Fall 2007 Exhibit: The Rescuers
Major Karl Plagge
Major Karl Plagge was a Schindler-type figure who was put in charge of the H.K.P. labor camp in Vilna in 1943. This was a work camp for a group of about 1,000 Vilna Ghetto survivors. The purpose of the camp was to repair German vehicles damaged at the front and the works needed some expertise in this field. My husband Paul’s father Leo was an engineer and as such he qualified for this work. Unlike at other forced labor camps, Major Plagge insisted the spouses and up to two children per family be permitted to remain together. In this way Paul’s older cousin Sonya was also saved from sure slaughter and was passed off as his sister since Paul was an only child and Sonya’s parents were amongst those murdered in the forest at Periary. The reason Major Plagge offered the Nazi hierarchy for keeping the families together was that production would improve and the women would be put to work mending uniforms. His true reason was to attempt to save the lives of these Vilna survivors who would otherwise be put to death.
When the Russians began their advance through Poland and the Nazis were retreating, Major Plagge managed to warn the families that the SS would “supervise their retreat to safety.” Of course this was a coded message which sent everyone to the few hiding places that had been prepared. Although Paul was only a child of 11, he had already selected his own hiding place during the prior “kinder aktion” and now he had a sense of which of the hiding places would be safe. He convinced his parents to hide in the very last place available to them. They and barely a few dozen others survived three days underground in the dark with little food or water. Then came years of clandestine border crossings, forged passports, DP camps in many countries and finally a way to emigrate to this country in 1949 with the help of some distant relatives.
Their lives and those of a few dozen others were saved by the humanity of a German officer. After years of research about him by Dr. Michael Good whose mother was a survivor in the same camp. Major Karl Plagge was finally named a “Righteous Among Nations” at Yad Vashem, Israel. A fitting honor for a man who suffered his own moral dilemma because of the Nazi doctrines and who put his own life at risk to save the Jews of Vilna who were in his keeping.