As an officer on the Luftwaffe staff, Schulze-Boysen had access to high-level information which was transmitted to a Soviet intelligence agent. ... Today, the members of the Rote Kapelle are heroes of the Resistance against Hitler. Originally, Mildred was given a six-year sentence, as she played a comparatively lesser role, but Hitler personally intervened and ordered her death. Throughout this time, Mildred Harnack’s primary job was to recruit members for the circle. Arvid gained his doctorate with a thesis which examined American workers’ movements and their migration towards communism. However, there were several well-known German resistance organizations which operated not only in Germany but in several of the occupied countries and one neutral country. These men were in high level positions (i.e., operations, logistics, transport, military, and most importantly, communications) with access to classified information. Red Orchestra was an all-inclusive term used for three separate groups: the Lucy spy ring, the Trepper Group, and the Schulze-Boysen/Harnack Group. This group smuggled coded messages on troop movements and other strategic information to the Russian Front. The guillotine was reserved primarily for the women and on 22 December 1942, it began with Libertas who, unlike the others, went to her death in a most undignified way. The first trial of thirteen defendants included Harro and Libertas Schulze-Boysen, Arvid and Mildred Harnack, the Schumachers, and the radio operator, Hans Coppi. Instead, they met at social occasions and from time to time, one on one. This was accomplished when information was exchanged for the promise their families would be protected. Miraculously, after being condemned to death, Greta Kuckoff (1902−1981) had her sentence commuted to ten-years in prison. He was not the only high-ranking Nazi protected by the Allies but that’s a story for a future blog post. One member of the Red Orchestra was Mildred Harnack (neé Fish). Of the three organizations in the Red Orchestra, the Lucy spy ring was the most effective. or, Sicherheitsdienst (the SS intelligence service) targeted was Die Swartz Kapelle or, The Black Orchestra. The guillotine at Plötzensee prison was located in the execution shed where thousands of German, Polish, and Czech underground operatives had previously been guillotined. In 1933, the SA or, the Brownshirts, raided the offices of Der Gegner and beat up Schulze-Boysen leaving swastika carvings on his back. His wife, Libertas, a family friend of Göring, joined Harro’s spy network and passed along information she received through her interaction with the field marshal (albeit, unbeknownst to him). Sandy and I were introduced to Jack and Kim H. by our good friend John W. We had cocktails with them the other day over at the Celtic Ray. In the author's notes at the end of the novel fill in some of the factual items about the group. In 1940–1941, the group was in contact with Soviet agents, trying to thwart the forthcoming German attack upon the Soviet Union. Released on 15 December 1942 as not identified to be part of the Red Orchestra by the Gestapo. It is said that he sent almost 130 messages per month over a period of three years. After the war, the Soviets rewarded Trepper with a lengthy prison sentence and for unknown reasons, he avoided being executed. We normally associate resistance to the Nazi regime as something that occurred in the occupied countries. Another organization the Gestapo and the S.D. Code books were discovered and hundreds of Soviet agents were identified. Jennifer Chiaverini’s historical novel Resistance Women is based on the true story of Mildred Fish Harnack and her circle of friends in the Red Orchestra (Rote Kapelle) resistance group in Berlin. They were extremely lucky since none of them knew the first thing about spy-craft, beyond a common sense approach. That designation, assigned by Nazi intelligence rather than the networks themselves, has basically stuck and colored their postwar reputation with the anti-Communist politics of the Cold War. If you were lucky, all they did was savagely beat you up. Led by General Ludwig Beck, the Black Orchestra was a loosely organized network of high-ranking German Wehrmacht and Abwehr officers. Other members of the Black Orchestra or at least willing participants, included the German ambassador to Rome, the mayor of Leipzig, most of Canaris’s staff, Field Marshall Erwin Rommel, General Ludwig Beck, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, General Carl-Heinrich von Stüpnagel (the German Military Governor of Paris), and other high-ranking officials. Over the next few weeks, the Nazis closed in. Even within the British intelligence community there were competing departments and agencies. Sandy and I appreciate you visiting with us. He was found guilty and served nine-months in prison before being released. This information included troop movements, invasion timetables, production statistics, and the equipment lost in each battle. It was such a compelling title that, after the war, Stalin co-opted the name and allowed the Western Allies to build up the Red Orchestra’s deeds to a great extent, knowing they would credit him with its accomplishments. She accompanied her husband on his trip to the USSR, and back to the USA in the later 1930s. The last and most dangerous act of overt resistance was called Widerstand or, “taking a stand against” the Nazi regime. He had a steel beam installed at the far end of the execution shed with eight meat hooks attached. Historically, people have reacted in three primary ways to totalitarian and fascist regimes such as Hitler and his Nazi party: they support it, they oppose it but do nothing or, they oppose it and become a resistance fighter (in small or large ways). The circles in which the Harnacks moved meant they met several influential people, many of them liberally minded, who hoped for the downfall of Hitler. I love the fact that one member decided to care for the Orphans of this group after the war. These were the Communists and the Social Democrats (the socialists). No, not the NFL or college football—we don’t watch any of that (except maybe for Michigan football when we’re not traveling during the fall). Libertas held out hope because of her Göring connection. For a time, Libertas worked in the movie division of the Propaganda Ministry and saw first-hand how the Nazis either stretched the truth or simply lied. Interest in hunting down former Nazis let alone prosecuting them had waned. However, others knew they would break under the interrogation and committed suicide, including John Sieg, for the purpose of protecting others. You like to travel and experience history and historical events. Other members were Social Democrats, members or adherents of the tenets of the former liberal ruling party of Weimar Germany. One of his cousins, Hans von Dohnanyi, was a member of the military group that later attempted to kill Hitler. I’m talking about what we Americans call soccer and we’re the only ones who call the game by that name. We think in terms of the Nazis’ persecution of the Jews but it is interesting to read about how they annihilated the Communists and Socialists before turning their full attention to the Jews. One of the leaders of the Black Orchestra was Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, head of the Abwehr—the German intelligence organization which reported up through the high command of the Wehrmacht (as opposed to the competing intelligence agency, the S.D. However, it is a first-hand account of an insider’s activities in Paris. Throughout 1941 and 1942, the group sent information to the Soviet Union. Keep in mind that Trepper is likely trying to sanitize his involvement as a double agent. Born in Wisconsin to German immigrants, Mildred became a doctoral student and lecturer on German literature at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. That evening, eleven leading members of the Red Orchestra were executed at Plötzensee—five were hanged and six by the guillotine. Trepper was able to escape his captors in 1943 and immediately went underground. The Great Game: Memoirs of a Master Spy. These members of the group organized around leftist Luftwaffe communications officer Harro Schulze-Boysen and intellectual Arvid Harnack were one of three Soviet intelligence nodes all of whom were confusingly designated Die Rote Kapelle. From 1936 onward, the Harnacks were friends with the Schulze-Boysens and others in this growing group. The Schulze-Boysens and the Harnacks were executed separately during the winter of 1942-43. Adam Kuckhoff broke under torture and gave the Nazis the names of the last remaining Red Orchestra members still at large. This group was never “official” in the sense that they had large meetings. She was liberated by the Russians and lived out her life in East Germany as a successful banker and politician. Nelson’s book is new, but her argument is not unique. P.S. Anne Nelson’s Red Orchestra: The Story of the Berlin Underground and the Circle of Friends Who Resisted Hitler (review | another) attempts to rehabilitate the Berlin circle from postwar red-smearing and underscore the everyday-ness of the participants (not all of them politically left) and the courage of their respective decisions to oppose Hitler actively. Your email address will not be published. You like to see original buildings that had a significant impact on the people and events of the history you’re engaged with. At that point, questions were beginning to be asked about Germany’s ability to win the overall war. The Vichy government turned a blind eye to the British led intelligence organizations such as Special Executive Operations (SOE) but they hated anyone associated with de Gaulle. Almost immediately after Hitler took power in 1933 the suppression and brutality by the Nazi regime began. Most of the condemned men were hanged by piano wire. Today, the members of the Rote Kapelle are heroes of the Resistance against Hitler. During his four years in the German army during World War I, Roessler met the soldiers who would later provide him with high-level military information which he would in turn, pass on to the Allies. The leader was Rudolph Roessler (1897−1958), a young newspaper man who tried to warn his fellow Germans about Hitler and the Nazi party. They supplied Roessler with a radio (nicknamed Lucy—short for Lucern, Switzerland). The Resistance is formed bit by bit, piece by piece and members are chosen carefully. 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