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THE PLOT TO KILL HITLER  Dietrich Bonhoeffer:        Pastor, Spy, Unlikely Hero

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THE PLOT TO KILL HITLER  Dietrich Bonhoeffer:        Pastor, Spy, Unlikely Hero

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By Patricia McCormick

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Bibliography

Bethge, Eberhard. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, A Biography.
	Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000.
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Letters and Papers from Prison. 
	New York: Touchstone, 1997.
Facing History and Ourselves: www.facinghistory.org.
Flossenbürg Concentration Camp 1938-1945, Catalogue of the Permanent Exhibition.
	Flossenbürg, Germany: Flossenbürg Memorial Foundation, 2009.
Leibholz-Bonhoeffer, Sabine. The Bonhoeffers: Portrait of a Family.
	Chicago: Covenant Publications, 1994.
Marsh, Charles. Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
	New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2014.
Metaxas, Eric. Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy.
	Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2010.
Sifton, Elizabeth and Fritz Stern. No Ordinary Men: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnanyi, Resistance Against Hitler in Church and State. 
	New York Review Books, 2013.
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: www.ushmm.org.

Interviews
Cameron, Ruth Tonkiss, archivist, Union Theological Seminary, New York, NY. 
	In discussion with the author. July 2015
Marsh, Charles, author, Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and professor of religious studies, University of Virginia. 
	In discussion with the author. June 17, 2015
Scheffler, Rev. Buckhard, director, Bonhoeffer Haus, Berlin.
	In discussion with the author. March 17, 2015

Other Sources
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum archives
Berlin State Library
Flossenbürg concentration camp archives

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Cast of Characters

The Family:
	Dr. Karl Bonhoeffer
		Dietrich's father was one of the most prominent psychiatrists in Germany. 
	Paula Bonhoeffer
		Dietrich's mother was trained as a teacher and was one of the few women of her generation to
		earn a college degree. The Bonhoeffers lost two sons and two sons-in-law because of their
		involvement in the plot against Hitler.
	Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer
		Seven years older than his brother Dietrich, he was a brilliant physicist and would go on to help
		Albert Einstein split the atom. 
	Walter Bonhoeffer
		Six years older than his brother Dietrich, he was an aspiring botanist. He died on injuries in
		World War I. 
	Klaus Bonhoeffer
		Five years older than his brother Dietrich, he was one of the original members of the conspiracy.
		As an attorney for a German airline, he used his ability to travel to build support for the coup. He
		was killed by a firing squad just days before the fall of Berlin.
	Ursula Bonhoeffer
		Four years older than her brother Dietrich, she married Rüdiger Schleicher, an attorney who was 
		one of the original members of the conspiracy. He was killed by a firing squad just days before
		the fall of Berlin.
	Christel Bonhoeffer
		Three years older than her brother Dietrich, she married Hans von Dohnanyi, the architect of the 
		conspiracy. Dohnanyi complied proof of Nazi atrocities, a file called the Chronicle of Shame. 
		Christel was arrested along with her husband but released; she brought coded messages to him 
		in prison so the conspiracy could continue. Dohnanyi was hanged at the Sachsenhausen 
		concentration camp. 
	Sabine Bonhoeffer
		Dietrich's twin, she married Gerhard Leibholz, a baptized Christian who came from a Jewish 
		family. Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnanyi helped them flee to Switzerland before they
		could be sent to a concentration camp.
	Suzanne Bonhoeffer
		Three years younger than her brother Dietrich, she married the philosopher Walter Dress, a friend
		of her brother's.
	Maria von Wedemeyer
		Dietrich's fiancée. After the war, she came to the United States and studied mathematics at Bryn
		Mawr College. 

The Conspiracy:
	Admiral Wilhelm Canaris
		Chief of the German intelligence agency, he originally went to Hitler to tell him about atrocities in 
		Poland, only to find out Hitler had ordered the killings himself. Canaris then became a key member
		of the conspiracy and was executed at Flossenbürg alongside Bonhoeffer.
	General Hans Oster
		Deputy head of the German intelligence, he was Dohnanyi's superior and allowed him to hire
		Bonhoeffer and to collect information about war crimes. When those files were discovered, Oster
		was hanged at Flossenbürg alongside Bonhoeffer.
	Lieutenant Fabian von Schlabrendorff
		A member of the conspiracy, he placed a bomb disguised as a bottle of cognac on Hitler's plane. 
		He was arrested and tortured but never revealed the names of the other conspirators. He was
		moved from one concentration camp to another, including Flossenbürg, where he saw Bonhoeffer's
		body carried to an open fire. He avoided being executed at Flossenbürg because of a clerical error
		and lived until 1980.
	Major Rudolph-Christoph von Gersdorff 
		A member of the conspiracy, he activated a pair of bombs inside his coat while giving Hitler a tour
		of his headquarters; Hitler left unexpectedly and Gersdorff disabled the bombs. Because none of 
		the conspirators ever revealed his name, even under torture, he was never caught by the Gestapo
		and lived until 1980.
	Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
		A member of the conspiracy, he placed a bomb under the map table at Hitler's headquarters. The
		bomb successfully went off, killing four people; Hitler escaped relatively unharmed. Stauffenberg 
		was killed by firing squad that night.
	Archbishop George Bell
		A member of the British parliament, he served as Bonhoeffer's secret contact in the British
		government. He was outspoken in his opposition to Hitler and delivered Bonhoeffer's eulogy on a
		radio broadcast three months after his death. 

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer grew up in a very talented family of intellectuals. But despite the fact that all of his sibling were very talented, Dietrich was a daydreamer and a tag-along brother who was afraid of Father Christmas. Afraid to even walk home by himself from school, Dietrich spent his days fingering away at the piano or daydreaming in the garden. On page 8 it states, "Soon he was playing Mozart sonatas. By twelve, he was composing his own songs." With his head in the clouds, Dietrich wondered all kinds of questions about life but the most prominent one was: What happens after we die?

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In 1914 World War I broke out and caught the awe of young Dietrich. He tracked Germany's progress on a map on his bedroom wall and reenacted the latest victories. All the daydreams of war were shattered when Dietrich's oldest brother Karl-Friedrich was called up for service and everything became real. Dietrich's second oldest brother Walter left a few months later. On page 11 it says, "When Walter left a few months later, he brought just one possession from home: his Bible." Soon after, one May morning, the Bonhoeffers received news of Walters death causing the home to fall into gloomy silence. Not long after, Dietrich's third oldest brother Klaus was drafted into the army leaving Dietrich as the man of the house.

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When World War I ended in 1918, Germany was crushed. Dietrich's brothers returned home and Dietrich once again felt greatly overshadowed by his talented older brothers. A bit later a letter arrived asking Dietrich to attend a prestigious music institute but Dietrich knew his heart wasn't in music, he decided he wanted to become a minister. After Walter's death, Dietrich started reading the Bible and felt that it held the answers to all his questions. His brothers constantly teased him for his choice for a "quiet, uneventful life." On page 18 it says: "It might be said that because he was lonely, he became a theologian," Bethge wrote, "and because he became a theologian, he was lonely."

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer started attending a university in Tubingen where he enjoyed his stay. He stayed up late into the night debating philosophical points and astounded the professors with his questions. But just as he loved learning, Dietrich also loved clothes. On page 20 it says, "He may have wanted to be a theologian, but he would never dress like a monk." On his eighteenth birthday, Dietrich headed to Rome never knowing what change was coming to Germany for at the same time, Hitler was then writing his Mein Kampf

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While in Rome, on Easter Sunday Dietrich went to a Catholic Church which was practically unheard of since he was a Lutheran. But in the church, St. Peter's Basilica, Dietrich's eyes were opened. He saw people of every nationality and skin color imaginable. On page 22 it says, "He scribbled something in his diary: "universality of the church."

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After Dietrich graduated, he decided to put his faith and the idea of a "living church" into action. He found a job as an assistant pastor in Barcelona but he couldn't convince the pastor to try out any of his ideas. At least the pastor allowed him to teach Sunday School. Seeing the poor attendance, Dietrich started going from house to house begging for parents to allow their children to attend Sunday School. On page 30 it says, "He had found his calling - and would find that he always preferred the rough and tumble of working with unprivileged children to the pristine halls of academia." At the same time, Dietrich started saving up money to a trip to India in order to study with Gandhi on how to put faith into action.

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In 1926, Dietrich's twin sister Sabine got married to Gerhard Leibholz, doctoral student in legal philosophy and also a Jew. By now, Dietrich's oldest sister Ursula married Rüdiger Scheilcher and Christel got married to Hans von Dohnanyi. That day Dietrich had not idea what role "Gert" will play in his life. On page 25 it states, "It was through Gert that Dietrich would first feel the sting of the Nazis'  hatred of the Jews.

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Once Dietrich started studying in Berlin University, he moved back home where he started working on his dissertation, "Sanctorum Communio (Communion of Saints)." Dietrich put forth such good points that even his teachers were won over and he graduated with flying colors. But the belief that the church is not a building but a force of good took him much further in life than anyone could imagine. On page 27 it says, "And it was this belief in the church as a moral authority greater than any government that would put him on a collision course with Adolf Hitler."

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In short, Dietrich was unimpressed by America. He considered them too loud and obnoxious and thought that the teachers didn't even know the subjects that they were teaching. Everything changed when a colored friend of his, Frank Fisher took him to the African-American Abyssinian Baptist Church. On page 41 it says, "The entire church, he would write home, exploded in "eruptive joy." Dietrich enjoyed the services so much that he started to look into African-American history and even offered to teach Sunday School. But all of that was nothing when Frank Fisher took him south to celebrate thanksgiving. Dietrich got a firsthand experience at the "separate but equal" and was shook to the core. Another memorable experience was when Dietrich went to see the film All Quite on the Western Front which in now considered an antiwar classic. That day Dietrich became a pacifist. At that time, news of the Nazis reached America and Dietrich's friends pleaded him not to go back. Despite the peer pressure, in the end, Dietrich went home.

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When Dietrich returned to Germany he started working as a lecturer at the Berlin University and quickly became everyone favorites teacher. But despite being favored by all the students, he decided that he would also teach in a poor section of Berlin where there were the most in need. The first day, when Dietrich arrived to teach, he was rained with garbage. Through all that, he did not say a word and when the racket quieted down, started speaking so softly that the students had to lean in to hear. On page 49 it says, "Then he told them a story about his time in Harlem, about boys like themselves, poor and overlooked by society." After that he never had a problem with his students. Dietrich got so involved in his ministry there that he moved into the neighborhood and when the time came for their confirmation, he had suits made for each one of the boys.

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When returning to Berlin, Dietrich found that he missed the sunny days of Barcelona. Together he and his close friend and colleague Franz Hildebrandt, a converted Jew,  complained about lectures that made them yawn and the weather in Berlin. Bonhoeffer also started working on another dissertation on the question: How do we know that God exists? When Bonhoeffer received an invitation to study at Union Theological Seminary  in New York City, Dietrich agreed but not because he though he could learn something but because he wanted to test his idea of a universal church. By the time Dietrich set sail to the United States all of his siblings were married and he was alone once again.

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When Bonhoeffer returned to his parents home, he learned of the Aryan Paragraph from his brother in law Hans von Dohnanyi and realized that it was like the "separate but equal" effect in the United States. This time around, it was not between whites and colored but between Germans and Jews. Bonhoeffer decided to speak out against Hitler and to not agree to the Aryan Paragraph but his words fell on deaf ears. Before long, swastikas were hanging behind altars of almost every church. On page 58 it states, "One minister declared, "Christ has come to us through Adolf Hitler."

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Two days after Hitler was named the Führer a soft, high-pitched voice was heard on the radio, denouncing the idea of Hitler being the supreme leader and those who formed an alliance with him will in the end be destroyed by him. The speaker was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, but before he could end his speech, his voice was cut off. To this day no one knows if it were Hitlers men who cut off the power to the microphone or if Dietrich simply run overtime. Soon enough, Germany's constitution was suspended by Hitler and the first concentration camp was set up in Dachau. On page 53 it says, "His government then imposed the Malicious Practices Act, making it a crime to criticize his regime."

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Feeling demoralized, Dietrich rented an apartment in London in order to have space to think. There he decided that if the church would not stand up to Hitler then he'll find another way. He then made contact with a powerful member of the Parliament, Archbishop George Bell, and proceeded to tell him all of the evils of Nazism. Hitler's men were outraged when they found a page in the Times encouraging leaders around the world to take a stand against Germany and Hitler. They quickly found that the person who went behind their backs was the young preacher Dietrich Bonhoeffer and ordered him to return to Germany immediately. When he came they told him to sign a document, "It was a pledge of compliance, an agreement to refrain from any contact with other churches or any speech critical of the regime" (page 75). He did not sign the paper.

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Slowly but steadily Jews started to get pushed out. Not just Jews but even spouses of "non-Aryans." Before long, Sabine's husband Gert was fired and their daughters were shunned at schools. On May 10, 1933, thousands of books got burned on the streets of Germany. On page 66 it says, "Also destroyed were the words of Heinrich Heine, a Jewish writer who had penned these fateful words nearly a hundred years earlier: "Where they burn books, they will ultimately also burn people."

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Storm troopers and soldiers paraded the streets with yellow spray cans, spraying yellow Star of Davids on Jewish businesses. That night Dietrich committed treason by writing a letter to Rabbi Stephen Wise, an influential friend of Dietrich in America to alert President Franklin Roosevelt of the state the Germany was in. In the coming weeks after that, Dietrich's' twin sister Sabine's' father-in-law died and she asked him to preach at the funeral. After going to a superior for advice, Dietrich refused and regretted that decision for the rest of his life. On page 62 it says, "How could I have been so horribly timid?" he wrote to his sister a few days later."

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Hitler decided that the Bible is too Jewish and the pastors just teach meekness instead of strength. Overall, he said that the Christian religion is too depressing. Hitler had his Mein Kampf replace the Bible and all images of saints and crosses to be replaced by a swastika. He proposed that all churches unite to create one mega church, the Reichskirche. All pastors were also to swear alliance to Hitler instead of God.  But disappointed at how easily the church gave in to Nazism, Dietrich and a few other pastors formed the Pastors' Emergency League. On page 70 it states, "They could scarcely believe that the church had not only failed to stand up to Hitler, but had now become an instrument of his oppression." But the contract for the organisation fell into the wrong hands and everything was stopped. That fall 20,000 people pledge alliance to the new religion.

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer decided that if the church will not stand up to Hitler then he will make one that will. He then came to a seaside town named Zingst where he and a few theology students started forming a church. On page 81 it states, "By day, he put them through rigorous studies, led the choir, and played soccer with them; by night, he worked on his call to action for the formation of a new church - one that would directly challenge Adolf Hitler." While there he wrote a book, The Cost of Discipleship, it would later go down as one of the most important religious texts. It spoke of what people had to give up in order to fully follow Christ, just like Dietrich gave up his trip to India to form this church.

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer's brother-in-law, Hans von Dohnanyi had become secretive. Despite all the lively conversation, he was silent. He then pulled Dietrich aside after dinner and told him that he had bad news. Every Jew of someone married to a Jew will have a J stamped in their passports, not allowing them to leave the country. Then he had pulled together a book he called the Chronicle of Shame where he put in all the evidence of Nazi abuse. Lastly, he has a question toward Dietrich because apparently Dohnanyi, Dietrich's brother Klaus, Dietrich's brother-in-law Rüdiger Scheilcher, and a few others were plotting to overthrow Hitler. On page 85 it states, "But Dohnanyi had a question for his brother-in-law, the theologian: Was it a sin to commit treason?" Dietrich replied that it was not and instead, told Dohnanyi that keeping silent is a greater sin than doing something about it.

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On June 29, 1934, while Germany slept, storm troopers pulled people out of their beds and shot them, if not on the street, then in their own homes! The next morning, Hitler reported that only 74 people had been killed and it was due to them planning an attempt on his life. Despite what was said, Dietrich's brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi, found evidence that more that 200 people were killed that night and even more than a thousand were dragged off to concentration camps for a slow death. Later that summer, Germany's president died leaving Hitler in charge. Hitler then gathered the troops and made then renew their ought of alliance to Germany, "But when they raised their hands, they found themselves swearing an ought of unconditional obedience no to their country but to Adolf Hitler Himself" (page 78). In November, Dietrich received a letter from Gandhi, allowing Bonhoeffer to come and learn about peaceful protests from him for the winter.

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Despite the safety of America and the warm welcome from his former classmates from the Union Theological Seminary, Dietrich was restless. He knew that all his friends went great lengths to arrange all of this, but he regretted coming here, where he couldn't find peace. "Now he was alone in a stifling dorm room, "in utter despair." He opened his Bible. "The one who believes does not flee," it said (Isaiah 28:16)" (page 92). Dietrich then decided that it was wrong for him to come to America and caught the last streamer to cross the Atlantic before the outbreak of World War II.

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Hitler's killing machine was now in full force, quickly taking down Austria and Czechoslovakia. In Dietrich's church, young men were asking him what to do if they got drafted into the army. On January 11, 1938, Bonhoeffer was arrested, interrogated for seven hours, and then banned from Berlin. Then Sabine asked Dietrich to get her family out of Germany. He then delivered her to the Swiss border where he passed her into the hands of his contacts in a Swiss church. From Switzerland, his sister, with the help of Archbishop Bell, moved to England where she spent the rest of the war in safety. Back home, Dietrich got the letter that he had to register to the military immediately. But even then his friends did not abandon him, on page 90 it states, "By the time he was due to report for service in Hitler's army, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was on an ocean liner on his way to America."

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On October 5, 1941, all the Jews in Berlin were to appear at a scheduled place for "evacuation." One of the people herded into the cattle cars was a friend to Dietrich and when he heard of it, he immediately started investigating. He soon found the 1,600 Jews had been deported from Berlin alone and this was happening all over the country. He then wrote a letter to Dohnanyi telling of these thing and risked getting a report out of Germany to one of his contacts in Geneva. On page 106 it states, "A young man, writing from a small, cramped study in his parents' home, was likely the first to ring the alarm about what would become the Holocaust, a genocide that would kill six million men, women, and children."

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On April 10, 1942, Dietrich was in Norway waiting for the fog to fade so that he could go back to Germany. There he met Helmuth James Graf von Moltke who was an aristocrat who was morally against Hitler. Dietrich convinced him that they could remove Hitler from power and when Moltke got home, he created the Kreisau Circle. While when Dietrich got home, Dohnanyi informed that the Gestapo were watching his every move. Later, when Dietrich went to Pomeranian hills to write his book, he fell in love. He went smitten over Maria von Wedemeyer but since she was 18 and he was 36, Maria's mother wasn't sure about them getting married so they settled on writing letters. At the same time, the Gestapo found the record of the transferred money for Operation 7, "The conspirators didn't know it yet, but they were running out of time" (page 113).

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When Dietrich returned to Germany, Dohnanyi was waiting for him with more secretive information and the decision that it was not enough to overthrow Hitler, he needed to be killed. Dohnanyi then asked Dietrich if it was okay to commit murder in such case to which Dietrich replied that God will understand and forgive them. Thankfully, a few officers had joined the conspiracy which enabled them to get close to Hitler, what they needed was someone to be able to travel back and forth between Germany and the Allies to make sure that Germany won't be destroyed when Hitler is killed. They needed someone who had contacts in the British Government. Was Dietrich willing? By now Dohnanyi worked for the Abwehr, a German intelligence agency, and now had access to a lot of secret information. His supervisor was part of the conspiracy and allowed Dohnanyi to continue gathering information. Dohnanyi then hired Dietrich as his counterintelligence officer which will allow Dietrich to have a cover story when outside of Germany. Dietrich then also had to pretend to support Hitler so that his second identity as a conspirator would not be discovered. On page 98 it states, "The young pastor had become a double agent."

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After sometime, Dietrich got his first assignment to Switzerland to gather intelligence for the Abwehr which meant to smuggle information to Switzerland. There, Dietrich tried to convince Winston Churchill to have Britain help the conspirators but Churchill declined, not even believing that anything can happen when Dietrich took the risk to reveal the names of some of the members. Even his mentor, Karl Berth, declared Dietrich crazy and out of his mind. On page 102 it says, "'If you want to know the truth,' he wrote to a friend, 'I pray for the defeat of my nation. For I believe it is the only way to pay for all the suffering which my country has caused in the world.'" Soon after, the conspiracy had another assignment: Operation 7. So was the code name involved in helping a woman named Charlotte Friedenthal and six other Jews escape Germany. Unfortunately, their agents in Switzerland wanted no part in it so Dietrich broke and decided to simply transfer some money to a bank in Switzerland the the group, which has now grown to 14 people, could use to pay for their expenses.

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Tired of waiting, he conspirators decided that they will act, with or without the help of the Allies. Their first attempt was to disguise a bomb as a bottle of cognac and by the time it would be presented to the Führer, it would explode. Unfortunately, the bomb has failed to explode. Their second attempt was to place two bombs into Major Rudolph-Christoph von Gersdorff, who was also part of the conspiracy, overcoat and have the bombs explode during a tour he will be giving Hitler. Though Gersdorff would die in the process, the fact that Hitler would die will be worth it. This time around, the Führer left in the middle of the tour unexpectedly and Gersdorff was forced to run to the bathroom to take the bomb apart before it would explode. Though they were never caught, "there was bad news from Dohnanyi's sources a few days later: Hitler's men were onto the conspirators" (page 120).

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On April 5, 1943, when Dietrich Bonhoeffer called the house of Dohnanyi a strange voice answered and Dietrich immediately understood that the house was being searched and that they would be coming to him at any time. He opened the fake diary on his desk and hid away all the important papers in a secret compartment and waited for his arrest. When taken to jail, he was treated nicer than most due to his uncle being the warden. The family was allowed to send him little stuff like ink and shaving cream. He was also allowed to receive books where every ten pages or so a letter was marked. It was a secret code that he and Dohnanyi worked out before they got arrested in order to keep their stories strait when either one of them was interrogated. The Nazi's though, were unaware of their involvement in the conspiracy and the real reason they were arrested was because of the huge withdraw of money to a Swiss bank which the Gestapo believed was due to pure greed. No one ever even imagined two members of the Abwehr to be disloyal, "and so Dohnanyi and Bonhoeffer and the others continued their planning for the next assassination attempt - right under the noses of the Nazi's" (page 124). While in prison, Dietrich allowed himself to dream and imagine that he was lying on his back on the grass and watching the clouds go by. One day, Dietrich's uncle showed up with some champagne which meant that the war was ending. Dietrich immediately sent a letter to his fianceé Maria to start getting the wedding ready.

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It was November 1942, a low point in the conspiracy, when a young officer, Werner von Haeften asked Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Shall I shoot? Surprised, Dietrich tried to dissuade him but Haeften wouldn't be pacified. Dohnanyi's Chronicle of Shame grew with more and more evidence and now the Gestapo were following them wherever they went. Due to this, Dietrich started a fake diary to lead the Gestapo off track. On page 116 it says, "The fake diary was filled with boring descriptions about the weather and the sights in the towns he visited.

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On July 20, 1944, Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and Werner von Haeften entered a room where there was a meeting due with the Führer with a suitcase that held a bomb. They placed it under the table six feet away from Hitler's leg. Three minutes before the bomb was due to erupt they excused them selves and when they just got past the checkpoint the bunker exploded. But Hitler lived, though his pants were ripped and hair stood on end, he was as alive as he could be. The two young men were caught and then executed that same night. Bonhoeffer was ministering to the sick when he got the news that the Gestapo went out on a massive raid but thankfully, Dohnanyi's Chronicle of Shame was still undiscovered and untouched. "Then they got word that Admiral Canaris, a key member of the conspiracy, had been arrested" (page 128).

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The conspirators had taken most of the Chronicle of Shame to another location but some remained. Someone then tipped off the Nazis that they would find valuable information behind a military base in Berlin. There the Gestapo found the rest of the Chronicle of Shame and evidence pointing to the fact that Hans von Dohnanyi and Dietrich Bonhoeffer with a few other were tied into a conspiracy to kill Hitler. Dohnanyi was moved to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp and Dietrich knew that they were coming for him next coming for him next. Now, there was a guard named Knoblauch who favored Dietrich and made a plan to make it possible for Dietrich to escape. But then, he got news that his brother Klaus and brother-in-law Rüdiger Scheilcher got arrested and he decided not to escape. On October 8, 1944, Bonhoeffer was transferred to a Gestapo prison, "Before he got into the van that would take him away, his brother Walter's Bible, the one he had carried with him everywhere since he was fifteen, was taken from his hands" (page 131).

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There was a stench of death when Dietrich Bonhoeffer arrived to the Flossenbürg concentration camp and taken to the barracks for political prisoners. The next day he and two other members of the conspiracy, Canaris and Oster, and three other men were forced to undress and march out to the center of the camp before they were hanged. Despite being side by side with death, page 137 states, "Before he was hanged, Bonhoeffer knelt and prayed." After they died, their bodied were burned. The next day most of the SS had fled by the time the Allies arrived at Flossenbürg. There they found 1,600 prisoners, a stack of charred bones and decomposing bodies which they buried in a mass grave.

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The war was coming to an end and Dietrich Bonhoeffer urging himself to hold out just a bit more when he was unexpectedly transferred to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Days passed and Dietrich told everyone not to lose hope, that the Allies will free them any day when, with no explanation, Bonhoeffer was put in a van full of prisoners and driven to a small town called Schönberg where they were temporarily held at a schoolhouse. On Sunday, April 8, 1945, some prisoners asked Dietrich to lead a prayer service and "In the whitewashed classroom where they were being held, he prayed and read to the prisoners as if he were teaching Sunday school back in Harlem - with a clear, patient, and comforting tone" (page 135). Dietrich Bonhoeffer was killed the next day.

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Dietrich's Bonhoeffers parents learned of his death July 20 whe they heard Archbishop Bell on the radio giving an eulogy of the young pastor he met earlier "as an emissary of the Resistance to Hitler" (page 140).