FLASHBACK READER: The First Who Am I - Published Spring 2001

I am one of the Germans who hated Hitler and worked side by side with him, giving the allies secrets that helped end the war sooner than it would have otherwise.  I was a World War I hero and when war came again, I could have lived out the war with my family far from the fighting.  Instead, I risked my life and the safety of my family to rid Germany of Hitler.  During World War II, I was the chief of the entire German intelligence branch of the government.  Historians point to my role as instrumental in bringing down the Third Reich.  Friends considered me an elegant man as I loved music and cultivating beautiful flowers.  As clever as I was, my luck finally rant out and in 1944 I was arrested by the Gestapo and put in prison along with Deitrich Bonnhoeffer.  My  last recorded words I tapped in morse code a few minutes before I was taken from my cell and shot were these: "they've broken my nose, please look after my daughters".  The memory of my courage and love for Germany lives on.