Helmuth James Graf von Moltke

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Helmuth James Graf von Moltke (born 11 March 1907 in Kreisau bei Gräditz, Lower Silesia, now part of Poland; died 23 January 1945 in Berlin) was a German jurist, a member of the opposition against Hitler in Nazi Germany, and a founding member of the Kreisau Circle resistance group. He was the great-grandnephew of Helmuth von Moltke the Elder, the victorious commander in the Franco-Prussian War and the Austro-Prussian War, and the owner of the Kreisau Estate in Silesia. He was the firstborn of the landowner and member of the Prussian house of Lords (Preußisches Herrenhaus) Graf Helmuth von Moltke. His mother, Dorothy (née Rose-Innes), was a South African of British descent, the daughter of Sir James Rose-Innes, the highest judge in the Union of South Africa. Both Moltke's parents were members of the Christian Science church.

1 Life
2 Endnotes
3 See also
4 Publications
5 Literature
6 External links
7 Notes

[edit] Life

From 1927 to 1929, Moltke studied legal and political sciences in Breslau (now Wrocław in Poland), Vienna, Heidelberg, and Berlin. In 1931 he married Freya Deichmann, whom he had got to know in Austria. In 1928 he got involved with college teachers and youth movement leaders in the organization of the "Löwenberg Labour Community" {Löwenberger Arbeitsgemeinschaften) in which jobless young workers and young farmers were brought together with students so that they could learn from each other, and also so that something could be learnt about civics, obligations, and rights. In Kreisau, Moltke set aside an unused part of the estate for farming startups, which earned him harsh criticism from neighbouring landowners.

In 1934, he sat his junior law examination. In 1935, he forwent the chance to become a judge, for he would then have had to join the NSDAP, and instead, he opened a law practice in Berlin. As a lawyer dealing in international law, he could on the one hand help displaced Jews and other victims of Hitler's régime emigrate, and on the other hand, he could travel abroad to establish contacts. Between 1935 and 1938, Moltke regularly went to Great Britain, where he completed English legal training in London and Oxford, so that he could represent his clients before the British courts if needed. When the Second World War broke out, he was active in the international law division of the Abwehr, the Wehrmacht's intelligence service, under Admiral Wilhelm Canaris.

Moltke possessed strong religious convictions and in a letter written to a British friend Lionel Curtis, which was smuggled to Britain via Switzerland in 1942 Molte wrote “Today, not a numerous, but an active part of the German people are beginning to realize, not that they have been led astray, not that bad times await them, not that the war may end in defeat, but that what is happening is sin and that they are personally responsible for each terrible deed that has been committed-naturally, not in the earthly sense, but as Christians”^[1]. In the same letter, Moltke wrote before World War II, he believed that it was possible for one to be totally opposed to Nazism without believing in God, but he now declared his former ideas to be "wrong, completely wrong"; only by believing in God could one be a total opponent of the Nazis in Moltke's opinion ^[2].

His work here mainly involved gathering insights from abroad, for instance from military attachés and foreign newspapers, and news of military-political importance, and relaying this information to the Wehrmacht. Furthermore, he was to maintain the connection between the supreme command of the armed forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht — OKW) and the Foreign Office, but above all to provide appraisals in questions of international law of war. Moltke hoped that, with his appraisals, he could have a humanitarian effect on the military events, and was supported in this by anti-Hitler officers such as Admiral Wilhelm Canaris and Major General Hans Oster, Chief of the Central Division.

Moltke's mindset and his objections to orders that were at odds with international law were not without danger, and in January 1944, he was arrested by the Gestapo. A year later, in January 1945, he stood, along with several of his fellow régime opponents, before the Volksgerichtshof, over which presided Roland Freisler. Since no evidence could be found that Moltke had participated in a conspiracy to bring about a coup d'état, Freisler had to invent another charge. Since Moltke and his friends had thought about a Germany based on older moral and democratic principles that could develop after Hitler, Freisler deemed fit to regard this as treason, a crime worthy of death. Hanns Lilje writes in his autobiography that as Moltke stood before the Volksgerichtshof, he had "possessed, in the face of clear recognition of the fact that the death penalty had already been decided, the moral courage for an attack on Freisler and the whole institution". In two letters written to his wife in January 1945 while imprisoned at Tegel, Moltke noted with considerable pride that he was to executed for his ideas, not his actions, a point that been underlined a number of times by Freisler. In one letter, Moltke noted "Thus it is documented, that not plans, not preparations, but the spirit as such shall be persecuted. Vivat Freisler!"^[3]. In the second letter, Moltke claimed that he stood before the court "...not as a Protestant, not as a great landowner, not as an aristocrat, not as a Prussian, not as a German...but as a Christian and nothing else"^[4].

Memorial stone to Moltke and his brother at Kreisau (Krzyżowa)

Moltke was sentenced to death on 11 January 1945 and put to death twelve days later at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin. In a letter written while in custody, he bequeathed his motivation for resistance to his two sons: "Since National Socialism came to power, I have striven to make its consequences milder for its victims and to prepare the way for a change. In that, my conscience drove me – and in the end, that is a man's duty."

Moltke has been honoured with a bust at Walhalla temple. As a very religious man, he was at once against the Nazi régime and against the attempt on Hitler's life.

[edit] Endnotes

↑ Rothfels, Hans The German Opposition to Hitler, London: Oswald Wolff, 1961 page 112.
↑ Ibid page 114.
↑ Ibid page 122.
↑ Ibid.

[edit] See also

List of members of the July 20 plot

[edit] Publications

Bericht aus Deutschland im Jahre 1943 ("Report from Germany in the Year 1943").
Letzte Briefe aus dem Gefängnis Tegel ("Last Letters from Tegel Prison"). Letters to his wife Freya and his two sons from the time of the trial against him, first published in 1951, later published together with Bericht in many editions (latest: Diogenes, Zürich 1997 ISBN 3-257-22975-5).
Briefe an Freya. 1939-1945 ("Letters to Freya"). Published by Beate Ruhm von Oppen. 2. Auflage, Beck, München 1991 ISBN 3-406-35279-0

[edit] Literature

ΔFreya von Moltke, "Erinnerungen an Kreisau 1930-1945", München 1987/2001 ΔFreya von Moltke, "Die Verteidigung europäischer Menschlichkeit", in: Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, Beilage zur Wochenzeitschrift "Das Parlament", Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung, Heft B27/2004

Kurt Finker: Graf Moltke und der Kreisauer Kreis. Dietz, Berlin 1993 ISBN 3-320-01816-7
Franz von Schwerin: Helmuth James Graf von Moltke. Im Widerstand die Zukunft denken. Zielvorstellungen für ein neues Deutschland. Schöningh, Paderborn u. a. 1999 ISBN 3-506-73387-7
Hanns Lilje: Im finsteren Tal, Reihe Stundenbücher Bd. 25, Furche Verlag, Hamburg