Last Letters

by Helmuth Caspar von Moltke

  My dear, dear love, I’d like to give you warmth and shelter, I’d like to offer you strength and aid; don’t you worry about me at all, that is, how I’m doing on the inside. Farewell, my dear, I have nothing else to say other than that I would like to repeat the same things over and over again. I embrace you. May the Lord watch over you and us. J.

  1. Rittberg was not willing to stand up for Helmuth in Freya’s company; see Freya’s letter of November 14, 1944.

  2. An allusion, as earlier, to tears.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO FREYA, JANUARY 18, 1945

  Tegel, 18 Jan 45

  My dear, your beautiful, peaceful letter, which I’ve just read, made me feel quite ashamed. I’m sitting here and trembling, and meanwhile you’re moving straight ahead as though all this were nothing. Yes, yes, I know why you’re able to, and it’s only my common, miserable, utterly unjustifiable lack of faith. Yes, my love, it is the grace of God that enables you to do all this.

  You ask about what I’ve been reading in the Bible: I always read three chapters from the NT two times and always try to organize my reading in such a way that I begin again with Matthew when I reach the Epistle to the Romans. In order to do so, I always wind up reading more than three chapters. Yes, when you read entire chapters, you skip over, no, overlook the same passages again and again. That is unavoidable. One reads individual verses more carefully. Only the fifteen chapters, which I have been reading daily for quite some time, have, of course, given me a very useful general overview; but for a normally active life, three chapters are probably already too much.

  The question as to what and how one ought to believe and what, how, and for what one ought to pray is a terribly difficult one, and I’m not able to answer it; or rather, I answer it differently every day. The two reference points for prayer are the Lord’s Prayer, which was clearly given to us in the Sermon on the Mount, and the unutterable groanings of the Spirit in Romans 8:26. Something that strikes me as well articulated and persuasive on one day sounds feeble and insubstantial on the next. Mark 11:241 is one particularly challenging passage, one that I will never feel up to.—Every day I also have to grapple anew to retain my faith. All of a sudden, I’m ambushed, from some ugly crevice, by the conviction that “it is all rubbish,” which is dreadful, but luckily it usually lasts just a matter of minutes.

  Yes, my dear, once everything has happened that can happen, you have to go back to a reasonably normal life. But let’s see what the next week brings. I have the feeling that if I’m to be executed at all, it will happen soon, so maybe we can wait out the next week. You see, my dear, I’m writing this only because my reason tells me that’s the way it is; but even as I’m writing, I get the feeling that I really ought not to be writing it, because it conflicts with my religious obligations. So let’s wait a bit until we know about Müller and Kaltenbrunner.

  May the Lord watch over you, my very dear love. Jäm.

  1. Mark 11:24: “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.”

  FREYA TO HELMUTH JAMES, JANUARY 19, 1945

  Friday after breakfast

  My dear love, I have exactly one hour to write, then I have to catch the express train so that I can be home at 7. On Sunday night I’ll come back. At 11 Carl Dietrich [von Trotha] and I went to see the dear young innocuous Ebersberg, Thierack’s adjutant. It was an extremely funny situation; soon after Carl Dietrich had offered dignified words on behalf of the family, the young man said that Goerdeler was not in fact the crux of the matter; the true crux was what they technically referred to as the “Kreisau Circle.” He continued with a wholehearted assertion that they noticed, again and again, that the wives would come without any inkling of what their husbands had been involved in and considered the allegations downright impossible. Sitting next to Carl Dietrich, I found it really hard not to laugh.1 With Carl Viggo [von Moltke] the role would have been easier to play. We requested that they wait, and the young man strongly encouraged me to seek out Herr Prost himself once again, which we decided to do on the spot, without Carl Dietrich!! He also said that Thierack would be on a business trip for another ten days, and once he had let that slip, he regretted it, and said he didn’t know whether the secretary of state would then not decide, which I consider out of the question. In short, the visit was funny but totally unimportant, and I was glad when I had maneuvered good old Carl Dietrich back out again. My overall impression of the Ministry of Justice is that Goerdeler’s connection with you is of very minor importance compared with the perception that your own plans were at least as dangerous as those of Herr Goerdeler.—At 3, I was at Müller’s, fortified by a cup of thick coffee at Dorothee [Poelchau]’s. I must confess that I can’t provide a very detailed description of the course of the conversation. I found it increasingly unpleasant that Müller wanted to separate me from you right there (in front of him!), but he was unable to, thank God, because he eventually said they were sorry that I had been caught up in this, too—seeing as we’re all Germans, after all. I was able to fend off that idea quite nicely by stating that I would be happy to be convicted along with you, because I belong to you. He immediately began by saying that one (I) wouldn’t be able to do anything more for you, because you are guilty of high treason, and it was unacceptable for traitors to live while the others at the front were dying for Germany. And your sentence can’t be postponed either, because they’d had bad experiences with that method in 1918.2 He insisted that the people had emerged from the prisons and were active again. (!!!) Besides, that would be unjust—letting you live—if many others had now already been put to death for far less. An SS Reich Leader or even the Führer could do nothing to change that because in essence they had no independent will in the matter. But he said that he would of course deliver my letter to Himmler immediately and efficiently—and he’s doing so. I said that they were unable to do anything to harm me. I told them I understood that their point of view was totally consistent, but that I knew your aims far too well not to see that you had only the best of intentions. He asked whether he ought to enlighten me about you or let me cling to this illusion. He could do as he liked, I told him, seeing as neither the one nor the other would make a dent in my certainty, because I understand them and you, but they don’t understand you. Then there was a reference to the knowledge of what the Gestapo had known. He said you had twisted his words around at a discussion granted for my sake and yours, because it was unfortunately true that the Gestapo knew nothing about the July 20th plot. It was understandable that you would clutch at any straws, but, he insisted, that could be explained only as prison psychosis. I didn’t try to correct everything he said, because it would have presupposed too precise a knowledge of the details, which I couldn’t afford to let on about; I—or you—would have been able to, because, well . . . for obvious reasons! The letter you wrote afterward proved, he said, that you are essentially aware of your guilt. (!!) He went on to claim that in the early summer he had been seriously interested in your fate; you had held an opportunity in the palm of your hand—and missed out on it. In short, my love, this “mighty” man has a very deep personal resentment toward you. Won’t Himmler share this feeling? Dear! They are right to resent you! It’s good that they do, because there’s no compromising with them!—I found it quite unpleasant that he was so very friendly with me personally. “If only he had listened to you more.” I didn’t want to hear that kind of talk at all. At the end came this: “If you ever have a wish or a problem, come to us. We are not the way people say we are!” Oh, my Jäm, they have no idea, and I felt so cheap for having made such a good impression on him! Do you understand that? It wasn’t sad at all; it was disgusting. It was altogether different with Prost. I went to see him soon afterward, once I had managed to wrest from Frau Breslauer the correspondence that had been given to her for safekeeping.3 We met in a café. Prost is a serious German official, severely injured in the previous war, head of the district court, Franke’s clerk and at the same time
the right-hand man of the minister, so probably the appropriate man in the Ministry of Justice. He sat down across from me and said nothing at all, nothing. He said, So tell me everything you want to say in the personal arena, from your personal knowledge of your husband. There’s nothing to say on a factual level, because your knowledge is no more than rudimentary. You can’t know much, and I can’t say anything about it. I spoke about your basic attitudes: nothing with Goerdeler, not reactionary, no professional interests, no personal interests, no coup. Then there was some back-and-forth. He said, yes, he knew every last detail of the matter. They arrived at a decision about the concrete facts after very careful and oppressive deliberation—but in arriving at this decision they also wanted to know about the personal dimension. It was far more difficult to address this issue because I couldn’t read his reactions, since he remained silent. I was convinced of his profound seriousness and lack of fanaticism despite his swastika, and so I felt a strong need to speak honestly. That’s why I couldn’t help saying at the end: And if you had to die, you would manage that, as I would understand and manage staying alive. That’s when he, too, brought himself to say: It would be good if I were not punished alongside you. I rejected that idea even more sharply and effectively than I had with Müller, and said that I belonged to you absolutely. Then he seemed to grow concerned about the upbringing of the Moltke offspring, and said I would need to believe in justice and not lose faith in Germany. Once again, I couldn’t help saying: I believe that what you have always stood for will live on even without you, and it is my conviction that one way or another, it would merge with Germany’s destiny; it has nothing to do with either the current form of government nor with you, and goes well beyond the personal realm. I believe in that and so I’m not the least bit afraid of internal difficulties with regard to my sons or to Germany, however things turn out with you. “I don’t want to give you any false hopes, but not rob you of any either,” came at the end, and a highly reverent dismissal. Perhaps, my Jäm, I said too much. I hardly think it can spoil anything, but when faced with this earnest, decent man who is guided by his own convictions, I could only react in a way that is true to us: See whether you can afford to execute that. He did understand.

  I have to get going! At once! May God watch over you!

  Today is the 19th.4 I’m well aware of it! What a rich year!

  Take a look at these Bible readings: Deuteronomy 8:18, Philippians 4:13.

  I’m taking you with me and staying close to you in great, ardent, strong, unadulterated, and, God willing, unchallenged love P.

  1. In fact both Carl Dietrich and Freya had been important participants in the Kreisau Circle.

  2. After the revolution in Germany of 1918 there was an amnesty for political prisoners.

  3. Freya trusted Helmuth’s secretary Frau Breslauer implicitly and had stored this correspondence with her on an interim basis, retrieving it now to be hidden in the Kreisau beehives.

  4. The anniversary of Helmuth’s imprisonment.

  HELMUTH JAMES TO FREYA, JANUARY 21–22, 1945

  Tegel, 21 Jan 45

  My dear, I’m sorry that you won’t find a letter when you get back, but I had assumed that Poelchau was at the women’s prison on Saturday and would come on Sunday. Well, he came yesterday and isn’t coming today.—I was quite delighted to read your two letters from the 19th. I am so happy that you are being borne along so graciously through all these difficulties. I gather that both conversations, the one with Müller and the one with Prost, went well. Prost’s attitude would seem to indicate that the Reich Ministry of Justice wants to preserve—or resecure—a degree of autonomy in the matter of clemency after all. Doesn’t it look that way to you too? There isn’t any petition for clemency on hand there. Should it prove definite that nothing can be done by way of the SS—that is, if Kaltenbrunner either refuses to see you or makes it clear in the meeting that he refuses to do anything—it couldn’t hurt if the old petition for clemency, perhaps with the date changed, were now given to the Reich Ministry of Justice, that is, to Prost. No, wait, there is something that needs to be changed because the trial is over. The second suggestion is this: Shouldn’t you give Prost a brief note a. about the factual reasons that merit further investigation, b. about the personal reasons, c. about the family considerations. Maybe you can go to see him again and tell him this: According to what you heard from the attorney and what you saw in Drögen,1 it is quite clear to you that I was never questioned by a man with a broad view and a judicial outlook, because there was no preliminary investigation; the detectives who questioned me—you saw them yourself for the most part, and it was quite clear that they couldn’t understand me in the slightest; and ultimately the view of me was formed from their reports. Naturally you can’t write that, but you’ll want to say it at least once.

  Of course all this is unimportant, but now that we’ve started collecting straws to clutch at, we’ll want to stay with this line of argument right down to the end. In my opinion, the petition should be presented only in oral form: Review this case once more, have another look at the man—so far there have been nothing but Gestapo points of view—or set him aside for the time being, without a formal pardon, until the question of amnesty is examined after the end of the war.

  I am very interested in the fact that when it comes to both Prost and Ebersberg, that is, the Reich Ministry of Justice, the “Kreisau Circle” is the major gravamen. I’d thought that only Freisler had discovered this so far. I get the feeling that with Müller this is not the case. Most likely Thierack and Freisler, who quite obviously discussed this in great detail, came upon it together. So it seems to me that everything that happens in the clemency case is hopeless. They have recognized that Kreisau2 would take an ax to the very root of National Socialism, and the result would go beyond a modification of the facade, as was the case with Goerdeler. This was evident from a remark by Freisler in the trial, which went along these lines: If Stauffenberg was the driving force in the military and Goerdeler in the organizational sector, it was Moltke in the intellectual sector. When people claim that Yorck brought all this together and he ought to become secretary of state in the Reich chancellery, they’re not so far off the mark. The additional penalties that were meted out are also a sign that they regard it all as highly explosive. Eugen [Gerstenmaier] was also questioned in great detail about how he met me. But Eugen is, of course, an exception; he got off so leniently as a result of pure stupidity.—The astonishing thing is that they’re leaving Carl Dietrich [von Trotha], Einsiedel, and Peters alone. But they probably think that otherwise they would have to keep extending their grasp in other cases, and that getting me out of the way and liquidating those most directly involved averts the serious danger. In terms of indirect causality, that is probably the right thing to do.—I gather from Müller’s remark about 1918, “they were all active again,” that his confidence in victory has suffered a bit of a blow. There’s really no other way of understanding the phrase. Setting aside cases without granting pardons can be justified by pointing out that amnesty is expected following a victory, and then people like that could be needed after all.

  All in all, one thing is gratifying: Since I couldn’t play dumb, like Eugen, it is still better for me to be done away with because of Kreisau than because of a tenth-rate role with Goerdeler.—If you should see Prost again, maybe you can tell him once more: Neither you nor I—and you’ve seen me—is the least bit bitter; we understand that they had to play their role, but it seems sad to us that Germans are trying to kill other Germans because they have differing opinions, particularly in a case like mine, where I always stated my differing opinion openly, and not provocatively in the least, at the proper place. Say that you know what difficult struggles of an official nature I had at the start of the war on account of that. If that attitude was unwelcome, they could at any time have used me instead in a different capacity where these fundamental questions wouldn’t come up on a constant basis.

  Oddly en
ough, the negative outcome with Müller helped me tremendously. I don’t know why, but it was as though a pressure on me had subsided, and this pressure was human hope; things eased up for me once it was gone, and you might say that I no longer had to expend my energies to prop it up. Once again, the Lord is very merciful with me, actually since yesterday morning. Everything has settled back down again on the old line of preparedness to do God’s will, dutifully and joyfully. But it’s not entirely the old line, although I can’t quite put my finger on where the difference lies.—This is the attitude I am now taking: What are Herr Müller, Herr Thierack, and the executioners before God, when all is said and done: people and instruments He may wish to use to act upon me. They don’t know that, and so one can feel sorry for them, but the way I see it, all the power of a Herr Müller adds up to nothing, God willing.