Five hours later, a jury of seven men and five women with two alternates of each sex was seated. Although nearly equally divided by gender, no one could say that there was a diversity of political opinion on the panel. A jury pool pre-evaluated by the FBI for unorthodox opinions was one subjected to a political litmus test—not an evaluation of its impartiality.
It was almost four in the afternoon when Mildred stepped back into the prison van to return to her eight-by-ten-foot cell. That evening, her stepsister Edna Mae Herrick dined with the journalist John Bartlow Martin. Martin, on assignment for McCall’s, was covering the trial for the popular women’s magazine. The Justice Department refused his request to interview Axis Sally so he sat down with Edna Mae, who had become a de facto spokesman for her sister since her arrival in the United States.
In the restaurant, Martin took copious handwritten notes as she described her sister’s formative years—her popularity in school, her close relationship with their mother, and her miserable relationship with her alcoholic stepfather. As she told Martin of her family’s troubled history, the restaurant’s cashier read aloud from an inaccurate gossip column in a Hearst newspaper.
“It says she did it because she was afraid. She is out on bond. She’s walking the streets right now!” the cashier yelled across the room.
“Is that the great American public?” Edna Mae wondered aloud and then fell into a deep silence.
After a few moments, she said, “People used to turn and stare at my sister on the street. I was always so thrilled that she was my sister. She was so wonderful.”381
Moved by her story, Martin wrote in his notes of Axis Sally’s dysfunctional relationship with her stepfather—and Edna Mae’s claim that Mildred was “hurt” by him. After hours of conversation with Mrs. Herrick, Martin had no clear answer to the question of how Mildred Gillars became a woman capable of treason, but his conversation with Edna Mae seemed to provide some clues:
Why did she need success so desperately? We do not know. We return to her childhood, when a loathing for her stepfather may have driven her from home as forcefully as did ambition. But the truth seems to be buried too deep to resurrect: one doubts she herself knows it.382
The details of Mildred’s youth were there for a reporter to hear, but they would see neither the printed page nor the open air of court. Words that may have painted a fuller, more sympathetic picture of Axis Sally would sit in a journalist’s files—unread and unexamined—for almost sixty years.
Sugarcoated Pills
With cool, methodical certainty, Assistant Attorney General John M. Kelley, Jr. laid out the Government’s case against Axis Sally. In 1947, Kelley had won the conviction of Boston Mayor James Curley on mail fraud charges, and quickly established a reputation as one of the Justice Department’s top young prosecutors. With a flair for mixed metaphor, Kelley compared the defendant’s radio work to “sugarcoated pills of propaganda” scattered far and wide to sow “seeds of suspicion and discontent” on the American home front and on the battlefield.383 Axis Sally denounced “members of the Jewish race, the then-President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill and the British people” for fame and profit.384
A failure in show business, Kelley claimed that she coldly sold her birthright to become a well-paid and well-known celebrity. The prosecutor described her meteoric rise in sordid terms. Driven by ambition and greed, she indulged in an affair with a fanatical Nazi—a man with three children and one on the way—to pave her road to the top. She was so successful that, by 1944, Mildred Gillars was the highest paid radio announcer at the broadcasting service.
When Kelley completed his brief opening statement, James Laughlin stood up to address the jury. Laughlin was no stranger to the crumbling green walls of the District Court. In the sweltering spring and summer of 1944, he had been center-stage as a public defender in the great Sedition Trial of that year. In a prosecution personally demanded by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a motley assemblage of anti-Semites and Nazi sympathizers was put on trial for violation of the Smith Act (which made it a crime to conspire to overthrow the government). A canny lawyer with a talent for publicity, Laughlin revealed to the press that the Anti-Defamation League of the B’nai B’rith provided the FBI with “evidence” against the defendants—sup porting his assertion that Jewish interests had instigated the sedition prosecutions in retaliation for the defendants’ unpopular views. His public grandstanding resulted in a contempt of court citation. Laughlin made headlines when he defended himself on the contempt charge. Nevertheless, the jury found him guilty.
The chaotic Sedition case ended in mistrial in November of 1944 when Judge Edward Eichler died of a sudden heart attack. The Justice Department refused to pursue the prosecutions further (Roosevelt died in April 1945 and the original impetus for the trial disappeared with the President’s death), but the public defender had established a less than sterling reputation among Washington lawyers. Now, Laughlin faced another politically driven case of even greater importance.
In a thunderous voice, Laughlin portrayed Axis Sally as a loyal but misunderstood American trapped in an impossible situation. Like many Americans before the war, he said that Mildred Gillars believed Franklin Roosevelt’s promises to keep the nation out of Europe’s conflicts. She felt a deep sense of betrayal when the President pursued policies that undercut US neutrality and blatantly tied America’s fate to that of Britain. The defense attorney reminded the jury that only a decade earlier her opinion was not at all uncommon: “She said no more and did no more than thousands and perhaps millions in this country said or did,” he claimed.385 Moreover, she was trapped in Hitler’s Germany without a valid passport and relied on the good graces of her German hosts. “She had no passport, no money. She had to remain where she was,” he emphasized.386
At first, Mildred was coaxed by what the attorney called the “magnetic—nay, hypnotic” personality of Dr. Otto Koischwitz. When all of the Professor’s charm proved insufficient to convince her to make propaganda broadcasts, she was finally coerced. Laughlin cast O.K. as a calculating Svengali—a Nazi cad who preyed on the hopes and affections of a lonely matron longing for marriage. With his finger pointing at the steel cases containing her broadcasts, Laughlin warned the jury that although the voice might belong to Mildred Gillars, the words and the message were that of Otto Koischwitz.
“The voice is Jacob’s voice but the hand is the hand of Esau!” he shouted across the courtroom.387 “Professor Koischwitz was a dynamic, hypnotic personality. He was a vigorous, determined man with fixed ideas and this defendant was under his influence,” the defense lawyer said, pointing at his client.388 O.K. was a philanderer and ladies’ man who promised marriage to his mistress, but suddenly died and left her alone to face Germany’s defeat and America’s vengeance. At the mention of the Professor’s name, Mildred dabbed at her eyes with the flowing indigo scarf she kept wrapped around her neck.
Laughlin insisted that she was only a small cog in the wheel of the Nazi propaganda machine, one that never had “any connection with Hitler, Goebbels, Goering or any others of that unholy lot. She made it plain to the Germans that she would do nothing that was hurtful to the United States government. She was proud to be a citizen of the United States and rejected material for her scripts that she believed harmful.” Laughlin asked the jury to reject the government’s assertion that Mildred held a highly paid position of great importance, for she lived in “constant fear of her life, under the threat of the Gestapo.”
Chief Prosecutor John Kelley’s first witness was Adelbert Houben. The 41-year-old former Program Controller at the Overseas Service testified to the financial success of Axis Sally’s radio career, claiming that, at her peak, she earned 3,000 Reich marks a month ($1,200 in 1949 dollars)—almost twice the amount of Houben’s own salary. Only one man at Reichsradio earned more money than Axis Sally—the Director General of the Overseas Service, Dr. Anton (“Toni”) Winkelnkemper.
Houben admitted that he was an ent
husiastic National Socialist who joined the party in 1932. He readily told the court that he believed in the party and “everything it stood for,” even displaying a reverent tone in his voice when referring to “the Führer.” Houben acknowledged that the radio drama Vision of Invasion was an attempt “to prevent the invasion by telling the American people and American soldiers that [it] would be a risky task with respect to the lives of the soldiers.”389 Furthermore, Houben made the damaging, yet debatable assertion that no foreigner was ever forced to appear on German radio.
On cross-examination, Laughlin asked the stocky ex-Nazi about his prior experience as a material witness. Noting that he had testified for the prosecution at both the Douglas Chandler and Robert H. Best treason trials in Boston, the confrontational lawyer asked, “You make your living by testifying against people, don’t you Mr. Houben?” Offended, Houben sputtered, “What do you mean by that?” Laughlin pointed out that he had collected between $800 and $900 from the US government for his prior appearances. Taking the bait, Houben volunteered that he had earned $2,400 more on his own as a laborer in Philadelphia—an admission sure to fuel further resentment against unapologetic Nazis profiting from the treason prosecutions.390
Houben’s testimony was momentarily halted while John Kelley read aloud from a list of stipulations agreed to by the defense. The first and most crucial was to inalterably affect the outcome of the trial: both sides agreed that Mildred Gillars was a native-born American citizen and remained so throughout the war. This blanket pronouncement about a woman who privately questioned whether she still held American citizenship effectively removed any possibility of an acquittal under the provisions of the 1940 Nationality Act—a law that allowed the renunciation of American citizenship in favor of the assumption of another nationality. This is what allowed Rita Zucca (the “Rome Axis Sally”) to avoid prosecution by the US government.
When Houben’s testimony resumed, he told the court of his internment with Mildred in Germany after the war and acknowledged that he felt quite differently about her guilt in those days. Privately, Houben made several statements critical of the government’s treatment of her, even calling it “a shame.”391 Houben also admitted that he told Justice Department prosecutors that it was a “mistake” to bring Miss Gillars to trial because she “had done nothing wrong.”392
Damning Messages
In his opening statement, John Kelley told the jury that it would be Mildred’s own words that would convict her. In the corner of the room, a stack of 29 acetates sat near a waiting phonograph. Kelley stated his intention to play only the propaganda portions of the broadcasts, but Laughlin objected. The judge agreed that the entire recording should be played to ensure that the defendant’s words remain in context. Only the judge, jury, attorneys and press had access to the forty headphones strung throughout the courtroom. With the mannerisms of a young starlet, Mildred slipped on her pair, resting her chin on folded hands in the style of her idol Theda Bara.393 Spectators leaned forward to try to hear snippets from reporters’ headphones.
Laughlin objected to the introduction of seven recordings as evidence because they were seized by the Counter-Intelligence Corps (CIC) from the basement of Mildred’s Berlin apartment house without a search warrant. Judge Curran asked the jury to leave while the court heard testimony from the agent who retrieved the recordings. Special Agent Hans Wintzen came to the stand to describe how he stumbled upon the recordings in a nearby storage room after interviewing the building’s superintendent.
Mildred then briefly took the stand and complained to the judge that her apartment and its contents were seized by the Allies and given to a Communist after the German surrender. Curran quickly ruled that although Axis Sally would be tried as an American citizen, the Constitution’s protections against warrantless search and seizure did not apply to her. She was a citizen pursued by the American military in a foreign land, and had no such legal protection. After Curran decided that the seven recordings would remain as evidence, the jury returned to the courtroom. Soon, toes were tapping in the jury box as Midge’s house band, Dick and His Footwarmers, played Nazified versions of swing and jazz. Between the musical selections, the jury heard the legendary voice for the first time:
This is Berlin calling, Berlin calling the American wives, mothers and sweethearts. And I’d just like to say, girls, that when Berlin calls, it pays to listen. When Berlin calls, it pays to listen in because there is an American girl sitting at the microphone every Tuesday evening at the same time with a few words of truth to her countrywomen back home.
Girls, you all know, of course, by now that it’s a very serious situation and there must be some reason for my being here in Berlin—some reason why I’m not sitting at home with you at the little sewing bees knitting socks for our men over in French North Africa. Yes, girls, there is a reason. I’m not on the side of President Roosevelt, I’m not on the side of Roosevelt and his Jewish friends and his British friends because I’ve been brought up to be a 100 percent American girl; conscious of everything American, conscious of her friends, conscious of her enemies.
And the enemies are precisely those people who are fighting against Germany today and in case you don’t know it, indirectly against America too, because a defeat for Germany would mean a defeat for America.
Believe me, it would be the very beginning of the end of America and all of her civilization, and that’s why, girls, I’m staying over here and having these little heart to heart talks with you once a week.… And that’s why I’m just going to put all the energy I can into these few moments I have with you each week and try to get you to see the light of day and to let you realize that you’re on the wrong side of the fence.…We are shedding our good young blood for this “kike” war, for this British war….
And I say damn Roosevelt, and damn Churchill, and all of their Jews who have made this war possible. And I, as an American girl, will stay over here on this side of the fence, on Germany’s side because it’s the right side, as I’ve told you many, many times before…394
Girls, watch out! Become America conscious! Don’t forget the beautiful things we have at home which are now in danger of being jeopardized by the Jewish and the British.395
With the inference that America’s late, beloved president was the leader of a cabal of Jewish homosexuals fresh in the jury’s collective mind, prosecutors turned to the July 27, 1944 edition of the Home Sweet Home program to illustrate the hidden purpose of the broadcasts:
Well, I’m afraid she’ll never surrender ’til you Kids surrender.
Well, how about it?
It is not a bad idea really. After all, you are fighting—it is a tough fight, but there is no getting the Germans down. You have been trying for a long, long time now and you remember what was told to you before you went to Africa; that it would be a walk away for you boys. Well, was it?
They’ll just get all kind of woozy and throw down those little old guns and toddle off home. Well, it would be the right thing for them to do after all, because they’re certainly not making any headway in the sector right now!396
By the end of the trial’s first week, the court had heard a series of recordings that spanned the length and breadth of Midge’s radio career. Friday’s proceedings began with the lilting strains of Lilli Marlene and ended with the despondent voice of Axis Sally on September 19, 1944 as American forces crossed the Rhine.
So you want to sacrifice your sons to try to destroy that great country, Germany? It is the blackest page in the world’s history. America should hang her head in shame. Think it over, America, will you? Well, girls, I’m sorry, but the time has really almost run out.397
The Actor as Traitor
“Stop chewing gum!” Judge Curran lashed out at the heavyset Prussian aristocrat in the witness chair. Hans von Richter was nervously chewing a stick of gum as he took the oath. Of all the prosecution witnesses, von Richter and his American-born wife, Georgia, were personally closest to the defendant. The couple k
new Midge intimately, had dined with her and Otto Koischwitz at their home, and sadly bade her farewell as Allied troops closed in on the capital. When she was on the run as a haggard and hungry fugitive, Hans von Richter turned her away. Hans and Georgia met in Cleveland, Ohio where he was a dashing German consular officer and she was the daughter of a successful local businessman. When the German Foreign Office transferred him to Brazil, Georgia followed him. The couple lived in Belo Horizonte for two and a half years, and then the Reich called him home to Berlin.
Like all foreign nationals in wartime, Georgia needed ration coupons to survive, and took employment as an announcer for the radio service. On several broadcasts, Mrs. Von Richter joined Midge, Margaret Joyce (“Lady Haw Haw”), Constance Drexel and others to chat on air about women’s concerns and cultural events. Georgia claimed that the content of her radio appearances was never political in nature. Unlike Koischwitz, Hans never demanded that his wife espouse political positions on the air or make propaganda broadcasts to America.
Von Richter spat out the gum and apologized. He testified that he saw Mildred Gillars speak into a Berlin radio microphone “many times.” Hans matter-of-factly acknowledged that Vision of Invasion, the recording most explicitly aimed at derailing the American war effort, featured her voice. Mildred whispered excitedly into her attorney’s ear as von Richter spoke. When Kelley finished his questioning, Laughlin rose to ask the witness if his wife had made broadcasts for the Germans. Von Richter answered in the affirmative and Laughlin delved into their content. Kelley strenuously objected, perhaps fearing the court hearing of other Americans who made similar broadcasts but were not facing the prospect of prison or death. The defense attorney saw his chance to wave the flag of injustice:
Axis Sally: The American Voice of Nazi Germany Page 20