Stephen Walker - Hide and Seek - The Irish Priest in the Vatican who Defied the Nazi Command. The dramatic true story of rivalry and survival during WWII.

In August 1931 he joined the Sturmabteilung, or SA, a paramilitary group which had a key role in the Nazi Party and played an important part in Hitler’s rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s. However, when Hitler seized control of Germany in January 1933, banning political opposition and turning the country into a one-party state, the Schutzstaffel, or SS, came to prominence and would be placed under the control of Heinrich Himmler. SS members generally came from middle-class backgrounds whereas the SA had a more working-class membership. In December 1932 Herbert Kappler made the move to the SS.

As the world around Kappler was changing, so too was his personal life. In September 1934 he married 27-year-old Leonore Janns, a native of Heilbronn, and they took an apartment in Stuttgart.

With German rearmament in full swing, Kappler was called up to complete military training three times between the summer of 1935 and the autumn of 1936. By now he had secured his first promotion, to SS-Scharführer (sergeant), and worked in Stuttgart’s main Gestapo office. His potential was spotted by his superiors, among them Reinhard Heydrich, who, as head of the Gestapo from April 1934, was already a key figure in the Nazi regime. This connection in particular would help Kappler later in his career.

Another promotion followed for the ambitious Kappler and as an SS-Oberscharführer (staff sergeant) he was later selected to attend the Sicherheitspolizei, or Security Police, leadership school in Berlin, becoming the first non-Prussian to graduate from the institution. Now he was a Criminal Commissioner and clearly destined for higher things. He was fast-tracked and shortly before the Second World War broke out he was posted to Innsbruck, which, after the Anschluss, was within Hitler’s Reich. Kappler’s work in Austria caught the attention of senior military figures in Berlin and he had soon established a reputation as a hardworking, loyal Nazi who acted swiftly against opponents. Not surprisingly, his stay in Austria was brief.

In the autumn of 1939, as Britain and France went to war with Germany, Kappler’s travels continued and he found himself in Rome, working as a police attaché at the German embassy. He had been selected to join a new wave of staff who would work out of German diplomatic missions. Kappler replaced Dr Theodor Helmerking, whose time in Rome had been regarded by senior figures in German intelligence as disappointing because he was not interested in the work. By contrast, Kappler was viewed as both ambitious and clever and his superiors in Berlin were convinced his arrival in Rome would mark a noticeable change. His job was to advise the German Ambassador to Italy, work with the local Fascist police force, and organize intelligence and espionage operations in the city.

Across the city, the man who would become Kappler’s wartime adversary was also settling into a new job. Hugh O’Flaherty had been away from Rome for a few years, posted to Haiti and Czechoslovakia, but by 1938 he was once again working in the Vatican. His title was Scrittore, or Writer, in the Holy Office, his task being to examine the Church’s teachings and important doctrinal matters. He was delighted with his new role.

O’Flaherty’s journey to Rome had begun in the rugged countryside of rural Ireland. Born in Cork in February 1898, he spent the early years of his life in Killarney, in County Kerry, where his father was a policeman with the Royal Irish Constabulary. The eldest of four children, Hugh, like his brothers Jim and Neil, went to the town’s Monastery School, which was run by the Presentation Brothers, a traditional Catholic body with the twin values of faith and discipline at its core.

The school’s religious ethos was to have a lasting and life-changing effect on the young Hugh. From an early age he made no secret of his wish to become a priest. However, his path to taking holy orders was not a straightforward one. At the young age of 15 he secured a junior teaching post and taught for three years. Originally Hugh had thought the teaching profession would satisfy him, but he clearly wanted to do something else with his life. In his heart he always knew he wanted to be a priest, and so, despite the fact that he was older than most other applicants, he applied to Mungret College.

The former agricultural school enjoyed an idyllic setting, on farmland surrounded by woods south of the River Shannon, some three miles from the city of Limerick. Formally known as the Apostolic School of the Sacred Heart, the college was run by the Jesuit Order. There were two schools on the site: a secondary school for young boys and an apostolic boarding college for older students. O’Flaherty joined the older boys, who, once their studies were complete, were expected to travel abroad to spread God’s word as missionaries. Even though Hugh had no Latin and was by now 20, two years older than the upper age limit, he was offered a place.

In the late summer of 1918, as the Great War entered its final months, Hugh O’Flaherty stood at the grand columned entrance of Mungret College clutching his bags and books. His new home was an impressive sight. The handsome stone building housed a chapel, dormitories and classrooms with views onto fields where cattle grazed. Within days he was out exploring the rolling countryside. Nature walks were part of college life and every month the boys went out to enjoy the area’s beauty spots.

The new entrant clearly relished his studies and soon established a reputation as a creative thinker. The young O’Flaherty wrote an award-winning essay entitled ‘The Best Means of Spreading Irish Culture’, speaking with admiration of those who had died for the ideal of a Gaelic Ireland. He argued that there were two ‘beacon lights’ which offered the way forward, ‘Catholicity and Nationality’. To him it was already clear that ‘Catholicity makes us pure-minded, charitable, truthful and generous’.

At the same time, the growth of modern music and dance exercised the young student’s mind. He proclaimed that much of it was ‘degenerating’ and ‘demoralizing’ and it should be banned because the dances were the ‘unchristian productions of African savages’.

As in many Jesuit schools, the regime at Mungret was strict. Boys who stepped out of line received corporal punishment. Those found guilty of an offence were issued with a docket and told to report to a priest, who would administer the appropriate number of slaps. In this structured and morally strict environment O’Flaherty blossomed personally and academically. He studied philosophy, ecclesiastical history, theology and scripture, and often came top of the class. He also became proficient in Latin.

The seminarian was also a fervent advocate of the Irish language. He maintained that it should be spoken as much as possible and argued that his fellow students should spend a few weeks of their holidays in an Irish-speaking district. The priests who taught them worked hard to promote the use of Ireland’s native tongue. One teacher wrote in the college journal that the boys should study Irish ‘to render you immune against the worst forms of Anglicization’.

Hugh and his classmates were also encouraged to discuss current affairs and O’Flaherty enjoyed the college’s debates. On one occasion, in the packed sports hall in front of teachers and students, Hugh’s team was assigned to speak for a motion which called for the prohibition of alcohol. O’Flaherty’s arguments helped to win the debate.

The trainee priest had some knowledge of abstinence. He was a teetotaller, having made a pledge to refrain from drinking or smoking when his brother Jim had fallen seriously ill with pneumonia. Should his brother regain his health, he vowed, he would never drink or smoke. Jim recovered and Hugh kept his promise.