Ilse Stanley - Concentration Camps

Concentration Camps

Unable to work at what she loved, and having no hope for matters to improve in the foreseeable future, Ilse became quite discouraged. In 1936, an unexpected set of circumstances led to her making a trip to Sachsenhausen concentration camp, posing as a social worker and under an assumed name. With falsified release papers, she secured the liberation of her cousin's husband.

The story of how Ilse accomplished this is interesting enough to tell in full:

In 1936, a cousin of Ilse's came to Berlin to consult a lawyer about getting her husband released from a concentration camp. The cousin had not yet realized the seriousness of Germany's situation, in which law and order was simply not operating. In the ensuing conversation, both women became distraught. After much soul-searching and a visit to her beloved Synagogue, Ilse reached a life-changing decision. Pitting her faith in the "goodness even in people who have been taught nothing but evil" p.68 against the odds of failure, she took her cousin to the Gestapo headquarters to look for help.

As they walked the halls with appropriately downcast eyes, they were stopped by an officer who took Ilse aside. As he questioned her closely about "Davis" and then "Ilse", she recognized "Fritz" (whose real name was Hans)—a theatre policeman from her acting days, for whose younger sister she had arranged a gala weekend in Berlin in honor of the girl's 16th birthday.

The two met later in a café, and Fritz explained to Ilse a plan he had devised. In the guise of a social worker and using the alias "Feldern", Ilse would hand-carry the release papers to the concentration camp and pick up the prisoner. Going in person had the essential element of surprise, which greatly increased the likelihood that the camp would actually release the prisoner, who might otherwise be quietly killed instead of released, particularly if he was in "unpresentable" condition.

The rules were stringent: a trusted Gentile chauffeur would drive Ilse to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp where her cousin's husband was held. She would enter alone, present the papers, and wait for the prisoner to be brought to her. If questioned about the papers, she would give the name of a (cooperating) high-placed Nazi lawyer, but say no more. No one must know when or where she was going, but a trusted, distant acquaintance—not a family member—would know when she was leaving and when to expect her return. If she did not return by the specified time, he was to call Fritz. No written record of any of her doings, or her information, could be kept longer than a day. Above all, under no circumstances must she ever show even the slightest reaction to any sight that might greet her on these trips.

She went, and she brought the prisoner home.

Having succeeded with this ruse on her first attempt, she continued rescue work for two more years. In order to have a cover-up office from which to do her work, and to provide a legitimate front for getting people out of Germany, she took a volunteer position with the vice-president of the Jewish Community, whom she calls "Mr. Gross" in her book. She worked in the Passports Office, on "the most hopeless" cases. In addition to working out passport issues for people and enabling many Jews to leave the country, she continued her trips to the camps, ultimately securing the release of 412 people before the devastating events of Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938).