American History Hit - American Traitors: Axis Sally

Episode Date: August 21, 2025

Is contributing to enemy propaganda treason? In this second episode on American Traitors, we are meeting 'Axis Sally', real name Mildred Gillars.Professor Michael Flamm joins us to explore the life of this American citizen who broadcast American music, scripted dramas and hateful rhetoric from the heart of the Nazi Third Reich, Berlin. Listen to find out how she was found guilty of treason.Michael is a scholar of modern American political history at Ohio State University. He taught at Mildred Gillar's former college, Ohio Wesleyan University from 1998 to 2024.Produced by Sophie Gee. Edited by Aidan Lonergan. Senior Producer was Charlotte Long.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.American History Hit is a History Hit podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Want to explore even more history? Sign up to History Hit, where you will discover history from around the world. From the American Revolution to prehistoric Scotland, there is plenty to discover. With your subscription, you'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries with a brand new release every week, exploring everything from the ancient world to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com slash subscribe to bring the past alive. According to Article 3, Section 3 Clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution, no one can be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act or on a confession in open court.

The latter won't be happening here. We stand by our innocence. But as the prosecution and defense laid out their cases, our eyes kept drifting to the wooden witness box. Who or what might the prosecution have aligned against us? Could we be brought face to face with the people we never thought we'd see again? Just as the traitor Axis Sally once was at her own trial, or the Rosenbergs whose fates were sealed by the testimony of those they once trusted. It's American History Hit, and I'm your host, Don Wildman. Thanks for listening.

In fighting a war, the use of propaganda aimed either at civilians on the home front or troops in the field, plays a strategic role in psychologically weakening the enemy. Its actual effectiveness is debatable, but that hasn't stopped militaries across the ages from putting it into practice. If guns and artillery are designed to destroy walls, machinery, and people, then propaganda targets hearts and minds, and that can gain you an advantage. Or so goes the thinking. In the 20th century, electronic media provided a whole new kind of propaganda.

No longer was it just posters and leaflets, dropping from the skies. Now there were radio broadcasts capable of reaching antennas in enemy trenches or on ships at sea. One of the most famous propagandists in World War II was an American named Mildred Gillers working for Nazi Germany, a woman best known by her nickname, Axis Sally. Our guest today knows her story well. Michael Flam is a professor of American political history at Ohio State University, but from 1998 to 2024, he worked at Ohio. Wesleyan University, which is where Milford Gillers attended school. His 2017 lecture, Axis Sally, Ohio Wesleyan's most notorious and least understood alum, tracked her journey from Ohio undergrad

to American Trader. Greetings, Professor Lamb, Michael, hello. Good morning. It's a pleasure to be with you. Let's set the scene. Of course, the story of Miller-Gillers as Axis-Sally begins before World War II, but starting with that background, it's always important to remember how resisted. the American public was to World War II before the attack on Pearl Harbor. For so many Americans, this was yet another European bonfire that we should avoid. The major fighters here are France, Great Britain, and China against Germany, Japan, and Soviet Union. I'm stating the obvious World War II. But this is to say that we were not in the battle first.

And so she's over in Germany during that time is when she gets there, right? Yes, Mildred arrived in Germany in 1934 after a failed love affair with a British diplomat, Bernard Mets, who was also Jewish. They met in New York City, where Mildred was a struggling actress. She followed him when the Foreign Service transferred him to Algiers in Morocco. The relationship ended. Mildred was at loose ends and decided to move to Burrude. Berlin because she had studied German when she was an undergrad at Ohio Wesleyan University.

She began in Germany teaching English at the Berlitz School, then went to work as a translator at Ufa. And so she is in Germany from the mid-1930s as Hitler and the Nazis rise to power. So we're placing her in time, but I want to back even further up for the basics of this girl, Mildred Gillers. Born in Portland, Maine, 1900, tough childhood, alcoholic mother, step-peau. Dad. Did she know her natural father? I'm curious. She did. Her stepfather was an interesting man. He was an alcoholic. He was abusive. He was also an Irish nationalist. And I mentioned that detail,

because that may help to explain why Mildred was both anti-Jewish and anti-British in her podcast. Although here, I do want to stress for your audience, we know a great deal about Mildred's actions. We know very little about her motives and intentions. And we do not know, for example, the extent to which she actually believed what she was saying and voicing on the air versus what her producer was telling her to say. Yeah. This is a very unusual story for anyone who doesn't realize this or doesn't know the background here in that an American voice is in Germany during World War II who becomes a very popular in Germany propagandist voice against the Americans. That's the very basics of what we're talking about here. And if you're thrown by that, that's good, because you're going to get a very interesting

education here about something you might not know much about. And that's what's really unusual about Mildred. She has to sort of navigate really interesting waters to become who she becomes. She is a troubled soul. She is a seeker. She tends to pursue unsuccessful relationships with married men. and it's a remarkable journey from Ohio, you know, student and undergraduate all the way to Germany to Reichs Radio. And at one point she becomes the highest paid performer on Reich's radio during the war.

That's incredible. How does she get from Maine to Ohio Wesleyan, just a standard application and off you go? Standard application, she was very interested in drama, naturally, became a theater and German major at Ohio Wesleyan. And Ohio Wesleyan at the time had a very strong drama program. She enrolled at Ohio Wesleyan in 1918, fall of 1918, as World War I is raging. She leaves in the spring of 1922 without earning her degree. The reasons for her departure are, like so many aspects of her life, rather murky. Yeah.

Well, she's an aspiring actress. She had toured with roadshow companies performed as a chorus girl on Broadway and then ends up in Algiers, North Africa, 1933, traveling with her mother, right? Yes, that is correct. But also, I mean, truly following this man, Bernard Metz, who at the time was her lover and was a British Jewish diplomat. And again, looking for the source of her later anti-Semitic statements on Nazi radio, that relationship may also have played a role. There's a really important aspect of this story. All of this will fall into place as we get into this further, but one sort of outlying idea is that how high an opinion Americans had of Germany

back then, before World War I, really. Since the 19th century, it was the pinnacle of innovation and invention. This was the feeling Americans had about Germany and why a person like Mildred would find her way going over there. This was kind of one of those places to go in the world. So from 1934 to 1940, she ends up living. in Germany, working in radio. How did she get into that? Well, first of all, Don, let me just add. For Mildred, I believe the main attraction of Germany was twofold. First, she spoke German, so that would obviously facilitate her move there. Also, Germany is prosperous as early as 1934 and 1935. Germany, meanwhile, the United States is in the depths of the Great Depression. Mildred has no money,

has always been struggling financially. So going to Germany makes sense because she did believe there might be more economic opportunity there. As you note, she had struggled during the 1920s to establish herself as an actress in New York. She did some semi-nude modeling at one point,

pursued the relationship with Mets, and when all else fails, Germany seems to hold out the possibility of finding a career, gaining attention, and supporting herself, which is always a struggle. for her. So she arrives in Germany, first works for Berlitz, then gets a job as a translator

at Ufa, which is sort of the German Hollywood. And from there, she starts to begin to move in in attainment circles in Berlin. How old is she when we're talking about this? She was born in 1900s. So she's in her mid to late 30s at that point. Okay. So she's a She's a grown woman, and she's quite aware of what's going on in Germany as far as Hitler's rise and all of what the Nazi party represents? Yes, I think that's an excellent question and an important point to stress. From her arrival in Germany, Mildred is very different from the typical American tourist in that she reads and speaks German. So she can understand the anti-Semitic slogans that are scrawled on the walls. She is very aware when German Jews begin to wear the yellow star.

She's aware when they sort of disappear from the streets of Berlin and are deported to the death camps. Now, she will always claim to her dying day that she was unaware of the ultimate fate of Germany's Jews. But she could not have noticed the persecution that they were facing. Okay. She is living with her fiancé. This is Metz, you're talking about, right? Yes. Tell me about their relationship more.

detail. What was the dynamics there? Great question. The answer is we don't really know. That is part of the murky background. We don't know a lot about her relationship with the artist that she posed nude for. We don't know a lot about exactly where and when she met Mets. What we do know is that the relationship was strong enough that she actually followed him to Algiers and that they were together at that point. And then it ended. And then in 1934, she goes to Berlin. Once she's in Germany, she begins dating someone else, right? Correct. She begins dating a scientist by the name of Paul Carlson.

He ends up fighting in the war, right? He dies on the Eastern Front. That Don is important because Mildred had really hoped that that relationship might lead to marriage and German citizenship. And Mildred never becomes a German citizen. And the whole issue of her citizenship is, I think, really important. and again, like so many aspects of her life, white, cloudy, and murky. So I'm trying to picture the life of this young woman who is, I guess, pursuing a career as anyone would. She happens to see that it's happened, you know, she's gone all the way to Germany to do this.

Is she working for a radio station or who is she employed by? In 1940, Mildred gets a position with Reich's radio. she hosts a musical variety program. Really what she does is she introduces American songs to a German audience. She's not political. She's just playing the platters, as they used to say on radio at that particular time. But very quickly, she becomes very popular. And that's really her entry point into radio.

It's just through playing American songs and introducing them to a German audience. Why was she so appealing? What was her skill? I think her skill was simply her ability to speak German very, very well. And of course, she knew American popular music quite well from growing up in the United States. She had a good voice. And, you know, by all accounts, came across well in the radio. She will, by 1943, become the highest paid performer on Reich's radio.

She's very skilled at radio broadcasting. In a sense, she finally found the greatest role, the perfect fit. of her life. Interesting. The stage hadn't worked. Other pursuits had not worked, but going on the air, going on the radio, that was where she made her mark. And does she go by the name, Mildred Gillers?

She goes by Midge at the mic. That's her original or sort of nickname, official name. Yeah. Long ago in this interview, I mentioned her father and whether she knew about him, so often the case with these types of people that they are pursuing some, you know, missing, you know, filling a hole in their psychology. It seems in her case that men are doing this for her in some regard. She becomes a lover of a married man named Otto Koizhiewiczs, right?

Max Otto Koizz, a German scholar, earned a doctorate, came to the United States in the mid-1920s to teach at a series of American universities like Hunter, for example. And that's simply because there was no employment for German professors in the 1920. In Germany, their economy had collapsed in the aftermath of World War I. while Pushwoods is in the United States, he develops a reputation for openly expressing pro-Nazi sympathies. And so he eventually is under pressure and he returns to Germany in the mid-1930s, in part because of pressure from the U.S. government and in part because by the mid-1930s,

Germany's economy has recovered and there are again economic opportunities in Germany for him. He eventually goes to work at Reichs Radio, Reichs Radio, and he will become Mildred's lover and producer when she, in the spring of 1942, shifts from entertainment to propaganda. Wow. All these years, so traumatic to be in Berlin, I suppose, is where she was living, right? Mm-hmm. Yes. Yeah. To be in Berlin during the rise of Nazi Germany and all of what we know about the Nuremberg, all the things that we know these iconic images, all of that is surrounding her. And, you know, it's so tempting as an American today looking back to think of this as such a black and white situation. Of course, it's not.

In those days, as I mentioned, Germany was a very popular place, certainly, you know, decades before. But even with the rise of Nazism, we're still on the fence as to how to look at this country and what's going on. So she's an American living. I guess there were a lot of Americans probably living in Berlin at that time, right? That is correct. And here, Don, I'm going to go back a moment. So Mildred grows up in Ohio. Ohio is a large German-American population.

Ohio was a hotbed of isolationism in the years leading to World War II. So undoubtedly that is part of her mindset at the time. Mildred also always claims that she is an artist, that she is not political. You know, to some degree, I think maybe we can take her at her word. That, of course, returns us to the issue of the extent to which she believes what she is. saying on the air and the extent to which she is simply the mouthpiece for her producer and for Reich radio. Well, it's going to get pretty dramatic. So coming up, we're going to discuss the contentious radio shows that will gain Mildred the notorious name Axis Sally, and eventually

accusations of treason. Welcome back. So Mildred Gillers, aka Axis Sally, has been in Germany for seven years. The war is in full swing now. When do her broadcasts become political. And what are the contents of them? Well, first, Don, I just want to let your listeners know in the fall of 1941. As war rages in Europe, but the United States remains neutral, Mildred was called into the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, and she was told that she would have to give up her job, a broadcasting position, and return to the United States. Mildred refused, and at that point, U.S. government seized her passport. It was actually taken from her and kept at the U.S. embassy. Now, that's important because that means that Mildred no longer has the freedom to travel. She does not

have a passport. At the same time, she does not renounce her U.S. citizenship, and the U.S. government doesn't revoke her citizenship. So she is sort of trapped in this kind of gray area. And that's in the fall of 1941. Then Japan attacks the United States at Pearl Harbor. Now the United States is at war with Japan. At that point, Mildred on the air voices anti-Japanese sentiments. But of course, Japan is an ally of Nazi Germany. And so now pressure is put on Mildred.

She signs a loyalty oath, we believe, with the German government, which allows her to remain on the air. I should say we do not actually have that document. Probably it was destroyed when Berlin was bombed during the war, you know, destroyed in the rubble of Berlin. But we have that, of course, you know, a few days later after Pearl Harbor, Germany attacked, well, Germany declares war on the United States. Hitler declares war on the United States. Now the United States in Germany at war and now Mildred is really in a difficult position. She guessed technically is still a U.S. citizen, but she's, yes, technically, is still a U.S. citizen, but she's,

She doesn't have a passport. She's not a German citizen, so she's an enemy alien within Germany, Nazi Germany. So all of that has to be a great deal of sort of pressure on Mildred. What I am suggesting is that when Koizhiewicz, her producer and later lover, suggests that she begin in the spring of 1942 making propaganda broadcast as Axis Sally and voicing anti-U.S. propaganda. She may very well have had very little choice in the matter. Interesting. Well, she had to have been the darling of Goebbels, right? I mean, he was in charge of this. Yes, although we don't have records of sort of direct interaction between Mildred

and Gurbals. Walter Winchell, who was a very prominent, very famous U.S. broadcaster at the time, would later claim that Mildred was Adolf Hitler's lover. There's absolutely no truth that I know of to that particular allegation or rumor. Did she know Hitler? They met, but it was only within the context of large parties and gatherings where many, many people were present. It wasn't a private audience. So I'm curious how the vibe changes for her, you know, as a radio personality, as she goes

from what was basically, you know, a DJ for nostalgic songs and big band tunes, types of things, to being much more military and much more targeted on propaganda. What kind of programs does she end up doing? Well, they are programs that still feature music, but now, in addition to introducing the songs, she is interspersing political commentary with the music. And she is very much speaking as the sister, the girlfriend of U.S. and British soldiers. This is particularly after the landings in North Africa. That's when she becomes a woman. known as Axis Sally and begins to reach a large audience. And as I say, by 1943, she is known to Allied troops as Axis Sally.

She is the highest paid performer on Reich Radio. Certainly in the European theater, she is the best known American Nazi propagandist. Right. I mean, her gig is to basically discourage these homesick Americans from fighting and and speculating about their wives and the sweethearts at home, planting all these seeds of suspicion and doubt that they're being, you know, unfaithful at home. This is why I mentioned at the beginning how the isolationism in America was still a very real element to this. And so her job, in part, was to play on that feeling of like, why am I over here, if you were a serviceman?

Why am I over here fighting someone else's battle? This is Europe's battle to fight. And instead, here we are. Of course, this has changed with Japan, but in Europe it's still about the Nazis and about clearing the Nazis out of Europe. So she's there to sort of remind them of this, you know, misplaced role that they're playing, I suppose. Also, lots of hateful rhetoric against President Roosevelt, the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and of course the Jews. How big a part of her persona and her presentation was anti-Semitism? How much did that play?

anti-Semitism was a major feature of her propaganda broadcast, beginning in the spring of 1942. In essence, Mildred makes two points over and over again. This is not America's war, it's Britain's war, and ultimately the Jews are behind all of it, both in terms of influencing British policy and influencing Franklin Roosevelt and his decision to lead the United States into war. And those are the points that she stresses over and over again. Although it remains unclear whether that is truly what she believes or that's what Poishwitz, her producer and lover, is telling her to stay on the air. And here I need to stress again, it seems absolutely plausible that Mildred is under extraordinary

pressure, direct or indirect, to follow orders and do what she is told. She is certainly aware of what happens to people who resist what the Nazi government wants them to do. Yeah. Coercion is always present, even if it's not being sort of directly threatened against her. It will be such a huge theme in the Nuremberg trials, the sense that I was just doing my job, this sort of, you know, chain of command notion that will play out in all those trials. And ultimately, is the excuse for even the Holocaust, that does play a part in her defense as well,

eventually and her reason for what she did. Absolutely. I mean, she stresses that she's an artist. She stresses over and over again that she had no awareness of the ultimate fate of Jews. She knew they faced persecution, but she claimed she did not know about the existence of the deaf camps. It's also interesting. She never expressed any remorse or contrition for what had happened to the Jews of Germany either. So, as with so many aspects of her life, it's a complicated story.

You wonder how much she knew about what was really happening on the battlefield because the allies are coming north from North Africa and eventually, of course, D-Day in 1944. But in those 42 and 43 years, I wonder how much the intensity of her broadcasts changed and grew, I imagine, as they realized that these guys are coming closer and closer. Absolutely. Although the tone of her broadcast, it's never really taking a threatening tone. As we've discussed before, it's mostly I'm the sister, the girlfriend, here's what you're missing, here's what you will never experience. Why are you risking or even sacrificing your life for this war that is ultimately on behalf of the British? Yeah. And it's worth comparing to the famous Tokyo Rose, who's doing the same number on the Pacific soldiers, the GIs coming across the Pacific.

but she's very obviously Japanese. You can hear it in her voice, whereas that's what's sort of insidious, especially insidious, about Mildre Gillers, Axis Sally. She's American. She has all those cadences. She is, I guess she's telling them that she's American, right? Absolutely. Now, and they can hear, you know, she has a classic Midwestern Ohio accent, you know, so

she's heartland American, you know, she's not even from the coast or, or anything of that nature. I should also let your listeners know in case some of them are confused. There was another second Axis Sally who was making broadcasts out of Rome during the war. She was an Italian-American woman from Brooklyn who didn't reach as wide an audience. It is interesting to note, she did renounce her U.S. citizenship and become an Italian citizen during the war. And as a result, the U.S. government never prosecuted her. She wound up being sentenced to a prison term by the Italian government and then released after a couple of years as part of a general amnesty.

But in case some of your listeners are confused or are recalling, you know, the Axis Sally who came broadcast out of Rome out of Italy during the war, there's a second. Wow. There's a famous broadcast she does called The Vision of Invasion, May 11, 1944, just before the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6th. It's a month before D-Day. She broadcasts a demoralizing and exaggerated account of the horrors awaiting any allied soldiers foolhardy enough to invade, you know, Fortress Germany or Fortress Europe. How did they describe her effect? As far as we can tell, GIs just tended to laugh at and be amused by Axis Sally's broadcast. We don't have any real evidence that she managed to disheartened or demoralize any American GIs.

And frankly, it appears it simply enjoyed hearing an American voice, particularly a female voice. They enjoyed hearing some American songs. And, you know, it relieved the monotony. There's a lot of monotony when you're serving in the military. And so there's no real evidence the broadcast had any impact. Now, the specific broadcast you mentioned, vision of invasion is interesting. It's, in fact, a scripted radio drama. Oh. Koizhawicz actually keeps He appears in it. He plays her husband. They are an Ohio couple.

And she is having nightmares about how her son has died during the invasion of France. But it's a scripted drama. She is reading lines that were written for her. She's not riffing or improvising. And that particular broadcast will become the basis of the single charge of treason for which she is convicted. And so just, you know, foreshadowing a bit the legal challenge she's going to face after the war, she winds up being convicted of treason, a single charge of treason, based on a radio broadcast that, in fact, was a radio drama, a scripted drama.

Interesting. Wow. She works alongside Hans Fritz, who was later tried and acquitted at the Norenberg trials, and Kurt Georges von Kiesinger, the station's liaison with the German propaganda ministry for overseas broadcasting. She is right in the heat of it all, wasn't she? Absolutely. She is the most popular broadcaster that Rice Radio employs, which is why she's the highest paid.

Absolutely. She is at the heart of it. She is at the center of Nazi propaganda efforts that are aimed at U.S. soldiers and British soldiers, Allied soldiers in general. I keep, we're going to circle back to this, but that drama, that radio drama, features an Ohio mother, Evelyn, she plays her.

who is foreseeing her son's death on an allied ship in the English Channel. I mean, they're really pulling on the heartstrings here. Absolutely, absolutely. And I should mention, Don, we have these broadcasts because beginning in 1943, the U.S. government is recording them to use as the basis for a legal case against her to prosecute her for treason. And there's some interesting history here. The U.S. Attorney General at the time was a man named Francis Biddle. And he was a great liberal, supporter of Franklin Roosevelt.

Biddle believed the United States had gone too far in World War I in prosecuting sedition. The United States and World War I had passed an anti-seidion act, which made it a crime to, you know, oppose the war, to criticize the draft, to criticize President Wilson, essentially to criticize any aspect of the U.S. effort in World War I. And many Americans, including the leader of the socialist party, Eugene Debs, were arrested, charged, convicted, and sent to prison on the basis of these supposedly seditious statements. So Biddle recalls that history and says, we're not going to go down that path. We're not going to make the same mistake during World War II. We're not going to treat words, speech as treason. But within the Justice Department, other people make the argument, that. That's true if Mildred was just standing on a street corner yelling at crowds or if she was handing out leaflets or pamphlets.

But she's on the radio. She is employing this new technology that enables her to reach tens of thousands of U.S. and allied soldiers at a time. And so Biddle is reluctantly convinced. And so beginning in 1943, the U.S. Justice Department is laying the groundwork for a treason case against Mildred after. after the war. Yikes. And that's going to rest on the fact that she is still a U.S. citizen, because under U.S. law, you can only be convicted of treason if you are a U.S. citizen. Well, one wonders if she was aware of all that going on behind the scenes of her life. How does she earn the name Axe Sallie? She obviously didn't go by that name.

No, it's really not clear. That's one of the interesting answer. It's not exactly clear why U.S. soldiers sort of gave her that particular name. I heard various explanations, but there isn't really a particularly good one. It's just kind of spread, Exodus Valley. Yeah, there was other names, Berlin, Babe, Olga. From her self-description, she's the Irish type. That's where they get the Sally, I guess. Black hair, white skin.

You know, she's just portraying herself as a girl from back home. Her last broadcast is on May 6, 1945. the Reddinger Army soldiers enter through the front of her station as she exits out the back, according to her. Third Reich surrenders two days later after the Battle of Berlin, and it's over for Axis, Sally, and for Germany at that point. But that will lead to, as you say, a capture and a trial. Michael, how did Mildred Gillers get caught?

When the war ends, she goes into hiding, she takes an assumed name, and she moves into the British sector of... of Berlin. And so for about a year, she's living under this assumed name, Barbara Moom, in the British sector. Eventually, the British arrest her. Interestingly, she only has one personal item with her, and that is a photo of Max Otto Koizhwitz, who was apparently the great love of her life. He had died back in 1944, so she still got a photo of him. Now, for about a year or so, she is in British custody while the U.S. and Britain work out extradition and some other sort of legal issues. And then in 1947, she's sent back to the U.S. to await trial. Okay. And she's indicted on 10 counts of

treason in 1947, namely for that famous broadcast vision of invasion. That was part of this, wasn't it? She's looking at the death sentence, isn't she? Potentially, there's a number of difficult issues here. Under the Constitution, under U.S. law, a U.S. law, a U.S. citizen can only be convicted of treason if there are two eyewitnesses to the act of treason. Now, if you'll recall, she's making broadcasts from a recording studio in Berlin. So where do they come up with the two eyewitnesses? Now, fortunately, or unfortunately, Mildred had visited a POW camp in 1944 posing as a member of the Red Cross.

And her goal was to sort of get testimony, get ideas from U.S. that she could then weave into her broadcast. Well, a number of those POWs would eventually testify against her in court, and they were considered the eyewitnesses to her truth. I see. Wow. Let's talk about that trial. Where does it take place, and how long are we looking at? Well, the trial begins in the fall of 1948. The timing is, I think, interesting and significant. President Truman is running for election. And so he is under a great deal of pressure to prosecute this traitor, Axis Thalley. At the same time, you know, World War II is already sort of fading into the background and now the Cold War is emerging. So in fact, the trial in the

fall of 1948 that gets the most attention is the famous Alger-Hiss Whitaker Chambers trial, which sort of focuses on communist subversion in the U.S. government, the State Department in particular. Nevertheless, in the fall of 1948, the Justice Department prepares and begins the trial. It starts in January 1949. It's interesting, the judge from the outset takes a very, very active role. For example, in order to ensure Mildred a quote-unquote fair and impartial jury, he dismisses seven Jewish jurors right at the start. Where does it take place? Is it in New York? Yes. It is in New York City. Wow. Well, there are you? go right there. Jurors listen to excerpts of her shows. They listen to testimony of soldiers who

had been interviewed by her. It must have been quite a scandal, this trial. Or is she just, as you say, lost in the lurch of the Cold War? It does attract media attention, but that pales in comparison to the Whitaker Chambers' Alger history. Because really now the Cold War, the communist threat, is seen as much more serious. You know, the trial is quite interesting. You It is, in my opinion, and I'm not a lawyer, the trial is not an even or level playing field. You know, you have the full resources of the federal government. Mildred's attorney is not particularly skilled or get at his job, in my opinion. To be fair, he does not have the resources of the federal government.

For example, they don't have the resources to bring any witnesses from Germany who might have testified about the coercion that Mildred faced and the threats that she faced. Mildred doesn't help her case either. During testimony, she commits perjury. She denies that, in fact, she's the person who made some of those broadcasts. She, you know, again, claims that she's an artist. She refuses to express regret or remorse. She's not a good witness in her behalf. The judge, again, I think, you know, is biased towards the prosecution, at least in this particular case.

He says that Mildred had given aid. and comfort to the enemy. She had committed treason unless she lived in constant fear of imminent and impending death or bodily harm at all time. In other words, the judge really is instructing the jury, don't believe for a moment that she is under coercion or duress unless the defense can make a case that it was constant and that she faced, you know, imminent threat. There was dramatic testimony from one former POW, Gunnar Dragsholt soldier, who saw her at a POW camp, I guess, and screamed things at her. They defamed her character, of course, that she had exhibited lewd behavior in 1944. It's a very negative portrayal, obviously, which probably had a lot

to do with the poor representation she had, not much pushback going on, I suppose. That's right. There is a film that's been made of Axis Sally, starring Al Pacino, who plays her attorney. It's not a very good film, and I don't think it accurately represents a well or how poorly her attorney represented her in that trial. But yes, there is a lot of negative attention given to Mildred, which makes it rather remarkable that in the end, despite all of its advantages, the U.S. government is able to convict her on only one of eight of the charges that are ultimately brought against her. And the sole conviction for treason is based on that broadcast you referenced vision of invasion, which was in fact a scripted radio drama.

Exactly. The conviction leads to a fine, $10,000, sentenced to imprisonment for 10 to 30 years, not death. This is appealed, of course. The appeals court upholds conviction 1950. How much time does she actually serve? So she was sent to a federal prison in West Virginia, Alderson Federal Prison, which is known as Club Fed, she ultimately serves her entire 12-year sentence. She actually refuses early release, even though, you know, she is an excellent inmate, a model inmate. While she's in prison

during those 12 years, she converts to Catholicism, learns to become a skilled seamstress. What is the takeaway in the end coming out of the trial, and does she just kind of fade away, or was her treason still a story throughout the 1950s? She really does fade away. Ultimately, when she is released from prison, one of the conditions that is imposed on her is that she not seek any kind of publicity or attention, that she lived quietly, that she not grant interviews.

For the most part, she complies with that restriction. In fact, after she is released from prison, Mildred returns to Ohio, she lives in a convent here in Columbus, Ohio, which is where I am right now, and she teaches various courses. She also, ironically, works to complete that college degree that she had never finished when she left Ohio Wesleyan in the spring of 1922. Wow. She actually served time with her fellow enemy radio announcer, Eva Tagore Takino, who was nicknamed Tokyo Rose. She was in prison with Tokyo Rose. Yeah, that's correct. They both went to

Club Fed. And I must tell you, I've visited Alderson, you know, it looks a lot, in fact, like a small college with a fence around it. It's not a particularly grim penitentiary type of life. Yeah, yeah. She described herself at the end as a patriotic America, irony. Her claim, for better and worse, was my war was with England and the Jews. So she maintained her anti-Semitism to the

I suppose. Yes, I think that's fair to say. Now, here it's important to understand, too. I mean, plenty of Americans before, during, and after World War II were anti-Semitic. Sure. And so, you know, she does express that openly. It's a little bit unclear how different she is in terms of her personal beliefs than millions of other Americans found herself in a position to voice those. And that brought her a great deal of attention. It sounds, maybe I'm projecting, but it seems there is an element of sympathy to your take on this, having researched this woman. How much do you think she was caught up in the currents of the times versus how much was she aware of her own motives?

It's very hard to tell. I have some sympathy for Mildred. She grew up in a difficult and dysfunctional family, both her father and her stepfather were abusive, alcoholics. Throughout her life, she is seeking some kind of stability and security. She has to make her way on her own at a time when that was very challenging for single women. She found herself in Berlin where she somehow managed to land the role of a lifetime, at least from her perspective. And she had always sought the limelight. She always wanted to be a star on the stage or on the radio. And so she finally got her great opportunity and it came at a great price.

So I do have some sympathy. I will also add that when it came time to pay that price, she accepted it. She served her whole sentence. And afterwards, she complied with the terms of her release, lived quietly for the most part. I don't condone what she did, but I do think it's important to have some empathy for her. And was in the end her propaganda or the tool of her useful? Did it achieve anything in reducing the threat to Germany? I've seen no evidence that her propaganda had any real impact whatsoever.

If anything, you might want to make the case that she was diverting resources the Nazi government might have used more productively elsewhere, you know, simply in terms of her salary. But certainly I have never come across any evidence that she managed to damage U.S. troop morale in the war or impact any battlefield result. A strange coda, Dekino, Tokyo Rose, was actually granted a presidential pardon in January of 1956, having to do with our relationship with Japan, I suppose. But nothing like that ever happened for Axis Sally.

No, no one came forward. And that's an interesting question as to why. I suspect it's because she was a U.S. citizen, a woman who had gone to Berlin and had served the government, Nazi Germany. There's another interesting coda. She eventually earned enough credits to receive her degree from Ohio Wesleyan in 1973. And she actually contacted the university and said, I'd like to receive my degree. And the president, after some internal deliberation, agreed and acknowledged that she had

served her time, paid the price, and that she could receive her degree. And then Mildred said, no, no, I want to receive my degree at commencement. I want to march across the stage and have you, the president, hand me this degree. It's like she wanted one more moment in the limelight. Well, that moment does attract national media attention, in part because it coincides in 1973 with the return of US POWs from Vietnam. And a number of those US POWs in Vietnam had made statements critical of the U.S. government while they were there, while they were in the Hanoi Hilton, the prison that the North Vietnamese

had set up for U.S. pilots who were shot down over North Vietnam. And so, ironically, in the end, as she receives the degree that, you know, 50 years earlier she had left behind, she does again become the center of media attention. Because her story intersects with this question about what is the proper behavior of U.S. citizens in time of war. Yes. What is the proper behavior of an actress? That is the question as well. In the end, she was looking for a stage. Professor Michael Flam is a scholar of modern American political history at Ohio State University,

taught a broad range of 20th century courses at Ohio Wesleyan University from 1998 to 2024, where Mildred Gillers went to school. Thank you so much, Michael. So nice to meet you. I hope we have it back again sometime soon. With my pleasure, Don, thank you. Hey, thanks for listening to American History Hit. You know, every week we release new episodes, two new episodes, dropping Mondays and

Thursdays, all kinds of content from mysterious missing colonies to powerful political movements to some of the biggest battles across the centuries. Don't miss an episode. By hitting like and follow, you help us out, which is great. But you'll also be reminded when our shows are on. And while you're at it, share it with a friend. American History Hit with me, Don Wildman. So grateful for your support.