Sophie and Johann

admin / April 19, 2018 / Leave a comment / Andrews Blog

The story of Sophie Scholl has fascinated me for many years. Such courage and dignity in one so young and so lovely makes a refreshing alternative view of humanity without conscience.

Most Germans already know Sophie Scholl. Recognized as one of the most inspirational Germans ever.

Not that many know about Johann Reichhart. Or about their meeting, brief though it was. I was fascinated by the thought that this dignified looking man, an 8^th generation executioner had to look at this beautiful young woman, just 21, and think “I am just doing my job” before chopping her head off. And her final words “Such a fine sunny day, and I have to go.” Not all Germans were Nazi’s ‘placing duty above conscience without pause to wonder why’ and not all anti-Nazi activists were men. Sophie Scholl is, deservedly, a legend. A bright flame of inspiration to any ideologue.

The man she met for the first time on 22 February, 1943 was Johann Reichhart. The 8th generation German executioner, the worlds leading practitioner of this dark art where he favoured the guillotine for its superior efficiency, ending over 3,000 lives by his own hand.

Following VE Day, Nazi member Reichhart was arrested and imprisoned in Landsberg Prison for the purposes of denazification but was not tried for carrying out his duty of judicial executioner. He was subsequently employed by the Occupation Authorities until the end of May 1946 to help execute 156 Nazi war criminals at Landsberg am Lech by hanging.

He cooperated with Allied chief executioner Master Sergeant John C. Woods in the preparations for further executions of those found guilty and sentenced to death at the Nuremberg Trials, but refused to carry out any further executions himself following two cases of mistaken identity.

Reichhart’s office made him a lonely and disliked person, even after abolition of the death penalty in West Germany in 1949. His marriage failed, and one of his sons, Hans, committed suicide in 1950 due to his association with his father’s profession.

When, in 1963, there were public demands, during a series of taxi driver murders, for the re-introduction of the death penalty in West Germany, Reichhart spoke out against capital punishment.

Reichhart died in Dorfen near Erding in 1972.

Sophie died a traitor and a criminal, sentenced to death for protesting the Nazi ways through membership of the White Rose. Johann was of course an upstanding member of the community and a first rate civil servant bound by duty to his employment.

And yet, despite the dehumanising effects of mindless conformity to one repetitive task legitimized in the guise of employment, I couldn’t help but wonder how Johann must have felt when he heard this beautiful 21 year old say those words before he placed her head on the brace and pressed the lever to end her life.

Known as Hitler’s judge the Nazi fascist Roland Freisler (R) sentenced Sophie and Hans Scholl and Christoph Probst to death in February 1943.

Ironically, it was a Jewish pilot in an American plane who dropped the bomb on Berlin in 45 that killed this rotten fascist judge. The B-17 of USAAF Lt. Colonel Robert Rosenthal

With the passage of time, Sophie’s story lives on. The convicted traitor is shown for what she was, inspiring many millions towards confidence in their own beliefs, while the duty bound civil servant doing his job and saluting the flag is revealed by the passage of time.

Sophie and Johann who met briefly on 22 February 1943, joined forever in a moment in time that shows the best and worst of humanity.

“The real damage is done by those millions who want to ‘survive.’ The honest men who just want to be left in peace. Those who don’t want their little lives disturbed by anything bigger than themselves. Those with no sides and no causes. Those who won’t take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness. Those who don’t like to make waves—or enemies. Those for whom freedom, honour, truth, and principles are only literature. Those who live small, mate small, die small.

It’s the reductionist approach to life: if you keep it small, you’ll keep it under control. If you don’t make any noise, the bogeyman won’t find you.

But it’s all an illusion, because they die too, those people who roll up their spirits into tiny little balls so as to be safe.
Safe?
From what?
Life is always on the edge of death; narrow streets lead to the same place as wide avenues, and a little candle burns itself out just like a flaming torch does. I choose my own way to burn.”

Sophie Scholl

Sophie and Johann (Brel) 2010

She was the mayor’s daughter from a town in Germany
The 4th of his 6 children back in 1943
She had a carefree childhood, painting pictures,reading books
She grew to be considerate, with brown hair and good looks

When the flags of war were waving and the nation turned to hate
She raised the rebels warning of what consequences wait
The white rose grew to symbolize the role she chose to play
And despite the reign of darkness she had light to guide her way

Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day and I have to go

Johann was an older man, enough to be her dad
from the 8th generation of the famous Reickhart clan
He worked the family business taking pay for ending life
Even though the cost would soon include his son and wife

Sophie was just 21 the day that they first met
Did Johann greet their circumstantial meet without regret
Knowing about life and death and choices people make
Her defiant stand of courage would live on as something great.

Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day and I have to go

Johann is someone you know, perhaps Johann is you
chained by submission to that thing he has to do
Placing duty above conscience without pause to wonder why
There’s accounting for all good or bad on that you can rely

When the lights went down in Johann’s town did Sophie come to mind Maybe a fleeting moment did he wonder bout her kind
Sophie and Johann live together in this song
One for standing for what’s right, the other for what’s wrong

Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day
Such a fine sunny day
And I have to go