The Gestapo’s harassment in Freudenstadt persuaded us to move to another city, and in 1936 we went to Stuttgart. There, I sought contact with our underground administration​—and right away I was given “work” to do. I regularly received picture postcards containing greetings. Actually, they were hidden messages. My job was to bring them to a secret place in the city. So as not to endanger this activity, I was told not to circulate any literature. Everything ran smoothly until August 1938.

One day, I received a card instructing me to stand in front of a well-known church on a certain evening. There I would receive further information. I went to the meeting place. It was pitch black. A man introduced himself as Julius Riffel. This, I knew, was the name of a faithful brother who worked in the underground. He hastily told me to travel to Bad Ems on a certain date in order to meet somebody. He quickly disappeared.

However, on the platform in Bad Ems, only the Gestapo was waiting for me. What had gone wrong? The man in front of the church​—actually a former brother from Dresden, Hans Müller, who knew everything about the underground work in Germany and had begun to collaborate with the Gestapo—​had set a trap for me. But it did not work. Shortly before, my mother had informed me that she had suffered a minor stroke, and I, in reply, had promised to visit her in Bad Ems on a certain date. This happily coincided with the “mission,” and our letters provided an alibi at my later judicial hearing. To my surprise, I was acquitted. Yes, in February 1939, after five and a half months of detention, I was free again!

Responding to His Friendship

Of course, I did not plan to stay inactive, especially since most of the brothers were suffering in concentration camps or were under arrest elsewhere.

After the responsible German brothers had been arrested with the help of Müller, Ludwig Cyranek took over the distribution of spiritual food. This brother, formerly a Bethel worker in Magdeburg, had just been released from detention, and he visited me in Bad Ems. “Come on, Maria! Let’s keep working,” he said. He brought me back to Stuttgart, where I got secular work. My real work, however, starting in March 1939, was that of distributing suitcases full of duplicated Watchtower magazines in Stuttgart and its surroundings. Other Witnesses courageously shared in this work.

Meanwhile, Brother Cyranek covered all but the northeastern part of the country. Since the Witnesses’ residences were being watched, he had to move with great caution and sometimes even had to sleep in the woods. Express trains brought him from time to time to Stuttgart, where he dictated to me special reports about our situation in Germany. I wrote ordinary letters, putting these messages between the lines in invisible ink and then sent them, via a cover address, to the Netherlands Bethel.

My case came to court in Stuttgart on September 17, 1940. By writing and forwarding Ludwig Cyranek’s letters, I had informed people living in foreign countries about our underground activity and our persecution. That was high treason, which carried the death penalty. It therefore seemed like a miracle that I, the principal defendant in Stuttgart, was sentenced to only three and a half years of solitary confinement!

So I was free again in 1943 and thus in a position, using extreme care, to pick up theocratic material from Holzgerlingen. After having copied it, I hid it between the walls of a thermos flask full of coffee and carried it to brothers living along the Rhine River and in the Westerwald section of Germany. From that time to the end of the war, I was able to work undisturbed.