Emilie Bonhoeffer

Who was Emilie Bonhoeffer?

Emmi Bonhoeffer was born on May 13, 1905, in Berlin. She died on March 12, 1991, in Düsseldorf, Germany. Hans Delbrück's daughter, and Justus and Max Delbrück's sister. On 3 September 1930, she wed Klaus Bonhoeffer, who was an anti-Hitler activist.

Emmi's husband Klaus was chief counsel of the Lufthansa Airline Company and leading civilian member of the military resistance to the Hitler regime. Though occupied raising their children, Emmi strongly supported her husband's decision to oppose Nazism, assisting him on countless occasions both morally and practically. Her husband was arrested in October, 1944 in connection with the plot to kill Hitler. He was sentenced to death in February, 1945, and murdered by the SS as the war was ending, on April 23, 1945.

Emmi barely escaped being killed when her house was destroyed in the last days of the war. She moved with her children to Schleswig-Holstein to re-build their lives in June, 1945. She was active in activities aiding war refugees, as well as anti-Nazi educational work and various humanitarian efforts.

An activist and author, Emmi Bonhoeffer was author of Auschwitz Trials: Letters from an eyewitness