WHAT EXCUSE DO WE HAVE FOR NOT WORKING
TOGETHER TODAY?”
Helping
Others Who Need Our Help
in Recognition of Our Common Humanity
More than a decade ago, noted historian Jim Horton was commenting about
the meaning of the Underground Railroad, and he said something close to the
following:
“If people back then would help others,
not even knowing who they were and at risk to their own lives, what excuse do
we have for not working together today?”
That powerful statement has motivated me from the day I heard it. It lies at the heart of my commitment
to tell the story of the Underground Railroad and other stories like it which
demonstrate man’s humanity and one’s willingness to help another who needs help
notwithstanding the personal risk involved.
I was recently reminded of this as I read a remarkable diary of a woman
named Iris Origo who lived in the Tuscan countryside during the height of World
War II.* The German Nazi Army was
in control of the surrounding land, yet there were allied prisoners of war who
had escaped from Nazi internment camps and others who had become detached from
their units.
This diary includes many remarkable stories which bring to life the
same values of courage and cooperation and perseverance which undergird the
story of the Underground Railroad.
They are yet another example of why stories like those of the
Underground Railroad can provide inspiration on how we can live at our best
today by helping others who need our help no matter where we live.
Iris Origo owned an estate not far from Florence. She, along with other partisans were
risking their lives rescuing escaped allied prisoners of war and other allied
soldiers who had been detached from their units. I love the way she explained the motivation of those who
were helping these soldiers at the risk of their own lives. It reminded me of what motivated the
heroes of the Underground Railroad.
“What, it may be asked,” she wrote, “was the motive underlying the
generous help given to the hunted Allied prisoners of war by the Italian
countryfolk, often at the risk of their own lives? It would be a mistake, I think, to attribute it to any
political – or even patriotic – motive.
There was, it is true, a certain amount of anti-German and anti-Fascist
feeling, especially among those peasants whose sons had been in the army
against their will. But the true
motive was a far simpler one. It
has been described by an Italian partisan as ‘the simplest of all ties between
one man and another; the tie that arises between the man who asks for what he
needs, and the man who comes to his aid as best he can. No unnecessary emotion or pose.’”
*War in Val D’Orcia – An Italian War Diary –
1943-1944 by Iris Origo
An English officer, himself an escaped prisoner of war, who owed his
life to the help given him in this manner, expressed views in almost identical
words: ‘The peasants’ native
sympathy with the under-dog and the outcast asserted itself. Simple Christianity impelled them to
befriend those complete strangers, feed them, clothe them, and help them on
their way. All
over Italy this miracle was to be seen, the simple dignity of humble people who
saw in the escaped prisoners not representatives of a power to be withstood or
placated, but individuals in need of their help.’”
This example was repeated many times:
Of the 70,000 Allied p.o.w.s at large in Italy on September 8th,
1943, nearly half escaped, either crossing the frontier to Switzerland or
France, or eventually rejoining their own troops in Italy; and each one of
these escapes implies the complicity of a long chain of humble, courageous
helpers throughout the length of the country. “I can only say,” wrote General
O’Connor to Iris Origo, “that the Italian peasants and others behind the line
were magnificent. They could not
have done more for us. They hid
us, escorted us, gave us money, clothes and food – all the time taking
tremendous risks…We English owe a great debt of gratitude to those Italians
whose help alone made it possible for us to live, and finally to escape.”
Iris Origo concluded with these words:
“It will, I think, be obvious that I love Italy and its people. But I have become chary of
generalizations about countries and nations; I believe in individuals, and in
the relationship of individuals to one another. When I look back upon these years of tension and
expectation, of destruction and sorrow, it is individual acts of kindness,
courage or faith that illuminate them; it is in them that I trust. I remember a British prisoner of war in
the Val d’Orcia helping the peasant’s wife to draw water from the well, with a
ragged, beaming small child at his heels.
I remember the peasant’s wife mending his socks, knitting him a sweater,
and baking her best cake for him, in tears, on the day of his departure.”
There were other heroes who reached out to save the lives of
others. One of them was the
Archbishop of Florence, Cardinal della Costa. When some of his nuns were arrested because they had given
shelter to some Jewish women in their convent, he went straight to the German
Command. “I have come to you,” he
said, “because I believe you, as soldiers, to be people who recognize authority
and hierarchy – and who do not make subordinates responsible for merely
carrying out orders. The order to
give shelter to those unfortunate Jewish women was given by me: therefore I request you to free the
nuns, who have merely carried out orders, and to arrest me in their stead.”
“The German immediately gave orders for the nuns to be freed,” Ms.
Origo writes, “but permitted himself to state his surprise that a man like the
Cardinal should take under his protection such people as the Jews, the scum of
Europe, responsible for all the evils of the present day. The Cardinal did not enter upon the
controversy. ‘I look upon them,’
he said, ‘merely as persecuted human beings; as such it is my Christian duty to
help and defend them. One day,’ he
gave himself the pleasure of adding, ‘perhaps not far off, you will be persecuted:
and then I shall defend you.’”
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