The No.1 Criminal of Lübeck

Johannes Prassek in a letter of July 1942

Who knows, if, depending on the will of the Stapo (Gestapo), I will ever be allowed to play the role of priest again. In any case, during interrogations one has made it clear to me, that that is over. Well, and what next? – Never mind, the good Lord will push my barrow. Maybe, everything will soon be over anyway, one way or the other! Just don’t forget about us when, maybe, it will last long years. I dread it. Not so much what one might have to endure, but that one may fail in one’s stance as a priest. We just happen to be in everyone’s sight. […]

I have the “honour” of probably being, among all the current criminals in Lübeck, the “criminal” who can expect the fattest penalty. That’s probably the reason one treats me with the utmost respect. Maybe it’s an “honour”: The No.1 criminal of Lübeck. What a joke. And then we were always so uninhibitedly cheerful, what? But the Nazis! Well!

Info

Johannes Prassek smuggled these lines in a lengthy Kassiber (a note smuggled from prison) from prison. They were directed to Johanna Rechtin, the housekeeper of the Lübeck presbytery in the Parade, the street location of Prassek’s parish, about July 1942. They give an insight into Prassek’s familiar way of communicating with friends and close acquaintances, making his ironic vein perceptible.