In July 1937 Mackenzie King visited the German dictator Hitler in Berlin where King had lived for some months as a young student. King warned Hitler that if Germany attacked Great Britain, Canada would go to war at Britain's side, but Hitler, if he paid any attention at all, did not seem to take the possibility very seriously. At the end of King's visit, Hitler gave him an autographed portrait mounted in a silver frame. The inscription reads, "To His Excellency the Canadian Prime Minister, Dr. W.L. Mackenzie King, in kind memory." King wrote afterwards:
I confess that the impression gained by this interview was a very favourable one. As I told Herr Hitler in the course of the interview, what he said was a relief to my mind because of the very positive manner in which he spoke of the determination of himself and his colleagues not to permit any resort to war. I did feel very strongly that he had big problems within the country which he had to meet. He impressed me as a man of deep sincerity and a genuine patriot. I felt increasingly in the course of my stay that there were conditions in Germany itself which accounted for much that had been done there which it was difficult to understand beyond its borders.
