A Most Unlikely Man, Guest Post by J.P. Rieger

Isadore Levinsky is a survivor. No stranger to concentration camps, he’s been freighted by boxcar to yet one more, possibly his last, before death by rifle or neglect. He’s survived this far because he’s done what any person would do under the circumstances: everything possible, irrespective of the consequences for others. At the nearly deserted Natzweiler-Struthof camp, Levinsky matches wits with fellow prisoner Otto Beck, a self-proclaimed pacifist, gentile and admitted liar. Beck has decreed that all food and water will be shared equally. He’s rallied the men and challenged his Nazi overseers, willingly taking their beatings and abuse. But is Beck a charismatic con man or a liberator? Previously convicted for treachery, Beck is architect of an escape plan specifically designed to assist his Nazi captors. Can Levinsky and the men survive Beck and find their way to freedom?

The Natzweiler-Struthof Concentration Camp

The Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp, located in the Alsace region, is the setting for A Most Unlikely Man: A Tale of Resistance. Located between the Vosges Mountains to the east and the Rhine River boundary between present-day Germany and France to the west, the Alsace region had been ceded, conquered and passed between the two countries many times over the centuries. Following World War I, the region was returned to France in accordance with the Treaty of Versailles until Germany forcibly annexed Alsace in 1940. The Third Reich established the Natzweiler-Struthof camp near the mountain village of Natzweiler in 1941. But prior to annexation, nearby Struthof had been the location of a luxury hotel catering to skiers, hikers and lovers of winter sports. The hotel later became headquarters for the Nazi S.S. officers stationed there.

View of Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp after liberation – Wikipedia

Most of the prisoners of Natzweiler-Struthof were victims of the “Nacht und Nebel” (Night and Fog) campaign which removed people deemed as “undesirables” such as Jews, homosexuals, gypsies and political resisters, from their home populations. The Nazi regime, hungry for granite for use in its buildings and monuments, used the prisoners for forced labor in nearby quarries. Other prisoners were forced to work in manufacturing plants. Some fell prey to human experimentation and deliberate exposure to diseases such as typhus and yellow fever. Other prisoners met their deaths as human guinea pigs for the testing of mustard gas and other lethal chemicals. Many died of overwork and exposure in the quarries and camp. Others were simply executed in the gas chamber.

Conditions in the camp were abysmal. The camp was located in the mountains. Weak and starving prisoners were routinely forced to walk steep inclines and stairs to perform their assigned tasks. The barracks were not heated and death from exposure and starvation was common.

From its establishment in 1941 to its liberation in 1945, approximately 40,000 prisoners passed though the camp and its satellites. An estimated 15,000 prisoners died in the camp system.

The June, 1944 Normandy invasion spelled the eventual end of the Nazi occupation of France including Alsace. Following the August, 1944 liberation of Paris, the Nazis, fearing Allied advances, transported all remaining prisoners of Natzweiler-Struthof to its satellite camps. By mid-September, only a minimal Nazi presence remained in the main camp. In late November, Allied forces reached the camp and found it completely deserted. By early 1945, Allied forces had freed the entire Alsace region.

The Natzweiler-Struthof setting is crucial to the plot of A Most Unlikely Man: A Tale of Resitance. In my fictional account, following the relocation of the prisoners to the satellite camps in mid-September, 1944, twenty-two prisoners are sent to the main camp because the satellite camps are at full capacity. Only Five Nazi soldiers have been permanently assigned to the camp to guard the group. This fact is not immediately apparent to the prisoners. But protagonist Otto Beck, imprisoned for his treason (his pacifist and anti-Nazi views) eventually realizes this and puts together an audacious plan to find freedom. The camp’s relatively close proximity to the Swiss border also features in the plan for liberation. The fact that manufacturing buildings were located near the camp and were subject to continual Allied bombing raids also plays prominently in the story. The strong presence of resistance fighters in the Alsace region is also crucial.

Of equal importance is the sense of defeat felt by the remaining Nazis who greatly fear the approaching Allied forces. Beck is a master of insinuation, misinformation and suggestion. He channels the mistrust of the Nazi officers for one another to benefit the prisoners and to implement his plan for liberation.

American and French forces eventually found the camp on November 25, 1944, the first of many concentration and death camps to be liberated and inventoried. Today, the campsite functions as a national memorial and cemetery for its victims.

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Meet J.P. Rieger

J. Paul (J.P.) Rieger is a mostly retired Maryland attorney and author of five books, The Case Files of Roderick Misely, Consultant, a mystery featuring a wannabe lawyer anti-hero published in April, 2013, Clonk!, a police farce set in Baltimore and published in May, 2023 by Apprentice House Press (Loyola University, Maryland), The Big Comb Over, a slipstream comedy of manners published in April, 2024, Sunscreen Shower, a Clonk! sequel, published by Flock Publishing in October, 2024 and A Most Unlikely Man: A Tale of Resistance, published by Blue Cedar Press in September, 2025. J. Paul and spouse live in Towson, Maryland.