Mildred Elizabeth (Sisk) Gillars (1895 - 1988)

Mildred Elizabeth Sisk aka Axis Sally was born November 29, 1895 in Portland, Cumberland, Maine, United States.^[1] She was a daughter of Vincent Michael Sisk and Mary J Hewitson.^[1] She took the surname Gillars in 1911 after her mother remarried.^[2][3]

In 1918, she enrolled at Ohio Wesleyan University to study dramatic arts, but left without graduating.

By 1920, she was living in to Conneaut, Ashtabula, Ohio, with her family.^[3]

She married Talbot Benjamin Kramer on August 4, 1923 in Cuyahoga, Ohio, United States.^[4]

She then moved to Greenwich Village, New York City, where she worked in various low-skilled jobs to finance drama lessons. She toured with stock companies and appeared in vaudeville but she was unable to establish a theatrical career. She also worked as an artist's model for sculptor Mario Korbel, but was unable to find regular employment, so in 1929, she moved to France and lived in Paris for six months.

In 1933, she left the United States again, residing first in Algiers, where she found work as a dressmaker's assistant. In 1934, she moved to Dresden, Germany, to study music, and was later employed as a teacher of English at the Berlitz School of Languages in Berlin.

In 1940, she obtained work as an announcer with the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (RRG), German State Radio.

By 1941, the US State Department was advising American nationals to leave Germany and German controlled territories. However, Gillars chose to remain because her fiancé, Paul Karlson, a naturalized German citizen, said he would never marry her if she returned to the United States.

Gillars' broadcasts initially were largely apolitical. This changed in 1942 when Max Otto Koischwitz, the program director in the USA Zone at the RRG, cast Gillars in a new show called Home Sweet Home. She soon acquired several names amongst her GI audience, including the "Bitch of Berlin," Berlin Babe, Olga, and Sally, but the one most common was "Axis Sally".

After D-Day (June 6, 1944), Gillars worked for a time from Chartres and Paris for this purpose, visiting hospitals and interviewing POWs, falsely claiming to be a representative of the International Red Cross. In 1943, they had toured POW camps in Germany, interviewing captured Americans and recording their messages for their families in the US. The interviews were then edited for broadcast as though the speakers were well-treated or sympathetic to the Nazi cause.

Gillars made her most famous broadcast on May 11, 1944, a few weeks prior to the D-Day invasion of Normandy, France, in a radio play written by Koischwitz, Vision of Invasion.

She remained in Berlin until the end of the war. Her last broadcast was on May 6, 1945, just two days before the Nazi surrender.

She was arrested on March 15, 1946. She was then held by the Counterintelligence Corps at Camp King, Oberursel, until she was conditionally released from custody on December 24, 1946. However, she declined to leave military detention. She was abruptly re-arrested on January 22, 1947 after being offered conditional release by America at the request of the Justice Department and was eventually flown to America to await trial on charges of aiding the German troops on August 21, 1948.

Gillars was thereafter indicted on September 10, 1948, and charged with ten counts of treason, but only eight were proceeded with at her trial, which began on January 25, 1949. The prosecution relied on the large number of her programs recorded by the Federal Communications Commission to show her active participation in propaganda activities directed at the United States. It was also shown that she had taken an oath of allegiance to the Führer Adolf Hitler. On March 10, 1949, the jury convicted Gillars on just one count of treason, that of making the Vision of Invasion broadcast. She was sentenced to 10 to 30 years in prison, and a $10,000 fine. In 1950, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld the conviction.

Gillars served her sentence at the Federal Reformatory for Women in Alderson, West Virginia. She became eligible for parole in 1959, but did not apply until 1961. She was released on June 10, 1961.

Having converted to Roman Catholicism while in prison, Gillars went to live at the Our Lady of Bethlehem Convent in Columbus, Ohio, and taught German, French, and music at St. Joseph Academy, Columbus.

In 1973, she returned to Ohio Wesleyan University to complete her degree, a Bachelor of Arts in speech.

Gillars died on June 25, 1988 of colon cancer at Grant Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio, United States.^[5][6] She was buried in an unmarked grave at Saint Joseph Cemetery in Lockbourne, Franklin County, Ohio, United States.^[7]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1} Maine Vital Records, 1670-1921, Mildred E Sisk, 29 Nov 1895; citing Portland, , Maine, United States, multiple sources, Maine.
2. ↑ United States Census, 1910, Mildred Gilliars in household of Robert Gilliars, York, Sandusky, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 134, sheet 9B, family 249.
3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1} United States Census, 1920, Mildred E Gillars in entry for Robert B Gillars, 1920; Conneaut Ward 1, ED 25, Ashtabula, Ohio, United States.
4. ↑ Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016, Talbot B Kramer and Mildred E Siske, 04 Aug 1923; citing Marriage, Cuyahoga, Ohio, United States, , Franklin County Genealogical & Historical Society, Columbus.
5. ↑ Ohio Death Index, 1908-1932, 1938-1944, and 1958-2007, Mildred E Gillars, 1988; Columbus, Franklin, Ohio, United States.
6. ↑ United States Social Security Death Index, Mildred E Gillars, 25 Jun 1988; citing U.S. Social Security Administration, Death Master File, database (Alexandria, Virginia: National Technical Information Service, ongoing).
7. ↑ Find A Grave, memorial page for Mildred “Axis Sally” Gillars (29 Nov 1900–25 Jun 1988), Find a Grave Memorial ID 23000, citing Saint Joseph Cemetery, Lockbourne, Franklin County, Ohio, USA.

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