in the nineteenth century: Around 1820, demobilized Prussian soldiers were hired by Emperor Pedro I of Brazil to establish an army worthy of the name, defend the newly independent country, and make war on Argentina. This emperor married Amelie von Leuchtenberg, a Bavarian princess. There are still German towns in southern Brazil (Blumenau, Pomerode).
informed his Berlin office: Source: Foreign Ministry, Berlin.
and even the curtains!: Ulrich von Hassell, Die Hassell Tagebücher (Berlin, 1988).
a swastika in its claws: Internal circular of the Foreign Ministry on duty uniforms, November 27, 1942. See also Jill Halcomb, Uniforms and Insignia of the German Foreign Office (Crown/Agincourt, 1984).
between Ribbentrop and Hitler: Walther Hewel was one of the few high-ranking Nazis who had experienced the outside world: He had lived for several years on the island of Java, where he had managed a tea plantation for an Anglo-Dutch company. Enrico Syring, article on W. Hewel in Die Braune Elite, v. 2.
“all its natural resources!”: In May and June 1941, the Wehrmacht high command gave orders intended to guarantee the “unprecedented rigor” demanded by Hitler with respect to Russia. Soviet prisoners of war were not treated in conformity with the norms of the international laws of war. Between the summer of 1941 and the spring of 1942, more than two million Soviet prisoners died in German detention.
“of the Geneva Conventions”: Informal conversations transcribed by Heinrich Heims at Hitler’s East Prussia headquarters, Monologe im Führerhauptquartier, 1941–1944 (Hamburg, 1980).
“sailor”) and “Lili Marlene”: “Das kann doch einen Seemann nicht erschüttern” was composed for a film by Kurt Hoffmann, Paradies der Junggesellen (Bachelors’ Paradise), with Heinz Rühmann. “Lili Marlene” was composed in 1938 by Norbert Schulze, a popular composer of light music. The version sung by Lale Andersen had become the unofficial anthem of the Wehrmacht.
complained about German aggression: “Course of Life,” personal archives of Fritz Kolbe, Peter Kolbe collection.
U-boats against American ships: The Greer was attacked off the coast of Iceland in early September 1941. A few months earlier, the Robin Moor had been sunk in the South Atlantic.
did not feel comfortable: “In Ritter’s staff, I had the chance to see with my own eyes all the atrocities… of the Nazis…. [N]ow I could see what war really was!” “Course of Life.”
plane, a Junkers Ju 52: Foreign Ministry, Fritz Kolbe file.
a pickax or a hammer: Reports from the Einsatzgruppen on the massacres in Russia circulated in the Foreign Ministry in Berlin beginning in December 1941. Döscher, Das Auswärtige Amt im Dritten Reich.
went to the cinema: It is not impossible that Fritz and Maria went to the Capitol cinema, near the zoo, where on October 31, 1941 the first color film from the Ufa studios was shown, a musical comedy with waltzes, fox-trots, and frills, entitled Women Are Much Better Diplomats, with two stars of the time, Maria Rökk and Willy Fritsch. Nor is it impossible that they saw The Important Thing Is to Be Happy, with Heinz Rühmann, which was shown at the Gloria Palast in the spring of 1941.
him home several times: “Sauerbruch and Kolbe became good friends.” Biographical document by Gerald Mayer and Fritz Kolbe.
the despised “old system”: The meeting with Schreiber is recounted in detail in the biographical document by Gerald Mayer and Fritz Kolbe. Georg Schreiber (1882–1963) was simultaneously a theologian, a university professor, and a politician. The pope had given him the honorific title of “prelate” in 1922. A Zentrum deputy in the Reichstag from 1920 to 1933, he avoided Nazi harassment with the help of Ferdinand Sauerbruch, who gave him a medical certificate enabling him to avoid a forced transfer to East Prussia. The prelate nevertheless had to give up all his duties at the University of Münster and accept a post as professor emeritus. Source: Professor Rudolf Morsey, Neustadt (former colleague of Georg Schreiber after the war).
He introduced himself: “Despite my Protestant background, we became good friends.” “Course of Life.”
“crimes of the Nazis?”: Clemens August von Galen (1878–1946), bishop of Münster, protested vigorously against the euthanasia measures implemented by the Nazi regime in three public sermons (July–August 1941). This public intervention brought about a halt to the program of extermination of the mentally and physically handicapped.
“one reason or another”: The prelate is supposed to have spoken the following words to Fritz: “It has nothing to do with high treason when you break your word given to a criminal.” “Course of Life.” “Prälat Schreiber… had confirmed [Fritz] by declaring him free of an oath to Hitler,” explains Ernst Kocherthaler in “The Background of the George Story” (1964, personal archives of Fritz Kolbe, Peter Kolbe collection, Sydney). At the time of this conversation with Georg Schreiber, Fritz Kolbe had the intention of fleeing Germany by using a network of smugglers across the Swiss border. Autobiographical document, May 15, 1945.
in Germany’s best interests: In May 1943, an internal circular from Ribbentrop warned the members of the Foreign Ministry that “any defeatist language will be severely punished.” Officials were called on to give an example and not influence “public opinion” (Volksstimmung) negatively. Source: Foreign Ministry.
was never carried out: Biographical document by Gerald Mayer and Fritz Kolbe.
him by a friend: Morgan, “The Spy the Nazis Missed.”
to go to Switzerland: Autobiographical document written by Fritz Kolbe in Berlin in early January 1947; personal archives of Fritz Kolbe, Peter Kolbe collection, Sydney.
the middle of 1942: One of the best-informed figures in the Reich was without any doubt the chief of foreign intelligence for the SS, Walter Schellenberg. In early August 1942, Schellenberg was seized by a great sense of uncertainty. At a meeting with his boss Heinrich Himmler in Zhytomyr, Ukraine, he offered to work for a separate peace with the Western powers, a solution that would enable Germany to maintain its conquests without weakening itself further. Himmler gave him a free hand to sound out the Western powers on condition that he spoke to no one about it. He explained that if word of this conversation reached the führer’s ears, he would deny everything and would not “cover” him. Walter Schellenberg, Mémoires (Paris, 1957).
of his own country: “How to get rid of the Nazis? I was of the opinion that there was only one way to get there: the defeat of Germany,” Fritz wrote in the autobiographical document of May 15, 1945. “Wood’s opinion is that we should continue the fight until a definite military decision against the present gang is obtained. He says there is no hope of any effective action being taken by opposition groups.” “Wood’s oral report,” OSS Bern message to Washington, April 12, 1944, National Archives.