The Search for Major Plagge: The Nazi Who Saved Jews, Expanded Edition

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The author's parents attribute their own survival to the actions of a Wehrmacht staff officer, whom they merely knew as a `Major Plagge', who to their personal knowledge, had saved the lives of hundreds of Jewish and Polish inhabitants of their home town, the city of Vilna. The organisation twice rejected his petitions because it was not certain why the major acted as he did. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

The risk for Plagge was that he would be accused of favouring Jews, and this was really a very serious offence.

Although unable to stop the SS from liquidating the remaining prisoners in July 1944, Plagge managed to warn the prisoners in advance, allowing about 200 to hide from the SS and survive until the Red Army's capture of Vilnius. He was made a prisoner of war by Britain where he caught Polio, which partially crippled him, so that he needed special shoes.

Michael Good will lead you to ''ponder humanity's dual nature--our propensity to act violently out of fear and bigotry, juxtaposed against our often unexpected capacity for acting with nobility and moral courage. The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. Plagge gave work certificates to Jewish men, certifying them as essential and skilled workers regardless of their actual backgrounds.I was just very struck that a Wehrmacht staff officer, a major, would be trying to save Jewish prisoners. After graduating from Ludwig-Georgs-Gymnasium, [2] a secondary school that focused on the classics, Plagge was drafted into the Imperial German Army.