In the special custody of the SS

22nd February 1945: Heinrich Himmler keeps many prisoners as hostages - now being evacuated west, they watch the collapse of Germany

The former German ambassador to Italy, Ulrich von Hassell, in front of the Nazi Volksgerichtshof.

Nobody was acquitted by the People’s Court. Ulrich von Hassell was condemned to death - for his association with the plot to kill Hitler - on 8th September 1944 and hanged at Plötzensee Prison on the same day.

Ulrich von Hassell (1881-1944), a career diplomat since 1909, had long been opposed to Hitler. He tried to warn the British, following the Munich agreement in 1938, that Hitler could not be trusted. “Britain - following a poor precedent - failed to announce with utmost gravity at Munich that it would take military action in case the agreement was violated.”

Following the failed bomb plot against Hitler in July 1944 the SS had gone to great lengths to track down all of those who were suspected of involvement. The hunt extended not just to those directly participating in the plot but to all those who were sympathetic to the cause. The widespread use of torture meant that the Nazis soon had many names to investigate. The net encompassed not only the suspects but their families as well.