Teenage rebels who fought Nazis are honoured at last

[drdon326]

A group of rebellious teenagers who formed a resistance network against the Nazis are being honoured after almost 60 years of neglect by the German authorities, who considered them no better than common criminals.

The Edelweiss Pirates, as they were known, were working class teenagers from western Germany who fought the Hitler Youth and helped resistance groups, risking imprisonment and death.

The Gestapo declared the group criminals in the 1940s, a tag which was allowed to remain for 60 years.

Six of their number were executed by the Gestapo and some have been honoured by Yad Vashem, the Israeli Holocaust memorial, for hiding Jews from Nazi persecution.

Tomorrow a small group of surviving Edelweiss Pirates will perform some of their songs on stage in Cologne, alongside local musicians at a festival which coincides with last week's official recognition of the group as resistance fighters.

"We were from the working classes, that is the main reason why we have only now been recognised," said Gertrud Koch, 81, who still goes by her Edelweiss codename of Mucki. "After the war there were no judges in Germany so the old Nazi judges were used and they upheld the criminalisation of what we did and who we were."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/06/25/wedel25.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/06/25/ixworld.html

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Im embarrassed to say i hadnt heard about them. I'm glad I had.

[Kellanved]

1. It is not that easy

"Edelweiss Pirates" was the Gestapo name for renegade youth organizations. It was not one organization with thousands of members, but many small groups.

Basically there were two styles of "Edelweiss Pirates":
a) Kids from blue collar families in cites, they used the names "Edelweiss Pirates" for themselves

b) Middle-class groups like scouts continuing undercover. They considered "Edelweiss Pirates" a cuss-word.

For both groups, the political anti-regime position was mainly a reaction to the outlawing of independent youth groups.

Even with Cologne acknowledging the Edelweiss groups, the problem is still present: the German conservatives (CDU) hinder all notions to recognize groups like that. Another example for that stance is their opposition to an amnesty for WW2 deserters. Yet, they never tire of demanding full honors for former Nazi officials. :puke:

In the case of the Edelweiss group Cologne, they based their position on the Gestapo interrogation protocols.


http://www.edelweisspiraten.com/

[Lydia Leftcoast]

2. At this year's Twin Cities Film Festival, there was a

German film about them. It really gave you a feeling for what it must have been like living in Germany in the last days of WWII, when everyone was struggling to survive in the rubble, in constant fear of bombing raids, and you still didn't know whom you could trust.

(In one scene, a member is saved from the Gestapo by a "well-timed" bombing raid.)