Mildred Fish-Harnack Executed (1943)

Tue Feb 16, 1943

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Mildred Fish-Harnack was an American historian and anti-fascist executed by the Nazi government on this day in 1943.

Together with her husband, Fish-Harnack brought together a discussion circle which debated political perspectives on the time after the National Socialists’ expected downfall. From these meetings arose what the Gestapo called the “Red Orchestra” resistance group. Beginning in 1940, the group was in contact with Soviet agents, trying to thwart the forthcoming German attack upon the Soviet Union. Fish-Harnack even sent the Soviets information about the forthcoming Operation Barbarossa.

On September 7th, Arvid Harnack and Mildred Fish-Harnack were arrested while on a weekend outing. She was executed on this day in 1943 by beheading. Her last words were purported to have been: “Ich habe Deutschland auch so geliebt” (“I loved Germany so much as well”).

Fish-Harnack is the only member of the Red Orchestra whose burial site is known, as well as the only American woman executed on the orders of Adolf Hitler.

  • PhAzE
    11·
    7 days ago

    She looks like Tom Holland