White Rose

The White Rose was the name of a German resistance group against the dictatorship of National Socialism, whose core was dominated by students and which was essentially based on Christian and humanistic values from the tradition of the youth alliances. It was founded during the Second World War on the initiative of a circle of friends around Hans Scholl and Alexander Schmorell in Munich from June 1942. Between the end of February and April 1943, it was crushed with the unmasking, arrest and finally the execution of its formative members following death sentences - now considered illegal - passed by the People's Court under the presidency of Roland Freisler.

The group wrote, printed and distributed a total of six pamphlets in various clandestine distribution channels, initially in the Munich region itself, and later via couriers in several other cities of the Nazi state - primarily in southern Germany - in varying, and tending to increasing, print runs of up to 9,000 copies at the last count. In these publications they addressed crimes of the regime and called for resistance against National Socialism. In the final phase of its existence, the White Rose attempted to expand its contacts to other resistance groups as far as the Reich capital Berlin and to system oppositional circles in the Wehrmacht through Falk Harnack. After the end of the Battle of Stalingrad, its members also painted slogans against Hitler and Nazi rule on public facades in Munich in nightly actions.

To this day, the White Rose is considered the best-known and most symbolic example of student-citizen resistance to the Nazi regime in Germany; in a broader sense, it stands for moral integrity, courage (civil courage), and willingness to make sacrifices in the service of humanistic-democratic ideals against the backdrop of a totalitarian dictatorship.

Members

The inner circle of the White Rose consisted of the siblings Hans and Sophie Scholl, Alexander Schmorell, Christoph Probst, Willi Graf and the university professor Kurt Huber.

In addition, other collaborators and supporters can be attributed to the White Rose, some of whom participated in actions of the White Rose or similar groups in other university towns even after the arrest of the Scholl siblings and their friends. Among them were Traute Lafrenz, Hans Conrad Leipelt, Marie-Luise Jahn, Hans Hirzel, Susanne Hirzel, Heinz Brenner, Franz J. Müller, Eugen Grimminger, Jürgen Wittenstein, Lilo Ramdohr, Gisela Schertling and Falk Harnack, who later became known as a director. They were joined by Harald Dohrn, Christoph Probst's father-in-law, the architect Manfred Eickemeyer, in whose studio the White Rose met, the painter Wilhelm Geyer, who rented Eickemeyer's studio and gave Hans Scholl the key to the rooms, and the bookseller Josef Söhngen, whose cellar served as a hiding place for the leaflets.

In addition, there was a larger circle of supporters, such as the brothers Wilhelm and Heinrich Bollinger, Rudolf Alt, Helmut Bauer, August Sahm, Hellmut Hartert, Michael Brink (Emil Piepke), Lilo Dreyfeldt, Hubert Furtwängler, Werner Bergengruen, Josef Furtmeier, Fritz Leist, Günter Ammon, Fred Thieler, Kurt Huber and many others. In Berlin, leaflets were distributed by the group Onkel Emil; in Hamburg, students (a "circle of 50 active persons", including Hans Leipelt, 30 of whom were arrested in late autumn) had formed a group around Heinz Kucharski and Margaretha Rothe, which was called the White Rose Hamburg after 1945.

Actions

After their experiences on the front lines of the Second World War and the reports of friends about mass murders in Poland and Russia, reading and discussion alone were no longer enough for them. In June 1942, Alexander Schmorell and Hans Scholl took action. The first four leaflets were written between late June and mid-July 1942 and sent anonymously by mail to intellectuals in the Munich area. In the winter of the same year, the group was expanded to include Sophie Scholl and Willi Graf.

From 23 July to 30 October 1942, Graf, Scholl and Schmorell had to go to the Eastern Front as medics. After their return, the students resumed their resistance activities. The fifth leaflet "Appeal to all Germans!" (with an estimated circulation of between 6000 and 9000) was distributed by courier between 27 and 29 January 1943 in several southern German towns and also in some Austrian towns. From the summer of 1942, the White Rose aimed above all to influence "the broad mass of the people", as Sophie Scholl put it after her arrest on 18 February 1943. This goal is made clear by the fact that the leaflet is written in clearly understandable language. After their front-line experience in the East, the students were convinced that the war could no longer be won ("Hitler cannot win the war, only prolong it."). They called for separation from "National Socialist subhumanism," imperialism, and Prussian militarism "for all time." Their vision of the future was a federal Germany in a united Europe after the war.

At the end of January 1943, the Battle of Stalingrad was lost for the German Reich with the surrender of the entire 6th Army under Field Marshal Paulus to the Red Army. About 90,000 members of the Wehrmacht became prisoners of war, about 150,000 soldiers were killed on the German side alone; more than twice as many died on the side of the Soviet Union. Stalingrad marked a decisive turning point in the course of the Second World War and led to increased resistance in the European countries occupied by Germany. Most of the German population was unsettled by this news. In the Congress Hall of the Deutsches Museum, on the occasion of the 470th anniversary of Munich University on January 13, there were spontaneous student protests against the speech of the Gauleiter of Munich-Upper Bavaria, Paul Giesler, which was interspersed with insults against alleged "shirkers" and vulgar innuendos against the female students present. Outraged, the young people, the majority soldiers in uniform, including war invalids, left the hall and broke through the police barriers. Led by a highly decorated lieutenant in uniform, a group freed fellow students who had already been arrested from the hands of the police.

The events spurred the members of the White Rose to increased activism. The announcement of the end of the fighting for Stalingrad provided the impetus for their sixth leaflet, "Kommilitoninnen! Kommilitonen!" The appeal, infused with patriotic fervor, came from Kurt Huber. Hans Scholl and Alexander Schmorell edited the text at the point where Huber called for joining the "glorious Wehrmacht." Through Helmuth von Moltke, the founder of the Kreisau Circle, this leaflet reached England via Scandinavia. Hundreds of thousands of them were dropped over Germany by British planes in late 1943. They were now headed, "A German Leaflet - Manifesto of the Munich Students."

In other cities, friends of the White Rose worked in small groups, distributing leaflets and keeping in touch. "Down with Hitler" and "Freedom" were written on the walls of the University and numerous other buildings in Munich on February 3, 8 and 15. Alexander Schmorell, Hans Scholl and Willi Graf had written the slogans at night with black tar paint and green oil paint using stencils (see also Stencil).

As early as the summer of 1942, the Gestapo initiated investigations into the White Rose leaflets, which were seen as "anti-state efforts". These investigations were initially unsuccessful and were soon discontinued. From the end of January, the Gestapo set up a special commission in Munich because of the redistributed leaflets.