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>> Do you remember the first time that you learned about Mildred and Arvid? >> I think I was too young to remember it, I can't say exactly when it was, because it was something we were always aware of as children, when we were with that part of the family, having spent some holidays there, really, from when we were babies. There was always this cloud, these people were referred to, and we didn't understand why it was always done with such a heavy, heavy heart, particularly by our great Aunt Ansa. >> Can you tell me, you explained earlier how she would react when she talked about the family, and this cloud that was over her head. >> Yes, she would start to relate the story, and then she would say, "Ach die gute die gute Arvid, ach die gute Mildred." She obviously loved them so much and they were such good people, and the total lack of comprehension that something like this could happen to such good people was with her until the day she died. There's no doubt. >> What do they mean to your family? >> In a way, to me, they mean a completely missed opportunity, unfulfilled lives, because their lives were so short. They were clearly so talented and so clever, and so able. Generally, when you look at a family tree, it starts thin and it gets wider as you get to the bottom. If you look at our family tree, it starts wide and it gets thinner as you get to the bottom because Arvid and Mildred didn't have children, obviously. Falk and Katie chose not to, Ansa chose not to. Inge had two. One died when he was 17, and the other had two children, and here we are. >> What have you heard about their personalities? >> I've heard mainly about their capabilities more than personalities, I think, their great intellectual capabilities, their incredible bravery to the point where when I visited Falk some years ago, he said it was terrible that the family felt that their cleverness and their conviction was putting the whole family at risk. >> Would you say that what you've learned about Mildred, that she's somewhat of a role model maybe for you, or could she be a role model for other women? >> I think she could be. I think she was an early feminist and progressive. But I think she had a strength of conviction that few people have, because she was prepared to risk her life. I think few of us would stand up and say we can't let this happen, it's wrong. We know it's wrong. We'll try and stop it, but we know the risk is that we may lose our lives. >> Why is it important that their story be told? >> I think it's very important that people understand that there was a German Resistance. The British certainly are in complete denial that there ever was. In fact, I was at a dinner last night, where a man sitting next to me told me that if as many Germans who claimed to have sheltered Jews and saved them had done so, there would have been more Jews altogether saved than ever existed. This is the kind of denial many British people are in. There is nothing in any English history books about the German Resistance. Nobody learns about it. People are shocked when you say well, actually, do you realize that not all Germans were Nazis. And Nicole and I have grown up as English girls, English women, and had to try and dispel this myth that the Germans were all complicit in this, in the atrocities of the Holocaust. For this reason, this story has to be told. I was really pleasantly surprised recently, my son has an RS, a Religious Studies text book and Dietrich Bonhoeffer features in it. It's the first time I've ever seen anything about anybody who resisted in Germany written in a history book. >> What's your reaction when people will say that to you and here it is your relatives? >> It's very difficult to react, because if you react in a vehement way, or an enthusiastic way, or even an angry way, of course you're typically German aren't you, which is part of the myth, as well. I find myself becoming very defensive. I find myself shocked at the ignorance of people who I'd considered intelligent and well educated up to that point. I feel hurt for the members of my family who lost their lives in the cause that is, that's denied. >> Why do you carry so much deep emotion for Mildred? >> I think it comes back to this unfulfilled life. Her life was fulfilled for a short time. But a life where she and Arvid may have produced children, and there may have been other strands to this part of the Harnack family, which comes down to my sister and myself. It would be lovely to have grown up knowing that there were the subsequent generations from Mildred and Arvid's part of the family to share the history, to share our lives with. We've forgone that for that reason, so from a personal point of view, it's incredibly important to us. >> If you could talk to her, what would you want to-- What would you want to talk to her about? >> I'd like to ask her why she did it, how she could do it, how she could have done it. I'd like to ask her why more people didn't do it. And I'd like to ask her what she would have done with the rest of her life. >> What would you tell school children if you were to go into a classroom and tell them about Mildred and Arvid as your relatives? What do you think is important for them to know? >> That these people stood up for what they believed in. They tried to stop what they knew was wrong, and they were prepared to risk whatever it took to do that. >> How would Inge describe Mildred, or even Angela for that matter, since you had a closer relationship with her? >> I think Angela, or Ansa as we knew her, would say that she was clever. She was sensitive. She was beautiful. She was highly educated. But she took risks that could have put the rest of the family in danger. >> So you speak of the danger. Do you know anything different, as to why they felt they were being put in danger by what was being done by Mildred and Arvid? >> Because had it been known, any one of them could have been arrested, interrogated, killed. >> Rainer believes that the Harnack family and the Bonhoeffers are related. >> I would like to research this a lot more myself at some point. But I think part of what has held us back is the fact that it was always shrouded in a degree of mystery, which I think has its foundation in fear, as much as anything. So the whole story has really been, not deliberately suppressed, but not brought out into the open, perhaps. This is very overdue. What you're doing is very overdue. >> In talking with Rainer, he said that one of the lesser known areas of the story is their resistance, but was their devotion to their Jewish friends, and helping Jews. >> Yes, I think there was, and certainly in the family, more generally, more broadly, there was certainly protection of Jews. Our grandmother's mother-in-law, Inge's mother-in-law and her husband were Jewish, and sheltered. I met a couple who'd been saved by the Weider family, been kept in their attic for months and months and months. And I met those as a teenager. When I was 16, I went to Berlin to meet all these people. And our links with Falk and his wife had been broken for a long time, for various family reasons, and those were re-established through me going investigating, and being driven around all the sites where the terrible decisions were made to do the-- to commit the atrocities. I met this couple who'd been saved by our family, and I'm sure there were lots and lots more. There's just a little story that illustrates the fear that the family would have lived in. Our great grandmother, Arvid's mother, Clara, was arrested at some point. She allegedly had been overheard referring to Hitler as a

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, and somebody had heard this and told the police and she was arrested and tried in court. And stood there and said, "Can you possibly imagine that a lady like me would use words like that?" and was acquitted. But it was so easy, you could be overheard by a neighbor who was sympathetic to the Nazis and be thrown in jail and then, worse from there. >> Do you know any of the political backgrounds, and not specifically what politics, but my understanding is that the Harnacks and their relatives came from all political stripes. I mean, mostly left-leaning, but that wasn't one umbrella that you could give to paint the whole family. >> No, not at all. Not at all. I don't think they were all left-leaning at all. I think some of them were so much more interested in their science or their study, their academic studies, or their translation of poetry, or whatever else, that politics didn't really play a big part in their thoughts even. >> You touched on something important. What kind of a family did Mildred marry into? >> She married into an elite family, elite in an academic sense. Almost everybody excelled at whatever it was they did in one way or another. >> I think it inspired her to see this elite intellectual family. >> Yes. >> And in her own way was like, I'm not going to let this family down, because she loved them so much, and she believed in what they believed in. >> Yes, and in a way, very demanding, all of them very demanding. And I sometimes wonder how am I going to leave my mark in the way all these people did. And because the family was scattered because of the Jewish connection, well, because of the resistance connection, or both, it's sad for us in a way, because we don't immediately follow on from the others, because we ended up here. But we can start again.