Last Letters Read online

  My dear love, what a time this is! What fruit will it bear? Will we have gained something that will make it easier for those who come after us, our own little sons above all, to gain insight, to plumb new depths and scale new heights? Or is each and every individual such an autonomous idea of God’s that he does, suffers, accomplishes, sows, reaps everything solely for himself? It is a matter of indifference, of course, yet this question does weigh on my mind. But one thing will remain for the little sons: You will carry these weeks within you, as a wellspring and as a host of angels watching over you, as something you can draw on, and the little sons are sure to sense and experience this

  [The letter breaks off here.]

  1. Refers to The Round Table: A Quarterly Review of the Politics of the British Empire, co-founded in 1910 by Lionel Curtis.

  2. A group of young people who had studied in Oxford and worked in South Africa under Governor Lord Alfred Milner after the Boer War ended in 1902. Curtis belonged to this group as well.

  3. This line of thinking shows how, in his attempts to find a defense strategy with any hope of success before the People’s Court, Helmuth tried occasionally to think in terms of the fascist ideology by which he would be judged. In this case, thinking out loud for Freya’s benefit, he strategically adopts a colonialist position, ostensibly in line with Germany’s own expansionist policies at the time. On the other hand, the supposition that Germany would have cooperated with the British Empire through some kind of “contribution” to its colonial enterprise would have been anathema to Nazi policy, particularly at this late stage of the war.

  4. Dietrich von Mirbach, a relative who worked under Steengracht in the Foreign Office.

  5. Many of the wives wound up being held in Sippenhaft, a kind of guilt by family association, in Moabit prison in Berlin.

  6. People in the Norwegian resistance who were affiliated with the Protestant church. Joachim Wolfgang von Moltke had been transferred to the armed forces staff in Oslo by the arrangement of Helmuth.

  7. Count Konrad von Preysing, the Catholic bishop of Berlin.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO FREYA, OCTOBER 17, 1944

  Tegel, 17 Oct 44

  My dear, tomorrow is the 18th,1 and I’ll probably live to see it, come what may. My dear love, what a happy day for us, a happiness, a grace that nothing can destroy. I know for certain that it will remain with me, for if the Lord should call me away, it will be one of the few treasures I’ll be able to take with me. When we must part, may this grace remain with you as well, seeing as how all this will be far more difficult for you.—The day after tomorrow, my dear, will mark nine months of my imprisonment, and that means you will have carried your worries and fear for me as long as you carried your little sons. If I must die, then I hope that through these nine months I’ll be reborn to you and can stay with you as your exclusive possession—on this earth—that no one else can claim. During this time, you’ve had to endure far more than I have, my love, and you have surely earned having your third son given to you.—My love, there’s one more thing that I want to say to you: You have accomplished something truly great in the years since 1933: You have always been prepared to sacrifice your husband. Never have you stood in his way out of concern for yourself, never have you flinched when something unpleasant needed to be done. No one will ever thank you for this, but you should know that through all these years, it has filled your husband with pride and joy. In this you stand totally alone among all the women involved, because all the others spent many years on the sunny side of politics.2—Recently it has all been coming back to me powerfully, every time I’ve thought about the many things for which I owe you my gratitude, how very much you have done and had to bear without knowing it. I know that it has ultimately enriched you as well, that you have also been sustained by the fact that the two of us have never wavered in our stance, that we never experienced any rupture.3 Still, it is nevertheless a real achievement on your part, one that is sure to have bolstered your strength to meet the challenges now facing you.

  My dear, on Saturday I was given an arrest warrant,4 which indicates that I will be going on trial along with Haubach, Steltzer, Gerstenmaier, Reisert, Sperr, and Fugger. I’m no. 1, and so it follows that this is an attack against Kreisau.5 The addition of the three Bavarians,6 whom I barely know, in connection with the fact that there are explicit statements to the effect that we were planning a violent overthrow, if need be with an act of violence against the Führer, makes me assume that the Gestapo has something specific from the Bavarian side. I don’t know what, but given the impossible conditions for mounting a defense before the People’s Court, even errors and mix-ups will be difficult to refute. At any rate, it seems clear that I am to be convicted because of Kreisau, not because of Goerdeler. Don’t let this message weigh down your efforts, for ultimately I have to act on the assumption that I will be able to refute this allegation, which goes way too far.

  My love, I cannot imagine that I’ll have any more opportunities to write to you, so I’m sending back your birthday letter and Casparchen’s first letter. I don’t want the executioners to ridicule them. Maybe they wouldn’t, but I don’t want to give them the chance.

  So until we meet again, my dearest love, my Pim, my tender, friendly, dearest wife. Until we meet again, here or there. Let us pray to the Lord that He may save me by a miracle, let us believe that He wants this and therefore can make it come about, but let us bow to His will if He has decided otherwise, and let us hold to our conviction that He has decided this for the sake of our salvation, even if we don’t understand. I’ll be leaving you in severe distress on the exterior, my love, but, I believe, with great inner strength and freedom. And so I needn’t worry about you and the little sons. He will watch over all of you and hold his hand over you. My love, I need to remind you once again that this verse unites us: “For whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord’s.”7

  J.

  1. Their thirteenth wedding anniversary.

  2. This is an exaggeration. Many of their friends stood in opposition to National Socialism from the outset, just like Helmuth and Freya, though some had cooperated with the regime in earlier years.

  3. Freya and Helmuth had opposed the Nazis from the beginning; see the Editors’ Introduction.

  4. See Appendix: Additional Documents.

  5. Kreisau used here to mean the opposition meetings held there in 1942 and 1943.

  6. Franz Reisert, Franz Sperr, and Joseph-Ernst Fürst Fugger von Glött, who were part of a Catholic Bavarian resistance group.

  7. Romans 14:8.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO HIS SONS, CASPAR AND KONRAD, OCTOBER 17, 1944

  Tegel, 17 Oct 44

  Dear Caspar, dear Konrad,

  I have one more thing I need to say to you, because no else can tell you this. Ever since National Socialism came to power I have tried to ease things for its victims and to pave the way for change. My conscience drove me to do this, and this is, after all, a duty for a man. This is why I’ve had to make material sacrifices and expose myself to personal dangers from 1933 onward. Throughout all these years, Freya has never tried to hold me back or even pressure me not to do what I thought was necessary, even though she was the one who suffered the most from the material sacrifices and has had to live with the constant worry that I might be arrested, locked up, or killed. She has taken everything upon herself willingly; she has always been prepared to sacrifice me if necessary. And I’m telling you that this is far more than I have done. Even running known risks is nothing compared with a willingness to let the person to whose life you have bound your own run risks that cannot be foreseen. And it is also far more than what a soldier’s wife takes upon herself, because she, of course, has no choice in the matter; but I did have a choice, and one word from Freya would have held me back from much of what I undertook.

  So, my dears, I want you to know what a brave mother you have. Love her, love one anot
her, and may you thrive in body, heart, and soul.

  Your Helmuth

  FREYA TO HELMUTH JAMES, OCTOBER 17–18, 1944

  Tuesday afternoon

  My Jäm, it’s not so urgent after all. This morning I was expecting it1 and was distressed when I received the two old letters with your nice new one, but as it turns out, we still have some time after all, and the arrest warrant seems to be a mere formality. I’ve known since last week, and said as much, that you are on a list with these others and in that order. There was a folder on Schulze’s desk,2 where I was able to study all of you. On the bottom it said “high treason and betrayal.” I don’t know whether we can necessarily draw the conclusions that you’re drawing from this. In any case, Schulze said today that the agenda indicates that your trial could not take place before November;3 every slot is taken for this week, and from the end of the week until November 3, the court would not be convening.

  You wrote a lovely letter to me, my dearest; and it didn’t give me any delusions of grandeur, although you regard my accomplishment as greater than it is. I achieve my true accomplishments unwittingly, and that is how I recognize the extent to which I belong not to myself but to God. (You wrote your letter this morning, this morning, just now, you thought about and wrote this. That’s how close we are, my husband!) The idea of the third son is also lovely, even though the sons don’t belong to us, yet we likely do belong to each other. But maybe I can carry you within me, somewhat longer at any rate, my love. I always want to carry you within me and never give birth to you, my love, and I can do that too. In these nine months, I’ve sometimes been so worried and anxious about you, though not always. Occasionally things have been calm for long periods of time, and I’ve been carefree, even though I was never free, but don’t overestimate that. Yes, I’ve always found that I would have to be prepared to sacrifice you, because a human life doesn’t acquire its true value until one is prepared to stake that life on something. Only in the past ten years have we learned that. I have always understood your putting your life on the line. That’s the way it has to be, and the consequences must also be accepted. Maybe we have to do this. But the other women see it the same way; Marion [Yorck], in any case, is just as aware of this.

  I agreed with and approved of everything else you wrote. You could have held on to the letters. I’ll write you a new, more encoded one, and give you back the one from Casparchen. I don’t think the executioners will be ridiculing them. Why should they be stored away? They’re yours, not mine, and they should be with you, but I can also understand your wanting to die free of things, then you can tear them up in the end.

  Wednesday afternoon: You see, the letter stayed where it was, and meanwhile a day went by that was happy for me. I visited you,3 I thought of you. You were with me, warm and sheltered in me; I wasn’t alone at all. I was doing well. My love! I’m sending you a tender embrace. P.

  1. The imminent trial.

  2. Kurt Schulze, the prosecutor assigned to Helmuth’s case.

  3. Freya was in the prison to exchange Helmuth’s clothing, but she did not see him.

  FREYA TO HELMUTH JAMES, OCTOBER 19, 1944

  Thursday afternoon

  My dear love, I just read your letters again and enjoyed them. I left most of them in Kreisau, but now I have new ones again. Do you sometimes think of Peter [Yorck]? Is he on your mind? Is he one of the people making your departure easier? How do you feel about him? That interests me. I’m so fond of him and am also quite attached to the women in his life.1 I really love him, the way I love my brothers and yours, and he was very close to me in the past few months with his unceasing helpfulness and friendship. He really loved you!—I’m reading various passages in the New Testament, mostly the passages on your note; I read those again and again.2 I stand before these inexhaustible sources of help and comfort with amazement and delight and gratitude, and still have everything ahead of me. Muto was telling me about one passage, and I must pass it along to you. Do you know it? 2 Cor. 6:3–10.3 It’s beautiful, isn’t it. But you can’t get so caught up in Paul that you forget the Gospels. Yesterday I read the Sermon on the Mount, but it has to be read again and again and again. It takes a while to unearth its treasures. I’m also reading and rereading Psalm 139. I like it so much. I read it and think about you and hope that it will always help you when your peace of mind is threatened. I am so sure, my love, that God will not abandon you.

  Hans [Deichmann]4 is about to call, he wants to come by and get me, and we’ll eat sandwiches here. I’ll have to stop when he calls, make tea, and pick him up at the commuter train. I wonder what happened the other day when you were gone! Will I hear about it tonight? When I’m cradled in my joy, I often get frightened and wonder what I’ll find when I’ve gone up the stairs and pressed the button. How nice it is that Hans hasn’t called yet. It’s so nice to write along with you. I see my beloved head and my beloved hands in front of me. I kiss them and love them and am with you with all my feelings and thoughts. May God watch over you, my beloved husband. I am and will remain your P.

  1. Marion Yorck and her sister-in-law, Irene Yorck, known as Muto, both of whom participated in the Kreisau Circle discussions.

  2. See Helmuth’s letter of September 30, 1944.

  3. 2 Corinthians 6:9–10: “as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.”

  4. Freya’s brother, Hans Deichmann.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO FREYA, OCTOBER 19, 1944

  Berlin, 19 Oct 44

  The things you brought yesterday were delightful. But don’t take any more chocolate away from your little sons for the sake of your gluttonous husband.

  On the 17th I spent about forty-five minutes with Müller.1 He was very friendly in his comportment and well briefed, and he had a very good though not entirely fair opinion of me. The essence was: “You are an opponent of National Socialism. At the very least, you have shielded traitors by not providing evidence, and you lied to us, not formally but in substance; even if I take a very lenient view of your own part in this, you have permitted, or weren’t able to prevent getting caught up in, the net of the sly old foxes2 and thus did their bidding.”—He also assured me that he had no reason to sling mud at me, and this is why he told you that you could raise the little sons to have respect for their father. So the overall thrust of the discussion revolved around imminent killing, which was only to be expected. At two points, however, there were hints that the verdict wasn’t set in stone yet. I’ve forgotten the first one. The second one came at the end, as we were saying goodbye, when he remarked, “Perhaps we can discuss this issue after the verdict, but for now you need to head to the People’s Court.” This may have been meant to guard against suicidal tendencies. That is possible. Still, maybe there is something to it. If I consider this comment along with another one, “The anger about your conduct has dissipated, but we have to act according to sober political considerations, and they necessitate your conviction for high treason,” it seems to me that there’s a very small window of opportunity, but one that requires two things: 1. that the trial goes reasonably well and that from their point of view the impression they have of me isn’t utterly catastrophic, and 2. that there is a straightforward political interest in sparing me for now. The first assumes that Freisler is dealt with, and the second, that Steengracht comes through. I would strongly urge that dealing with Freisler is mainly entrusted to Carl Viggo [von Moltke]. He’s better in this case. The only way forward I see is for them to want me to be kept alive for a future purpose; a petition for clemency necessarily leads to carrying out the sentence. The arguments—he surely didn’t want it, he got entangled in all this against his own will—can only serve to bring the trial to a tolerable end, one that you might give a grade of D+, so to speak, with this “plus” making it possible to justify a deferral by citing the interests of the state. I didn’t get
the impression that Müller despised me or has his mind set 100 percent. My dear, the whole thing is quite complicated, just like everything your husband does, and I hope that as you ponder it, it will get somewhat simpler.

  Goodbye, my love, may the Lord watch over you. J.

  1. It must be emphasized how extraordinary it would have been for the chief of the Gestapo to meet with a prisoner destined for execution before the trial.

  2. Members of the Goerdeler and Beck group; see Editors’ Introduction.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO FREYA, OCTOBER 20, 1944

  Tegel, 20 Oct 44

  My dear, hold on to the letter from Casparchen. It is such a lovely letter, I carry it in my heart, and maybe it will bring you and him joy later on. It was hanging on the closet of my cell1 all these months and was the most colorful thing in the cell. It caught my eye a hundred times a day, and reminded me of the golden heart that, God willing, is blossoming under your care. I can’t put the letter on the wall here; it’s just lying in my folder, and I’m worried it’ll get lost.

  I have a need to use these days to the fullest, to spend every hour working on us and on making ourselves ready. But after the strain of the past three weeks things eased up when the announcement came that there is time until November 3, and it’s no longer going at full blast. The result is that I’m interested in all kinds of things that had already disappeared from view, such as the fields in Kreisau, the development of your fruit trees, the plantings in the wooded areas between the fields, and so on. I’m quite amused at myself. But now, when I wake up at night, I suddenly think of the blooming fruit trees in the garden; only five or six days ago, I always turned to passages from the Bible or hymnal verses at times like these. Just goes to show how weak the flesh is under normal circumstances. I’m sending you a few hymnal verses that have delighted me. And I embrace you, my love; may the Lord watch over us. J.