No Greater Love: After the executions

The telling of the White Rose story typically ends with the executions on February 22, 1943. But those executions triggered an avalanche of activity.

That avalanche of activity revealed who remained true to the fight for justice, and who demonstrated weakness as soon as courage was demanded. And who, being fully human, did not know which way to turn.

These are their stories from February 22 through February 24, 1943. In alphabetical order.

Lilo Berndl nee Ramdohr

News of the executions traveled fast. And now Lilo heard that there was a warrant out for the arrest of Alexander Schmorell? Already? On February 22, 1943? Unspeakable.

Lilo recalled that not only she, but also Miele Roters, Professor Baur, and even Maria the maid were terribly upset by the newspaper ad that appeared on February 24, 1943 [full text below]. A one thousand Mark ($8,000) reward was offered for the capture of her friend Alex.

Falk! Lilo suddenly remembered Falk Harnack. He would be expecting Hans Scholl the next day in Berlin. He had to know what had happened. Hopefully, she could catch him in Chemnitz before he left for the meeting.

She hurried to the nearest telegraph office. “Friends at the front have fallen,” she dictated. The clerk unquestioningly sent off the telegram, likely expressing sympathy for her loss. Now she could only hope he “got the message,” in more ways than one.

Gerhard Feuerle

Gerhard Feuerle fell apart when he heard about Sophie’s demise. He had had a hard enough time dealing with things he had seen on the front lines. Now this? “Nervous breakdown” would have been an understatement. As he later said, he “fell deeper emotionally than he had ever experienced before.”

His mother worried about him. In the wake of the arrests, student soldiers were under strict orders not to leave Munich. But Gerhard kept showing up at home. He told his mom he could not continue his studies. She would put him on a Munich-bound train, only for him to reappear on his family’s doorstep.

Wilhelm Geyer

Agent Rechtsteiner in Ulm was especially busy on February 24, 1943. That pesky artist, Wilhelm Geyer, was one of the Gestapo’s primary suspects. They should have known. He had been trouble since 1933!

Geyer endured the agent’s litany of the Scholls’ crimes, how they had hidden paint and the duplicating machine in “his” cellar. Rechtsteiner claimed they had even used the studio to print the White Rose leaflets. “The Scholls have been executed,” Rechtsteiner intoned, “and it looks bad for you too.”

Since Rechtsteiner did not record his questions, it is difficult to tell what information Geyer volunteered and what came about as the result of queries from the agent. Though he talked a lot, he gave the Gestapo little to go on. Geyer rambled on about his loyal service in the armed forces during World War I, and through December 1942 when his recent military service almost bankrupted his family.

He portrayed his relationship with the Scholls — and specifically with the Scholl siblings — as strictly personal, bound by a common love of art. He faithfully depicted his daily routine while he worked in Munich, including daily breakfasts and frequent dinners with Hans and Sophie, all with an apolitical spin. He had to eat with them to save money, because he had no means to cook himself a hot meal.

Agent Rechtsteiner was not stupid. Aha! He ate breakfast with them every day, then he assuredly heard them express political views. (He had been well-prepped by his colleagues in Munich.) Nothing too extreme, responded Geyer.

In a statement sure to please the Ulm Gestapo, Geyer said, “I was well aware of the political views of the Scholl siblings. I was particularly happy to see that Hans Scholl was against his father’s political views. Father Scholl is well-known to be an oddball who does not base his views on reality.” Rechtsteiner would not argue with that.

But, Geyer continued, when he had seen the graffiti in Munich, he had expressly asked Hans his opinion on the topic. And Hans had declared that something as stupid as that placed the entire university in danger. Moreover, they had even talked about leaflets once, and both Hans and Sophie had openly rejected “such machinations.”

As evidence of his good faith, Geyer offered to prepare a sketch of the layout of the basement for the files. That should help the Gestapo, no? And prove that all he had been after when he went downstairs with that dim candle was coal, nothing else.

Rechtsteiner was satisfied with Geyer’s statement, but he still made Geyer sign his interrogation transcript, which included a sentence swearing that as the father of six children, he would never have gotten involved with the Scholls, and had he ever learned of their treason, he would have tried to set them straight.

Before he left Rechtsteiner’s office, there was one more difficult issue to address: The studio key and those cigarette ration coupons. Not to worry, Rechtsteiner assured him. He would let the agents in Munich know that it was all right for Geyer to pick up both when he went to Munich next week to resume work with Firma Mayer. Just stop by the Gestapo offices and let them know who he was. Rechtsteiner would see to everything.

Since one could never know if or when a Gestapo agent could be trusted, Geyer was “extremely pale” when he got home that day. His wife Clara had worried about him, because the interrogation lasted four hours. She had no way of knowing if he would even come home. Pale or not, it was a relief when he walked in the door.

They would have been even more relieved had they seen the note Rechtsteiner added to the transcript. “Geyer has no priors. There are also no known negative matters from a political viewpoint. Next week Geyer is going to Munich on business. At that time he will pick up the keys to the studio. — Geyer sketched the layout of the basement of Leopold Strasse 38 as requested. It serves to complete his statements.”

Anneliese Graf

In Gestapo custody since late on the evening of February 18, 1943, Anneliese found herself suddenly free, at least for a while. They gave her no explanation — and her release probably occurred before Gisela Schertling’s testimony had been typed up and become general knowledge among the Gestapo agents in Munich. They just sent her home on February 24. She did not argue.

Gerhard Graf

Willi Graf’s father also saw the news. “I hope Willi wasn’t one of them,” he said. Willi’s name was not listed among those beheaded, but Gerhard Graf knew his son.

Willi Graf

Perhaps Willi Graf heard about the mediation efforts of Wolf Jaeger and Captain Buhl. He alone out of all the student soldiers caught up in the Gestapo dragnet officially and boldly demanded to be released from prison.

“Since I am not connected with the Scholl matter in any way,” the note declared in his own handwriting in a note addressed to The Official in Charge, “I hereby request that I be released as soon as possible so I may resume my military duties in the Student Company as well as resume my studies.” He signed it, Wilhelm Graf, Sergeant (Medic). Date: February 24, 1943.

Eugen Grimminger

Grimminger had read about the arrests. That had not been enough to make him lose sleep. But this? News on February 23 about their executions?

“I was flatly upset about the way the two of them acted,” he said later. “I could see that I had gotten myself into a difficult situation.”

Lisa Grote

When Lisa — nanny and friend of Alexander Schmorell and possibly Kurt Huber — heard about the executions, she knew only fear, and more fear.

Despite that fear, Lisa Grote met with her friends. These were the same people who had cheerfully made copies of White Rose and other leaflets, passing them out from baby carriages and any other means at their disposal. Now these people shared her fear. She could see it in their eyes. They had no idea what they should do now.

Fritz Hartnagel

Although the Scholls knew how to contact Fritz, no one let him know about the arrests of Hans and Sophie. Oblivious to events in Munich, Fritz pulled out some of Sophie’s old letters and penned a heartfelt letter to her. He thanked her again for the little purple flower she had sent him. That flower gave him hope, filled him with joy.

He worried, however, that in those last few letters — the last of which was written well before the arrests — she had not mentioned anything about where she was, what she was doing. Was Hans still in Munich?

February 23, and Fritz Hartnagel thought of little other than Sophie Scholl. It bothered him that she had shut him out of her life, that he didn’t even know what classes she was taking. “How will you be spending the day?” he wondered aloud in a letter written from his hospital bed. “You know, you have never written me anything about your lectures, which certainly take up a lot of your time. But I don’t sense that they are the most important thing for you, even though you certainly are in Munich to study at the university.”

He reported that he had been able to ingratiate himself with the nursing staff at the field hospital in Lemberg. One day he had been invited to share a bottle of wine, and another day, he and his roommate were invited to partake in “real coffee” and cake in a nurse’s room.

“You see, I am still terribly greedy,” he wrote Sophie. “Sometimes I am ashamed of myself when I lie in wait for a meal, like a lion in a cage. Hopefully, I will soon be able to overcome this reflex that comes from long privation.”

He promised Sophie another letter soon.

The same day that Fritz penned those words to Sophie, Magdalena Scholl informed Fritz of Sophie’s arrest and conviction. She said that Inge had also written Fritz a letter, and she didn’t know which letter would arrive first.

Mrs. Scholl told Fritz that the family would not have known about the arrests, much less the conviction, had it not been for the concern of friends who had traveled from Munich to Ulm to give them the news. She did not mention Traute Lafrenz and Wilhelm Geyer by name, perhaps for fear that so doing would endanger them.

Hans and Sophie were not the only ones arrested and convicted, she said. Another student, “the father of three of the littlest children,” had also been caught. And “one person” — Alex, though she did not name him either — “has fled.”

The Scholl family held out hope that the lives of Hans and Sophie would yet be spared (this was February 23!). Robert Scholl had submitted a clemency petition, she wrote, and they had not yet heard back from the courts. She assumed that meant it had not been rejected. If Fritz similarly could telegraph a clemency petition, “as one who fought in Stalingrad,” to the People’s Court in Berlin, his request could carry some weight.

Magdalena Scholl described their visit with Hans and Sophie at Stadelheim Prison the day before, unaware that it had been the last time she would ever see them alive.

“Sofie leaned easily on the radiator, smiling. She had a glow in her eyes that I had never seen before. She let nothing get to her. She probably had overcome everything in these days. Both of them praised the good treatment of the agents. Hans had lost a lot of weight. But his eyes were glowing and he assured us that separation [death] was not painful for him. We should say hello to everyone, including you. The divine” – not God, merely the divine – “was a comfort to them, and welcome.”

While Mrs. Scholl may have soft-pedaled many things pertaining to her children, when it came to Sophie’s inability to love Fritz, she did not gloss over the truth. She comforted him as best she could, without resorting to untruths. “You were attached to Sofie with a very rare faithfulness and love,” she began. “In her heart of hearts, she treasured this and would gladly have fled to this place, when so many kinds of people entered her life.” Mrs. Scholl deftly validated Fritz’s love for Sophie, without pretending that love had been returned.

Her consistent use of past tense with reference to Sophie and Hans indicates that she did not believe her own words about hoping the clemency petitions would ultimately succeed. In that same vein, she also encouraged Fritz not to give up on life. “This is not for nothing. Consider how difficult it is for us parents, that we must miss them for the rest of our earthly lives — our children, whom we loved so very much, who had such good and rich talents.”

Despite Magdalena Scholl’s deep-rooted Pietist faith, the events of the previous forty-eight hours left her badly shaken, almost doubting. “We would like to ask, weren’t there tens of thousands of angels that could have prevented this from happening? But then I hear Sofie singing, God wanted it this way.” She was doing her best, she told Fritz, to keep from asking WHY.

She hoped he would be able to come soon. “For us, you are a part of Sofie.”

Hans Hirzel

While Christoph Probst, Hans Scholl, and Sophie Scholl awaited execution at Stadelheim prison in Munich, in Ulm — a mere stone’s throw from the Scholls’ great apartment on Münsterplatz — Gestapo Agent Rechtsteiner called Hans Hirzel in for a follow-up interview. On this day, February 22, 1943, Hans Hirzel answered all questions truthfully, without evasion.

Before the interview could be completed, Rechtsteiner ordered the immediate arrest of Hans’ sister Susanne. Normally Susanne would have been in Stuttgart. On that particular day, she was in Ulm. When the Gestapo showed up at the Hirzels’ shabby parsonage, they ransacked that home, searching for evidence against the Hirzel siblings.

On February 23, 1943, Hans Hirzel — together with his sister Susanne — was transported to Stuttgart for further interrogation.

While Hans Hirzel was being interrogated at Hotel Silber in Stuttgart on February 24, Agent Rechtsteiner in Ulm kept digging. What other kernels of information could he glean from his two “interviews” with Hans Hirzel. Rechtsteiner read the evaluation that Dr. Hoffmann, the headmaster of the Gymnasium in Ulm, had submitted.

Rechtsteiner now had to process this report and forward it to Stuttgart. Hofmann’s words were a true backhanded compliment.

Hans Hirzel had overcome great physical handicaps to attain his level of knowledge and ability. He was intellectually gifted and multitalented. His strengths included music, natural sciences, mathematics, and philosophy, while his primary weakness had always been classical languages. He participated in class discussions and was diligent.

But. “He possesses a strong self-confidence that was likely not a little encouraged at home,” Hofmann wrote. “Therefore he is not always aware of the limits of his ability and his own immaturity.”

Hofmann repeated that theme in his closing statement, again blaming the parents for Hans’ shortcomings. “Basically, he is a decent, good-natured, and ideally disposed young person who wants justice. There is only a certain amount of immaturity in him. Perhaps he was too spoiled at home and too greatly admired.”

Rechtsteiner’s work did not stop there. During Hans Hirzel’s tell-all the day before, he had given up the source of the typewriter he used to type the addresses. In a breach of protocol, Rechtsteiner did not immediately dispatch agents to the Glöckler’s home to search Kurt Glöckler’s laboratory. Instead, he telexed the Gestapo in Munich. Should he pursue that lead?

Yes, the answer came back swiftly. And conduct an interview with Mrs. Emilie Glöckler who lent it to Hans Hirzel as well!

Therefore Mrs. Emilie Glöckler was summoned to Gestapo headquarters on February 24 and instructed to bring the typewriter with her. Before her interrogation, she handed the Triumph portable typewriter, new manufacture, to an agent. He in turn proceeded with the type comparison while Rechtsteiner interviewed the woman.

Though Ulm can be a small enough city that gossip spreads rather quickly, Mrs. Glöckler said she had heard nothing of the “distribution of leaflets with seditious content” charges filed against Hans Hirzel. In fact, his borrowing the typewriter from her had been an unusual but not extraordinary occurrence. He had never made use of one of their typewriters before, but after all, he did return it promptly, when promised.

Rechtsteiner dismissed her after that brief interview. He noted for the record — and for the Secret State Police [Gestapo] in Stuttgart — that they had secured the typewriter, and that the crime lab had run the usual type comparison tests.

Further, the Gestapo in Ulm had made inquiries with Chief Inspector Schrag of the telephone company in Ulm with regards to the Stuttgart telephone directory Hans Hirzel claimed he had pilfered from the post office.

“The Post Office cannot research the matter,” Rechtsteiner said, “since new telephone directories have not been placed in individual public telephone booths for the past two years. The fact of the matter is, telephone directories have been swiped from most of the public telephone booths. They have never been replaced.”

Susanne Hirzel

Unaware that Sophie and Hans Scholl had already been executed, Susanne nevertheless worried when the Gestapo showed up at the Hirzels’ home on February 22, 1943. It was their instructions to ‘wear something warm and bring along her toiletries’ that set off her internal alarm.

Her brother Peter, he who had seen such horrible things on the Russian front, accompanied her. Peter reminded his older sister that she should deny knowledge of the leaflets, that Hans had promised he would take the blame should their work be discovered.

The moment she sat down across from her interrogator, she knew she was in serious trouble. The agent had a checklist. He said if she answered truthfully, she would be allowed to go home. Instinctively, she knew that was a lie.

As she listened to the list of accusations, things her brother had said in his interrogation only an hour earlier, her heart sank. Hans Hirzel, her own brother, had betrayed her. He had given the Gestapo details of White Rose operations in Ulm and Stuttgart. She could only answer “yes” as the list was read.

Susanne regained her strength the next morning, despite having spent the night in a Gestapo jail. A female prison guard handed her a broom and a shovel, with the command to clean the floors. Susanne refused. The guard said nothing.

Susanne’s euphoria was short-lived when she was led outdoors to a waiting Mercedes. She and her brother Hans were being transported to Stuttgart for additional interrogations. Although her euphoria had waned, Susanne greeted Hans with “abundant overconfidence.” Which properly annoyed the Gestapo guards assigned to the siblings. Which thrilled Susanne.

Until Susanne’s excitement faded completely. Fears of Iron Maidens and Gestapo torture resurfaced. As the black Mercedes crossed the snow-covered Alb and drove along the Danube, she was afraid the agents would stop the car, lock it, and push them into the river. They were so very vulnerable.

She had to summon what little strength remained when they halted on Stuttgart’s Karlsplatz, home to the Gestapo. There can be no coincidence between the large numbers of dissidents from Stuttgart and its environs, and the unqualified brutality of Nazi measures in the city. White Rose talk of the “southern German propensity to democracy” was certainly not based in reality.

Because prison conditions here were worse than anything known in Munich. Had the Gestapo in Stuttgart taken the lead on the White Rose case, there likely would have been more executions than the seven that actually took place. And the humiliation would have been greater, because the Württemberg Justice Department kept its guillotine in the atrium of the courthouse. No privacy curtains as at Stadelheim.

Hotel Silber, ca. 1900. Stadtarchiv Stuttgart. Public domain.

Susanne’s description of the terror she experienced from February 23-25, 1943 is worth quoting in full:

They delivered us to the so-called “Hotel Silber [Silver],” a large building on Stuttgart’s Karlsplatz, at the time, Gestapo headquarters. I was put in a wooden cage, as there were clearly no cells in the house. It was unlit, absolutely dark, but it did contain a chair.

Now and then, unexpectedly, a light was turned on, but only for a short moment. I suspected that they wanted to make sure I was still alive, because it surely was important to them to have us. I could have easily killed myself if I had had a safety pin, or if I had had a nail file or tweezers among my toiletries.

I was taken from the prison on Büchsen Strasse, the so-called “Büchsenschmiere” [canned sandwich spread], to “Hotel Silber” for more interrogations, for fingerprinting and photos, this over three days. And always taken back to my “holding cell.”

Everything is thrown into a “holding cell,” prisoners who are between stations, prisoners picked up on the streets for drunkenness or knife attacks or such things. Since there were no chairs in this cell, approximately twenty-five women alternated indifferently between sitting on the floor and leaning against a shabby wall. In one corner there was a stinking, always overflowing pail that had to be used as a toilet, even when it overflowed.

At night, one mattress for every two women was thrown into the cell, along with linens that were filthy and covered with feces. I spent those three nights sitting up, refused to eat anything, and drank only very little water. I hung on to my toiletries like they were pure gold. I thought, “My skin is healthy and what touches it belongs to me and only me.” It’s a good thing this bug-infested nest was destroyed by bombs and no longer exists.

On Wednesday February 24, Susanne faced another interrogation, though this one was completely off-the-record. They fingerprinted her, took a mug shot. But before they took her back to that miserable cell, the agent said, “Yes, yes. You’re going to improve the world. Well, let me tell you one thing. This State destroys its enemies.” Destroys. That stuck with her for a very long time.

The Hirzel family

As Hans and Susanne Hirzel traveled to Gestapo headquarters in Stuttgart, their parents tried to shake off the aftermath of the previous day’s visit from the Gestapo. It had unnerved Mrs. Hirzel to the core of her being.

Agents Stolch and Barth had flashed their badges. Mrs. Hirzel and her oldest son Peter had escorted the gentlemen upstairs to Rev. Hirzel’s study, the first place they wanted to search. That pastor was a packrat — “Father never threw anything away,” Susanne said — and the agents were taken aback when they opened the door to his home office.

“Madam Pastor,” one of them said, “your son was surely never allowed entrance to this room? Surely we do not have to search here?”

They found nothing incriminating in Hans’ room, but they were convinced of his guilt. When they finished that search, one asked, “How can an educated person do such a thing?”

Peter Hirzel had followed his mother and the two agents throughout the house. Before they left, they checked him out. Anyone related to Hans and Susanne was automatically suspect.

Susanne Hirzel recorded the exchange between the agents and Peter in her memoirs. One of them asked Peter, “And just who exactly are you?” Peter: “I am his brother.” — The agent: “Your brother is a felon.” — Peter: “In my eyes, he is not.” — The official: “And where do you come from?” — Peter: “In contrast to you, I have come from the Front.”

For Mother, who stood in the background and heard all of this, it was not exactly amusing.

Wolf Jaeger

When the Gestapo agents sifted through the evidence collected in the Scholls’ apartment on February 18, they found the Gerhard Ritter book that Wolf Jaeger had checked out of the National Library on Hans Scholl’s behalf. Wolf’s name was attached to that volume.

So the Gestapo — weary from the high-stress weekend, but still on the case — called Wolf in for an interrogation. As he had done for Hubert Furtwängler earlier, Captain Buhl (C.O. of the Second Student Company) accompanied Wolf to the interview, ameliorating the harshness of the charges. Buhl personally vouched for Wolf and said he could not be involved in anything treasonous.

“This encouraged Wolf to plead the case for Alexander Schmorell and Willi Graf, who were also members of the armed forces,” Wolf’s wife said after the war. “He requested that the Gestapo withdraw their case and allow them to be tried before a military tribunal. Although he was able to take his pleas to the highest levels, he encountered only resigned replies and shaking of the head.”

Traute Lafrenz and Werner Scholl

Traute Lafrenz and Werner Scholl were still in Munich as Elisabeth Scholl learned the awful truth they had witnessed the day before. They spent this Tuesday, February 23, tending to “formalities,” primarily ridding Hans and Sophie’s flat of the mounds of evidence the Gestapo had left behind. In their rush to get the Scholls to trial as quickly as possible, the search had not been especially thorough.

The hard-working duo was aghast to discover rolled-up lists of names and addresses — more than 1,000 — mixed in with Sophie’s toiletries, evidently the recipients of leaflets in January and February. They discarded the printer’s ink and similar items. Traute called on her old landlady Mrs. Wertheim at Lindwurm Str. 13 (where Gisela Schertling now resided) for assistance. Mrs. Wertheim allowed Traute and Werner to burn the rolls along with anything that could incriminate other persons in the circle of friends.

The letters and diaries the Gestapo had overlooked? Those went back to Ulm.

Dr. Carl Muth

Carl Muth had to endure a search of his home (the Gestapo agents found nothing). That inconvenience did not bother him nearly as much as what he had read about the deaths of the Scholls and Christoph Probst. Werner Bergengruen recalled that “he spoke of Hans and his sister. He spoke of all the young, openly, or mutely protesting persons who were falling prey to the so-called greatest strategist [Hitler’s self-description] and executioner of all time. He grieved like a bereaved father.”

Angelika Probst

Following her brother Christoph’s arrest, Angelika Probst worried herself sick. She knew his trial was scheduled for February 22. But she had no news. The day was “sheer agony” for her. Her mother’s cryptic message the day before, telling her that Christl had not been affected by the arrests, provided cold comfort.

Around 5 o’clock in the afternoon on February 22, Angelika received a telegram from home. “Don’t worry. Everything will be all right.” Believing her mother must have received good news, she could finally exhale.

Until her stepfather called. “Get yourself on the very next train and come. I cannot say more.”

As her stepfather requested, Angelika left first thing the next morning from Marienau, the northern German town where she and her husband Bernhard Knoop ran a boarding school.

The trip took all day. When she arrived in Munich late on the evening of February 23, she kept looking for Christl. If everything were truly all right, he would be there to greet her. In the lights, noise, “bustling masses of people,” nowhere could she find her brother’s eyes.

“Rather, I saw the pale gray face of my stepfather,” she said. She asked him if something had happened. “And as if in a dream, I heard the answer. Yes, something has happened. Our Christl is no longer alive.”

With those few words, Angelika’s world crumbled.

When her stepfather took Angelika to her mother, she found Karin Kleeblatt “wholly broken,” her anguish over Christl’s death unbearable. Dr. Kleeblatt had learned of her son’s execution after the fact. She had not had an opportunity to say goodbye.

Angelika went for a walk the next morning, still unable to come to terms with Christl’s death. She was shocked to come face to face with bright reddish posters plastered on advertising pillars, posters proclaiming:

For high treason, the following were sentenced and executed: Hans Scholl, 26 years old; Sophia Scholl, 21 years old; Christoph Probst, 24 years old.

She also knew that her dear friend Alex, the man she loved more deeply than life itself, had fled, and that there was a bounty on his head.

With this insult added to the injury she could not endure, she was all the more pleased to observe new graffiti sprout on the walls of the University of Munich overnight. Some brave soul painted in huge letters, THEIR SPIRIT LIVES!

“And that is the truest and greatest thing that could possibly be said about what happened,” she concluded.

Herta Probst

Early in the afternoon of February 22, 1943, Herta Probst received a telegram from a stranger named Leo Samberger. Leo advised her to file a clemency petition on behalf of her husband Christoph Probst.

Unaware that Christl had already been beheaded, at 5:35 pm the same day, Herta notified the District Attorney’s office in Munich that she intended to join the Scholls’ clemency petition on behalf of her husband. “Written petition follows.”

The Propaganda Ministry

Following is the press release that hit all major newspapers in Germany on February 23, 1943. This is the version for the Munich papers.

“Death Sentences for High Treason.” LPM. On February 22, 1943 in a Courtroom of the Palace of Justice, the People’s Court sentenced 24-year-old Hans Scholl, 21-year-old Sophie Scholl, both of Munich, and 23-year-old Christoph Probst of Aldrans near Innsbruck, to death and to loss of civil rights for high treason and for aiding and abetting the enemy. The sentence was executed the same day.

Those sentenced had conducted themselves as characteristic loners in their defacing of houses with treasonous demands and by disseminating treasonous leaflets to the military and to the spirit of resistance among the German nation in a most shameless manner. In light of the heroic battle of the German nation, such depraved subjects have earned nothing else except a quick and dishonorable death.

Gisela Schertling

On February 24, 1943, Agent Schmauβ called Gisela Schertling in for another little talk. Dear, dependable Rev. Dr. Karl Alt had reported Sophie Scholl’s last words regarding Gisela to his real bosses, the Gestapo. Of course, Agent Schmauβ did not disclose that right away.

Gisela repeated her statements of February 18, especially the part about Hans’ calling out to her to tell Alex he would not be home that night. This time, Gisela gave Alex’s full name and said she had been too “excited” (or agitated) to remember his name. She had not withheld it on purpose.

Gisela asked Agent Schmauβ to return her books that had been in Hans’ apartment and gave him a list of the ones she needed. She also requested permission to visit her parents, which was summarily denied. And she could not say what the “general public” thought about the matter, because she had tried not to talk about it to anyone.

When pressed about Dr. Muth, Gisela essentially denounced him. Hans Scholl had said he was not a National Socialist and that he raved about the Weimar Republic. She had not seen a picture of the Führer in his home. She did not, however, think he was capable of seditious activity, and Hans’ treason certainly was not attributable to him.

She had been surprised by the events of February 18. She had no idea that the Scholls were involved in something like that. And (this question courtesy of Prison Chaplain Karl Alt) why Sophie would have asked her to give greetings to their friends, and who those friends might be? Willi and Anneliese Graf were the only friends who came to mind.

Schmauβ let her go, evidently convinced she did not know enough to warrant “temporary custody.” But not before she signed the transcript. There were no witnesses present.

Alexander Schmorell

On February 23, 1943, Alexander Schmorell spent a comfortless — but relatively safe — night, most likely in the home of a Bavarian composer named Kaminski.

Alex would stay on the streets of Munich all day on Wednesday February 24, alone and hunted. He did not reveal his whereabouts, how he stayed under the radar, or whether another acquaintance harbored him that Wednesday.

By now, Schurik topped the Gestapo’s “Most Wanted” list. Posters bearing his likeness had been supplemented by large newspaper ads. The photograph remained the same unflattering one used on the posters, almost a Mad Magazine caricature of a man with floppy ears, bug eyes, and a huge bow tie. But the text described him perfectly, if not especially polished.

One Thousand Mark ($8,000) Reward for Apprehension of a Criminal. The former student Alexander Schmorell, born September 16 (3), 1917, recently residing in Munich, is being sought. Schmorell is 1.82-1.85 m tall (5’11”-6’1”), thin, he has dark blond hair, blue-gray eyes, large prominent ears, and a somewhat large Adam’s apple. He walks erectly and speaks High German with a Bavarian accent. He was last seen wearing a gray-green hat with grayish white piping, gray-green windbreaker, gray jacket, long light gray pants, and worn brown shoes.

The public is requested to assist in the search with the additional incentive of the [above-mentioned] reward that may only be claimed by private parties. Communications regarding this matter will be treated confidentially if desired, and should be presented to Criminal Police Headquarters, Munich, Sixteenth Precinct, Room 385, Telephone Number 14321 Extension 457, or to the nearest police station.

Late the evening of the 24th, Alex settled into the attic room of his art instructor, Herr König. Although Mr. König was a loyal Nazi (no doubt about that), Alex recognized that he placed personal relationships above political principle. König gave Alex bread and tea and told him he would bring him breakfast in the morning.

A late-night air raid siren provided Alex with the opportunity to look up an old girlfriend under cover of darkness. The very pregnant Marie Luise might be able to help him escape. Since she had no connections to the White Rose, the Gestapo would never think of interrogating her about his whereabouts.

Alex therefore wended his way to the air raid shelter on Habsburger Platz where he found her as he had anticipated. He asked her to join him outside — it was another false alarm — because he needed to talk to her. But Marie Luise had seen the Wanted posters in the newspapers. Aiding and abetting a fugitive would not be good for her health.

She discussed the matter with a girlfriend in the shelter, who advised her against going with Alex, “since his face was already very well-known through the newspaper notices.” Before the All Clear had sounded, someone had already called the neighborhood mole also known as block warden, who in turn notified the Gestapo.

When Alex left the shelter, the Gestapo was waiting for him. They immediately took him into “temporary custody.” Alex was shaken to his very core, believing that Marie Luise had betrayed him. He could bear a great deal, but treachery on the part of a friend was something beyond his ken.

Lilo quickly learned that that had not been the case. All appearances to the contrary, Marie Luise had not been the informant. Professor Baur told her that Alex had been recognized by two soldiers in that same air raid shelter, and they, not Marie Luise, turned him in.

That was little solace to the tired young man who could run no longer.

Elisabeth Scholl

Elisabeth had not spoken with her parents since they returned from Munich late the evening of February 22, 1943. The job she had taken with the Scheringer family near Ingolstadt in mid-February required completion of a little paperwork with the Arbeitsamt [Labor Office] in that city.

Not suspecting a thing, she took care of business, then treated herself to a repast at a local café. She innocently leafed through the daily newspaper, coming upon the news item with photographs about the sentencing and execution of her siblings and Christoph Probst. “I thought I was losing my mind,” she said in 2003.

In June 1943, she described that balmy Tuesday morning, that February 23, for her family. “When I walked out of the café and onto the streets of Ingolstadt back then, completely dazed and yet surprised that the sun was still shining and people talked as usual, my sole small comfort was that Mother’s faith was so strong and that I could find a little refuge under that protection.”

The Scholl family

Robert Scholl was convinced that the Nazi justice system would do right by his two children. With the assistance of Leo Samberger, a law student, Robert Scholl had filed a clemency petition on February 22, 1943. The Scholl parents had even been granted a visit with both Hans and Sophie. Robert Scholl, a member of the German bar association, knew that his clemency petition would result in the release of his two children.

Secure in that belief, Robert Scholl called Leo Samberger and invited him to join the family for dinner at Humplmayr’s.

Around 6:30 pm, Leo joined Robert and Magdalena Scholl, Werner Scholl, and Traute Lafrenz at that very expensive, very nice restaurant. While they waited for their meal, Leo finalized the clemency petition on behalf of Christoph Probst. After handing it to Robert Scholl to edit, he greeted friends at a neighboring table.

Have you heard the news, those friends asked Leo. Those students, the ones with the leaflets? They just said on the radio that they were executed at 5 o’clock. Leo was stunned. He could not bring himself to give the Scholls that news.

Instead, they sat at table for hours on end, talking about the terrible things that had transpired that day. Leo tried to comfort them without giving away the horrible news, tried to distract them with something other than their children’s fate.

Leo joined the distraught family as they walked to the train station. Traute and Werner stayed behind in Munich to wrap up loose ends. After Robert and Magdalena Scholl boarded a train bound for Ulm, Leo stood in Munich’s quiet streets, talking and talking some more to Werner.

There is no record of the Scholls’ activities on February 23, other than the letter Magdalena Scholl wrote Fritz Hartnagel. But on February 24, the Scholl parents learned that they would be allowed to bury their two children, just not in Ulm. They would have to travel to Munich and the burial would have to take place at Perlacher Cemetery, with Rev. Dr. Karl Alt presiding.

Unaware of that cleric’s penchant for reporting everything he witnessed to the Gestapo, the entire Scholl family went to Munich that same day. None of them would have stayed away, even if they had been conscious of Alt’s true role in the affair. Inge thought Rev. Alt demonstrated “solidarity with the dead.”

Before they met at the grave site, Inge made two stops that were important to her. She visited Carl Muth, who told her that if he had known what Hans and Sophie were doing, “he would have tied them up with ropes.”

And together with Otl Aicher, she stood in Hans and Sophie’s rooms. There was a houseplant on Hans’ desk. It had not been watered in ages. Violet leaves were attached to the stems “like butterflies” and were scattered across the desk, his desk. A pot with tulips bloomed in Sophie’s bedroom.

Then the moment that had brought them to this place — the Scholls plus beloved friends Otl and Traute… Perlacher Cemetery was closed and under the pronounced supervision of the Gestapo. Föhn still reigned supreme, because that warm southern wind revealed snow-covered Alpine peaks in the distance.

Sun had started to set “blood red” as the funeral got underway. Rev. Alt pointed to the Alps and reminded the mourners “where our help comes from” in time of need. There is one sun that never sets, he said, and it only beams light and strength into the darkest and most sorrowful hours.

He closed the service with I Corinthians 13, telling those who grieved that their beloved children, siblings, friends had requested just that passage before they passed on. “No one has greater love than he who gives his life for his friends,” and the graveside service was ended.

They found “some place” to sit together, “in deep spiritual weariness,” as Inge recalled. Robert Scholl interrupted their reverie with a most disturbing proclamation. “Shouldn’t we all simply slit our jugular and join them? Show them that we won’t take this?”

Hans and Sophie would not have wanted that, friends and family implored him. Don’t even think such a thing!

Mrs. Scholl distracted her husband from his suicidal contemplations with a matter-of-fact, Let’s go eat supper. “She insisted that we eat together in some restaurant or another before we went home,” Inge said. “She was thinking about her still-living children. I believe she used up half her meat rations for the month for that meal [in the restaurant].”

One last stop remained for the Scholls before they caught the late train home. Werner, Inge, and Elisabeth showed up at Gisela Schertling’s apartment — accompanied by Traute Lafrenz — around 9 pm. They told Gisela that the parents were in town, and that they had also been present at the trial on the 22nd. They (the whole crowd) had gone to the burial that day.

Inge told Gisela about her visit with Carl Muth, and how that man had said he would have tied Hans and Sophie up with ropes had he known. This visit made Gisela very, very uncomfortable. She let them do most of the talking.

For one thing, they were far more upset about Hans and Sophie’s death than she was. Even Traute seemed broken up. Gisela’s anxiety must have been evident, because they stayed only fifteen minutes or so, before making some excuse or the other and taking their leave.

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The above information is fully footnoted in our White Rose histories. Please purchase them for access to that material! To order digital version of White Rose History, Volume I: Coming Together (January 1933-April 30, 1942), click here. To order digital version of White Rose History, Volume II, click here. WRH1 is © 2002, 2003, 2007 by Denise Elaine Heap. WRH2 is © 2002, 2007 by Denise Elaine Heap.

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