22 February 1943 – 17 Adar 1 5703
Many tales of bravery and heroism stand out from the horrors of World War Two, but that of the White Rose resistance organization is unique among them. The organization’s members – a group of students and a philosophy professor named Kurt Huber from Munich’s Ludwig Maximillian university – were all Germans. From 1942 to 1943 they distributed pamphlets calling on their fellow-citizens to resist the Nazi dictatorship in the name of humanist and Christian values. Protesting against war, oppression and the regime’s criminal acts, they insisted that anyone not actively involved in the struggle to free the German people from the Nazi yoke was as guilty as Hitler and his stooges. The organization stood for free speech, freedom of conscience and every citizen’s right to safety from the violent acts of oppressive
government.
Hans Scholl, Wili Graf and Alexander Schmorell took to thestreets by night and daubed their slogans in tar on public buildings in Munich. “Hitler is a mass murderer,” and “Freedom” greeted early-morning
passers-by before the authorities could clean them off. In February 1943, Professor Huber wrote the sixth pamphlet, rallying all students to stand up against the murderous regime. Hans Scholl and his sister Sophie were caught handing them out in the university by a janitor, who reported on
them to the Gestapo. They were tried, sentenced to death, and guillotined in prison in Munich. Other members of the organization were detained after a police investigation; some received long prison sentences, others were executed.
“Somebody, after all, had to make a start,” Sophie said at their trial. White Rose took heroic risks – and paid the price – in the name of humanity and social conscience at a time when most Germans just stood idly by.
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