler had offered to surrender to the western Allies. The offer was declined. Himmler had implied to the Allies that he had the authority to negotiate a surrender, which Hitler considered to be treason. That afternoon, Hitler's anger and bitterness escalated into a rage against Himmler.[28] He ordered Himmler's arrest and had SS-Gruppenführer Hermann Fegelein (Himmler's SS representative at Hitler's headquarters) shot for desertion.[29]

By this time, the Red Army had advanced to the Potsdamer Platz, roughly a kilometre away from the bunker, and all indications were that they were preparing to storm the Reich Chancellery. This report and Himmler's betrayal prompted Hitler to make the last decisions of his life.[30] Shortly after midnight on 29 April,[31][32] he married Eva Braun in a small civil ceremony in a map room within the Führerbunker. The two then hosted a modest wedding breakfast, after which Hitler took his secretary Traudl Junge to another room and dictated his last will and testament. It left instructions to be carried out immediately following his death, with Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz and Joseph Goebbels assuming Hitler's roles as head of state and chancellor, respectively.[33] Hitler signed these documents at 04:00 and then went to bed. Some sources say that he dictated the last will and testament immediately before the wedding, but all agree on the timing of the signing.[o][p]

Eva Braun and Hitler at Berchtesgaden (with Hitler's dog Blondi at right), June 1942

On the afternoon of 29 April, Hitler learned that his ally, Benito Mussolini, had been summarily executed by Italian partisans. The bodies of Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, had been strung up by their heels. The corpses were later cut down and thrown into the gutter, where they were mocked by Italian dissidents. These events may have strengthened Hitler's resolve not to allow himself or his wife to be made a "spectacle" of, as he had earlier recorded in his testament.[34][q] Hitler had been given some capsules of prussic acid by Himmler through SS physician Ludwig Stumpfegger, and initially had intended to use them for his suicide. When he received the news that Himmler had contacted the Allies through a Swedish diplomat to arrange for an end to the war, Hitler was outraged. With this betrayal in his mind, Hitler began to doubt whether the ampoules would be effective. He ordered Haase to test one on his dog Blondi. The capsule worked – the dog died instantly.[35]