The Boy Who Dared

It is October 27, 1942. Helmuth Hübener has spent 264 days on death row at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin, Germany. Seventeen-year-old Helmuth fearfully sits in his cell, aware that the prison executioner is working today. He daydreams about his past to ignore his dread. He recalls walking with his mother, Mutti, at age three near their home in Hamburg. Young Helmuth is angry that he must hold hands with Mutti while his older brothers, Hans and Gerhard, can walk ahead. A parade of Nazi “Brownshirts” march by and Helmuth tells one he will become a soldier when he is older. The Brownshirt compliments Helmuth’s bravery and intelligence.

In his cold cell, Helmuth urinates and tidies his bed. In his memory, he is seven and lying in bed with Hans and Gerhard. The moon’s brightness reminds Helmuth of God and heaven. Helmuth and Gerhard discuss the infinite nature of heaven and the universe. Overcome, Helmuth claims he is “floating” (6), which Gerhard finds illogical. Helmuth loves feeling like he is floating up to God and heaven.

Helmuth’s memory shifts to playing toy soldiers at his grandparents’, Oma and Opa’s, apartment next door. Oma laments the country’s turbulent political atmosphere. Opa says Hitler will start a war if he takes control, and Oma agrees that she is afraid of him. Their conversation confuses Helmuth, who thinks Hitler will improve Germany. Helmuth wants to be a brave soldier like Hitler was in WWI.

Noise outside his cell brings him back to the present day. He does not know his execution date and fears that the executioner is at his door. It is just a guard with his breakfast of stale bread, which reminds Helmuth of Hitler’s promise to bring “work and bread” to an impoverished Germany (11).

Helmuth’s mind wanders again. On the day Hitler becomes chancellor, Helmuth is eight. In his memory, his teacher plays the announcement on the radio, and Helmuth shares his classmates’ excitement. Uniformed boys in the Jungvolk, the section of Hitler Youth for 10- to 14-year-olds, give Nazi salutes and taunt their Jewish classmate, Benno Seligmann. The teachers quietly argue whether Hitler will bring Germany progress or war. World War I ended in 1918 but the Treaty of Versailles made Germany destitute. The teachers debate if Hitler will harm Jewish people and if he is using them as a scapegoat to unify the Germans. As a Mormon, Helmuth believes that Jewish individuals are “God’s first chosen people” (15); he does not understand why they are disliked.

Walking home, Helmuth passes storm troopers, or Nazi soldiers, praising Hitler and the National Socialist Party. He is excited when a storm trooper calls him a soldier and invites him to a parade. At home, Mutti is cooking a celebratory meal. She looks tired because she is always working. Mutti is divorced from Hans and Gerhard’s father, and Helmuth does not know who his father is. Helmuth is furious that she will allow his brothers but not him to go to the night’s parade. He wishes he had a father to take him. He listens to the parade on the RRG, the government radio station. The music floods him with nationalist feelings.

Later that week, Helmuth listens to Hitler on the radio. Hitler’s energetic speech convinces Helmuth that Communism is a threat that must be stopped. Hitler vows to protect and strengthen Germany but declares that all Germans must help. He declares “Christianity as the foundation of […] national morality and the family as the basis of national life” (22).

Helmuth returns to reality to use the bucket in his cell. He wipes himself with a bit of newspaper bearing Hitler’s name, then mentally drifts back to the month following Hitler’s appointment as chancellor. Young Helmuth tells Mutti that he dreamt he was flying with a sparrow. Mutti explains that sparrows are appointed by God to bring people to heaven. He cannot fall asleep again and finds Mutti listening to the radio. The Reichstag, Germany’s parliament, is engulfed in flames. Hitler blames the Communists, and a suspect has been arrested. Helmuth believes the Communist agitators should be imprisoned.

Brother Worbs, Opa’s friend and a fellow Mormon, visits the next day to rage over Hitler’s new order of protection that limits freedom of speech. Brother Worbs’s attitude surprises Helmuth, as good Mormons should honor their leaders. Brother Worbs warns that everyone is now in danger, and not because of Communism, but because they cannot speak freely. Mutti is skeptical about how quickly the Communists were blamed. Helmuth asks Oma about the suspect in custody, and she surmises that he will be executed.

The Nazis win majority control of the Reichstag in the election the following week. Many Jewish people are refusing to buy German products to push back against the Nazis. Herr Zeiger, Helmuth’s teacher, tells the class to stop shopping at Jewish stores, and blames Jewish people for Germany’s economic problems. He points to Benno Seligmann, Helmuth’s Jewish classmate, and calls the Jewish people traitors, even though Benno’s father is a proud German veteran of WWI. When Benno defends himself against Zeiger’s ranting, he is punished and never returns to the school.

Not long after, Mutti sends Helmuth to buy cake trimmings from Herr Kaltenbach. Helmuth sees SS and SA soldiers hanging posters on shops in the Jewish neighborhood, urging people to boycott the shops. Hitler Youth are vandalizing the windows and doors. Helmuth watches as Herr Seligmann, Benno’s father, is beaten for trying to clean his vandalized windows. Helmuth is disturbed by the violence. Since Herr Kaltenbach is no longer in his shop window, he goes to a German shop instead.

The next month Helmuth goes to the movies with Gerhard. Before their western film plays, a newsreel showing students burning books announces that Germans can now only read German books. The audience cheers but Helmuth is upset because his favorite books are Gerhard’s novels about the Wild West. At home, he hides the books but, conflicted, asks Gerhard if breaking the law is ever warranted. Gerhard says it is if it is to help others. Helmuth doubts the books will help anyone but himself and admits to Gerhard what he did. Gerhard finds this funny because the author, Karl May, is Hitler’s favorite.

Helmuth, aware again of his circumstances in prison, hears a neighboring prisoner scream, the executioner ready for them. He vomits after hearing the guillotine fall. He prays and feels the nearness of God, calming him. He feels like he is floating as he repeatedly prays “asThouwiltasThouwiltasThouwilt” (38).