It's February 22, sixty-nine years after Christoph Probst, Hans Scholl, and Sophie Scholl were convicted of treason in Germany's Volksgericht and promptly beheaded. While much about that day has been fairy-taled beyond recognition, one element of the legend has basis in fact.
Namely, as Hans Scholl was being led to his death, he shouted Long live freedom!
Now, he did not shout it loudly enough for the whole prison to hear. And he did not shout it after sharing a cigarette with Christl and Sophie. And he did not shout it after shedding a tear for an unnamed 'girlfriend' of any sort.
But his final words - appropriately enough - reminded the executioner, prison chaplain, and witnesses to his death that the friends of the White Rose were giving their lives for the notion that "freedom of the individual" was worth fighting for. Three leaflets had specifically mentioned their obsession with this personal freedom that had been taken from them by Hitler and his regime.
Showing posts with label alex schmorell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alex schmorell. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Monday, May 3, 2010
Mourning Micha
Rarely has the beloved son or daughter of a White Rose protagonist touched lives and protected the verity of history as did Michael Probst. Not yet three years old when Freisler pronounced his father guilty, “Micha” is best known to us as the little boy riding atop his daddy’s shoulders. A daddy laughing, smiling, a daddy at home in his native Bavaria. A daddy, who – for the moment at least – focused on Herta and his babies, leaving thoughts of resistance for another day.
Michael Probst admitted that he spent the better part of his youth, perhaps even his young adulthood, attempting to get out from under that famous father’s shadow. Christoph Probst’s untimely death made him larger than life. Known for his backbone and integrity, Christoph Probst the hero dwarfed Christoph Probst, the flawed human being. For Michael and his brother Vincent, that birthright inspired both awe and frustration.
Michael Probst admitted that he spent the better part of his youth, perhaps even his young adulthood, attempting to get out from under that famous father’s shadow. Christoph Probst’s untimely death made him larger than life. Known for his backbone and integrity, Christoph Probst the hero dwarfed Christoph Probst, the flawed human being. For Michael and his brother Vincent, that birthright inspired both awe and frustration.
"I am the son of Christoph Probst..."
The Legacy of the White Rose
In 1976 when my Aunt Angelika died, I read my father’s letters for the first time. They had been in the estate of his sister. My father’s letters to my mother had burned in Lermoos, and the letters with political content had been destroyed out of fear of imprisonment under kinship laws in 1943.
For the first time, my father became close to me. I appreciated him in his being, saw him live his short life. And now I recognized how many portrayals of the White Rose did him an injustice, yes, how
In 1976 when my Aunt Angelika died, I read my father’s letters for the first time. They had been in the estate of his sister. My father’s letters to my mother had burned in Lermoos, and the letters with political content had been destroyed out of fear of imprisonment under kinship laws in 1943.
For the first time, my father became close to me. I appreciated him in his being, saw him live his short life. And now I recognized how many portrayals of the White Rose did him an injustice, yes, how
Sunday, September 6, 2009
The "Love-Hate" part of our work
Today I stumbled across a Web site with attached forum that initially made me angry. I know the person behind it. Met her at the Orenburg conference in September 2007.
She's insecure, the kind of insecure that feels the need to elbow her way into the middle of every picture. The kind of insecure that babbles incessantly, so that people tend to run the other direction when they see her coming. The kind of insecure that isn't above rearranging the name tags on the tables so she can sit on the dais.
We were stuck on a train with her for twenty-two hours. Oy. No fun. All of the above, plus she wouldn't stop trying to prove her superiority. Finally had to ignore her, which was hard. She was in our "reserved" compartment, after all. Have I already said "Oy"?
She's insecure, the kind of insecure that feels the need to elbow her way into the middle of every picture. The kind of insecure that babbles incessantly, so that people tend to run the other direction when they see her coming. The kind of insecure that isn't above rearranging the name tags on the tables so she can sit on the dais.
We were stuck on a train with her for twenty-two hours. Oy. No fun. All of the above, plus she wouldn't stop trying to prove her superiority. Finally had to ignore her, which was hard. She was in our "reserved" compartment, after all. Have I already said "Oy"?
Monday, July 13, 2009
Remembering on July 13
We recognize that February 18 and February 22 will likely always be the dates associated with White Rose resistance. We've tried to emphasize other significant events and realign the stars, as it were. But it's a quixotic endeavor.
Therefore, although we have partially given up and yielded to the desire to celebrate the end of the White Rose (which is essentially what happens with the February dates), we won't stop reminding our readers why the other dates are central to the notions of informed dissent and civil disobedience, as seen in the example of the White Rose.
For narrative to that end, see the post directly below this one. It is lifted directly from Chapter 63 of Volume II of my White Rose histories.
As wonderful and heartrending as this part of the story is, there's nothing like hearing Clara Geyer narrate it live and in person. Or reading her husband's accounts of that day. Or holding a copy of the letter Dr. Deisinger wrote the Schmorell family immediately after the war, and sensing the greatness of Alex Schmorell's heart.
So, here's to you, Alex and Professor Huber, whose lives were cut short this day in 1943, but whose Life could not be extinguished. And here's to you, Manfred and Harald and Josef and Wilhelm, who survived to bear witness to the actions of your younger friends. And here's to you, Clara, Josef, Erika and Karl, who stood by your friends when they needed you most.
And here's to you, dear Gisela, who on this day discovered your backbone and found redemption.
Your memories are for a blessing. To all of us.
Therefore, although we have partially given up and yielded to the desire to celebrate the end of the White Rose (which is essentially what happens with the February dates), we won't stop reminding our readers why the other dates are central to the notions of informed dissent and civil disobedience, as seen in the example of the White Rose.
For narrative to that end, see the post directly below this one. It is lifted directly from Chapter 63 of Volume II of my White Rose histories.
As wonderful and heartrending as this part of the story is, there's nothing like hearing Clara Geyer narrate it live and in person. Or reading her husband's accounts of that day. Or holding a copy of the letter Dr. Deisinger wrote the Schmorell family immediately after the war, and sensing the greatness of Alex Schmorell's heart.
So, here's to you, Alex and Professor Huber, whose lives were cut short this day in 1943, but whose Life could not be extinguished. And here's to you, Manfred and Harald and Josef and Wilhelm, who survived to bear witness to the actions of your younger friends. And here's to you, Clara, Josef, Erika and Karl, who stood by your friends when they needed you most.
And here's to you, dear Gisela, who on this day discovered your backbone and found redemption.
Your memories are for a blessing. To all of us.
Excerpt from White Rose History Vol. 2, July 13, 1943... The Trial. The Executions.
On July 13, 1943, Clara Geyer had taken the earliest train out of Ulm – together with both Josef and Erika Rieck, of course. By 9 am, they were sitting in the courtroom. This was the first time she had heard that Judge Freisler was not involved, that the trial would take place in a Special Court with Judge Schwingenschlögl presiding. Someone whispered that this judge was “human.” She could only hope.
Whoever passed along that “secret” was badly mistaken. In December 1941, a Polish youth named Boleslaw Buczkowski had been arrested for defending himself when attacked by the farmer he worked for. The farmer had accused the youth of stealing an apple and had hit him. Buczkowski retaliated and gave the farmer a cut over his eye. The Polish youth – who had just turned seventeen – fled into the forest and foolishly admitted to someone that he wished he could set the man’s farm on fire.
Four months later, a judge sentenced Buczkowski to eighteen months in prison. During sentencing, the judge justified the stiff judgment by stating, “With the Poles, only a harsher sentence seemed to achieve the usual goals of punishment meted out.”
The District Attorney’s office in Munich was horribly upset by what they perceived to be too mild a sentence. They appealed to Judge Schwingenschlögl, who re-opened the case in August 1942. In the new trial, the youth was given a death sentence. Schwingenschlögl decreed that the Pole’s execution be announced throughout the greater Munich area by means of 410 placards. His family was prohibited from claiming his remains, and his farewell letters were destroyed.
If Clara Geyer had known that about Judge Schwingenschlögl, she would not have been as happy that Judge Freisler was not sitting on the bench. As it was, she believed they had been “very fortunate indeed.” And – she noticed that she and Erika were the only women in the courtroom.
Judge Schwingenschlögl was assisted by District Court Counsel Boller and Dr. Eder. Dr. Hohmann acted as prosecutor, and there was no court clerk. Dr. Reisert, a good friend of the Geyer family, had gained permission to represent all four defendants. The judge read the indictment into the court record. The defendants were accused of credible knowledge of a treasonous activity and failure to report same. The prosecutor did not try to make a case for aiding and abetting etc.
The judge questioned each defendant individually. First Söhngen, then Eickemeyer, followed by Geyer, with Dohrn last. Clara stated that her husband “gave the best answers out of all of the defendants.”
Schwingenschlögl grilled Geyer about his religious beliefs. Why are you a fanatical Catholic, he wanted to know. Geyer responded that he was not a fanatical Catholic. “A fanatical Catholic is never a good Catholic.” – “Why then do you go to church every Sunday?” said the judge. – “Because I must set a good example for my children,” replied Geyer.
The prosecution then called in Gisela Schertling, specifically to testify against Wilhelm Geyer and Josef Söhngen. “We all held our breath,” said Clara, “because everything hung on her statement.”
To their shock and voiceless ecstasy, Gisela recanted everything she had said in her Gestapo interrogations. She spoke in favor of Wilhelm Geyer and bore witness on his behalf.
The prosecutor was caught completely off guard by this development. He tried to undo the harm her testimony was wreaking on his case by introducing facts not in evidence. The judge would have none of it. If it was not already in the files, Schwingenschlögl told Dr. Hohmann, he could not mention it now.
Addressing Gisela directly, the judge inquired, “Do you have anything to say regarding the Gestapo reports?” When Gisela said she did not, the judge started to dismiss her. “Then I have no further questions for you.”
Söhngen saw his opportunity and took it. He jumped up and said, “But I have some questions.” He would never forget the expression on Gisela’s face when she turned to look at him. “It was immediately clear that I had won,” he said.
The judge permitted the defendant Söhngen to cross-examine Gisela Schertling. She recanted every last bit of her statements made in Gestapo custody. Without hard copy of those transcripts, Dr. Hohmann was hard pressed to prove that she had said what Agent Beer claimed she had said. The February 16 meeting between Hans Scholl and Josef Söhngen? It never happened.
It is easy to see why Clara Geyer thought they had gotten a good judge. Söhngen remembered that while he was questioning Gisela, Schwingenschlögl would occasionally interrupt. “I think you mean to ask if…,” he would say, presenting Söhngen’s query in an even more favorable light.
When Söhngen finished with Gisela, Dr. Hohmann called in Karl Rieber to testify against Geyer. He had been present for Theodor Haecker’s reading, they reminded him. He should tell the judge about that treasonous lecture.
Clara Geyer laughed every time she thought about the sight of Karl Rieber in that Nazi courtroom. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day, yet he stood in court holding an umbrella under his arm. He could barely hear a single question the prosecutor posed. “How do you stand with regards to the Party?” Hohmann would ask. Party, party? And Rieber would cup his hands to his ears, straining to make out the words. “How do you stand with regards to the Party?” Hohmann would repeat. Finally Rieber grasped the question. “Loyal,” he said, following a tense pause.
Clara dug her fingernails into Josef Rieck’s arm to keep from laughing out loud in relief. She could not help but notice that even the judge fought back his own guffaws. “The pleased looks were contagious, starting behind the bench.”
Judge Schwingenschlögl read Clara Geyer’s letters to her husband into the court record. Her words sounded strange out there in public, unusually calm and trusting. This was not at all what she had expected. Things were going too smoothly. Well, hopefully not too smoothly.
Emboldened by the turn of events, Dr. Reisert petitioned the court for acquittal for all four men. They had surely done nothing to merit punishment. Their deeds were a far cry from anything deserving of the death penalty.
Around 4:30 pm – seven-and-one-half hours after the proceedings had gotten underway – Judge Schwingenschlögl called for a recess. Clara’s optimism and that of the four defendants rapidly dissipated with the words, “The verdict was to be handed down from Berlin by telephone.” So much for a human judge and hopes for a mild verdict.
However, the judge decreed that the prisoners were to be allowed to eat the food their families had provided, and indicated that they were to be taken to an adjoining room. “They were starving,” Clara recalled. Naturally, she had brought plenty to go around.
While they anxiously waited, hoping for an acquittal but ready for anything, the executions of Alexander Schmorell and Kurt Huber were just beginning. Alex went first. But not before spending a few moments with Dr. Deisinger, the attorney who was awed by the young man whose life he had been unable to spare.
“You may be surprised to find me so at peace at this hour,” Alex told Deisinger. “But I can tell you that even were they to tell me that another – say this prison guard here who has been assigned to guard me – if even he were to say that he would die in my stead, I would nevertheless choose to die. I don’t know what else there could be for me to do on this earth were I to be released at this moment.”
Alex made Deisinger promise that when the war ended, if the Allies tried to prosecute Marie Luise for denouncing him, Deisinger must take her case. No harm should come to her. His attorney should make that clear to everyone.
Deisinger joined the others who had gathered to “witness” Alex’s execution on behalf of the State. Even the executioner was surprised when three SS officers appeared around 4:45 pm, bearing special permission to watch the prisoner die.
“I will never forget the conversation among these SS Officers and the magistrates,” said Deisinger. “They discussed when death occurred at a beheading and whether it were possible to make it happen slower or faster if they so desired. It was also noteworthy that the execution was delayed for a while because the three SS Officers and the executioner thought it necessary to discuss the age, set-up, and methodology of the guillotine.”
“These were terrible minutes for me,” he continued, “as well as for those sitting on death row. On the one hand, the idealism and moral greatness of a young person who was ready to die for that idealism in just a few minutes; and on the other hand, the ribald lust of subhumanity hungry for a glimpse of the death of a defenseless sacrifice.”
But the execution took place despite these morbid contemplations. Forty-six seconds after Alex left his cell, eight seconds from the time he was handed over to the executioner named Reichhart. “There are no incidents or other events of any significance to report,” Mr. Tiefenbacher would report to Berlin two days later.
Alex’s clear and loud “Yes” – when asked if he were the prisoner Alexander Schmorell – remained inside Dr. Deisinger’s head for a very long while. That room was so oppressive. His young client, so terribly free. “I left that room shaken to the very core of my being,” said Dr. Deisinger.
“When I entered the prison hallway, I passed Professor Huber’s cell. He was the next sacrifice who was to be presented to that Moloch Hitler. And he was also being led from his cell, as he called out a final farewell to the prison chaplain, an ‘I’ll see you in a better world.’"
Mr. Tiefenbacher may have reported that nothing of significance happened, but the Catholic prison chaplain told a different story. When the executioner’s assistant asked Huber if he were the prisoner Kurt Huber, he said yes, and “Shame on you!” Deisinger recalled what happened next.
The chaplain stood at a window in the hallway from which you could see over to the execution room. Shortly thereafter, a hollow thud. We knew that Professor Huber had also sacrificed his life for freedom. The chaplain made the sign of the cross in the direction of that room of death. We silently shook hands and I left that terrible house of horror, left to tell the parents of Alexander Schmorell about the death of their son.
The news caught Hugo Schmorell and his wife completely off guard. No one had told them – or Klara Huber – about the July 13 date. In fact, Klara still waited for a response to her request for a visitor’s pass, received in Berlin only three days earlier.
At 5:20 pm, the Executive District Attorney sent a telegram to Berlin. “With regard to 6I (sic) 24/43G, matter taken care of today without incident.”
About thirty minutes later, close to 6 pm, “Eickemeyer et al” were re-called to the courtroom. Clara said that Eickemeyer was still chewing his food. The judge did not make them wait long. Manfred Eickemeyer, Wilhelm Geyer, and Harald Dohrn were acquitted. There simply was no credible evidence to show that they knew anything about Hans Scholl’s activities.
Josef Söhngen received six months in prison for failure to report the leaflets he had received – a crime that had even gotten the “girls” a full year in prison, and seven years in the penitentiary for Helmut Bauer and Heinrich Bollinger. Judge Schwingenschlögl ruled that Söhngen’s guilt could be mitigated because his failure to report had been due to negligence, not a conscious decision to hide evidence from the authorities.
Schwingenschlögl found it completely believable that “even Wilhelm Geyer” had not been initiated into Hans Scholl’s intrigues. The judge had developed a curious thesis, allegedly based on Gisela Schertling’s testimony that day in court.
All of the accused have been brought to trial because of their relationship to the traitor Scholl. According to their descriptions, Scholl was a person of above-average abilities, who was interested in all realms of intellectual life. Though he was only twenty-four years old, he was easily able to strike up an acquaintance with all kinds of people. He had a large circle of friends, which included older people as well. Scholl, however, appears to have been more reserved when it came to his treasonous activities. The circle of participants and confidants who have been arrested is relatively small.
The witness Schertling – though she was his lover – was not initiated into his treasonous activity at all. She stumbled onto it shortly before his arrest when she came across a large inventory of leaflets while visiting him in his room.
Except for Professor Huber, to whom Scholl was close, Scholl and Schmorell recruited and initiated only young people. This is possibly because they had hopes of greater activity from young people, or because they were afraid that older people would wrestle leadership away from them. It therefore cannot be assumed that Scholl initiated every acquaintance into his activities.
When court was adjourned, the party began in earnest. Fortunately, Wilhelm Geyer had warned his wife that they would have to spend one more night in prison. She therefore was not worried when they led him and his three friends away. Clara Geyer did not think it was possible to be this happy.
Nor were Clara and the Riecks the only ones celebrating that night. “Fellow prisoners romped,” her husband said later. It was unbelievable, simply unbelievable. Four men on death row, and three had been acquitted! (Dr. Reisert, who one year later was sentenced to five years in prison for his role in the July 20, 1944 assassination attempt, told Wilhelm Geyer after the war, “You all obviously had a better attorney than I did.”)
Their outrageously high spirits were dampened, however, when someone said: Did you hear? Professor Huber and another fellow were executed today. While you were in court.
Wilhelm Geyer harbored no illusions about the outcome of the day’s trial. If he had not gotten the key and cigarette ration coupons back… If Gisela Schertling had not recanted her testimony… If the files had not gotten so screwed up… If Freisler had presided… All these “If’s,” and things could have ended differently for him as well.
For now, he could not figure out why things had gone so agreeably. He could not lose sleep over the reasons fate had dealt him one hand and Professor Huber another.
The only thing he knew, the only thing that mattered? Tomorrow he would hold his babies for the first time in one-hundred-and-one days.
(c) Ruth Hanna Sachs.
Whoever passed along that “secret” was badly mistaken. In December 1941, a Polish youth named Boleslaw Buczkowski had been arrested for defending himself when attacked by the farmer he worked for. The farmer had accused the youth of stealing an apple and had hit him. Buczkowski retaliated and gave the farmer a cut over his eye. The Polish youth – who had just turned seventeen – fled into the forest and foolishly admitted to someone that he wished he could set the man’s farm on fire.
Four months later, a judge sentenced Buczkowski to eighteen months in prison. During sentencing, the judge justified the stiff judgment by stating, “With the Poles, only a harsher sentence seemed to achieve the usual goals of punishment meted out.”
The District Attorney’s office in Munich was horribly upset by what they perceived to be too mild a sentence. They appealed to Judge Schwingenschlögl, who re-opened the case in August 1942. In the new trial, the youth was given a death sentence. Schwingenschlögl decreed that the Pole’s execution be announced throughout the greater Munich area by means of 410 placards. His family was prohibited from claiming his remains, and his farewell letters were destroyed.
If Clara Geyer had known that about Judge Schwingenschlögl, she would not have been as happy that Judge Freisler was not sitting on the bench. As it was, she believed they had been “very fortunate indeed.” And – she noticed that she and Erika were the only women in the courtroom.
Judge Schwingenschlögl was assisted by District Court Counsel Boller and Dr. Eder. Dr. Hohmann acted as prosecutor, and there was no court clerk. Dr. Reisert, a good friend of the Geyer family, had gained permission to represent all four defendants. The judge read the indictment into the court record. The defendants were accused of credible knowledge of a treasonous activity and failure to report same. The prosecutor did not try to make a case for aiding and abetting etc.
The judge questioned each defendant individually. First Söhngen, then Eickemeyer, followed by Geyer, with Dohrn last. Clara stated that her husband “gave the best answers out of all of the defendants.”
Schwingenschlögl grilled Geyer about his religious beliefs. Why are you a fanatical Catholic, he wanted to know. Geyer responded that he was not a fanatical Catholic. “A fanatical Catholic is never a good Catholic.” – “Why then do you go to church every Sunday?” said the judge. – “Because I must set a good example for my children,” replied Geyer.
The prosecution then called in Gisela Schertling, specifically to testify against Wilhelm Geyer and Josef Söhngen. “We all held our breath,” said Clara, “because everything hung on her statement.”
To their shock and voiceless ecstasy, Gisela recanted everything she had said in her Gestapo interrogations. She spoke in favor of Wilhelm Geyer and bore witness on his behalf.
The prosecutor was caught completely off guard by this development. He tried to undo the harm her testimony was wreaking on his case by introducing facts not in evidence. The judge would have none of it. If it was not already in the files, Schwingenschlögl told Dr. Hohmann, he could not mention it now.
Addressing Gisela directly, the judge inquired, “Do you have anything to say regarding the Gestapo reports?” When Gisela said she did not, the judge started to dismiss her. “Then I have no further questions for you.”
Söhngen saw his opportunity and took it. He jumped up and said, “But I have some questions.” He would never forget the expression on Gisela’s face when she turned to look at him. “It was immediately clear that I had won,” he said.
The judge permitted the defendant Söhngen to cross-examine Gisela Schertling. She recanted every last bit of her statements made in Gestapo custody. Without hard copy of those transcripts, Dr. Hohmann was hard pressed to prove that she had said what Agent Beer claimed she had said. The February 16 meeting between Hans Scholl and Josef Söhngen? It never happened.
It is easy to see why Clara Geyer thought they had gotten a good judge. Söhngen remembered that while he was questioning Gisela, Schwingenschlögl would occasionally interrupt. “I think you mean to ask if…,” he would say, presenting Söhngen’s query in an even more favorable light.
When Söhngen finished with Gisela, Dr. Hohmann called in Karl Rieber to testify against Geyer. He had been present for Theodor Haecker’s reading, they reminded him. He should tell the judge about that treasonous lecture.
Clara Geyer laughed every time she thought about the sight of Karl Rieber in that Nazi courtroom. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day, yet he stood in court holding an umbrella under his arm. He could barely hear a single question the prosecutor posed. “How do you stand with regards to the Party?” Hohmann would ask. Party, party? And Rieber would cup his hands to his ears, straining to make out the words. “How do you stand with regards to the Party?” Hohmann would repeat. Finally Rieber grasped the question. “Loyal,” he said, following a tense pause.
Clara dug her fingernails into Josef Rieck’s arm to keep from laughing out loud in relief. She could not help but notice that even the judge fought back his own guffaws. “The pleased looks were contagious, starting behind the bench.”
Judge Schwingenschlögl read Clara Geyer’s letters to her husband into the court record. Her words sounded strange out there in public, unusually calm and trusting. This was not at all what she had expected. Things were going too smoothly. Well, hopefully not too smoothly.
Emboldened by the turn of events, Dr. Reisert petitioned the court for acquittal for all four men. They had surely done nothing to merit punishment. Their deeds were a far cry from anything deserving of the death penalty.
Around 4:30 pm – seven-and-one-half hours after the proceedings had gotten underway – Judge Schwingenschlögl called for a recess. Clara’s optimism and that of the four defendants rapidly dissipated with the words, “The verdict was to be handed down from Berlin by telephone.” So much for a human judge and hopes for a mild verdict.
However, the judge decreed that the prisoners were to be allowed to eat the food their families had provided, and indicated that they were to be taken to an adjoining room. “They were starving,” Clara recalled. Naturally, she had brought plenty to go around.
While they anxiously waited, hoping for an acquittal but ready for anything, the executions of Alexander Schmorell and Kurt Huber were just beginning. Alex went first. But not before spending a few moments with Dr. Deisinger, the attorney who was awed by the young man whose life he had been unable to spare.
“You may be surprised to find me so at peace at this hour,” Alex told Deisinger. “But I can tell you that even were they to tell me that another – say this prison guard here who has been assigned to guard me – if even he were to say that he would die in my stead, I would nevertheless choose to die. I don’t know what else there could be for me to do on this earth were I to be released at this moment.”
Alex made Deisinger promise that when the war ended, if the Allies tried to prosecute Marie Luise for denouncing him, Deisinger must take her case. No harm should come to her. His attorney should make that clear to everyone.
Deisinger joined the others who had gathered to “witness” Alex’s execution on behalf of the State. Even the executioner was surprised when three SS officers appeared around 4:45 pm, bearing special permission to watch the prisoner die.
“I will never forget the conversation among these SS Officers and the magistrates,” said Deisinger. “They discussed when death occurred at a beheading and whether it were possible to make it happen slower or faster if they so desired. It was also noteworthy that the execution was delayed for a while because the three SS Officers and the executioner thought it necessary to discuss the age, set-up, and methodology of the guillotine.”
“These were terrible minutes for me,” he continued, “as well as for those sitting on death row. On the one hand, the idealism and moral greatness of a young person who was ready to die for that idealism in just a few minutes; and on the other hand, the ribald lust of subhumanity hungry for a glimpse of the death of a defenseless sacrifice.”
But the execution took place despite these morbid contemplations. Forty-six seconds after Alex left his cell, eight seconds from the time he was handed over to the executioner named Reichhart. “There are no incidents or other events of any significance to report,” Mr. Tiefenbacher would report to Berlin two days later.
Alex’s clear and loud “Yes” – when asked if he were the prisoner Alexander Schmorell – remained inside Dr. Deisinger’s head for a very long while. That room was so oppressive. His young client, so terribly free. “I left that room shaken to the very core of my being,” said Dr. Deisinger.
“When I entered the prison hallway, I passed Professor Huber’s cell. He was the next sacrifice who was to be presented to that Moloch Hitler. And he was also being led from his cell, as he called out a final farewell to the prison chaplain, an ‘I’ll see you in a better world.’"
Mr. Tiefenbacher may have reported that nothing of significance happened, but the Catholic prison chaplain told a different story. When the executioner’s assistant asked Huber if he were the prisoner Kurt Huber, he said yes, and “Shame on you!” Deisinger recalled what happened next.
The chaplain stood at a window in the hallway from which you could see over to the execution room. Shortly thereafter, a hollow thud. We knew that Professor Huber had also sacrificed his life for freedom. The chaplain made the sign of the cross in the direction of that room of death. We silently shook hands and I left that terrible house of horror, left to tell the parents of Alexander Schmorell about the death of their son.
The news caught Hugo Schmorell and his wife completely off guard. No one had told them – or Klara Huber – about the July 13 date. In fact, Klara still waited for a response to her request for a visitor’s pass, received in Berlin only three days earlier.
At 5:20 pm, the Executive District Attorney sent a telegram to Berlin. “With regard to 6I (sic) 24/43G, matter taken care of today without incident.”
About thirty minutes later, close to 6 pm, “Eickemeyer et al” were re-called to the courtroom. Clara said that Eickemeyer was still chewing his food. The judge did not make them wait long. Manfred Eickemeyer, Wilhelm Geyer, and Harald Dohrn were acquitted. There simply was no credible evidence to show that they knew anything about Hans Scholl’s activities.
Josef Söhngen received six months in prison for failure to report the leaflets he had received – a crime that had even gotten the “girls” a full year in prison, and seven years in the penitentiary for Helmut Bauer and Heinrich Bollinger. Judge Schwingenschlögl ruled that Söhngen’s guilt could be mitigated because his failure to report had been due to negligence, not a conscious decision to hide evidence from the authorities.
Schwingenschlögl found it completely believable that “even Wilhelm Geyer” had not been initiated into Hans Scholl’s intrigues. The judge had developed a curious thesis, allegedly based on Gisela Schertling’s testimony that day in court.
All of the accused have been brought to trial because of their relationship to the traitor Scholl. According to their descriptions, Scholl was a person of above-average abilities, who was interested in all realms of intellectual life. Though he was only twenty-four years old, he was easily able to strike up an acquaintance with all kinds of people. He had a large circle of friends, which included older people as well. Scholl, however, appears to have been more reserved when it came to his treasonous activities. The circle of participants and confidants who have been arrested is relatively small.
The witness Schertling – though she was his lover – was not initiated into his treasonous activity at all. She stumbled onto it shortly before his arrest when she came across a large inventory of leaflets while visiting him in his room.
Except for Professor Huber, to whom Scholl was close, Scholl and Schmorell recruited and initiated only young people. This is possibly because they had hopes of greater activity from young people, or because they were afraid that older people would wrestle leadership away from them. It therefore cannot be assumed that Scholl initiated every acquaintance into his activities.
When court was adjourned, the party began in earnest. Fortunately, Wilhelm Geyer had warned his wife that they would have to spend one more night in prison. She therefore was not worried when they led him and his three friends away. Clara Geyer did not think it was possible to be this happy.
Nor were Clara and the Riecks the only ones celebrating that night. “Fellow prisoners romped,” her husband said later. It was unbelievable, simply unbelievable. Four men on death row, and three had been acquitted! (Dr. Reisert, who one year later was sentenced to five years in prison for his role in the July 20, 1944 assassination attempt, told Wilhelm Geyer after the war, “You all obviously had a better attorney than I did.”)
Their outrageously high spirits were dampened, however, when someone said: Did you hear? Professor Huber and another fellow were executed today. While you were in court.
Wilhelm Geyer harbored no illusions about the outcome of the day’s trial. If he had not gotten the key and cigarette ration coupons back… If Gisela Schertling had not recanted her testimony… If the files had not gotten so screwed up… If Freisler had presided… All these “If’s,” and things could have ended differently for him as well.
For now, he could not figure out why things had gone so agreeably. He could not lose sleep over the reasons fate had dealt him one hand and Professor Huber another.
The only thing he knew, the only thing that mattered? Tomorrow he would hold his babies for the first time in one-hundred-and-one days.
(c) Ruth Hanna Sachs.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Logical Disconnects
Several years ago, a fellow who follows our work emailed me a link to a most bizarre Web site. There's a group of far, far right-wing extremists who decorate people who murder abortion doctors with a White Rose, in honor of Hans and Sophie Scholl. That's what their Web site proclaims, as unbelievable as it sounds.
I've often wondered if those ... people understand what White Rose stood for nearly seventy years ago. They haven't got a clue.
That makes about as much sense as the anti-Semitic Web site (which has since come down) that quoted Mordechai Anielewicz as a good thing. Somewhere, there's a logical disconnect.
In these days of Obama, when the KKK and John Birch Society are seeing their ranks swell with racists who are becoming ever more vocal with their hate speech, it's interesting to see what my daily Google alert for White Rose resistance brings me. Because a growing number of these haters bedeck themselves with the mantle and mantras of the White Rose. It would be funny were it not so sad.
Although the friends we call the White Rose were hardly of one mind in their politics and religious beliefs, and although a few - most notably Professor Kurt Huber - struggled with anti-Semitism till the very end, in general the students and adults we know as the White Rose advocated liberty and justice for all. They abhorred the murders of human beings for whatever reason. They promoted ideals that we associate with tolerance, compassion, and hearts that broke at the crimes their country perpetrated.
The far, far right wing wannabe politicos that wrap themselves in the words of the White Rose take those very words out of context. Instead of working for tikkun olam - repairing the world - they try to marginalize the Other. The very thing the White Rose worked to undo.
Alex Schmorell especially felt like an Other, neither Russian nor German. As did Christoph Probst, whose stepmother had been relegated to a no-class citizen, much as the KKK/JBS does to the Other in our country.
It is a terrible thing when we must rescue the good story of civil disobedience and informed dissent from the hands of those whose lives and words most imitate the oppressors during the dark days we call the Holocaust or Shoah. But rescue it we must.
Freedom and honor. Those concepts were abused for twelve horrible years seventy years ago. We must not allow them to be abused again.
I've often wondered if those ... people understand what White Rose stood for nearly seventy years ago. They haven't got a clue.
That makes about as much sense as the anti-Semitic Web site (which has since come down) that quoted Mordechai Anielewicz as a good thing. Somewhere, there's a logical disconnect.
In these days of Obama, when the KKK and John Birch Society are seeing their ranks swell with racists who are becoming ever more vocal with their hate speech, it's interesting to see what my daily Google alert for White Rose resistance brings me. Because a growing number of these haters bedeck themselves with the mantle and mantras of the White Rose. It would be funny were it not so sad.
Although the friends we call the White Rose were hardly of one mind in their politics and religious beliefs, and although a few - most notably Professor Kurt Huber - struggled with anti-Semitism till the very end, in general the students and adults we know as the White Rose advocated liberty and justice for all. They abhorred the murders of human beings for whatever reason. They promoted ideals that we associate with tolerance, compassion, and hearts that broke at the crimes their country perpetrated.
The far, far right wing wannabe politicos that wrap themselves in the words of the White Rose take those very words out of context. Instead of working for tikkun olam - repairing the world - they try to marginalize the Other. The very thing the White Rose worked to undo.
Alex Schmorell especially felt like an Other, neither Russian nor German. As did Christoph Probst, whose stepmother had been relegated to a no-class citizen, much as the KKK/JBS does to the Other in our country.
It is a terrible thing when we must rescue the good story of civil disobedience and informed dissent from the hands of those whose lives and words most imitate the oppressors during the dark days we call the Holocaust or Shoah. But rescue it we must.
Freedom and honor. Those concepts were abused for twelve horrible years seventy years ago. We must not allow them to be abused again.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Just the Facts, Ma'am
I'm one of the lucky few who has been taught by excellent teachers from the very beginning. No other component of education ranks as high as the women and men who, underpaid and undersupplied, stand in front of classrooms day after day. Somehow, each year I managed to be assigned to yet another person who would have been honored as Teacher of the Year, were life completely fair.
Except for my third grade teacher. Poor thing, she had to take over our class barely six weeks into the new school year, assuming the wooden desk of one of those venerated educators. And she was no Mrs. T. She did not understand how to challenge us, motivate us to think out loud, like Mrs. T did. She mistook mischief for badness, sass for impudence.
The new person did not take us outside to explore wildflowers, or sit us down in small groups to work on assignments. Instead, she hung bad handwriting samples on the bulletin board to encourage classmates to mock poor cursive. And my Ps and Qs always, but always, took front and center of her disdain.
Whether naturally lazy or just ill-equipped, this woman could not teach. Yet I took two things away from her class that I do indeed remember to this day. First, she demonstrated the power of reading aloud. When she ran out of things to say, she would pick up a book, say Charlotte's Web, perch on a stool, and read to us for the rest of the day. I still enjoy hearing words spoken, words crafted to sit on a white page, but spoken instead. It's magic, that rhythm. No mistake that mysticism often invokes chants uttered, not sung.
And her second gift to me? Something she never intended as such. When she got angry, she would mete out fact-writing as punishment. The greater the offense, the more facts you had to write down. It didn't matter what, as long that Big Chief tablet contained nice neat lists. Of facts.
She didn't realize that whenever I pulled an encyclopedia off the shelf, or went down the hall to the library, I was in heaven. There is so much to know. And the more you learn, the more you know, the bigger you realize this old world is. That hunger is hardly satisfied by feeding on the fruit of knowledge. You go from writing "Texas is the very best state in the United States" (an acceptable third grade fact in Houston), to comprehending how it gained independence, to its flora and fauna, to the surrounding states, to Valley Forge. And before you know it, you wind up studying overseas, still fascinated by the people and cultures and trees and all that make this planet ours.
And before you know it, you wind up searching for the truth about a group of college kids who were beheaded for daring to speak the truth about Hitler.
The usual dust cover summary of the White Rose will tell you that they were a group of friends at the University of Munich, who committed to resist Hitler and began to do so by writing leaflets calling for the overthrow of the regime. That on February 18, 1943, two of them (Hans and Sophie Scholl) threw leaflets over the balcony of the main university building that housed the lecture halls and classrooms for philosophy and the humanities. That the janitor saw them and had them arrested. That they, along with Christoph Probst, were tried and beheaded on February 22, 1943. That fourteen others were tried on April 19, and four more on July 13. In all, six were murdered, and eleven served prison sentences.
The dust jacket version of their story leads the casual reader to believe that these wonderful young students were near saints. One extant edition of letters highlights innocent love affairs, sexless liaisons without even a breath of a kiss. They are ascribed purity of heart, purity of mind, and above all, purity of soul. Their all too real spiritual struggles jump off the page and dominate the telling.
But this pretty terrible third grade teacher inadvertently taught me to chase rabbits. You never know. You can end up in Wonderland with Alice, at tea with Bugs, or pursuing the science of burrowing animals. Chasing rabbits will at least get you off dead center.
I learned for starters that the literature about them is all wrong. Yes, there are bits and pieces of it that ring true, but not nearly enough. These wonderful young students were that same mix of good and bad that you and I are. When they fell in love, it was with hormones raging, riddled with angst and guilt and desire. Pure passion.
They fought our battles too. Christoph's demon was his clinical depression, knowing that his father had died of the same disease, by his own hand. He found solace in a solid woman, whom he finally married after the birth of their second child. His family hobnobbed with the premiere banned artists. Emil Nolde painted a portrait of Christoph and his sister.
Willi Graf decided very young to distance himself from Hitler's hordes. He marked through names of friends who joined Hitler Youth, leaving his address book a stark reminder of how few were courageous. When Willi was 15, he and 11 friends marched alone in a throng of several hundred thousand Hitler Youth boys, their lack of proper attire and proper flag a thumb in the eye of the city fathers. Assigned to a medical unit on the Russian front, he witnessed unbelievable bestiality by his "comrades". His nightmares ended only with his execution.
These kids coped with drug addiction, sexual addiction, and stupid jealousies. They wrote love letters, sketched scenes from their hometowns, and went skiing over New Year's. Sophie loved the Variety Club, Hubert started a string quartet, Alex sculpted a bust of Beethoven. Several excelled at fencing, one was allegedly a petty thief, a couple played piano, and they all devoured every banned book they could find.
They had their mentors too. Carl Muth, friend of Hans Jonas, instructed them how to find answers to theological questions on their own. Wilhelm Geyer (whom Julius Streicher named the most dangerous artist in Germany) taught Sophie how to paint and Alex how to make stencils. Eugen Grimminger funded their efforts with roughly the equivalent of $50,000 in real money. And a regular army guy, Commander Buehl, managed to outwit the Gestapo and protected several who were in his Student Company.
Some had Jewish family members. Christoph's beloved stepmother Lisl was Jewish, as was Eugen Grimminger's wife Jenny. Most had neighbors they had seen destroyed, financially or physically. They differed from their classmates by perceiving the Nazi noose as an outrage that needed righting, as illegal acts against human beings. And the ones who saw Warsaw? Well, no words can describe the fury that possessed them from that day on.
They didn't come close to overthrowing Hitler. They painted anti-Nazi slogans up and down the main streets of Munich, "seventy times," the Gestapo screamed. Though the tar-based paint kept their graffiti visible long after their deaths, no one rushed out to topple the regime just because they proclaimed that Hitler was a mass murderer. And while a few were sorry that such a pretty young girl had to die, most people expressed the sentiments that someone overheard in class, words that only deepened his anguished sorrow. "They should have strung 'em up in front of the university," two students opined.
So why tell their story, when all they did was for nothing? Why do I fight this battle to get the real story out there, when people seem happier with the feel-good version?
The answer is the same to both questions. They did not die for nothing. Sophie's boyfriend back-tracked on his original plans to raise chickens. Instead, he became one of Germany's most respected, ethical judges. Often Fritz Hartnagel represented the sole voice of justice in a court where too many Nazis were not disbarred. He is gravely ill, and I offer a prayer, a mi sh'berach for his health.
Traute Lafrenz came to the States and has worked hard to make our world safer, healthier, more compassionate. Anneliese Graf took to heart her brother's admonition to keep the torch lit. She has worked tirelessly in the field of education.
These people have in turn inspired others. And all of us recognize our limits, our shortcomings, our very humanness. There is something at once bracing and comforting in knowing that no matter how often we fail, we are capable of such great good.
Even you. Even me.
(c) 2001 Ruth Sachs. All rights reserved.
Except for my third grade teacher. Poor thing, she had to take over our class barely six weeks into the new school year, assuming the wooden desk of one of those venerated educators. And she was no Mrs. T. She did not understand how to challenge us, motivate us to think out loud, like Mrs. T did. She mistook mischief for badness, sass for impudence.
The new person did not take us outside to explore wildflowers, or sit us down in small groups to work on assignments. Instead, she hung bad handwriting samples on the bulletin board to encourage classmates to mock poor cursive. And my Ps and Qs always, but always, took front and center of her disdain.
Whether naturally lazy or just ill-equipped, this woman could not teach. Yet I took two things away from her class that I do indeed remember to this day. First, she demonstrated the power of reading aloud. When she ran out of things to say, she would pick up a book, say Charlotte's Web, perch on a stool, and read to us for the rest of the day. I still enjoy hearing words spoken, words crafted to sit on a white page, but spoken instead. It's magic, that rhythm. No mistake that mysticism often invokes chants uttered, not sung.
And her second gift to me? Something she never intended as such. When she got angry, she would mete out fact-writing as punishment. The greater the offense, the more facts you had to write down. It didn't matter what, as long that Big Chief tablet contained nice neat lists. Of facts.
She didn't realize that whenever I pulled an encyclopedia off the shelf, or went down the hall to the library, I was in heaven. There is so much to know. And the more you learn, the more you know, the bigger you realize this old world is. That hunger is hardly satisfied by feeding on the fruit of knowledge. You go from writing "Texas is the very best state in the United States" (an acceptable third grade fact in Houston), to comprehending how it gained independence, to its flora and fauna, to the surrounding states, to Valley Forge. And before you know it, you wind up studying overseas, still fascinated by the people and cultures and trees and all that make this planet ours.
And before you know it, you wind up searching for the truth about a group of college kids who were beheaded for daring to speak the truth about Hitler.
The usual dust cover summary of the White Rose will tell you that they were a group of friends at the University of Munich, who committed to resist Hitler and began to do so by writing leaflets calling for the overthrow of the regime. That on February 18, 1943, two of them (Hans and Sophie Scholl) threw leaflets over the balcony of the main university building that housed the lecture halls and classrooms for philosophy and the humanities. That the janitor saw them and had them arrested. That they, along with Christoph Probst, were tried and beheaded on February 22, 1943. That fourteen others were tried on April 19, and four more on July 13. In all, six were murdered, and eleven served prison sentences.
The dust jacket version of their story leads the casual reader to believe that these wonderful young students were near saints. One extant edition of letters highlights innocent love affairs, sexless liaisons without even a breath of a kiss. They are ascribed purity of heart, purity of mind, and above all, purity of soul. Their all too real spiritual struggles jump off the page and dominate the telling.
But this pretty terrible third grade teacher inadvertently taught me to chase rabbits. You never know. You can end up in Wonderland with Alice, at tea with Bugs, or pursuing the science of burrowing animals. Chasing rabbits will at least get you off dead center.
I learned for starters that the literature about them is all wrong. Yes, there are bits and pieces of it that ring true, but not nearly enough. These wonderful young students were that same mix of good and bad that you and I are. When they fell in love, it was with hormones raging, riddled with angst and guilt and desire. Pure passion.
They fought our battles too. Christoph's demon was his clinical depression, knowing that his father had died of the same disease, by his own hand. He found solace in a solid woman, whom he finally married after the birth of their second child. His family hobnobbed with the premiere banned artists. Emil Nolde painted a portrait of Christoph and his sister.
Willi Graf decided very young to distance himself from Hitler's hordes. He marked through names of friends who joined Hitler Youth, leaving his address book a stark reminder of how few were courageous. When Willi was 15, he and 11 friends marched alone in a throng of several hundred thousand Hitler Youth boys, their lack of proper attire and proper flag a thumb in the eye of the city fathers. Assigned to a medical unit on the Russian front, he witnessed unbelievable bestiality by his "comrades". His nightmares ended only with his execution.
These kids coped with drug addiction, sexual addiction, and stupid jealousies. They wrote love letters, sketched scenes from their hometowns, and went skiing over New Year's. Sophie loved the Variety Club, Hubert started a string quartet, Alex sculpted a bust of Beethoven. Several excelled at fencing, one was allegedly a petty thief, a couple played piano, and they all devoured every banned book they could find.
They had their mentors too. Carl Muth, friend of Hans Jonas, instructed them how to find answers to theological questions on their own. Wilhelm Geyer (whom Julius Streicher named the most dangerous artist in Germany) taught Sophie how to paint and Alex how to make stencils. Eugen Grimminger funded their efforts with roughly the equivalent of $50,000 in real money. And a regular army guy, Commander Buehl, managed to outwit the Gestapo and protected several who were in his Student Company.
Some had Jewish family members. Christoph's beloved stepmother Lisl was Jewish, as was Eugen Grimminger's wife Jenny. Most had neighbors they had seen destroyed, financially or physically. They differed from their classmates by perceiving the Nazi noose as an outrage that needed righting, as illegal acts against human beings. And the ones who saw Warsaw? Well, no words can describe the fury that possessed them from that day on.
They didn't come close to overthrowing Hitler. They painted anti-Nazi slogans up and down the main streets of Munich, "seventy times," the Gestapo screamed. Though the tar-based paint kept their graffiti visible long after their deaths, no one rushed out to topple the regime just because they proclaimed that Hitler was a mass murderer. And while a few were sorry that such a pretty young girl had to die, most people expressed the sentiments that someone overheard in class, words that only deepened his anguished sorrow. "They should have strung 'em up in front of the university," two students opined.
So why tell their story, when all they did was for nothing? Why do I fight this battle to get the real story out there, when people seem happier with the feel-good version?
The answer is the same to both questions. They did not die for nothing. Sophie's boyfriend back-tracked on his original plans to raise chickens. Instead, he became one of Germany's most respected, ethical judges. Often Fritz Hartnagel represented the sole voice of justice in a court where too many Nazis were not disbarred. He is gravely ill, and I offer a prayer, a mi sh'berach for his health.
Traute Lafrenz came to the States and has worked hard to make our world safer, healthier, more compassionate. Anneliese Graf took to heart her brother's admonition to keep the torch lit. She has worked tirelessly in the field of education.
These people have in turn inspired others. And all of us recognize our limits, our shortcomings, our very humanness. There is something at once bracing and comforting in knowing that no matter how often we fail, we are capable of such great good.
Even you. Even me.
(c) 2001 Ruth Sachs. All rights reserved.
Excerpt from ROSES AT NOON, nonfiction novel about the White Rose (by Ruth Hanna Sachs)
May 1, 1942
It is so cold today. Cold and snowing. I wonder if I am making the biggest mistake of my life. Yesterday I footed numbers in Daddy’s office, checked his arithmetic to keep his clients happy. He had the heat turned up. Even Inge laughed now and then.
But today, today. The signs flashed by, Mering, Nannhofen. I told myself over and over, Sophie, you have waited two years to be in Munich with Hans. With Hans!
I will admit it out loud. It was great fun seeing him waving to me from the platform. His arm around Traute, that casual romance that gives him the very breath he breathes. She looked the picture of elegance, every hair in place, her shoes matching the skirt she wore. I really should not like her, you know. But there is something so un-Nazi about her, we are at once kindred spirits.
We rode the streetcar out to Dr. Muth’s. If Hans had not told me volumes about this Catholic scholar before, if I had not met him myself a few months ago, I would have packed my bags and headed home. Home to Ulm, where that heated office burns me with its boring nothingness, and we all agree on politics. But in the time it took Dr. Muth to put on tea, I did not know myself.
Hans had warned me about the professor’s penchant for penetrating masks. I thought I wore mine well. You know what I mean. That Sophie mask that tells the world I am in control, that I know what I want, when and where. But with a few words, Dr. Muth rips it off, ruthlessly, like you rip a bandage off a child.
We were talking about this and that. Knowing that Dr. Muth concurs with our conclusions about, about Hitler, I courageously talked about our need to do something. You know I have felt this way a long time now. We jabber and prattle about how awful that man is. Daddy even got arrested for calling him the divine scourge on Germany.
But none of us does anything about it. We talk, and the more the cheap wine flows, the grander our schemes. So I casually mentioned that opinion, feeling a little bolstered by Hans’ presence. And Dr. Muth fixed those blue eyes, blue eyes of lightning, not of sky, directly on me. ‘And, Fräulein Scholl, what basis do you find in the Bible for what you propose?’
Traute rescued me by steering the discussion to the magazine Dr. Muth publishes, or used to publish till the Nazis shut him down. But I know he has not forgotten the question. I will have to find an answer for him.
Hans, my dear dense brother, soon caught on to Traute’s defense. ‘Sophie, let’s celebrate your birthday at my place tonight. Should we invite all our friends, or would that be too much for you?’
And with that deft maneuver, we were out his garden gate, back on the street.
Funny, but I had nearly forgotten the cake Mama had baked, and the bottle of wine Daddy had donated. I would have preferred waiting till tomorrow, when Fritz is here. But I could not spend one more minute in that house, with that question hanging over me.
I persuaded Hans to keep the party small. He knows these people, and I feel like I should too, the way he talks about them when he comes home. But all at once, I stood overwhelmed.
Overwhelmed by the swastikas on every house. Munich… The very best of our country has been violated, raped by men in brown. Venetian beauty defiled by shrines to criminals. The artists I cherish, the Noldes and Geyers who paint with color so vibrant, they make the world sing, they are burned and banned. In their place, hideous murals sully grand edifices.
Hans and Traute have learned to cope with the devastation. When we passed Hitler’s House of Modern Art, Hans whispered in my ear, ‘Soph, you like the wienie palace?’ I had heard that joke before, but seeing it firsthand, I erupted into giggles. First time I felt good all day. This Parthenon with columns that, yes!, were a tribute to proud Bavarian sausages. At best.
They left me alone in his room for an hour or two. The Blue Horses that survived Hans’ own arrest a few years ago comforted me strangely. I resisted the urge to hang the picture straighter. I must have slept, lulled to sleep by the aroma of a lone jasmine in an airless room. For it was nearly dark when Hans and Traute returned, bearing food.
‘We invited Christl and Alex,’ Hans said, waiting for my reaction. I could not think of two people I wanted to meet more.
Alexander Schmorell arrived first, doffing his beret and kissing my hand. Before the second sentence, I found myself calling him Schurik like everyone else, blessing him with the Russian name that connected him to his homeland. And separated him from the insanity of our Volk.
And I don’t have to tell you that for half a second, I could not even remember Fritz’s name. Schurik embodied everything I have wanted Fritz to be. He made me laugh, he made me forget that I was being demure, he made me feel like a lady, every bit as pulled-together as Traute.
When Christl showed up, the other three reacted with an emotion I have never experienced. This tall, lanky farm boy folded himself into the room. It was like their backbone had straightened or their vision re-focused. Christoph Probst, this Christl, brought pictures of his babies, news of his wife, that village decency that knows little of goose-stepping or Sieg Heils.
He also got us going on a game he had conjured up on the way to the party. We tried to stump each other on famous literary quotes. Sounds boring, I know, yet it was anything but. Of course, someone had to quote Novalis, and I think Hans was the culprit. He likes Novalis’ view of going to the edge of the pit before finding the way home. And we debated Goethe, a trivial debate to be sure, but not completely without merit. Can someone who never lived a single day of misery really write? I say no. Goethe lovers find themselves forced to defend the indefensible.
I enjoyed being among friends who read banned literature. There are not many places in Germany these days where one would dare quote from Heine or Stefan George or Spinoza. But in this room, not to quote our greatest poets and thinkers was unthinkable. Traute assured me she would introduce me to the booksellers who stocked these good books.
And I cannot tell you what it did for me to see Hans among these people. You know how he has those mood swings that make him impossible to love. I can never forget how badly he treated Lisa Remppis, my best friend. She tolerated his ups and downs far longer than any woman should, and he still trifled with her feelings for him. I think he only wanted her when she finally had enough. Some stupid nonsense about writing her name out in bread crumbs when he was in jail for, well for.... But by then, she had called it quits.
I don’t have to tell you about Rose Nägele. One of the dearest women our family has known, hard worker too, bright girl. Did Hans’ sexual addiction start with Rose, or was that the first we knew of it? I wish I knew. But he never should have hurt her like he did.
He seems to have learned from those failed courtships. He and Traute cuddled off and on, teased each other like friends do, yet it is clear that he loves her deeply. Things are different with him and Traute. Maybe he has finally found someone who loves him with all those faults he usually hides so well. She knows every wart and kisses them into diamonds.
In the middle of our lighthearted fun and scholarly debates, Hans dropped a bombshell on us. He dramatically pulled a piece of paper from his hip pocket and began to read. Words about a madman who spreads lies till they become truth. Not till they are believed as truth, like we define Goebbels’ pathetic and provocative propaganda. But until they become truth. The more he read, the more you could see the sheer terror on our faces. Terror at the reality of the world portrayed in that poem.
He sat down, quite satisfied with himself. And none of us knew who wrote the text. I thought he had. My brother is articulate and passionate about his writing, and words like that flow from his pen with no effort at all.
But Gottfried Keller had written it, well over a hundred years ago. Schurik immediately devised a plan for forcing every German to read it. ‘We will rent planes and drop millions of these from the skies on every city in Germany.’
And though they joked with him about the extravagance of his idea, threatening to put it all to his rich father’s account, no one contradicted him. I found that extraordinary, but said nothing.
Someone (and it was not Hans) remembered that we were here to celebrate my birthday. A little early, to be sure, but the cake would not keep another eight days.
And dear Schurik, he who has stolen my heart, suggested we head down to the river. We dug through the mounds of junk in Hans’ desk drawers till we found twine ‘to cool the wine the Russian way,’ Schurik said with a mysterious smile. And Traute managed to find five things that held liquid—I dare not call them cups or glasses—and four forks and a spoon for the cake. I think part of the strength of their relationship is that she does not try to organize Hans’ life.
We had the city almost entirely to ourselves. Our Luftwaffe has been so merciless in its bombings of the English that we fear the day retaliation begins. It has not started yet, but everyone lives behind walls of black curtains. The air raid shelters are often better stocked than our own kitchens.
Hans’ apartment in the Mandl Strasse lies next to Munich’s English Gardens. We walked that street, and I fingered the cold cement wall that divides Schwabing from the Gardens. Schwabing, heart of the university district, home to artists and actors alike, draws its life from the Gardens. In this patch of earth, German efficiency is buried among dense shrubs and wonderful forests. I understand why Hans’ letters home spoke most often about his time in these Gardens, walking in the rain, breathing the last remnant of pure air in a place so brownly defiled.
A great harvest moon hung over the river. Christl wished out loud that his family friend, Emil Nolde, could see this yellow orb and paint it. I tried not to express my astonishment that Christl actually knew someone whose work I studied and imitated. I must have been bad at disguising my surprise, because Schurik mentioned that Nolde had painted a portrait of Christl and his sister Angelika. No wonder Hans spent as little time as possible in Ulm. These people fed his soul.
Oh, and the twine! Schurik tied it around the bottle and dragged it in the icy river. The feel of doing something distinctly Russian must have ignited the passions he cannot hide for long. Because we sang his songs of the Volga, melodies swaying in moonlit birch trees and steppes that never end, tunes no Bach-fed brain could ever sing. We sang his songs that speak of death, and hardship, and the pain of living, all tinged with silver and gold and horizons sparkling with dew. All in the darkest, richest, minor keys on earth, a darkness and a richness banned from Aryan ears as too Jewish.
We found a level place next to the river, a river that hardly compares to the great rivers of Ulm—the Iller and the Danube. This Isar flows dirty, more a canal than a river. In fact, in places only the canal that parallels the river is navigable. But if you must have a city, you should have a river, and the Isar is better than nothing at all.
The hilarity of Christl’s game segued into muted discussion no less intense than the debates of Hans’ room. I am the only one of the group not studying medicine. Over cake and wine, after the embarrassment of toasts in my honor, we talked about the internships they had recently completed.
Schurik explained for my benefit his distaste for medicine. His father, a well-known physician in Munich, more or less forced him to study. He wants to be a sculptor, but that matches neither his father’s nor the government’s view of what is good for young men to do. The least detestable alternative was to acquiesce to his father’s desire, since that also meant a near-exemption from active duty in Hitler’s army. But after the war, he wanted to pursue the things he cherished: sculpting, painting, and piano. And he wanted to go home to Russia.
Hans lapsed into his melodramatic style of story-telling to describe his work at Schrobenhausen. He had treated frost-bite victims from the winter’s devastation in Russia. He must have forgotten that my Fritz is headed to the Russian front tomorrow, because he described the fingerless hands in gory detail. But he ended with the observation that if he had ever doubted his love of medicine, the internship had restored the passion. For he saw that healing was something God let him do. He could not undo all the evils our country inflicted, but he could heal, one person at a time. And after the war, he could do even more.
Traute nodded vigorously as he spoke. Her permission to study medicine was likely granted due to her father’s rank in the National Socialist Party, since we women are expected to be reproductive units, with minimal education wasted on us. When it was her turn, she whispered that after the war she wanted to be the best doctor in either Munich or Hamburg (her hometown), if you-know-who did not pass laws that kept her from practicing. Without her saying a word, we knew how absurd, yet how necessary, it was for her to whisper those sentiments at midnight, under a harvest moon, in a deserted city.
Even I noticed that Christl was being quiet. I thought perhaps he had fallen asleep, since he does have a newborn at home. But Schurik knew his friend better. ‘Christl, Christl,’ he shook Christl by the knee. ‘What are you thinking? What do you want from life?’
When Christl looked up, the tears were streaming down his cheeks. ‘Listen to us,’ he nearly shouted, caring little whether Nazi mole heard him or not. ‘You all know what Manfred tells us is going on in Poland. They are slaughtering Jews, murdering innocent children. And we sit here and talk of medicine and art. After the war, after the war, we say. Not just you. Me too. I am guilty too.
‘But what am I going to tell my children? That their daddy was too much of a coward to do anything? That their daddy did not love them enough? After the war, after the war. Well, listen to me. After the war, the rest of the nations will have the right to say, You Heines, you Jerries, you damn fools, why didn’t you do something? Why didn’t you resist?’
I know I did not breathe for the longest time. The cold night grew colder still. Resist. He had said the word. Resist.
(and this isn't even the good part... there's more!)
(c) Ruth Hanna Sachs
It is so cold today. Cold and snowing. I wonder if I am making the biggest mistake of my life. Yesterday I footed numbers in Daddy’s office, checked his arithmetic to keep his clients happy. He had the heat turned up. Even Inge laughed now and then.
But today, today. The signs flashed by, Mering, Nannhofen. I told myself over and over, Sophie, you have waited two years to be in Munich with Hans. With Hans!
I will admit it out loud. It was great fun seeing him waving to me from the platform. His arm around Traute, that casual romance that gives him the very breath he breathes. She looked the picture of elegance, every hair in place, her shoes matching the skirt she wore. I really should not like her, you know. But there is something so un-Nazi about her, we are at once kindred spirits.
We rode the streetcar out to Dr. Muth’s. If Hans had not told me volumes about this Catholic scholar before, if I had not met him myself a few months ago, I would have packed my bags and headed home. Home to Ulm, where that heated office burns me with its boring nothingness, and we all agree on politics. But in the time it took Dr. Muth to put on tea, I did not know myself.
Hans had warned me about the professor’s penchant for penetrating masks. I thought I wore mine well. You know what I mean. That Sophie mask that tells the world I am in control, that I know what I want, when and where. But with a few words, Dr. Muth rips it off, ruthlessly, like you rip a bandage off a child.
We were talking about this and that. Knowing that Dr. Muth concurs with our conclusions about, about Hitler, I courageously talked about our need to do something. You know I have felt this way a long time now. We jabber and prattle about how awful that man is. Daddy even got arrested for calling him the divine scourge on Germany.
But none of us does anything about it. We talk, and the more the cheap wine flows, the grander our schemes. So I casually mentioned that opinion, feeling a little bolstered by Hans’ presence. And Dr. Muth fixed those blue eyes, blue eyes of lightning, not of sky, directly on me. ‘And, Fräulein Scholl, what basis do you find in the Bible for what you propose?’
Traute rescued me by steering the discussion to the magazine Dr. Muth publishes, or used to publish till the Nazis shut him down. But I know he has not forgotten the question. I will have to find an answer for him.
Hans, my dear dense brother, soon caught on to Traute’s defense. ‘Sophie, let’s celebrate your birthday at my place tonight. Should we invite all our friends, or would that be too much for you?’
And with that deft maneuver, we were out his garden gate, back on the street.
Funny, but I had nearly forgotten the cake Mama had baked, and the bottle of wine Daddy had donated. I would have preferred waiting till tomorrow, when Fritz is here. But I could not spend one more minute in that house, with that question hanging over me.
I persuaded Hans to keep the party small. He knows these people, and I feel like I should too, the way he talks about them when he comes home. But all at once, I stood overwhelmed.
Overwhelmed by the swastikas on every house. Munich… The very best of our country has been violated, raped by men in brown. Venetian beauty defiled by shrines to criminals. The artists I cherish, the Noldes and Geyers who paint with color so vibrant, they make the world sing, they are burned and banned. In their place, hideous murals sully grand edifices.
Hans and Traute have learned to cope with the devastation. When we passed Hitler’s House of Modern Art, Hans whispered in my ear, ‘Soph, you like the wienie palace?’ I had heard that joke before, but seeing it firsthand, I erupted into giggles. First time I felt good all day. This Parthenon with columns that, yes!, were a tribute to proud Bavarian sausages. At best.
They left me alone in his room for an hour or two. The Blue Horses that survived Hans’ own arrest a few years ago comforted me strangely. I resisted the urge to hang the picture straighter. I must have slept, lulled to sleep by the aroma of a lone jasmine in an airless room. For it was nearly dark when Hans and Traute returned, bearing food.
‘We invited Christl and Alex,’ Hans said, waiting for my reaction. I could not think of two people I wanted to meet more.
Alexander Schmorell arrived first, doffing his beret and kissing my hand. Before the second sentence, I found myself calling him Schurik like everyone else, blessing him with the Russian name that connected him to his homeland. And separated him from the insanity of our Volk.
And I don’t have to tell you that for half a second, I could not even remember Fritz’s name. Schurik embodied everything I have wanted Fritz to be. He made me laugh, he made me forget that I was being demure, he made me feel like a lady, every bit as pulled-together as Traute.
When Christl showed up, the other three reacted with an emotion I have never experienced. This tall, lanky farm boy folded himself into the room. It was like their backbone had straightened or their vision re-focused. Christoph Probst, this Christl, brought pictures of his babies, news of his wife, that village decency that knows little of goose-stepping or Sieg Heils.
He also got us going on a game he had conjured up on the way to the party. We tried to stump each other on famous literary quotes. Sounds boring, I know, yet it was anything but. Of course, someone had to quote Novalis, and I think Hans was the culprit. He likes Novalis’ view of going to the edge of the pit before finding the way home. And we debated Goethe, a trivial debate to be sure, but not completely without merit. Can someone who never lived a single day of misery really write? I say no. Goethe lovers find themselves forced to defend the indefensible.
I enjoyed being among friends who read banned literature. There are not many places in Germany these days where one would dare quote from Heine or Stefan George or Spinoza. But in this room, not to quote our greatest poets and thinkers was unthinkable. Traute assured me she would introduce me to the booksellers who stocked these good books.
And I cannot tell you what it did for me to see Hans among these people. You know how he has those mood swings that make him impossible to love. I can never forget how badly he treated Lisa Remppis, my best friend. She tolerated his ups and downs far longer than any woman should, and he still trifled with her feelings for him. I think he only wanted her when she finally had enough. Some stupid nonsense about writing her name out in bread crumbs when he was in jail for, well for.... But by then, she had called it quits.
I don’t have to tell you about Rose Nägele. One of the dearest women our family has known, hard worker too, bright girl. Did Hans’ sexual addiction start with Rose, or was that the first we knew of it? I wish I knew. But he never should have hurt her like he did.
He seems to have learned from those failed courtships. He and Traute cuddled off and on, teased each other like friends do, yet it is clear that he loves her deeply. Things are different with him and Traute. Maybe he has finally found someone who loves him with all those faults he usually hides so well. She knows every wart and kisses them into diamonds.
In the middle of our lighthearted fun and scholarly debates, Hans dropped a bombshell on us. He dramatically pulled a piece of paper from his hip pocket and began to read. Words about a madman who spreads lies till they become truth. Not till they are believed as truth, like we define Goebbels’ pathetic and provocative propaganda. But until they become truth. The more he read, the more you could see the sheer terror on our faces. Terror at the reality of the world portrayed in that poem.
He sat down, quite satisfied with himself. And none of us knew who wrote the text. I thought he had. My brother is articulate and passionate about his writing, and words like that flow from his pen with no effort at all.
But Gottfried Keller had written it, well over a hundred years ago. Schurik immediately devised a plan for forcing every German to read it. ‘We will rent planes and drop millions of these from the skies on every city in Germany.’
And though they joked with him about the extravagance of his idea, threatening to put it all to his rich father’s account, no one contradicted him. I found that extraordinary, but said nothing.
Someone (and it was not Hans) remembered that we were here to celebrate my birthday. A little early, to be sure, but the cake would not keep another eight days.
And dear Schurik, he who has stolen my heart, suggested we head down to the river. We dug through the mounds of junk in Hans’ desk drawers till we found twine ‘to cool the wine the Russian way,’ Schurik said with a mysterious smile. And Traute managed to find five things that held liquid—I dare not call them cups or glasses—and four forks and a spoon for the cake. I think part of the strength of their relationship is that she does not try to organize Hans’ life.
We had the city almost entirely to ourselves. Our Luftwaffe has been so merciless in its bombings of the English that we fear the day retaliation begins. It has not started yet, but everyone lives behind walls of black curtains. The air raid shelters are often better stocked than our own kitchens.
Hans’ apartment in the Mandl Strasse lies next to Munich’s English Gardens. We walked that street, and I fingered the cold cement wall that divides Schwabing from the Gardens. Schwabing, heart of the university district, home to artists and actors alike, draws its life from the Gardens. In this patch of earth, German efficiency is buried among dense shrubs and wonderful forests. I understand why Hans’ letters home spoke most often about his time in these Gardens, walking in the rain, breathing the last remnant of pure air in a place so brownly defiled.
A great harvest moon hung over the river. Christl wished out loud that his family friend, Emil Nolde, could see this yellow orb and paint it. I tried not to express my astonishment that Christl actually knew someone whose work I studied and imitated. I must have been bad at disguising my surprise, because Schurik mentioned that Nolde had painted a portrait of Christl and his sister Angelika. No wonder Hans spent as little time as possible in Ulm. These people fed his soul.
Oh, and the twine! Schurik tied it around the bottle and dragged it in the icy river. The feel of doing something distinctly Russian must have ignited the passions he cannot hide for long. Because we sang his songs of the Volga, melodies swaying in moonlit birch trees and steppes that never end, tunes no Bach-fed brain could ever sing. We sang his songs that speak of death, and hardship, and the pain of living, all tinged with silver and gold and horizons sparkling with dew. All in the darkest, richest, minor keys on earth, a darkness and a richness banned from Aryan ears as too Jewish.
We found a level place next to the river, a river that hardly compares to the great rivers of Ulm—the Iller and the Danube. This Isar flows dirty, more a canal than a river. In fact, in places only the canal that parallels the river is navigable. But if you must have a city, you should have a river, and the Isar is better than nothing at all.
The hilarity of Christl’s game segued into muted discussion no less intense than the debates of Hans’ room. I am the only one of the group not studying medicine. Over cake and wine, after the embarrassment of toasts in my honor, we talked about the internships they had recently completed.
Schurik explained for my benefit his distaste for medicine. His father, a well-known physician in Munich, more or less forced him to study. He wants to be a sculptor, but that matches neither his father’s nor the government’s view of what is good for young men to do. The least detestable alternative was to acquiesce to his father’s desire, since that also meant a near-exemption from active duty in Hitler’s army. But after the war, he wanted to pursue the things he cherished: sculpting, painting, and piano. And he wanted to go home to Russia.
Hans lapsed into his melodramatic style of story-telling to describe his work at Schrobenhausen. He had treated frost-bite victims from the winter’s devastation in Russia. He must have forgotten that my Fritz is headed to the Russian front tomorrow, because he described the fingerless hands in gory detail. But he ended with the observation that if he had ever doubted his love of medicine, the internship had restored the passion. For he saw that healing was something God let him do. He could not undo all the evils our country inflicted, but he could heal, one person at a time. And after the war, he could do even more.
Traute nodded vigorously as he spoke. Her permission to study medicine was likely granted due to her father’s rank in the National Socialist Party, since we women are expected to be reproductive units, with minimal education wasted on us. When it was her turn, she whispered that after the war she wanted to be the best doctor in either Munich or Hamburg (her hometown), if you-know-who did not pass laws that kept her from practicing. Without her saying a word, we knew how absurd, yet how necessary, it was for her to whisper those sentiments at midnight, under a harvest moon, in a deserted city.
Even I noticed that Christl was being quiet. I thought perhaps he had fallen asleep, since he does have a newborn at home. But Schurik knew his friend better. ‘Christl, Christl,’ he shook Christl by the knee. ‘What are you thinking? What do you want from life?’
When Christl looked up, the tears were streaming down his cheeks. ‘Listen to us,’ he nearly shouted, caring little whether Nazi mole heard him or not. ‘You all know what Manfred tells us is going on in Poland. They are slaughtering Jews, murdering innocent children. And we sit here and talk of medicine and art. After the war, after the war, we say. Not just you. Me too. I am guilty too.
‘But what am I going to tell my children? That their daddy was too much of a coward to do anything? That their daddy did not love them enough? After the war, after the war. Well, listen to me. After the war, the rest of the nations will have the right to say, You Heines, you Jerries, you damn fools, why didn’t you do something? Why didn’t you resist?’
I know I did not breathe for the longest time. The cold night grew colder still. Resist. He had said the word. Resist.
(and this isn't even the good part... there's more!)
(c) Ruth Hanna Sachs
Thursday, June 25, 2009
History: January through December 2007
(Photo is of Lilo Ramdohr and her grandson Domenic... September 2007)
November 13, 2007
Thomas Friedman's October 10 Newsweek column challenged today's college students to break away from their 'Generation Q' - the quiet generation - stereotype and do more to effect change in our society. Many of his points are well-taken, especially comments about some being content to upload their concern, a so-called Facebook activism.
When I read his words about a month ago, I found myself agreeing with him. After all, my generation marched on Washington, joined the Peace Corps (one friend died while serving), and held peaceful and not-so-peaceful demonstrations against the injustices of our day.
Then we grew up, settled down, and lost our idealism and willingness to take risks on behalf of others. It's always harder to fight injustice when we're personally comfortable.
The more I've thought about it, the less I agree with Friedman. What we need is tikkun olam, repairing this old world. Give me slow and steady informed dissent any day, the kind of passion that still goes to football games and school dances, yet is deadly serious about doing whatever can be done to make our society whole. Especially when that passion lasts a lifetime.
I love seeing Naomi Iser and her Brandeis friends publicly declare their fast on behalf of Darfur relief ~ as one of many ways they have embraced that issue. Or Tim Hansen and Amy Samuelsen and their entourage at Brigham Young University agonizing over the Cambodian genocide of 1975-1979 and concluding: "We need to help the world."
But informed dissent cannot and should not be limited to the Big Things like genocide ~ although if images of Darfur now and Cambodia then don't elicit righteous indignation, a person is likely emotionally dead. Still, real activism has no heart if we can get upset about events halfway around the world while remaining numb to human rights abuses next door and wounds suffered by our neighbors.
So I am equally happy when I note that Robert Barton (also of BYU) noiselessly gives his time to volunteer, to help out in 'small spaces.' Or when I read that five Baylor University guys took their friend's close call with suicide to heart. And set out to do something about the epidemic of hopelessness.
This is the true message of the White Rose students and the adults who learned from them. Yes, they attempted grandiose things, noble feats of conscience. But all of that would have meant nothing if Willi Graf had not been willing to give up his seat on the streetcar to Russian women, forced laborers in Munich. If Alex Schmorell and Nikolai Nikolaeff-Hamasaspian had not taken food and clothing to POWs and more of those forced laborers, also in Munich. If Traute Lafrenz had not assisted her Jewish neighbors in Hamburg when the noose tightened.
Caring about the wrongs that are right in front of our face should ~ must ~ accompany activism and even attend acts of civil disobedience.
Informed dissent? Means caring more about integrity and about the powerless more than we care for our own comfort. Because once you start caring, actions follow.
October 25, 2007
It's a good thing I made no promises this time last year. Otherwise, I'd have some major apologizing to do!
To be painfully honest, White Rose work pretty much came to a standstill over the last twelve months. It didn't make sense any longer. I felt like - we all felt like - we were butting our heads up against a brick wall that had been reinforced with commercial-grade steel and topped off with barbed wire. Any time we tried to do anything that put "the truth" of the White Rose story out there, any time we bucked the system or took on the well-funded White Rose establishment in Munich, we ended up suffering the consequences. And made nary a dent in a well-oiled, corrupt machine.
I don't know about you, but I am not a person who relishes pain. Even the emotional kind.
So it was easier to put "White Rose" on hold and concentrate on things that made me and our family happy. We moved to Utah (because the unemployment rate out here is much lower than on the East Coast or in Texas, and it was easier to find a job unrelated to White Rose), stored our archives in the basement in unopened boxes, and did as little as possible.
Luckily, Dr. Igor Chramov in Orenburg, Russia is a persistent fellow. Although we didn't answer his initial 2007 email about the Schmorell conference in September, he followed up. And followed up. For reasons I don't understand to this day, we decided to go to Orenburg after all. It was not necessarily a "rational" decision. The trip was horribly expensive, I was unmotivated by the topic, and by the time the conference rolled around, I was up to my eyeballs in non-White Rose work. It seemed like a terrible choice to have made.
The Orenburg part of the trip was preceded by a week in Germany. We visited old friends in Bad Heilbrunn, people and place that serve as a favorite flannel nightgown or broken-in hiking shoes. For several days, we simply basked in the warmth that comes from that kind of friendship.
Equally important, we visited two of the White Rose women we hold dear. The first visit nearly didn't happen. Herta Probst is not well, and her family tends to protect her from people and things that would drag her down. Especially after the Probst family's awful experience with the recent Sophie Scholl movie - in which Christoph Probst was falsely portrayed as the weakling, when Hans Scholl was the one who almost fainted (and so on and so on) - they can hardly work up the strength to tackle anything related to the White Rose. It doesn't seem to matter how loudly or correctly they attempt to rectify history, to persuade writers to "get it right the first time." There's so much invested in The Official Legend that no one listens to them.
The plan therefore involved a ten-minute "hello" to Herta Probst, followed by dinner with one of her children.
Four hours later, we were still talking, eating cake and drinking coffee, laughing even at the ridiculousness of some of the pompous asses who put on a big White Rose show with no substance behind them.
This conversation began to effect a change inside me, reminding me why our work is important, why it's important not to give up even when the "pompous asses" seem to be winning. I saw anew the faces of the White Rose that make this story so personal, so very valid for the 21st century. When Herta recalled the shenanigans her beloved husband and Schurik had pulled, the silliness that had been heart and soul of a powerful friendship that eventually led both to give up their lives for freedom and justice, I saw and heard "my" BYU team in all their crazy glory, hearts of gold, yearning for a world where injustice is a thing of the past.
The next day, we sat across the table once again from Lilo Ramdohr, this time joined by her precious grandson. A new generation is joining the work of "keeping true memories alive". In Domenic's face, I could see the passion that once had been on Lilo's, when she was a young woman fresh out of college, caught up in an unwanted intrigue for the sake of her friend Schurik, and for the sake of Germany. Lilo's health is failing too - she turned 94 on October 11 - so it is important for Domenic and all the other grandchildren of these White Rose families to become actively involved in righting the record.
Yet as is so often the case, the "good guys" have largely kept silent over the past sixty years. For the most part, they have quietly gone about their lives, never seeking fame or fortune for their virtues, past or present. The 'new generation' is therefore under-informed about their grandparents' heroics. They know only that it's a topic that's hardly ever brought up, although "White Rose" in general often consumes the German media.
It's rarely these "good guys" who hog the media spotlight. I saw with Domenic that our work involves far more than merely recording an accurate history for scholars and young students to read. We can also fill in the gaps for children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren who badly need to know just how heroic some of their family was.
[And I have yet to figure out how an entire nation of "scholars" has allowed the fraud to be perpetrated so long, to the point that those who proudly wore the swastika during the Third Reich are allowed to posture and swagger before the cameras, with no one dragging them off the stage in handcuffs for blatant lies. I understand why the liars do it - it must be awful living with the guilty conscience of a Nazi past, even if none of them was a guard at Auschwitz - but I don't understand why tenured professors, government officials, radio and television journalists, and keepers of archives let them get away with it. - Note that I include U.S. "scholars" in this indictment, because way too many American universities regularly invite known Nazis posing as "freedom fighters" to speak on campus - without challenging one word of their speeches. Unforgivable.]
The Russian leg of the trip started off traumatically. We arrived on September 12. Moscow felt like it was under siege, almost a martial law mentality. Police on every street corner, Kremlin off limits, no one "able" to speak either German or English when we asked directions. We came oh-so-close to turning around and heading back to Bad Heilbrunn, where we felt safe. Our airport hotel in Moscow did not even have Internet service, so in the short space of a day, we began to feel cut off from the rest of the world. A scary place to be.
(A couple of days later, we heard that Putin had dissolved his government the day we were "in town". And a new Siberian friend told us that the day before - yes, September 11 - there had been a suicide bomber, evidently near the Kremlin, in Moscow. No wonder the city was on edge!)
After an equally rough start in Orenburg - no Internet service there either, among other things - the change that began with the visit with Herta Probst blossomed into a full-fledged turning point. I cannot go into too many details, as I am still processing some of the conversations and conclusions.
What I can tell you: I saw firsthand the great White Rose dichotomy, up close and personal. At that memorial service on the occasion of what would have been Alexander Schmorell's ninetieth birthday, a decidedly motley crew had gathered.
Some had come because German and Russian television cameras showed up. They made sure they were front and center of photo ops. They tried to grab the best tables whenever we ate together (and we ate together a lot!). They genuflected before the graven image of fifteen minutes of fame. In short, they represent on a small scale the larger circle of would-be scholars who nearly drove me away from this topic that for so long has been my passion.
But there were others there as well, the "others" I felt comfortable with, "others" who gladdened my heart and renewed my hope for Truth. I changed my opinion about a couple of people whose work I had known about without knowing them - positive change. We discussed and debated our differing conclusions. It felt good to be among these "others" who care as much as I do about getting the story right - the first time.
We left Orenburg completely exhausted, but convinced we had to return to White Rose work full-time. Effective today, we are doing just that.
It's funny in some ways. We came to Utah, expecting to put the White Rose behind us. Over the past few years as we have sent out our newsletters, I've always felt like BYU - Brigham Young University - would be the last place that could ever be hospitable to the true White Rose story. LDS theology does not encourage civil disobedience. When I've seen Mormon missionaries in Texas, the East Coast, in Germany, I've always envisioned even Mormon young people as complete conformists who only do as they are told, without thinking, reflexively as it were.
Just as Orenburg renewed my vision for our White Rose efforts and changed my mind about some of the "players", living and working among BYU students has definitely changed my mind about BYU. True, LDS theology does not encourage civil disobedience. But "my" BYU team showed me that they care very much about right and wrong, about social justice, about values that matter. They subscribe to a very strict honor code, yet they are anything but conformists. I'm proud that some of them have become my friends. They have renewed my hope in students who are willing to be themselves, stand up for what is right, and in so doing, change the world.
Who knows? A year that started out one way may prove to end up completely different.
One thing is for certain. I am different.
Thomas Friedman's October 10 Newsweek column challenged today's college students to break away from their 'Generation Q' - the quiet generation - stereotype and do more to effect change in our society. Many of his points are well-taken, especially comments about some being content to upload their concern, a so-called Facebook activism.
When I read his words about a month ago, I found myself agreeing with him. After all, my generation marched on Washington, joined the Peace Corps (one friend died while serving), and held peaceful and not-so-peaceful demonstrations against the injustices of our day.
Then we grew up, settled down, and lost our idealism and willingness to take risks on behalf of others. It's always harder to fight injustice when we're personally comfortable.
The more I've thought about it, the less I agree with Friedman. What we need is tikkun olam, repairing this old world. Give me slow and steady informed dissent any day, the kind of passion that still goes to football games and school dances, yet is deadly serious about doing whatever can be done to make our society whole. Especially when that passion lasts a lifetime.
I love seeing Naomi Iser and her Brandeis friends publicly declare their fast on behalf of Darfur relief ~ as one of many ways they have embraced that issue. Or Tim Hansen and Amy Samuelsen and their entourage at Brigham Young University agonizing over the Cambodian genocide of 1975-1979 and concluding: "We need to help the world."
But informed dissent cannot and should not be limited to the Big Things like genocide ~ although if images of Darfur now and Cambodia then don't elicit righteous indignation, a person is likely emotionally dead. Still, real activism has no heart if we can get upset about events halfway around the world while remaining numb to human rights abuses next door and wounds suffered by our neighbors.
So I am equally happy when I note that Robert Barton (also of BYU) noiselessly gives his time to volunteer, to help out in 'small spaces.' Or when I read that five Baylor University guys took their friend's close call with suicide to heart. And set out to do something about the epidemic of hopelessness.
This is the true message of the White Rose students and the adults who learned from them. Yes, they attempted grandiose things, noble feats of conscience. But all of that would have meant nothing if Willi Graf had not been willing to give up his seat on the streetcar to Russian women, forced laborers in Munich. If Alex Schmorell and Nikolai Nikolaeff-Hamasaspian had not taken food and clothing to POWs and more of those forced laborers, also in Munich. If Traute Lafrenz had not assisted her Jewish neighbors in Hamburg when the noose tightened.
Caring about the wrongs that are right in front of our face should ~ must ~ accompany activism and even attend acts of civil disobedience.
Informed dissent? Means caring more about integrity and about the powerless more than we care for our own comfort. Because once you start caring, actions follow.
October 25, 2007
It's a good thing I made no promises this time last year. Otherwise, I'd have some major apologizing to do!
To be painfully honest, White Rose work pretty much came to a standstill over the last twelve months. It didn't make sense any longer. I felt like - we all felt like - we were butting our heads up against a brick wall that had been reinforced with commercial-grade steel and topped off with barbed wire. Any time we tried to do anything that put "the truth" of the White Rose story out there, any time we bucked the system or took on the well-funded White Rose establishment in Munich, we ended up suffering the consequences. And made nary a dent in a well-oiled, corrupt machine.
I don't know about you, but I am not a person who relishes pain. Even the emotional kind.
So it was easier to put "White Rose" on hold and concentrate on things that made me and our family happy. We moved to Utah (because the unemployment rate out here is much lower than on the East Coast or in Texas, and it was easier to find a job unrelated to White Rose), stored our archives in the basement in unopened boxes, and did as little as possible.
Luckily, Dr. Igor Chramov in Orenburg, Russia is a persistent fellow. Although we didn't answer his initial 2007 email about the Schmorell conference in September, he followed up. And followed up. For reasons I don't understand to this day, we decided to go to Orenburg after all. It was not necessarily a "rational" decision. The trip was horribly expensive, I was unmotivated by the topic, and by the time the conference rolled around, I was up to my eyeballs in non-White Rose work. It seemed like a terrible choice to have made.
The Orenburg part of the trip was preceded by a week in Germany. We visited old friends in Bad Heilbrunn, people and place that serve as a favorite flannel nightgown or broken-in hiking shoes. For several days, we simply basked in the warmth that comes from that kind of friendship.
Equally important, we visited two of the White Rose women we hold dear. The first visit nearly didn't happen. Herta Probst is not well, and her family tends to protect her from people and things that would drag her down. Especially after the Probst family's awful experience with the recent Sophie Scholl movie - in which Christoph Probst was falsely portrayed as the weakling, when Hans Scholl was the one who almost fainted (and so on and so on) - they can hardly work up the strength to tackle anything related to the White Rose. It doesn't seem to matter how loudly or correctly they attempt to rectify history, to persuade writers to "get it right the first time." There's so much invested in The Official Legend that no one listens to them.
The plan therefore involved a ten-minute "hello" to Herta Probst, followed by dinner with one of her children.
Four hours later, we were still talking, eating cake and drinking coffee, laughing even at the ridiculousness of some of the pompous asses who put on a big White Rose show with no substance behind them.
This conversation began to effect a change inside me, reminding me why our work is important, why it's important not to give up even when the "pompous asses" seem to be winning. I saw anew the faces of the White Rose that make this story so personal, so very valid for the 21st century. When Herta recalled the shenanigans her beloved husband and Schurik had pulled, the silliness that had been heart and soul of a powerful friendship that eventually led both to give up their lives for freedom and justice, I saw and heard "my" BYU team in all their crazy glory, hearts of gold, yearning for a world where injustice is a thing of the past.
The next day, we sat across the table once again from Lilo Ramdohr, this time joined by her precious grandson. A new generation is joining the work of "keeping true memories alive". In Domenic's face, I could see the passion that once had been on Lilo's, when she was a young woman fresh out of college, caught up in an unwanted intrigue for the sake of her friend Schurik, and for the sake of Germany. Lilo's health is failing too - she turned 94 on October 11 - so it is important for Domenic and all the other grandchildren of these White Rose families to become actively involved in righting the record.
Yet as is so often the case, the "good guys" have largely kept silent over the past sixty years. For the most part, they have quietly gone about their lives, never seeking fame or fortune for their virtues, past or present. The 'new generation' is therefore under-informed about their grandparents' heroics. They know only that it's a topic that's hardly ever brought up, although "White Rose" in general often consumes the German media.
It's rarely these "good guys" who hog the media spotlight. I saw with Domenic that our work involves far more than merely recording an accurate history for scholars and young students to read. We can also fill in the gaps for children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren who badly need to know just how heroic some of their family was.
[And I have yet to figure out how an entire nation of "scholars" has allowed the fraud to be perpetrated so long, to the point that those who proudly wore the swastika during the Third Reich are allowed to posture and swagger before the cameras, with no one dragging them off the stage in handcuffs for blatant lies. I understand why the liars do it - it must be awful living with the guilty conscience of a Nazi past, even if none of them was a guard at Auschwitz - but I don't understand why tenured professors, government officials, radio and television journalists, and keepers of archives let them get away with it. - Note that I include U.S. "scholars" in this indictment, because way too many American universities regularly invite known Nazis posing as "freedom fighters" to speak on campus - without challenging one word of their speeches. Unforgivable.]
The Russian leg of the trip started off traumatically. We arrived on September 12. Moscow felt like it was under siege, almost a martial law mentality. Police on every street corner, Kremlin off limits, no one "able" to speak either German or English when we asked directions. We came oh-so-close to turning around and heading back to Bad Heilbrunn, where we felt safe. Our airport hotel in Moscow did not even have Internet service, so in the short space of a day, we began to feel cut off from the rest of the world. A scary place to be.
(A couple of days later, we heard that Putin had dissolved his government the day we were "in town". And a new Siberian friend told us that the day before - yes, September 11 - there had been a suicide bomber, evidently near the Kremlin, in Moscow. No wonder the city was on edge!)
After an equally rough start in Orenburg - no Internet service there either, among other things - the change that began with the visit with Herta Probst blossomed into a full-fledged turning point. I cannot go into too many details, as I am still processing some of the conversations and conclusions.
What I can tell you: I saw firsthand the great White Rose dichotomy, up close and personal. At that memorial service on the occasion of what would have been Alexander Schmorell's ninetieth birthday, a decidedly motley crew had gathered.
Some had come because German and Russian television cameras showed up. They made sure they were front and center of photo ops. They tried to grab the best tables whenever we ate together (and we ate together a lot!). They genuflected before the graven image of fifteen minutes of fame. In short, they represent on a small scale the larger circle of would-be scholars who nearly drove me away from this topic that for so long has been my passion.
But there were others there as well, the "others" I felt comfortable with, "others" who gladdened my heart and renewed my hope for Truth. I changed my opinion about a couple of people whose work I had known about without knowing them - positive change. We discussed and debated our differing conclusions. It felt good to be among these "others" who care as much as I do about getting the story right - the first time.
We left Orenburg completely exhausted, but convinced we had to return to White Rose work full-time. Effective today, we are doing just that.
It's funny in some ways. We came to Utah, expecting to put the White Rose behind us. Over the past few years as we have sent out our newsletters, I've always felt like BYU - Brigham Young University - would be the last place that could ever be hospitable to the true White Rose story. LDS theology does not encourage civil disobedience. When I've seen Mormon missionaries in Texas, the East Coast, in Germany, I've always envisioned even Mormon young people as complete conformists who only do as they are told, without thinking, reflexively as it were.
Just as Orenburg renewed my vision for our White Rose efforts and changed my mind about some of the "players", living and working among BYU students has definitely changed my mind about BYU. True, LDS theology does not encourage civil disobedience. But "my" BYU team showed me that they care very much about right and wrong, about social justice, about values that matter. They subscribe to a very strict honor code, yet they are anything but conformists. I'm proud that some of them have become my friends. They have renewed my hope in students who are willing to be themselves, stand up for what is right, and in so doing, change the world.
Who knows? A year that started out one way may prove to end up completely different.
One thing is for certain. I am different.
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