1 In front of all prisoners assembled in the roll-call square at Sachsenhausen, August Dickmann, one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, was shot on September 15, 1939, by order of Heinrich Himmler, Reichsfuehrer SS, for being a conscientious objector and “Volksschädling” (parasites of the nation). Shortly thereafter, newspapers in Germany and abroad reported about this police judgment.

2 Jacob von Bennekom (Netherlands) was imprisoned as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Rotterdam and in Amersfoort camp. In November 1944, he was shot when he refused to set up anti-tank barriers close to the town of Zwolle, as all other prisoners did. This incident was reported by an eyewitness who became one of Jehovah’s Witnesses after the war.

3 Willi Letonja, (Austria) an ardent National Socialist, served in Hitler’s army. When he learned the Bible’s message from his mother and brother, he became one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1941. He refused further military service and was beheaded on the Brandenburg guillotine on September 1, 1942. Shortly before his execution, he said to his brother: “Anton, why are you crying? This is not a reason to cry; this is a reason for joy!”

 4 After having spent 13 months at Munich-Stadelheim prison for duplicating and distributing Watchtower magazines, Vinzenz Platajs (Austria) was beheaded at Brandenburg on October 9, 1944.

5 Heinrich Fundis from Sulzfeld refused the call for military service. He was beheaded on December 18, 1941.

6 Paul Weseler belonged to a group of active Jehovah’s Witnesses from Oberhausen, Mühlheim/​Ruhr, and Karlsruhe. He, along with Wilhelm Bischoff, Julius Engelhard, Auguste Hetkamp, Johann Hörstgen, and Friedrich and Klara Stoffels, were executed in August 1944.

7 Because he refused to put on an army uniform, 19-year-old Sigurd Speidel from Sindelfingen was beheaded on January 27, 1943.

8 On May 9, 1941, Kurt Liebold from Cossengrün (Thuringia) was beheaded for being a conscientious objector. He had earlier spent two years in prison for participating in one of the mid-1930’s leaflet campaigns of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

9 After three years of detention at Fort Torgau, Max Moserth, from Burgstädt, was beheaded on the charges of Wehrkraftzersetzung (demoralizing the troops), on June 26, 1942.

 10 Rolf Appel, a printery owner from Süderbrarup, was executed as a conscientious objector in 1941, as was his 17-year-old son, Walter, in 1944. The parents lost custody of their younger children, and the authorities forced the mother into poverty.

11 As early as 1934, Heinz Bernecker from Königsberg (front right) was forced to work in a labor camp in East Prussia. From 1938 to 1942, he was again detained. When he was guillotined at Brandenburg as a conscientious objector on June 19, 1942, his wife Elisabeth was in the Ravensbrück camp. The grandparents took care of the three children left behind.

12 The Wohlfart family from Pörtschach (Austria). On December 7, 1939, Gregor, the father, was beheaded as a conscientious objector along with other Witnesses in Berlin-Plötzensee. For the same reason, his 20-year-old son Gregor, was executed on March 14, 1942. Franz was sent to the Rollwald labor camp. The youngest son, Willibald, and his siblings, Ida, Annie, and Kristian, were sent to a Nazi reform school located at a monastery in Landau. Both boys were forced into front-line duty in Russia. Willibald was killed there, while Kristian suffered severe injuries.

 13 In the death cell, Johannes Harms from Wilhelmshaven (beheaded January 8, 1941) wrote: “One of Jehovah’s Witnesses is given an opportunity to break his covenant even when in view of the gallows. Therefore, I am still in the midst of the fight.”

14 Hans Rehwald, now at age 34, had spent five years in prison. Before his execution by a firing squad in Königsberg on February 1, 1943, he spoke a prayer so touching that no soldier fired. Following the second order, one shot hit him in the stomach. The officer killed the conscientious objector with his pistol. At that time, Hans Rehwald’s wife, Martha, and other relatives were imprisoned in concentration camps.

15 On April 27, 1940, Wilhelm Kusserow, a conscientious objector, was shot by order of the military court in Münster. His court-appointed counsel later wrote the family: “He asked me to send you his greetings. He awaited death honorably, and he died immediately.”

16 Wolfgang Kusserow, sharing his brother Wilhelm’s conviction, was beheaded at Brandenburg penitentiary on March 28, 1942. Defending himself before court, he said: “I am sure that if Jesus Christ lived on earth today, he would experience the same persecution today as in the past.”

 17 Karl Kühnel, a carpenter from Clausnitz (Ore Mountains), was imprisoned because he had mailed the petition of June 1933 to the authorities and private citizens. In 1937, he and his wife lost custody of their two children. Because he refused to pledge allegiance to the flag, he was beheaded in Berlin-Plötzensee on October 24, 1939.

18 Helene Gotthold, a nurse and mother of two, was married to a miner and lived in Herne and Bochum. In 1926, she became one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. In 1937, while her trial was pending, the Gestapo (secret police) beat her so severely that she suffered a miscarriage. On December 8, 1944, she and three other female Witnesses were executed by the guillotine for being active for their faith.

19 Emmy Zehden (center) from Berlin provided a hideout for three conscientious objectors, including her foster son and nephew Horst Schmidt, to whom she wrote a farewell letter on June 9, 1944, the day of her execution. The execution record states: “Without resistance the convict was placed under the guillotine. She was calm and self-composed . . .” Today a street in front of the Berlin-Plötzensee prison bears her name.