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Last Letters
Last Letters: The Prison Correspondence 1944-45 | Helmuth Caspar von Moltke, Johannes von Moltke, Dorothea von Moltke
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Tegel Prison, Berlin, in the fall of 1944. In a cell and shackled for most of the day, Helmuth James von Moltke is awaiting trial for his leading role in the Kreisau Circle, one of the most important German resistance groups against the Nazis. By a near miracle, the prison chaplain at Tegel is Harald Poelchau, a friend and co-conspirator of Helmuth and his wife Freya. From Helmuth's arrival at Tegel in late September until the day of his execution by the Nazis on January 23, 1945, Poelchau would carry Helmuth's and Freya's letters in and out of prison daily, risking his own life. Freya would safeguard these letters for the rest of her own long life, considering them a treasure too intimate to share with the public before her death. Published to great acclaim in Germany in 2011, this volume now makes available this deeply moving correspondence for the first time in English. Last Letters is a profoundly personal record of the couple's love, faith, and courage in the face of Fascism. Written during the final months of World War II and in the knowledge that each letter could be the last, the correspondence is at once a set of love letters written in extremis and a historical document of the first order. Helmuth and Freya draw closer together than ever as they await his trial and execution. They navigate both the mundane details of life in and out of prison during wartime, and their own profound swings between despair, hope, and elation as Helmuth prepares and revises his own defense and Freya tries to intercede on his behalf. Throughout, the two letter-writers are sustained by their conviction, by their faith, and by the knowledge, as Freya writes, that "after all, except for your life there is nothing they can take from you."
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balletbookworm
Last Letters: The Prison Correspondence 1944-45 | Helmuth Caspar von Moltke, Johannes von Moltke, Dorothea von Moltke
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This is not an easy book to read - it‘s a collection of letters between a couple that expected almost daily that he would be executed by the Nazis and contain minute details of Helmuth‘s defense and Freya‘s visits to various officials to try and get Helmuth released, so they do get a bit repetitive when read all at once. But their discussions of faith, love, reminiscences about their children, heart-felt farewells in each letter are truly moving.

balletbookworm Each of these letters was smuggled into and out of Tegel prison by the prison chaplain, at risk to his own life. And it does make one wonder if one could place themselves at risk, knowing the stakes, if in the same situation the von Moltkes and their friends were in during WWII. 5y
balletbookworm This is the first time these letters have been available in English - Freya chose not to allow the letters to be published until after her death in 2010 and in reading them you understand why. They are incredibly intimate letters. We are so lucky they were preserved. 5y
BookishClaire wow... 5y
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