Stalingrad Madonna

The picture was drawn by Lieutenant Kurt Reuber, a German staff physician and Protestant pastor, in December 1942 during the Battle of Stalingrad.

But I wish I could tell you how absorbed I have been painting my Madonna, and how much it means to me.The picture looks like this: the mother's head and the child's lean toward each other, and a large cloak enfolds them both.

[2] Later, Reuber hung the drawing in his bunker for his unit celebration, which he described as a moment of Christian devotion shared by all the soldiers in his command.

...The entire celebration took place under the influence of the picture, and they thoughtfully read the words: light, life, love.

[3]The Madonna was flown out of Stalingrad by Dr Wilhelm Grosse, his battalion commander of the 16th Panzer Division on the last transport plane to leave the encircled German 6th Army.

There they remained, until German Federal President Karl Carstens encouraged Reuber's surviving children to donate the work to the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in Berlin.

Springer, Reuber's three children, and Prince Louis Ferdinand (in his role as chair of the Memorial Church board of trustees) attended the dedication ceremony in August 1983.

[4] The drawing and Reuber's letters were published shortly after the war, and Navy chaplain Arno Pötzsch wrote an apologetic book of poetry entitled The Madonna of Stalingrad in 1946.