Background
Peter Yorck von Wartenburg was born in Klein-Öls, Silesia, on 17 November 1903. The son of one of Germany's most renow ned and aristocratic families.
Peter Yorck von Wartenburg was born in Klein-Öls, Silesia, on 17 November 1903. The son of one of Germany's most renow ned and aristocratic families.
He studied law and politics at Bonn and Wroclaw.
Worked in the civil service, rising to the rank of senior government Councillor. He served as a Lieutenant in the Polish campaign during World War II and from 1942 he was attached to the War Economy Office.
He shared the latter’s contempt for Hitler and National Socialism. One of the first conspirators to be arrested after the abortive plot of 20 July 1944, Yorck von Wartenburg’s conduct in the People's Court was both dignified and brave, in the face of Roland Freisler's insults and provocations. Asked why he had never joined the NSDAP. he answered simply: ‘Because I am not and never could be a Nazi.' His Resistance activity, like that of other members of the Kreisau Circle, was based on Christian conviction, the rejection as he explained to Freisler of ‘the totalitarian claim of the State on the individual which forces him to renounce his moral and religious obligations to God'.
He was hanged on 8 August 1944.