An officer in the Wehrmacht — Germany’s World War II military — von Boeselager was part of a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler.
He had realized in 1942 that Hitler was a maniac who was systematically murdering Jews, Roma and others for their ethnic backgrounds. The assassination became “no longer about saving the country, but about stopping the crimes” against humanity that Hitler was committing. In 1943, von Boeselager was given a pistol so he could shoot Hitler and SS head Heinrich Himmler at a dinner, but the idea was scrapped when Himmler couldn’t make the dinner von Boeselager was attending.
The order to abort the mission was von Boeselager’s greatest regret: he recalled he was only about two feet from Hitler, and always wondered to himself, “What would have happened if you had shot him?” Another attempt came in 1944: von Boeselager’s role then was to bring troops to Berlin to take control of the city after Hitler’s death. But the July 20 plot failed: someone moved the briefcase with the bomb inside, and Hitler survived the blast with minor injuries. A furious fuhrer ordered the Gestapo to round up anyone who could have been involved. About 5,000 people were arrested, and about 200 were executed as conspirators.
Von Boeselager was not implicated, but he kept a cyanide capsule on his person until the end of the war, just in case that happened. After the war, he studied economics and forestry, and was considered a hero by the Germans and French both. He urged youth to become involved in politics to avoid a repeat of Hitler’s mania for power. Believed to have been the last of the coup planners alive, von Boeselager died on May 1 at 90. One of his prized possessions to the end: the pistol he was given to shoot Hitler with.