📍Münsterplatz, 89073 Ulm, Germany
1932 – 1942“My family moved to Ulm when I was eleven, in 1932, and in 1939 we settled in a spacious flat on the fourth floor of an Art Nouveau building at Münsterplatz 33, looking out on the great cathedral square. My father, Robert, was a tax adviser and a liberal who had once been a town mayor; he distrusted Hitler from the start. My mother, Magdalena, had been a deaconess and brought warmth and quiet faith to our home. There were five of us children at home, and our house was full of books, music, walks and argument. At first, like many young people, I was swept up in the Hitler Youth movement, with its camps, songs and talk of a new Germany. My father argued with us, and slowly I came to see what it meant: banned books, friends persecuted, and the hollowness of the slogans. Our flat on the Münsterplatz became a place of honesty, where we read forbidden authors, listened to music, sketched and wrote, and talked late into the night. I loved drawing, nature and the rivers around Ulm, and I wrote long letters to my friend Fritz about faith and conscience. I trained as a kindergarten teacher and was made to do national labour service before I could go to university. In May 1942 I joined my brother Hans in Munich to study biology and philosophy, and soon I learned that he and his friends were writing the White Rose leaflets, calling on Germans to resist. I joined them without hesitation. Today a memorial stands outside our old home on the Münsterplatz, and schools, squares and streets across Germany carry our name, so that the courage of a few young people from Ulm is not forgotten.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today