Nazi policies toward Christian churches became more severe over the years of Nazi rule (1933–1945). During the years of World War II (1939–1945), German police arrested thousands of Christian leaders.1 The Nazis began to view some branches of the Catholic Church as hotbeds of anti-Nazi resistance during the war, and they imprisoned many priests from countries throughout Europe.2 German authorities often arrested and imprisoned Catholic leaders without explaining what crimes they may have been suspected of committing.3
In late 1940, Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler ordered the transfer of all priests imprisoned by the Nazis to one location at Dachau concentration camp outside of Munich—after intense negotiations between representatives of the Nazi government and the Pope. More than 1,000 priests were imprisoned at Dachau by the end of 1940. Over 2,500 were imprisoned there between 1940 and 1945.4 The priests were housed together in barracks apart from the other prisoners. Living conditions improved for them temporarily between February 1941 and September 1941 through the intervention of the Pope, but they still faced severe hunger and abuse. Conditions grew worse for them in fall 1941. Nazi doctors performed inhumane and unscientific medical experiments on some Polish priests, and older priests deemed incapable of work were removed from the camp and killed in the so-called “euthanasia” program code-named “14f13.”5
Archbishop Michael von Faulhaber6 wrote this letter to the administration of the Dachau camp in the final days of World War II in Europe to request the release of the priests still imprisoned there. As the highest-ranking Catholic leader in Munich, Faulhaber was the Catholic authority responsible for the area. He was critical of many Nazi policies even though he shared several of the views of the Nazi Party—he was an anti-communist German nationalist who supported the German military and had opposed the foundation of the Weimar Republic after World War I. But Faulhaber was vocally opposed to the Nazi regime’s racial ideology, its anti-Catholic policies, and its violations of human rights.7
Dachau had just been liberated two days before Faulhaber wrote this letter, but it is unclear if he knew that the SS camp guards had already surrendered to American forces. Faulhaber had been in communication with the imprisoned priests at Dachau—he had responded to a November 1944 request from the imprisoned priests and gave the camp at Dachau the official status of a deanery8 within the hierarchy of the Catholic Church.
Faulhaber’s letter is handwritten on a plain sheet of paper, rather than the official letterhead typically used by high-ranking members of the Catholic Church. He addressed his request only to the “honorable Camp Administration of Dachau” and cited “humanitarian and official grounds.” Why might he have chosen to frame his letter this way? Why might he have made this plea at this particular date—exactly one week before the surrender of Nazi Germany?
Faulhaber continued in his role as Archbishop of Munich after 1945. He remained a vocal critic of Communism and worked to restore the strength and influence of the Catholic Church in West Germany. Among other official duties, the Archbishop ordained thousands of priests and bishops within the archdiocese before his death in 1952—including the future Pope Benedict XVI.9