Survival

Abstract

In 1944 and even 1945 Zahn continued to hope that the Allied coalition would break apart before a complete German defeat. Even as he wrote articles for newspapers promoting resistance to the Red Army, however, his distance from the regime grew. In early 1944 his closest friend was imprisoned, together with the friend’s family, as hostages for the good behavior of the friend’s brother, an intelligence officer who had deserted to the British in Istanbul. After the July 20, 1944 attempt on Hitler’s life, Zahn’s wife Christa, who was at the time living on the estate of the Stauffenberg family in south Germany, was arrested by the Gestapo. The bomb intended to kill Hitler had been set by Colonel Klaus von Stauffenberg. Zahn returned to Germany from the Eastern Front to persuade the Gestapo to free her, which he succeeded in doing by playing the patriotic soldier.