—BERLIN, GERMANY—
JULY 20, 1944
When Stauffenberg’s conspirators hear the news that Hitler is alive after having survived the assassination attempt, one after another withdraws from his commitment, fearing Hitler’s wrath and concerned about the welfare of his family.
Hitler sustains minor injuries to his arm and ear, but much greater damage to his confidence in his trusted colleagues. His arm is doctored and bandaged, and his ear treated and stuffed with cotton balls. Later that afternoon, he welcomes Italian dictator Benito Mussolini to the Wolf’s Lair, giving him a personal tour of the bomb site. When Hitler learns that Brandt has died, he posthumously promotes him to the rank of brigadier general.1, 2
• • •
General Friedrich Fromm, the commander of the reserve army, and a silent conspirator in the assassination attempt, shows pretended outrage when he hears of the explosion planned to kill Hitler. Fromm supported Hitler in the early years of his leadership, but after a while he, too, became disillusioned. In 1942, wanting to negotiate a peace agreement with the Soviet Union, Fromm secretly stopped supporting Hitler.
He immediately telephones the Wolf’s Lair, seeking a report on Hitler’s condition. Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel tells him the Führer has been only slightly injured.
“Arrest the conspirators!” Fromm shouts, cursing. But officers suspecting his participation in the plot overpower him, confining him to a room under guard at the Bendlerstrasse Headquarters.
Fromm is freed by loyal regime officers around midnight. He bursts into Stauffenberg’s office and orders an armed escort to arrest the conspirators of treason, including Colonel Stauffenberg, General Friedrich Olbricht, Albrecht Mertz von Quirnheim, General Ludwig Beck, and Lieutenant Werner von Haeften.
“Are you not also a conspirator?” one of the men asks Fromm.
Fromm is silent.
• • •
Close to midnight, General Fromm has a private talk with accused general Ludwig Beck.
“In just a little while,” Fromm tells Beck, “I will have you executed, as well as Stauffenberg and the other men responsible for the attack on Hitler’s life.”
Beck looks at the floor and says nothing.
“I am giving you the opportunity to die with dignity,” Fromm says. “If you wish to kill yourself rather than face the firing squad, I will allow it.”
“Are you not just seeking to protect yourself from the firing squad, Fromm?” Beck asks. “With my death, you can better keep your conspiracy involvement a secret.”
Fromm frowns. Noticing the officer’s tired, sad face, he hands Beck a pistol. “Yes,” Beck says. “I do prefer to die with dignity by my own hand.”
Beck puts the pistol to his head, takes a deep breath, and closes his eyes. He pulls the trigger, firing the bullet deep into his skull. But it does not kill him. He lies on the floor in pain, blood pouring from the wound caused by the bullet lodged in his brain.
Fromm calls for a nearby army sergeant.
“Beck has failed in his attempt to kill himself.” Fromm smirks. “Kill him, Sergeant.”
The sergeant puts his pistol close to Beck’s head, pulling the trigger and fatally wounding the lifelong devoted German officer.
• • •
At half past midnight, in the Matthäus Churchyard in Berlin’s Schöneberg District, Fromm lines up the remaining group of men in front of a firing squad. He orders them swiftly executed and buried. Later Fromm orders their bodies exhumed, burning them and scattering their ashes.
After the murders of Stauffenberg, Olbricht, Quirnheim, and Haeften, Fromm is approached by Joseph Goebbels, who has heard rumors about what happened. Upon learning that Fromm has already executed the four conspirators, Goebbels sneers, looking Fromm in the eye and accusing him of being in a big hurry “to get your witnesses belowground.”3
• • •
Under the policy of Sippenhaft, Hitler orders the Gestapo to find and arrest Stauffenberg’s entire family, as well as Quirnheim’s parents and one of his sisters. He has Quirnheim’s brother-in-law, Wilhelm Dieckmann, arrested and executed. He inwardly questions the loyalty of his commander of the reserve army, General Friedrich Fromm, and wonders if he has in some way participated in the assassination plot.4, 5
• • •
Nina, Stauffenberg’s wife, staying at Schloss Lautlingen with her children and extended family, learns of her husband’s failed assassination plot and of his hurried execution. She instinctively places her hand on her belly as if to somehow shield her unborn baby from the horrors she knows she and her family will face.
When she sees her oldest son, Berthold, and his eight-year-old brother, Heimaren, listening to the radio newscast late that afternoon, she turns it off and shoos her children out of the room. She decides not to try to answer their questions about the assassination plot at that moment, and wonders how she can possibly protect them from the consequences of their father’s actions.
“Please, Uncle Nux, take the children for a long walk,” she asks her uncle Nikolaus, also a member of the conspiracy. Alone in the quiet, Nina thinks about how she will tell her children the dreadful news.
The next day, Nina has a talk with her two eldest sons.
“Berthold, Heimaren,” she says, “I have two things to tell you.”
After a few seconds of silence, she tells the boys, “It is your father who carried out the attack on Hitler. He is the one who planted the bomb meant to kill the Führer.”
She watches her sons’ mouths drop open.
“Father? Our father!” Berthold gasps, his eyes wide and wild. “He tried to kill our beloved Führer?”
“Yes, Berthold,” she says softly. “Your father has been executed for his part in the plot. I’m so sorry to have to tell you this terrible news.”
The boys start to cry.
“Why, Mutter?” Heimaren asks, his voice quivering. “Why would Father do such an awful thing?”
“He did it for us, Heimaren,” she says. “And he did it for all of Germany. One day, son, you will understand the reasons.”
The next day, Nina and Uncle Nux, as well as Nina’s mother and aunt, are arrested by the Gestapo and taken to Berlin. The children are left behind in a housekeeper’s care, guarded by two Gestapo officials.
“They will forever be outcasts here in the Vaterland,” Nina cries. “All alone. No friends, no parents, no one to love and protect them.”
• • •
Hitler feels satisfaction after arresting Stauffenberg’s family members. He thinks his policy of Sippenhaft6 will keep his officers from committing actions against him and they will remain loyal to him.
“If anyone else commits treason,” he threatens, “not only will they suffer the consequences of their actions, but their family will be arrested and punished.”
Hitler decrees that the name “Stauffenberg” be wiped out, erased from all German records, and no longer spoken in the Fatherland.
“Change the children’s name from Stauffenberg to Meister,” he orders. “And put them on a train to Buchenwald.”
• • •
The men of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion are fighting in La Haye-du-Puits when they hear about the attempt on Hitler’s life, Stauffenberg’s execution, and the arrest of his family. They are sickened.
“Too bad Stauffenberg didn’t kill Hitler!” Sergeant Forte says. “Might’ve stopped this war.”
“I’m sorry for Stauffenberg’s family—his wife and children,” Private Adams says. “They don’t deserve to be . . .”
“Arrested and probably killed?” Sergeant Forte says.
“Loyalty to Hitler ends up costing them their lives and the lives of their children,” Private Adams says. “I could never do that to Catherine and Jesse.”
“The Nazis aren’t thinkin’—just obeyin’ orders blind,” Sergeant Forte says. “They’re fools.”