University Procrastinates, Allows Axis Chaplain's Name on Honor Roll

After almost a year the University still has neglected to erase the name of a German chaplain from the World War II Memorial Plaque (above).

"Adolf Sannwald (Enemy Casualty)" remains one of the two names inscribed under the Divinity School, of which he was a member of the class of 1926. Last December 11 the University admitted "the inclusion of the name of one alumnus who served in the German army was an error and will be corrected."

Entering the Nazi army as a chaplain in January 1942, Sannwald was killed June 3, 1943, on the Russian front. His name was included in all the University casualty lists since 1946, when the University learned of his death.

Dean Sperry said yesterday he is completely opposed to having the chaplain's name removed "because I think that a Christian Church ought not to be restricted in its sympathies to one state or nation."

Promised Removal

Inclusion of Sannwald's name is in direct contradiction to the University's policy followed on the World War plaque. When, in 1931, the University built Memorial Church to honor its dead, it omitted the names of four alumni who had died on the German side.

After Sperry and the Student Council protested the emission, the Boards of Preachers financed a plaque on the North Wall to commemorate Harvard's German World War I dead. Sperry called this plaque "a matter of conscience" and added, "at the time undergraduates objected to it because it was seperate, and die hards outside the University because it was there at all."

Established in '44

The names of 697 students, faculty members, and alumni who died in World World War II are inscribed on the new $75,000 roll, which the President and Fellows voted in May 1944 to honor "Harvard men who gave their lives in the armed services of his country or of the United Nations during the present World War.