The Lost Boys

by Catherine Bailey

  In ‘a state of indescribable agitation’, Schlabrendorff had to contrive an excuse to retrieve the package.43 ‘The failure of our attempt was bad enough, but the thought of what discovery of the bomb would mean to us, and our fellow conspirators, friends and families, was infinitely worse.’ To his relief, he established that the bottles of cognac were still with Colonel Brandt. Claiming that the wrong parcel had been sent by mistake, he flew to Rastenburg to collect it. It was only when he caught a train from the Führer’s headquarters back to Berlin that he was finally able to dismantle the bomb. Locking the door to his sleeping compartment, he gingerly unwrapped the parcel. ‘The reason for the failure immediately became clear.44 Everything but one small part had worked as expected. The bottle with the corrosive fluid had been broken, the chemical had eaten through the wire, the firing pin had been released and had struck forward – but the detonator had not ignited!’ Schlabrendorff blamed it on the British, believing that it was ‘one of the few duds that slipped past’ an inspection. But it was possible that the fuse had failed to ignite due to the extreme cold over Russia.

  A week later, on 21 March, Tresckow and Schlabrendorff made what was now their third attempt on Hitler’s life. As part of the ceremonies to commemorate ‘Heroes Memorial Day’, Hitler was due to tour an exhibition of captured arms at the Zeughaus on Unter den Linden.fn1 To answer any queries, an officer from Army Group Centre was detailed to accompany him.

  Tresckow assigned the role to Colonel Rudolf-Christoph von Gersdorff, an extraordinarily brave 38-year-old who, for the sake of saving Germany, had volunteered as a suicide bomber. Using explosives primed with a ten-minute British fuse, Gersdorff was to hide the bomb in his clothes and blow up Hitler and himself.

  Hitler arrived at the exhibition at the scheduled time of 1 p.m., accompanied by Himmler, Göring and Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, the chief of staff of the armed forces. He made a short speech for German radio before moving towards the entrance of the exhibition hall. Here, Gersdorff greeted the Führer, saluting with his right hand, while setting off the chemical fuse with the other.45

  As the acid ate through the wires, Gersdorff tried to keep as close to Hitler as possible.46 But – almost as if he had some presentiment of Gersdorff’s intent – Hitler refused to stop and view any of the exhibits. Walking quickly through the hall, he emerged from the building within two minutes. His early exit, throwing his schedule into confusion, was noted even in London, where the BBC was monitoring the radio broadcast.

  With only minutes to spare, Gersdorff rushed to a nearby cloakroom to disarm the suicide vest. Back at Army Group Centre HQ in Smolensk, Tresckow was listening to the radio broadcast with a stopwatch in his hand. When, almost as soon as Hitler entered the exhibition hall, the commentator announced that he had departed for the War Memorial, it was clear to Tresckow that this attempt, too, had failed.

  In Berlin, Hassell, unaware of General Tresckow’s attempts to assassinate Hitler, had a new reason to despair. On 11 March, ten days before Hitler’s visit to the armoury on Unter den Linden, he learned that his younger son, Hans Dieter, had been seriously wounded on the Russian Front. A bullet had pierced his lung and there was a danger that the wound would prove fatal. He had been taken to a field hospital and Hassell was hoping that he could be moved away from the battlefield. He was also worried about his elder son, Wolf Ulli, who was fighting in France. But at least Fey, and his two young grandsons, Corrado and Roberto, were safe.

  9.

  When, at Ebenhausen in January 1940, Fey married Detalmo Pirzio-Biroli, a 25-year-old cavalry officer whom she had met several years before at a ball in Rome, she could not stop weeping. The celebrations were clouded by the family’s awareness that, with Fey marrying, and her two brothers about to enrol on active service, separation was imminent. ‘I was furious with myself,’ Fey wrote in her diary, ‘but the tears just ran down my cheeks. I later found out that my father had only just managed to finish his speech before leaving the drawing room in a hurry, because he too could not control his emotions. At the same time, Almuth and Hans Dieter had hidden in the cellar to cry their hearts out. It was too ridiculous!’

  As newly-weds in wartime they knew they would not have long to spend together but, for the first five months of their marriage, the couple lived in Detalmo’s family’s palazzo in the centre of Rome. Then, in the spring of 1940, with Fey pregnant, they decided to escape the heat of the city and move to Brazzà.

  The villa, with its twelfth-century castle and its vast estate, had been in the hands of Detalmo’s mother’s family, the di Brazzà Savorgnan, for over a thousand years. ‘I had heard so much about this place that I was very curious to see it. Luckily, the reality is far lovelier!’ Fey wrote excitedly to her parents. ‘It stands on a hill far from all the troubles and the noise of the world. On one side, you look down over a great plain toward Venice. On the other, you can see the mountains, still tipped with snow. The ruins of the castle are in the grounds. The villa itself is enormous and is surrounded by many smaller houses where people attached to the estate live. Everything is in good taste. Detalmo and I have a bedroom and drawing room on the second floor – very airy and light, with a breath-taking view. This morning the gardener took me to the kitchen garden. It is huge and full of fig, pear, and apple trees.’

  Fey also met Nonino, the family’s much-loved servant: ‘Nonino, coachman, butler and chauffeur at Brazzà for fifty-four years, arranges everything so perfectly that I find my main tasks are only to keep the twenty or so flower vases full and to discuss menus and shopping with the cook and the gardener.’

  The couple had only been at the castle for a month when, in June 1940, Italy declared war on Britain and France and Detalmo left to join his cavalry regiment. Fey, however, stayed on to oversee the running of the estate and await the birth of Corrado. She loved the peace of Brazzà – ‘the greenness, the great silence’ – and, with its clean air and plentiful supplies of food, it was perfect for the baby. Yet, after Corrado was born in November, in contrast to the social whirl of Rome, she recognized the irony in her quiet, uneventful life. ‘I’ll just tell you in a few words what I do during the day,’ she wrote to her sister, Almuth, in Munich. ‘As soon as the little one is dressed and fed, I go out to check on the kitchen, the food, the laundry, and the housework to make sure everything is done as I want it. Then I go to the farm to talk to Bovolenta [the farm manager] about various problems – the pig, the hens, the rabbits and the pigeons. He is never very pleased when I arrive; at least that is the impression I get, because I keep discovering things that are managed to our disadvantage … In the afternoons, Corradino is put in his playpen. He talks a lot and is very athletic. I sit by, knitting, which I love, or mending, which I hate! After dinner I go to bed at about ten o’clock, and read.’

  When Almuth visited Brazzà a few months later, Detalmo was home on leave. It was the first time she had seen the couple since their wedding and she was bowled over by their idyllic life, far away from the trauma and privations of the war. ‘I feel as though I’m living through a dream,’ she wrote to her parents. ‘The journey was fine, and when I arrived at Udine station, I found Detalmo, thin but very charming in his uniform, waiting for me with Nonino and the carriage. We trotted slowly through the spectacular Italian countryside … Fey has become a beautiful woman; I had to keep looking at her anew. She seems to be in perfect health. We immediately went to look at Corrado. He really is the sweetest baby I’ve ever seen, and Detalmo is a very enthusiastic father.’

  Soon after Almuth returned to Munich, Fey discovered she was expecting another child. ‘You know if I should die now or after the second baby, I would feel immensely sad for leaving you,’ she would later write to Detalmo. ‘For the rest I would not be sad, for I have had so much happiness in these few years. I had a beautiful childhood, a lovely example in my parents for practically everything … and I came to know what real love between a man and a woman means, and what love for one’s own child means.’ Yet
, cut off at Brazzà, her mood fluctuated and she was desperately anxious for her family in Germany and for her brother Hans Dieter, who was fighting on the Eastern Front. ‘My mother wrote telling me my father is watched all the time by the Gestapo and the casualty lists in Russia are staggering,’ she told Detalmo. ‘I long for this war to be over and for you to come home.’

  Detalmo was at Civitavecchia, a port on the west coast of Italy, waiting to hear whether he would be drafted to North Africa, where Italian forces and Rommel’s Afrika Korps were fighting the British. He wrote to Fey to say that it was also possible that he would be posted to Udine, just 5 miles from Brazzà. Yet he felt it would be disloyal to leave his regiment. Fey urged him to accept the posting; aside from missing him, she needed his help in shouldering the responsibilities of managing the estate. Tired of a barrage of complaining letters, Detalmo wrote back firmly: ‘I warn you once more, Fey darling: Do not complain. Complaining, besides being ungrateful toward providence, could also bring bad luck. Today news came that they must find some officers to serve on ships to North Africa. If I should be appointed to such a thing and cross the sea twice a week for months and months, you would then say: “How nice when he was in Civitavecchia. Why did it not stay like that?” Maybe I will try and come to Udine. However, even if this were not to take place, don’t complain! I feel so much that complaining in our present position brings bad luck! You must do nothing but rejoice and be happy and thank God for what we have today, because so far we have been extremely lucky!’

  Providence seemed to be on their side, however. At the beginning of 1942, just before the birth of Roberto, Detalmo was indeed posted to Udine. He was charged with overseeing the military forts that stretched across the plain to San Daniele, 10 miles north-west of Brazzà. Built to repel the many armies that had set out to conquer the north of Italy over the previous thousand years, most of the castles belonged to or stood on land owned by his ancestors.

  Detalmo remained at Brazzà throughout 1942. The children were thriving, and both he and Fey wrote regularly to her parents in Berlin with details of their progress. ‘The two boys are turning out well but are very different in character. Corrado is nervous and brilliant-minded; Roberto is slow and always half asleep,’ Detalmo reported to his mother-in-law. For Fey, the children seemed an anchor of stability when the world was in turmoil. ‘I love the little boys so much,’ she wrote to her parents. ‘They are all my joy in these uncertain times.’

  As both Fey and Detalmo recognized, they continued to be ‘extremely lucky’. Unlike almost anywhere in Europe, Brazzà remained untouched by the war. The nearest fighting was hundreds of miles away across the Alps, and it was one of the few regions that were not being bombed by the Allies or the Axis powers. Their idyll, however, was coming to an end. On a cold night in January 1943, sitting in front of a blazing fire in the library, Detalmo wrote what would turn out to be his last letter to his father-in-law from Brazzà:

  It’s ten o’clock and we are alone. Fey is sitting at her writing desk, and you can tell the effect the hot wine, which she is drinking for her cold, is having on her speech …

  There’s no doubt that the happiest people are Corradino and Robertino, who are lucky enough to be two years and one year old. They fall into utter despair about twenty times a day, but each time it never lasts more than twenty seconds. They are lucky to be in Brazzà, for the clean air as well as for the food. Brazzà is like a huge old hen protecting us with its broad wings.

  A few weeks later, after being at home for over a year, Detalmo heard he was being posted elsewhere.

  Detalmo’s loyalties were not as straightforward as they appeared. Not only was he a committed anti-Fascist and an admirer of Ugo La Malfa, ‘Cornali’, the famous Italian Resistance leader, but he had many British relatives and friends to whom he felt nothing but warmth and admiration. He was also part-American, connected via his maternal grandmother, Cora Slocomb, to a wealthy New Orleans family.

  He had therefore long hoped for a posting that would give him opportunities to extend his links with the Allies. Now, assigned as an interpreter to a prison camp for British and American POWs at Mortara, near Milan, he would have access to the Allies and the opportunity to work with ‘Cornali’, who was organizing clandestine resistance groups in the industrial areas of northern Italy.

  Confined with his regiment and then at home at Brazzà, he had been prevented from using the connections to British intelligence which he had exploited on behalf of his father-in-law in the early years of the war. In February 1940, it was Detalmo who had set up the meetings between Hassell and Halifax’s intermediary Lonsdale-Bryans, with whom he was acquainted. Since the meetings had to be strictly secret, Detalmo had arranged for Lonsdale-Bryans to travel to Arosa in Switzerland, masquerading as a specialist physician attending Hassell’s elder son, who was being treated for a recurrent bronchial condition. Yet, despite setting up three meetings, nothing came of Detalmo’s initiative. Clearly the British had no faith in the ability of the German Resistance to eliminate Hitler and establish a democratic government.

  Parting with her husband was a wrench for Fey but she recognized that his posting at last gave him the opportunity to work secretly against Mussolini’s regime. Her isolation at Brazzà meant that she felt safe in confiding anything to her diary: ‘Detalmo is happy because he can dedicate himself to the undercover organization of Milan and at the same time avoid having to go and fight against the Allies,’ she noted. She was also buoyed by his letters: ‘Darling little Fey, be in good spirits and don’t worry about anything,’ he wrote a few days after he left. ‘Give my love to the two little ones and have a big long kiss from me. I see you and the children as something so great and beautiful that it almost acquires the shape of a dream.’

  Fey did not see Detalmo until June, when he obtained leave to take her and the boys to visit her parents at Ebenhausen. It was also an opportunity for him to brief his father-in-law on developments in Italy. Rumours were circulating among the British and American POWs at Mortara that the Allies were preparing to invade southern Italy, and while they were staying at Ebenhausen it was announced that the British had occupied Pantelleria, a small island south of Sicily. Drawing on his conversations with senior figures in the Italian Resistance, Detalmo was convinced that, if an invasion were launched, it would precipitate Mussolini’s fall. He also hoped that if the Fascist regime were overthrown in Italy, it would trigger a move against Hitler.

  Fey did not take part in the political discussions between her father and her husband. While she supported their cause unreservedly, the children were her focus and she was thrilled to be home with her parents, who had not seen the boys since Roberto was born. ‘We are all with my family at Ebenhausen,’ she wrote on her first night home. ‘I’m at the desk in the little drawing room looking out over the garden, which is in full bloom. I adore this view. The children have been a great success and – even though a mother should never say it – they are really beautiful and well behaved. This evening, Detalmo told me briefly what my father said to him: his position in Berlin is ever more difficult; they are reluctant to grant him trips abroad, and he’s been informed that he is under constant surveillance. Furthermore, he is despairing about the army. With very few exceptions, no one is disposed to take any initiative against Hitler. They are frightened to risk their own position, in case of prison or death.’

  A month after she and the boys returned to Brazzà, the rumours Detalmo had heard were confirmed when, on 10 July, the Allies invaded Sicily. As he had predicted, Mussolini fell shortly afterwards and was transported by the Allies to a secret prison in the Apennines.

  Detalmo and Hassell, who were in touch via a secret courier, both hoped that Mussolini’s arrest would precipitate Hitler’s downfall. In early August, Detalmo wrote to Fey: ‘I am rather expecting news from your father, not personal things but rather general, if you understand my point. There must be lots going on up there. Let us hope it is for the best and not for the w
orst.’ Fey was on tenterhooks too. She replied to Detalmo: ‘I had the same impression as you. My father must be rather busy, but I am, as always, pessimistic; it is so much more difficult for him than the Italians.’ And she wrote again, two days later: ‘As you can imagine my thoughts continue with my father, and I am nervous and impatient. Now I have the feeling that he is not achieving anything. I am sure that he is doing his best and tries, but I would feel so depressed if all his efforts were to remain without success.’

  Fey remained at Brazzà during July and August, looking after her boys and the household while Detalmo was at Mortara. ‘It feels so good to be able at last to write freely and not have to fear the censor and the political police,’ he wrote on 2 August. ‘I feel full of confidence. I know that the laws are now humane, just and reasonable. Not any more the oppressive and humiliating Fascist laws. I feel no affront is being made against my honour and dignity as a man … My darling Fey, I am sorry the events have been such that we haven’t had a chance to concentrate on ourselves. Life is dynamic and whirls like a wind. The old days are gone …’

  On 3 September, the Allies invaded the Italian mainland, landing at Salerno, 165 miles south of Rome. Detalmo could barely contain his excitement. ‘Events are precipitating!’ he wrote to Fey. ‘The Eighth Army has landed in Calabria … With Russia pressing so steadily on the Eastern Front, the situation should deteriorate very rapidly. Germany will have to shrink inside her own territory, and it is not an impossibility that within two months the war in Europe will be over.’ Not long before, he had also cautioned her to leave for Rome at the first sign of danger. ‘Put your safety and the children’s first; our property and our belongings second,’ he urged. Reluctant to leave Brazzà and believing it to be the safest place for the boys, she had replied sharply: ‘I am preparing everything so that I can leave if things deteriorate. But let me tell you this: I want to leave Brazzà as late as possible for the sake of the children. Here they eat well, and it is not hot. In Rome it is hot, and the food will be bad.’