While in Washington DC I stopped in the Library of Congress to look into the archived manuscript collection of Martha Dodd. In one folder I found materials Martha had collected about her friend Mildred (Fish) Harnack. Mildred Harnack is the only American woman executed by the Nazis. A literary scholar from Wisconsin, Mildred met Arvid Harnack - a lawyer and economics student from a distinguished German family. They married in the US, and in 1929 moved to Germany to complete her dissertation in Jena. The couple became active in the anti-fascist movement, and eventually were associated with the Red Orchestra (Rote Kapelle), a supposedly pro-soviet spy ring. Mildred facilitated contact by Arvid to Martha's father - Ambassador William E.Dodd, and it is believed that Arvid passed on information on Hitler's preparations for war. The Gestapo eventually rolled up the group, and Mildred along with her husband were put in the infamous Plötzensee Prison, where they were tortured. Mildred was later guillotined in early 1943.
Mildred Harnack was a passionate lover of the German language and German literature. Her last words to friends before her execution were: "...und ich hatte Deutschland so geliebt" (and I so loved Germany). The Dodd materials include some English translations Mildred had completed of several poems of Goethe. I am not sure what Martha Dodd intended to do with the material - perhaps a book about Mildred - but to my knowledge the project was never completed.
The story of Mildred Harnack was largely forgotten in the US after the war, mostly due to the anti-communist hysteria that eventually ensnared Martha Dodd and her husband.Alfred Stern. That finally changed in 2000 with the publication of Resisting Hitler , (German: Mildred Harnack und "Die Rote Kapelle") a biography of Mildred by the NY writer Shareen Blair Brysac.
Also interesting to read is this long poem To and From the Guillotine, by Mildred's friend Clara Leiser: (excerpt)
The executioner - had he the grace
To see what luminous beauty had been despoiled?
For never could his noose have been assigned
A fairer jewel - or his beheading block.
Reader, forgive this unaccustomed shock
To tender sensibilities or mind.
Easier far to read than to undergo;
But Mildred did not whimper at the blow.
And I am unprepared to join the weak
Who lack not the gift but only the courage to speak.
She was my friend, you see. And she was yours.
Bear with me now. Read how her spirit endured.
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