Chapter Twenty-Nine: God Forbid
Willi Graf and friends, 3 Jan 43: "What if we win the war, God forbid? Then resistance will be more necessary than ever. We are dead either way."
The first week of January 1943, White Rose friends - students and older companions alike - put their hands to the work that was before them. They had spread out to their hometowns over Christmas break, talking to old classmates, bündische buddies, anyone they believed would join in the work. And for these friends, there was only one work - ensuring that every German knew the atrocities that were being perpetrated in the name of the German people.
These were not spontaneous meetings. Before leaving Munich in December, they had assigned one another tasks. ‘You do this, I’ll do that.’ See last year’s New Year’s Eve post to know more.
Everything in this chapter - and this is a complete copy of Chapter 29, not an excerpt - is part of the tapestry. The conversations Willi Graf had with the Bollinger brothers reappeared in his January 18 discussion with Sophie Scholl on the same topic, namely whether a Christian could assassinate a leader. Frl. Josenhans’ conscientious inventory nearly cost Eugen Grimminger his head. The outspoken opposition to Willi Graf’s resistance efforts by his close friends Fritz Leist and Hein Jacobs left him vulnerable at a bad time. Hans Hirzel’s “hiding” items at home instead of off premises had disastrous consequences.
These threads, red, gold, black, blue, white, cyan, every color under the sun, came together into the tapestry we call White Rose. Lose one thread, and it’s off.
As you read this single chapter from White Rose History, Volume II, understand that every person on this virtual page matters. Their fearful courage, their courageous anxiety, their doing a little, or doing a lot, sometimes just being there for one another, trusting - when trust was a scarce commodity… It is all part of who they were and what they did.
Snow, snow everywhere, from Munich to Saarbrücken, with Stuttgart and Ulm in between! What a beautiful way to begin the new year.
In Saarbrücken, temperatures climbed that Friday January 1, 1943. There was still snow on the ground, but it was melting. “You can’t exactly call it cold,” Willi said about the day that held so many sales calls.
He returned to the Bollingers’ home, happy that Heinz and Willi remained receptive to working with the students in Munich. “Good discussion,” before going to see Albert Reuter, a classmate he hoped to recruit. By now, his spiel had become “the usual,” and Albert also seemed open.
Willi had made an appointment with (unnamed) friends who were supposed to visit him in his parents’ house that evening, again for recruitment purposes. They were no-shows, which dampened the good results from the morning a little.
Yet nothing could have prepared him for the bitter shock that the first night of the new year was to bring him. Hein Jacobs came by late – so far, so good – and initially, time with him was as delightful as it had always been. Anneliese and Mathilde joined them for a while.
After Willi’s sisters went to bed, his conversation with Hein turned to the things that meant the most to him. And strangely, he encountered a brick wall. Willi did not disclose the source of the dissonance that arose that night. Its origin could have been the White Rose work, or Fritz Leist’s anti-Willi campaign, but it also could have been Marianne. Whatever bothered Hein became a real obstacle to their continued friendship.
And it caught Willi Graf completely off guard. They were able to talk about “it” after a while, but “it” did not go away.[1]
Conversely, whatever had been the reason for the feud between Hans Scholl and his father on New Year’s Eve had been forgotten by January 1. Or at least put out of his mind. He and Sophie struck out for Geislingen an der Steige, that favorite Scholl retreat about twenty miles northwest of Ulm.
Sophie later told Fritz that the snow, and the beech forests, and the lovely foothills, and the snow, the snow, were all so glorious. “Snow in broad daylight can inspire you with such wild exuberance that you romp and frolic around like overgrown children. But when twilight descends on the snowy woods, or the tall, narrow, snow-covered houses, this mood becomes transformed into its opposite: A solemn and expectant hush like Christmas Eve.”[2]
How the siblings needed that refreshing hike! Just as Willi’s day had been filled with “recruitment,” Hans and Sophie likely visited Albert Kley, the teacher-artist in Geislingen they admired. The Geyer family said it was known that Hans Scholl asked Mr. Kley to join their work, and he refused. (To this day, Albert Kley will not speak of how it happened, what Hans said, or why he said no.)[3]
Even the Nazi prosecutor would later recognize Hans’ early-January single-mindedness. “At the beginning of 1943, the accused Hans Scholl claims he came to the conclusion that there was only one way to preserve Europe, namely by shortening the war.”[4] Hans Hirzel may have been confused about how to proceed, and his reasons for any actions taken may have been fuzzy at best. But Hans Scholl – and Sophie – had clearly defined for themselves what they were doing, and why.
January 1 also brought “physical inventory” to Eugen Grimminger’s business. Since Grimminger was a fastidious CPA, he asked Miss Josenhans (a secretary) to document not only his business assets, but personal effects as well. Any accountant worth his salt would have done the same, as that etches in stone what belongs to the company, and what is the property of an employee.
Miss Josenhans was a particularly thorough woman. When Grimminger said “everything,” she listed everything. Including four pages of books from his private library. He took that list home.[5]
On Willi Graf’s twenty-fifth birthday – Saturday, January 2, 1943 – he awoke wondering what had gone wrong with Hein the night before. When Hein appeared to celebrate Willi’s birthday, no matter how badly Willi wanted to work through the problem, the words would not come. All that morning, the two friends talked to one another as if they were strangers.
Conversation was so strained that Hein left in the afternoon, leaving Willi to reflect on what it would take to set things right. “Whether I can write about the things that moved me on this day?” On his birthday. “I will not do it, because I do not yet see the big picture. That will still come.”
Karl Heinz Scheer unexpectedly paid Willi a call after Hein was gone. Willi would have preferred to have Hein back in the hopes that they could reconcile, because Karl Heinz – “Karo” from the short time he spent in New Germany – was a bit problematic for Willi. He had been in New Germany, he had been a “good Catholic,” but now? Karl Heinz Scheer worked in the Chancellery in Berlin, worked for the Führer, entrusted with developing travel plans to the Russian front.
This former classmate was a nice enough guy, and Willi determined to learn as much from him as he could. Who knew what information could be valuable down the road? But he did not so much as hint about White Rose operations while Karo was there. That friend was far too “positive” about the Nazi regime. Karo also would have been one of the New Germany comrades whom Willi Graf had deleted from his address book, because Karo had abandoned them to become a member of Hitler Youth.
Things did get interesting when the Bollinger brothers dropped in while Karo was still present. Heinz knew Karl Heinz from school days, so it was not a terribly awkward moment. But someone introduced the topic of Germany’s military situation, as well as the current political and economic climate. Willi Graf opened-mouth-inserted-foot when he declared that he saw both the military and political milieu as “not particularly favorable,” because of German setbacks in Africa and Russia.
That did not sit well with Karo, not one bit. He parroted the standard Party line, stating that events on the front were merely temporary. “The military command was certainly working on preparations to shore up our front lines in order to renew the offensive.” One can visualize Willi and the Bollingers rolling their eyes at one another behind Karo’s back.
Heinz Bollinger offered what could have been considered a compromise position. He said maybe it was too hard to know what things were like because the military situation was not “transparent enough.” From Karo’s standpoint, there was no difference between Willi’s statement and Heinz Bollinger’s. He simply would not entertain any doubts to the effect “that our military situation should be viewed as muddled or bad.”[6]
Happily for Willi, the Bollingers stayed longer than Karo. Once the Führer sycophant was gone, the three dissidents could get down to business. Willi said that they “conversed about the real meaning of things and powers,” and that the discussion was “very enlightening” for them.[7]
When Anneliese Knoop-Graf asked Heinz Bollinger what Willi had meant, he replied that they talked about the moral-theological aspects of resistance against the State.[8] This would have had its roots in the Catholic (and Lutheran, and Baptist, and Methodist, and LDS) obsession with Romans 13, in which Christians are admonished as follows:
Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resists the power, resists the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.
Will you then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and you shall have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to you for good. But if you do that which is evil, be afraid; for he bears not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, an avenger to execute wrath upon him that does evil.
Wherefore you must be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience’s sake. For this cause pay tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor. (Romans 13:1-7)
These words would have presented a major impediment to anyone as serious about “faith” as Willi Graf and the Bollinger brothers. Yet for these three young men, they reflected on issues well beyond this text to include additional considerations, something most religious individuals in those days failed to do. Could National Socialism be considered a legitimate “power”? Did it manifest the “will to power” or were its politicians merely a bunch of thugs?
They apparently discussed as well whether Willi Graf and Willi Bollinger’s status as soldiers – soldiers who had sworn an oath of loyalty – affected their intentions of assassinating the very Führer to whom they had vowed allegiance. Willi Graf subsequently told the Gestapo that he had decided his status as a student soldier made him as much a civilian as soldier. Though he “admitted” to the Gestapo that he knew his status had not changed, he probably rationalized the breaking of this oath with that student-soldier reasoning.[9]
No surprise then that Mrs. Graf found the Bollinger brothers “sinister.” She grew suspicious whenever they were around.[10]
As energizing as Willi had found the chat with the Bollingers, he went to bed wishing he could speak with Hein. “Hopefully we can still talk in the few remaining days of this vacation.”[11] How discord dulled Willi’s edge!
Sunday January 3 (and likely following early Mass), Heinz Bollinger came by the Grafs’ residence to continue the previous day’s conversation. Willi told his diary, “It is almost like a lecture on the metaphysics of life in our times. Afterwards, the conversation appeared so distant to me, or better said, so timeless, that I was surprised.”[12]
They picked up almost precisely where they had left off on Saturday. ‘All right, so our military, political, and economic situation is, shall we say, not as secure as it is portrayed to be in newspapers, on the radio, etc. Think of Africa. Think of the increased bombings in Italy (yea, the Americans are coming). Think of the Russian front.
‘So we’ve lost the war. What now? If we lose, will the Allies let the Soviets take over? Will Germany become a Communist country? How can we keep that from happening? But do we stand a chance either way? What if we win the war, God forbid? Then resistance will be more necessary than ever. We are dead either way.’[13]
Heinz Bollinger remembered that they concluded, “It would have been an unbearable agony to have had to live in a Hitler-Germany after winning the war.”[14]
At least Willi got his wish. Hein agreed to an afternoon meeting. A meeting that accomplished nothing, to Willi’s regret. That barrier was still there, and they passed the time with idle chit-chat. The “spark” that had made Hein Jacobs such a treasured friend was forever extinguished, and Willi could hardly bear it.[15]
As Willi Graf’s resolve strengthened regarding the students’ resistance in Munich, Hans Hirzel continued his wild emotional and intellectual roller coaster ride. With his third physical (medical, not psych) coming up any day now (and this time, they would let him into the army, he just knew it), he thought it might be a good idea to try to “calculate” how the war would turn out.
He bought a cheap world atlas that contained data for every country on the globe, data including economy, land area (focusing on land area available for agriculture, housing), industry, ships’ tonnage, developed mineral resources, and the like.
That data was turned into a simple spread sheet – manual, not Excel! – to sum strategic statistics by alliance, Axis versus Allies. His work left him speechless. There was a veritable “avalanche” closing in on Hitler’s Germany. The best-case scenario had the Axis Powers somehow squeaking out a victory, but even that was cold comfort. The “defeated” countries - the Allies - would still control the vast majority of the world’s natural resources.
And if Germany were to lose the war – and the statistics he had just put together indicated that was the greater probability – what then? Wouldn’t they face a “Super Versailles” that would make the original look like child’s play?
Maybe the students in Munich were on to something after all. Hans Hirzel recalled that they seemed to make a positive distinction between “German” and “National Socialist.” It would take convincing the world of precisely that distinction if they were to survive after Germany lost the war.[16]
Sophie did not require spread sheets or statistics to know that an “avalanche” was rapidly descending on Germany. With Fritz Hartnagel in Stalingrad, she hung on every word of every news broadcast, legal and otherwise. She wrote Fritz another letter on January 3, hoping he was all right and that “not even hardship and the noise of battle can throw you off course.”
As she reminded him of Otl’s favorite saying – “hard head and soft heart” – her unhappiness grew. Sophie’s relentless struggle with depression never had anything to do with Fritz. Sophie could not bear her perceived culpability (for what?). “It often makes me unhappy that I am not a vehicle for universal suffering,” she told Fritz. “That way I could at least remove part of my guilt from those who are undeservedly having to suffer so much more than I.”
Sophie assured Fritz that she was with him so often in spirit those days that sometimes she believed she would meet up with him on the street. She concluded the letter with sentiments that must have seemed strange to a C.O. of a battalion in Stalingrad:
You know the value of a human life, and we have to know what we're risking it for. What a responsibility you bear! However, you do know a source of strength.[17]
By January 4, students began to trickle back to Munich. Hans Scholl left Ulm, with Sophie planning to follow him in a couple of days.[18] Apparently Harald Dohrn accompanied Christl and Herta Probst back to Tegernsee via Munich, and briefly made Hans’ acquaintance.[19] Surprisingly, Gisela Schertling was among those who returned early. She was so excited about the coming semester that she even registered her new address with the police: Lindwurm Str. 13, first Traute’s and then Hans’ residence.[20] It would not be a great mystery who had helped her find that room.
Willi Graf recognized that his “Christmas vacation” would soon be over, so he dedicated this Monday to his family. No recruiting, no metaphysical talks about the war or Hitler. Just Mathilde and one of her friends. They laughed and joked, teasing one another about “family history.” It would be a fairly sure bet to say that the story of Willi and the cherry tree resurfaced.
“This vacation, I’ve mostly sat at home, I mean in the evenings,” Willi wrote in his diary. “This is on purpose, because I want to be together with the whole family for hours at a time.” Nevertheless, it bothered him that his mother stayed distant. She always seemed to be put out about something. “How can one show her what she means to us? Only possible in little utterances.”[21]
But on Tuesday, his last full day in Saarbrücken, Willi combined home fires with smoldering White Rose “business.” He and one of the other New Germany Willis took a long walk through the snowy city forest. (It could not have been Willi Bollinger or Willi Reiter, because this was the “first talk” with this friend.)
The other Willi did not commit to anything, because he worried about what he would do now that he had returned from two years on the front lines. Before they went back to civilization, Willi Graf’s friend had settled on the study of theology. Willi evidently approved of the decision.
His mind, however, was in Dudweiler where Hein Jacobs lived. Marita had come for a visit, and they had invited Willi to come by sometime in the afternoon. Maybe with Marita there… And indeed, the banter was a bit more gracious, partly due to the backdrop. They hiked up a much loved forested hill known as the Burning Mountain, where coal burns underground and seeps through the fissures of the rise, and has done so since the 17th century.
But, as Willi said, “we never got around to anything substantial.” And to think that only days prior, Hein had been of one mind with Willi, seemingly a sure-fire candidate for heading the resistance in Bonn.[22]
Before going home, Willi stopped in to see the Mauer brothers. Ali must not have been home, because Willi mentioned dialog with Ludwig Mauer only. If only he had not promised his family he would spend this last evening with them, he could have firmed up something with Ludwig, a Catholic priest and slightly older “member” of the New Germany/Gray Order club. “It was almost evident from the beginning that our views are the same.”[23] Which meant that Fritz Leist had not been able to sway the Mauers.
The day’s meetings had invigorated Willi. Instead of being exhausted by the careful conversations, he desired to continue them at home, with his family. Yet even if the adrenaline was pumping, he did not dare say what he had to say in front of his father. Anneliese and Mathilde would make a good enough audience.
Though he had been at the Mauers’ house till late, his sisters had waited up for him. All three siblings sat together till the early morning hours, with Willi dominating the discussion. He enlightened them in detail about German atrocities in Russia, things that he had talked about only within the safe circle of the White Rose before this night.
Anneliese and Mathilde grew alarmed as Willi’s intensity increased. It was an “outburst of fury” from their calm, coherent brother, fury they had never seen. He railed against Hitler’s “murderous tyranny.” Whether because of rage and anguish at the stories he related, or out of frustration at the apathy he encountered (in that room, perhaps?), he repeatedly banged his head on the door frame.
“You will see, something will happen,” he reiterated again and again.
When Anneliese contemplated this disturbing scene after the war, she wondered what could have been behind it. Could it have been his “loneliness in the hour of a life-threatening decision?” Maybe he was afraid that his family would find out what he was doing.[24] I have to think that their “two percent” calculation factored into Willi’s torment. That, and the nightmares from the Russian front that never stopped.
Hans Scholl was lonely too, but his was not a head-banging loneliness. Without Sophie, and with no classes in play, he had too much time on his hands. He dropped in on Katharina Schüddekopf, advising her that they would be holding additional readings once the semester got underway. Would she like to come? She agreed, but did not encourage further discussion.[25] And he paid a call on Gisela Schertling, basically asking her the same thing.[26]
With no one in town, it was difficult to put together an “event,” so Hans went back to the apartment on Franz Josef Str. and wrote a letter to Rose Nägele (of course).
He had secretly hoped she would come to Ulm over Christmas, but was very pleased with the Bergengruen book she had given him. He was excited to be back in Munich and admitted he could not sleep the night before due to the “stimulation.”
One of the most familiar images of Hans Scholl stems from this missive. Hans told Rose he believed he was in a “transitional period,” something that was hard to endure but healthy for the intellect.
It's the same impulse that makes waiting at big railroad junctions appeal to me so much. I know someone of whom it could be said that, wherever he goes, he never takes his coat off and always remains a passing stranger, though he doesn't keep quiet or play the role of a mystery man. When you speak with him, you feel he may conclude every sentence by abruptly pulling out his watch and saying, “Time to go.” I like him a lot.
As he had recently told Inge in Ulm, Hans advised Rose that he had decided he really liked his medical studies after all. He traced his ‘intellectual’ development over the years. First came medicine, then he acquired an aversion to medicine and took up philosophy. That was followed by a time when he was fascinated by political theory and politics. Now he was back at Square One, with medicine his primary love.
All those philosophy courses he had enrolled in had caused him to lose ground in his medical studies, so now he had to ditch philosophy altogether (he wrote Rose – and what he ‘wrote Rose’ was rarely the whole truth) and concentrate on medicine if he was going to graduate on time. But the detours had not been for nothing, because at that time, he knew “man” well, which he believed was necessary if he wished to be a good doctor.[27]
In Ulm, Sophie was preparing to join Hans. And Hans Hirzel’s plans to work with the White Rose were back on track.
He visited Heinrich Guter and told him about dumping the duplicating machine into the Danube. Unlike Franz Josef Müller and Walter Hetzel, Heinrich did not laugh. In fact, he did not so much as ask Hans Hirzel why he had bought a duplicating machine in the first place.[28]
Thinking ahead, Hans Hirzel knew he would have to find some way to transport leaflets from his home to the post office – and to Stuttgart, if that was to be the plan. He went to the leather shop owned by Kurt Glöckler’s parents, a handsome shop on Platzgasse, right off Ulm’s Münsterplatz. Telling Mrs. Glöckler that he required luggage for his upcoming induction into the armed forces, he paid 14 Marks ($112) for a nice brown leather suitcase.
Until he heard from Hans and Sophie, he determined he would use it to store the paper he had purchased for the old duplicating machine. So he took the suitcase he had just bought from the Glöckler’s store and carried it to their attic. These incriminating items would be far more secure there than at his own home.[29]
Alexander Schmorell also geared up for the work that lay ahead. He retrieved the American-made Remington typewriter from his neighbor, Karl Pötzl. No record of the excuse he used this time.[30]
Wednesday January 6, Willi could not put off his goodbyes any longer. He started the day in church, where the “awesome meaning of Epiphany” readied him for the year ahead. One last sales pitch to Alfred Reuter, one last round of hugs from his family. “I’ve been well taken care of at home,” he wrote, sounding almost surprised by the acknowledgment. His train left at 8:30 pm, and despite the annoyance of cigarette smoke in the compartment, he slept.[31]
With Sophie still in Ulm, Hans Scholl looked up Gisela Schertling again. He escorted her to a concert at the Bayerischer Hof.[32] Neither Gisela nor Hans recorded anything about the concert itself.
Hans convinced Gisela to accompany him to Manfred Eickemeyer’s studio. He had promised an artist in Ulm – Wilhelm Geyer – that he would ask about the possibility of Geyer’s using the studio while Eickemeyer was in Cracow. Gisela agreed, likely still enamored of Hans’ attention.
It is not clear whether the meeting with Eickemeyer had been set up in advance, or whether Hans merely dropped in on the older gentleman, hoping he would be home. Either way, he fulfilled his promise to Geyer. Hans told Eickemeyer that Wilhelm Geyer had recently received a contract from Firma Mayer to do glass paintings (paintings on glass, not stained glass windows). He showed the architect prints of Geyer’s banned works, explained about Geyer’s large, impoverished family.
Not only did Eickemeyer consent to meet with Wilhelm Geyer, he also told Hans that if that meeting went well, Geyer could use the studio at no cost. He wanted to hear more about Geyer’s work. Hans talked so long that they were in Eickemeyer’s studio until well after the last streetcar stopped running.
When Hans and Gisela left, Gisela mentioned that she had missed the streetcar to her room. Instead of offering to walk her home, Hans invited Gisela back to his apartment. She apparently believed his intentions were pure (or did not care if they were not), because she unhesitatingly went with him. Later she would say that she went only because he was highly persuasive.
Once there, Hans had only one thing on his mind. And that thing had nothing to do with getting acquainted with Gisela, with finding out that her father edited the Nazi newspaper for her hometown, much less with hearing that Gisela was proud of her father’s work and thought National Socialism was good for Germany. Hans later admitted he already knew all of that anyway.
Hans Scholl only wanted to get Gisela Schertling in bed. Yet not as a lover would go about seducing a younger woman. Hans gave Gisela a shot of morphine before proceeding with the “romance.” He told her he wanted to see what effect it would have. When Gisela was fully under the influence of the opiate, he had his way with her, though Gisela claimed they did not actually have intercourse that night.
The attempt to control Gisela did not end with sex-or-nearly-sex on Wednesday. From then on, Hans lectured Gisela about her political beliefs. He showed her his books and told her she must read them. And the very thing that had appealed to Gisela before Christmas now became offensive to her: Hans bragged about his “experience” and said that he was “mature beyond his years.”[33]
Whatever did or did not happen in his room seemingly did not affect Hans the next day. Willi Graf arrived in town and they spent the afternoon together. Although perhaps it did affect Hans, and Willi simply did not recognize the signs. Willi’s diary noted, “Tea, otherwise nothing.”[34] That had to have been disappointing when he had so much to report.
Among Willi’s other disappointments: Anneliese’s room. What had seemed so clear-cut before the holidays was back up in the air. Why couldn’t anything be easy? In any case, Anneliese was not in Munich yet, so he had a little time to figure it out.
Before heading over to visit Fritz & Company in the Siegfried Strasse, Willi dropped in on Hans Scholl again. Still no meaningful conversation as he had expected. Perhaps it was better that he had other plans.
To Willi’s delight, Gustel Sahm was at the Siegfried Strasse! Best of all, Willi learned that Gustel had been granted leave to continue his studies in philosophy and psychology in Munich. Still smarting from the loss of Hein Jacobs’ friendship, it must have been gratifying to reconnect with another old friend. If only Fritz Leist would leave Gustel alone.
That was not to be. After the war, Gustel told Anneliese Knoop-Graf that Fritz “expressly forbade him to take part in White Rose activities.” Gustel did not tell Willi that, but unlike Emil, he was not completely under Fritz Leist’s thumb.
The conversation between Willi and Gustel provided an exhilarating end to a trying day. They did not speak of Willi’s resistance efforts, merely the situation they found themselves in. Sometimes that was all it took to gain strength for the business at hand.[35]
For serious scholars:
Fritz Hartnagel and Sophie Scholl
Sophie’s January 1, 1943 letter to Fritz Hartnagel was in Jens, uncensored. Topics covered: Walk to Geislingen, and debate with Hans about Leibniz’s theodicy.[36]
Sophie’s January 3, 1943 letter was also in Jens, also uncensored. The primary topic in this letter centered around Sophie’s unhappiness that all suffering did not flow through her.[37]
© 2002, 2003, 2007, 2023 Denise Elaine Heap. Please contact us for permission to quote. To pre-order digital version of White Rose History, Volume II, click here. Pre-publication price is $48; after that date, price will increase to $54.
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