Читать книгу Hide and Seek: The Irish Priest in the Vatican who Defied the Nazi Command. The dramatic true story of rivalry and survival during WWII. - Stephen Walker - Страница 11
Оглавление‘We Germans regard you only as Jews, and thus our enemy’
Herbert Kappler
Hungry and poorly dressed, a group of fourteen Allied servicemen arrived at the entrance of the Holy See looking for shelter and food. They were taking an enormous risk by travelling in such a large group and looking out of place. But they were lucky, for a friendly priest from St Monica’s monastery offered them respite and made contact with Anton Call, a carabiniere who was on close terms with Monsignor O’Flaherty and Sir D’Arcy Osborne and had helped to hide Albert Penny, the British seaman who had arrived at the Vatican on a bicycle. Call advised the new arrivals to approach the Vatican in twos and threes. He said once they got inside they should declare they were prisoners of war and ask to be handed over to Osborne’s butler, John May. The next day Call discovered that the servicemen were in a local barracks. The plan had failed. The escapees had managed to fool the Swiss Guards but not the gendarmes, who handed them to the carabinieri in St Peter’s Square. All fourteen men were taken to the Vittorio Emmanuele barracks.
That night Call visited O’Flaherty. The police officer gave the priest details of the new detainees and O’Flaherty gave him 3,000 lire to buy food for the escapees. Within hours the men were well fed and well dressed. O’Flaherty considered the police barracks a safe place to leave the servicemen as the Germans did not visit the place. But the men’s freedom was short-lived, for in late October the Germans unexpectedly arrived at the barracks. Two of the group managed to escape but the remaining twelve were rounded up. For O’Flaherty the episode was a clear reminder that the escape operation needed more space and resources.
For Herbert Kappler the discovery of the escapees justified his policy of keeping the Vatican under surveillance and confirmed that he was right to keep a close watch on O’Flaherty. In his developing battle with the monsignor it was an enjoyable early triumph. Even so, for every escapee Kappler’s men caught there were many more who evaded detection.
O’Flaherty took huge personal risks. On one occasion he met three South African escaped servicemen in Rome and while he was taking them to the apartment he had found for them they were stopped by three SS men. Luckily the Germans were lost and just wanted directions. Another time he escorted two more South Africans from a railway station to their safe house. He visited hospitals where escapees were being treated and regularly secured their release to pro-Allied families in the city.
It was an open secret that O’Flaherty was the man behind the escape operation. By late October 1943 around 1,000 servicemen had been placed in safety in homes across Rome and in farms and buildings outside the city. Kappler wanted to catch the monsignor red-handed but knew he could only arrest him away from Vatican territory.
By now the monsignor and his friend and collaborator John May realized that the two of them could not handle the escape operation on their own. ‘Look, Monsignor, this thing is too big for one man, you can’t handle it alone … and it’s hardly begun!’ May said. O’Flaherty agreed that another senior figure was needed to share the workload of recruiting host families, raising money and visiting suitable accommodation for the escapees. Count Sarsfield Salazar of the Swiss legation was approached. Salazar had been interned when Italy declared war but had later been released. He had originally joined the staff of the American embassy and gained experience dealing with prisoners of war when he visited internment camps as an official inspector. And now, as a diplomat for a neutral country, he had the ideal background. Salazar agreed to join May and O’Flaherty.
The trio’s first priority was to secure more accommodation, so O’Flaherty went house hunting, criss-crossing the city by tram and on foot looking for suitable houses and apartments. After living in Rome for nearly two decades he knew the city intimately and soon found a flat in Via Firenze and another, about a mile away, in Via Chelini.
But, as well as premises, the Escape Line needed cash to pay for food and clothes for the escapees. The issue of money was discussed at night-time meetings between Osborne, O’Flaherty and May. The British Minister agreed to seek financial assistance from the Foreign Office in London and over the next nine months large sums of money were made available. Eventually Foreign Office officials would secure a loan through the Vatican Bank of three million lire. It was a risky strategy for them because they knew a paper trail leading to Osborne could jeopardize his position in Rome. One senior British civil servant summed up the arguments and concluded that it was best to make funds available: ‘It is worth taking a good many risks, including that of compromising his position in the Vatican, to send money to British prisoners, wherever they may be in Italy.’ Money would also come from other sources, including a Jesuit account and the American government through its chargé d’affaires Harold Tittmann.
While sitting in his room in the Vatican, O’Flaherty answered the phone and heard the unmistakable voice of Prince Filippo Doria Pamphili. A member of one of Rome’s oldest families, the prince could trace his ancestors back to Admiral Andrea Doria, known as the liberator of Genoa. He was a friend of the monsignor and sympathetic towards his Escape Line. An opponent of Fascism, he had refused to accept Mussolini’s rule. Pamphili had declined to fly the Italian flag from his palace to mark the Fascist leader’s anniversary – a move that had particularly angered Mussolini because the prince’s residence was across the street from where crowds used to gather to hear the leader speak. Pamphili was imprisoned and then banished to southern Italy, but in recent months he had been allowed to return to Rome. He had become friendly with O’Flaherty before the war and the monsignor had often been to parties at his home. Having secretly become involved in anti-fascist groups which helped refugees, the prince was now telephoning O’Flaherty to say he wanted to see him.
The journey from the Vatican to the Palazzo Doria in Via del Corso didn’t take long. There the two men adjourned to the prince’s impressive picture gallery, where they were surrounded by renaissance and baroque paintings, some of the city’s finest works of art. Ever conscious of watching eyes and listening ears, the prince told O’Flaherty, ‘Even in my own palazzo I am not safe from spies now.’ He then explained that he wanted to help the escape organization, and handed over 150,000 lire, which at the time was equal to some £2,000.
O’Flaherty was being watched by Kappler’s men, who noted his trip to the prince’s residence.
As autumn arrived Kappler was adjusting to his new life as the chief of the Gestapo in Rome. Now he had the entire city under his control. One day specific orders came from Berlin. Kappler’s secretary put the call through to her boss, who listened intently. First the caller congratulated him on his promotion and then there were words of praise for his deputy, Erich Priebke, who, like Kappler, had been awarded the Iron Cross for his work in finding Mussolini.
Kappler had made sure his work tracking down the former dictator had not gone unnoticed by his superiors in Berlin. He had sent one cable reminding them that Mussolini was discovered ‘exclusively from intelligence sources controlled by me’. After the good wishes came the instructions, relayed in stark terms from Heinrich Himmler’s office.
The deportation of Rome’s Jews was to be Kappler’s first task following his promotion. This command, he was told during the phone call, would be followed by a radio message which would confirm that he was to begin the ‘Final Solution’ in the city. He had been in his new post only a few days but he was already once again at odds with his bosses in Berlin. Just as he had initially opposed the plan to rescue Mussolini, he found this latest plan objectionable. He didn’t agree with the order he had just received. He felt he knew Rome well, certainly better than those sitting behind desks in Germany. He believed any attempt to deport the city’s Jews would do little to engender sympathy among a local population already angered by the German occupation. Then there were the practicalities of a mass round-up. How could widespread deportations be organized? Days earlier Kappler had been instructed in a message from Berlin to secure the routes in and out of the Vatican. He had questioned whether he had the manpower for such measures and replied that ‘instructions to this effect can only be carried out if additional forces are brought up’.
Kappler was sure he did not have enough SS men and what staff he did have lacked any experience in these matters. It was a bad plan, but he knew he had to do more than simply object to it. If he was to successfully oppose this latest order from Berlin, he needed allies. He travelled the short distance to Frascati to meet Field Marshal Kesselring. He reminded Kesselring how he had dealt with Jews on a previous occasion in Tunisia. Rather than carry out mass deportations, Kesselring had formed the Tunisian Jews into work gangs, and Jewish leaders who had been arrested were released after payment of a fine. When Kappler told him how many men he would need to organize deportations across Rome, the field marshal was alarmed. Kesselring said he could not afford to have men tied up in such matters because they were needed to defend Rome. Kappler had found his ally. The new head of the Gestapo in Rome then started to put together his own plan.
Kappler summoned the city’s Jewish leaders. On the last Sunday of September he ordered two of Rome’s leading Jewish representatives to attend a meeting with him. Shortly after 6 p.m. Ugo Foa and Dante Almansi stood outside Kappler’s office in Villa Wolkonsky. They had not been told why he wanted to see them. At first their host was polite and the conversation was pleasant, but Kappler’s mood changed and he told his two visitors, ‘We Germans regard you only as Jews, and thus our enemy.’ He then chillingly warned them that unless the Jewish community handed over 50 kg of gold within the next thirty-six hours, 200 Jews would be deported to Germany. If the gold was handed over no one would be harmed.
Kappler’s plan had no official sanction and he was operating alone in the hope that his actions would delay the deportations.
Angry and worried, Foa and Almansi left their meeting with Kappler knowing they needed advice and help. Foa, a former magistrate, and Almansi, President of the Union of Jewish Communities, were both well connected in Rome. They spoke with contacts in the city’s Fascist police, but there was little the Italian police could do to change Kappler’s mind. The two Jewish leaders knew they had to act.
Word of the Gestapo chief’s ultimatum quickly spread among the city’s 12,000-strong Jewish community. Foa and Almansi felt they could raise the amount demanded but they were concerned that they could not do it within Kappler’s deadline. They set to work immediately. In an office close to the River Tiber, beside the central synagogue, donations were left. As darkness fell, a queue had formed to hand over rings, chains, pendants and bracelets. Even gold fillings were removed from teeth, and slowly the amount collected edged towards 50 kg. Twice Foa and Almansi appealed to Kappler to give them more time, and twice he agreed.
The Vatican had also been informed of the demand Kappler had placed on the Jewish community. Aware of the difficulties in reaching Kappler’s figure, Pope Pius XII offered to loan them gold if there was a shortfall. The Holy See said the loan could be arranged for any amount and could be repaid in instalments without interest. However, the Vatican’s loan was not needed. By early afternoon on Tuesday, 28 September, Kappler’s target was finally reached.
Packed into ten boxes, the gold was taken under police guard across the city to Villa Wolkonsky, where Kappler had issued the demand nearly two days earlier. The Obersturmbannführer was conspicuous by his absence and declined to see Foa and Almansi. The two Jewish leaders were then told to take the gold to Via Tasso, a short distance away. There they were greeted by a young SS captain who in error under-weighed the amount and then, after much delay, correctly measured the gold. The correct amount had been delivered and the two men prepared to leave. As a parting gesture, Foa declared that he would personally go to Germany at some stage to retrieve the gold. As darkness fell, Foa and Almansi returned to their families and friends and Rome’s Jewish community felt a sense of relief. Across Europe Jews were being rounded up and transported to death camps. Yet to date it seemed that Italy was exempt, and the Jews of Rome believed that the payment of gold would prevent any deportations from their own city. It was a false hope.
Within hours SS men were at their door, raiding the offices of Rome’s Jewish community, the very place where the gold had been handed in. They took money and documents, including details of Jews who had donated gold. Two weeks later they returned and took away old manuscripts and rare books.
Kappler still hoped he could win the argument that the deportation of the Jews should be abandoned. He had all the rings, bracelets and other gold items put into one box and sent off to Berlin. The package was marked for the attention of Obergruppenführer Ernst Kaltenbrunner, who was Himmler’s deputy in the Reich security empire. Kappler attached a covering letter. In his note he explained why he was against the planned deportation of Jews. Such a move, he wrote, would deprive him of the chance to exploit the Jewish community for intelligence purposes. He added that Field Marshal Kesselring had approved plans to use Roman Jews in labour gangs across the city.
When Kaltenbrunner opened the box he was indifferent to the gold and unconvinced by Kappler’s reasons for abandoning the deportation of Jews. The gold was of little consequence and would remain in Kaltenbrunner’s office untouched until the war ended. Kappler’s arguments he tackled head-on. He contacted Kappler and instructed him that the deportation must be his top priority: he must ‘proceed with the evacuation of the Jews without further delay’. Kaltenbrunner’s tone was equally direct as he told Kappler that ‘it is precisely the immediate and thorough eradication of the Jews in Italy which is the special interest of the present internal political situation and the general security in Italy’. He dismissed any suggestion that the operation should be delayed and added that ‘the longer the delay the more the Jews who are doubtless reckoning on evacuation measures have an opportunity by moving to the houses of pro-Jewish families’.
By now Kappler’s opposition to conducting the deportations was causing much anxiety in the corridors of power in Berlin. If the Final Solution was to be enacted in Rome, the Nazi leaders knew they had to put their own man in. In the first week of October an SS captain and a detachment of Waffen SS men were dispatched to Rome to hasten the rounding up of Jews. If Kappler was uncomfortable receiving questionable orders on the telephone, he probably felt even more uneasy hearing them in person in his own office.
At Villa Wolkonsky the newly arrived Captain Dannecker sat opposite Kappler. Even though Kappler outranked him, he knew his guest had to be taken seriously. Theodor Dannecker was a troubleshooter, sent from Berlin with Himmler’s blessing. He had a track record of carrying out Jewish deportations and twelve months earlier had organized round-ups of Jews in Paris.
Dannecker told Kappler that he required manpower of at least one motorized battalion and wanted the operation to be surrounded by secrecy. He also needed the names and addresses of Rome’s Jews. Kappler was running out of excuses and time. Realizing he had lost the argument, he simply handed over the list.
On Saturday, 16 October, as rain fell on the streets of Rome, lines of SS officers and military policemen made their way to the city’s Jewish ghetto. This time the Nazi policemen had not come for gold, money or documents. This time they wanted men, women and children. Kappler’s attempt to delay the deportations had failed. Armed with submachine guns, the SS police and Waffen SS ordered around 1,200 people out of their homes. Frightened, wet and cold, and clinging to what small possessions they could carry, the captives were placed into open army trucks.
Most of them were still in their nightclothes. As the children cried and screamed and the adults openly prayed, they were driven to the Italian Military College, close to the Tiber. It was a carbon copy of the raids Dannecker had led in Paris. By mid-afternoon the operation was over. Nearly 900 of those arrested were women and children. At the military college the prisoners were examined and interviewed and around 230 non-Jews were released.
The news of the deportations reached the Vatican very quickly. As the German raids began, Princess Enza Pignatelli Aragona Cortes, a young aristocrat well known on the Rome social scene and involved in charity work, was woken by a phone call from a friend. The caller lived near the Jewish ghetto and informed her of the German raids. The princess decided she must inform the Pope. She had known Pius XII for some time and had been received by him in the Holy See. The princess left her home and travelled to the Jewish ghetto to witness what was happening. She then went directly to the Vatican and, although she had no appointment to see the Pontiff, was quickly granted an audience. In his study the princess informed the Pope what was happening and told him he must act to stop the deportations. The Pope seemed genuinely surprised to hear the news. He said he had believed the Jews would remain untouched after the payment of gold. Then he made a phone call and, as he saw the princess out, promised that he would do all he could to help.
Cardinal Luigi Maglione, the Vatican’s Secretary of State and one of the Pope’s aides, summoned the German ambassador to attend the Vatican. Maglione asked Ernst von Weizsäcker to use his influence and intervene to stop the deportations, saying, ‘It is painful for the Holy Father, painful beyond words, that right here in Rome, under the eyes of the Common Father, so many people are made to suffer because of their particular descent.’ The ambassador considered Maglione’s comments and asked, ‘What would the Holy See do if these things continued?’ It was the key question and clearly referred to the morning raids. The cardinal replied, ‘The Holy See would not wish to be put in a situation where it was necessary to utter a word of disapproval.’
Weizsäcker responded with a series of compliments about the Vatican. He praised the Catholic Church for steering a neutral course in the war and then suggested it would be wise if the Holy See refrained from making a protest, telling the cardinal, ‘I am thinking of the consequences that a step by the Holy See would provoke …’ He added that these measures came from ‘the highest level’ and stressed that their conversation must be regarded as confidential. In response Maglione asked Weizsäcker to intervene by appealing to his ‘sentiments of humanity’.
The meeting was cordial and diplomatic. Even so, Weizsäcker’s reference to the ‘highest level’ was seen as a threat by an already nervous Vatican. The Pope did not want a showdown with Rome’s new rulers. There were too many uncertainties. If he protested too strongly about the deportations, would the relationship he had established with the Germans change for the worse? Would Berlin continue to respect the independence of the Vatican State? Such questions were considered against a backdrop of persistent rumours that the Germans would invade the Holy See and seize the Pope. Just as he had done since the start of the war in 1939, Pius XII knew he had a diplomatic game to play.
That night Kappler worked until late, as he had to file a report on the day’s events for Himmler. Just before midnight he finalized his dispatch and had it transmitted to the office of the Reichsführer-SS in Berlin. Kappler reported that the ‘action against the Jews started and finished today in accordance with a plan worked out as well as possible by the office’. Even though he stated that there were insufficient numbers of German police, he stated that 1,259 people had been arrested but those of mixed blood and foreigners had been released, leaving just over 1,000 still in custody. Kappler also noted that the operation had gone ahead without any opposition and that the use of firearms had not proved necessary.
Two days later all the prisoners were taken to a railway station and squeezed into trucks and transported to Auschwitz. Within a week 800 would be dead.
On the day the Jews left Rome’s Tiburtina Station on their one-way journey to Auschwitz, Sir D’Arcy Osborne met the Pope. There was only one topic of conversation. The British Minister told the Pope that he had ‘underestimated his own moral authority’ and talked of ‘the reluctant respect in which he was held by the Nazis because of the Catholic population of Germany’. Osborne was gently pushing the Pontiff to be more forceful. He asked him to consider that an occasion could arise that might involve his taking a ‘strong line’. They discussed the security situation in Rome and the behaviour of the German army and police. The Pope said he had no complaints about either organization and told Osborne that he would never leave Rome unless he was removed by force.
