Chad Finer

Freya Von Moltke was born in Cologne, Germany on March 29, 1911. Freya’s father, Carl Theodor Deichmann, was a banker; her mother’s name was Ada. Freya studied law at the University of Bonn, eventually working in research for her future husband, Helmuth James Graf von Moltke. They were married in 1931 and lived in the von Moltke family farm in Kreisau (now part of Poland) before moving to Berlin.

Freya also studied law in Berlin, receiving a Juris Doctor from Humboldt University of Berlin in 1935. Mr. Von Moltke became an English barrister while establishing an international law practice in Berlin.

When Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, Mr. Von Moltke foresaw disaster for Germany. In 1937 their first son, Helmuth Caspar was born. They had a second son, Konrad, in 1942.

When war began in Europe, Freya’s husband was drafted into the High Command of the German army. He became increasingly concerned by the many human rights abuses perpetrated by the Nazis that he saw in his travels. He attempted to fight these abuses by insisting that Germany observe the Geneva Convention.

In 1941 he wrote, “Certainly more than a thousand people are murdered in this way every day, and another thousand German men are habituated to murder… What shall I say when I am asked: And what did you do during that time?”

In the same letter he said, “Since Saturday the Berlin Jews are being rounded up. Then they are sent off with what they can carry…. How can anyone know these things and walk around free?”

While in Berlin during the war, Freya’s husband formed a group joined to oppose Nazism. Their discussions ranged widely, from the failures of Germany to fend off the rise of the Nazis to pan-Europeanism and European Union. Other meetings established, “Principles for the New [Post-Nazi] Order” and “Directions to Regional Commissioners.”

In 1944 Freya’s husband was arrested by the Gestapo for warning an acquaintance of that person’s impending arrest. Freya was able to visit him while in prison. After a 1944 attempt to assassinate Hitler, Mr. Von Moltke was tried by the Nazis, convicted, and executed in January 1945 for “treason.”

In post-war 1945, the part of Germany where the von Moltke farm stood was ceded to Poland. All Germans, including Freya, had to leave. Freya went to South Africa, where her husband’s mother had come from. While there she was a social worker and therapist for disabilities.

From 1947 to 1956 she lived in South Africa, but became increasingly disenchanted with Apartheid. Freya returned to Berlin briefly before coming to Norwich in 1960. In Norwich she joined social philosopher Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy, who had ben a professor at Dartmouth, and an old family friend. Freya has been active since the war in publicizing her husband’s ideas and actions during the war, to serve as an example of principled resistance. As early as 1949 she traveled to the United States to lecture on “Germany: past and present,” “Germany: Totalitarianism versus democracy,” German youth and the new education,” and “Women’s position in the new Germany.”

On the centenary of her husband’s birth, March 11, 2007, Freya was invited to attend a commemoration of his legacy in Berlin, where German chancellor Angela Merkel described her husband as a symbol of “European courage.” Freya has been a subject of many interviews and articles. She told interviewer, Owings: “People who lived through the Nazi time, and who still live, who did not lose their lives because they were opposed, all had to make compromises.”

With the reunification of Germany, Freya was supportive of transforming the former von Moltke estate in Kreisau into a meeting place to promote German-Polish and European mutual understanding. Poland and Germany invested 30 million DM in renovating the venue, which opened in 1998 as the Internationale Jugendbegegnungsstätte Kreisau (Kreisau International Youth Center). In 1999, Dartmouth College awarded Freya an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters for her writings on the German resistance during World War II. In that same year, she accepted the Bruecke Prize from the city of Görlitz, Germany in recognition of her life’s work.

In 2004, a fund was established, the Freya von Moltke Stiftung für das Neue Kreisau (Freya von Moltke Foundation for a New Kreisau), to promote the long-term support of the meeting place and further the work done there. As of 2007, Freya actively supported this initiative as the honorary chair of the board of trustees of the Kreisau Foundation for European Understanding (the supporting entity for the Kreisau meeting site) and the Institute for Cultural Infrastructure, Sachsen in Görlitz..

At the age of 75 Freya became a U.S. citizen in order to pursue her interest in participating in the political system. She regrets not having run for office. It was in Norwich that Freya began the task of transcribing her husband’s letters—all 1600 of them! With Letters to Freya 1939-1945, published in German in 1988 and awarded the Geschwister Scholl Prize in 1989 (published in English by Alfred Knopf in 1990 as Letters to Freya), Freya has preserved an important chapter of European history for future generations. [1-17-2008]

[Note: much of this bio was obtained from Wikipedia and from an interview with Mrs. Von Moltke on the evening of January 17, 2008].