The Man Who Thought He Was Greek



Admiral Willhelm Canaris

Written on 22 of May 2013

Ever since I was a little girl, I had at home history lessons other people could only dream about. My father, a mechanical engineer, was, and still is, a great history enthusiast. He used to read a lot and share with the family stories, which, we children, remembered for the rest of our life. To my brothers’ delight, my father studied all possible wars, and all possible battles that happened in history. Many times a kitchen table served as a ground, where Alexander the Great was fighting Persians, where King Leonidas was fighting Persians, and where all great battles of WWII were recreated…

Later on, our teachers in the college were opening their eyes wide, since all three of us, my brothers and I, we had an extended knowledge of the military history …..Including small details....

The story, we children always liked, was about German admiral Willhelm Canaris.  He was born on January 1st, 1887, in Westphalia, to the wealthy family of an industrialist, and brought up and schooled in a very patriotic way. From the times of the Prussian King Frederick I, Germans loved their army.  A military career was considered very honorable, and most of the aristocratic, and rich youth started their adult life serving the country.  Willhelm Canaris was not different, what separated him from other young men was his name, and his look.  Mediterranean looking Canaris was very interested in his family roots, and one day discovered that he carried the same name as the most beloved Greek hero Konstantinos Kanaris, and this fact shaped the rest of his life.

Born on the island of Psara, just near the by the Chios island, Konstantinos Kanaris became an orphan in very early age. It was his uncle who took care of him, and who inspired him.  Kanaris became a seaman, famous freedom fighter for Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire, and later on, a legendary admiral, and the Prime Minister of independent Greece.

Young Wilhelm Canaris was very attracted to the idea of being a descendant of a Greek hero. He visited Greece on several occasions and like many other young men fell in love with the Mediterranean, but he went much further in his admiration, he had learned the Greek language, and in 1905, at age seventeen, he had joined German Imperial Navy.  He also always carried with him a picture of Admiral Konstantinos Kanaris which was given to him while on vacation in Kerkyra (Corfu).


Wilhelm Canaris’ talents were recognized very early. Fluent in German, English, Spanish, French, and Greek, he was involved in intelligence,  as well as served as a German Navy officer.  In between the wars Canaris was making a career similar to many other German officers who were members of a Nazi Party with this difference, that he had never been a Party member.  How he became one of the most powerful people in III Reich without being an NSDAP member, will be forever a mystery.  As a matter of fact, he opposed Hitler and all the Nazi madness from the beginning of Hitler’s career. During WWII Canaris was already an admiral and a chief of Abwher  -a  German Military Intelligence. Germans always had a very ambivalent opinion about Canaris, they were afraid of him, he was one of those who did not make a career because of Hitler, he came from the 'old money', was educated and able to win the mind battles…He was a German Odysseas.  They suspected that he collaborated with British, but the Greek Gods were taking care of Wilhelm Canaris.  He had an extraordinary ability to analyze the situation and avoid a danger, even though; he was a member of some radical groups, which were plotting against Hitler. As a chief of  Abwehr, he knew about the atrocities of WWII and was personally involved in saving Lubavitch Jews in Poland.  By the end of WWII opponent of Wilhelm Canaris, Heinrich Himmler gathered some evidence which resulted in dismissing Canaris from Abwehr. He was put under the house arrest and subsequently, on 9th of April 1945, just one month before the end of the war, executed in the Flossenbürg concentration camp for the act of high treason. He was 58 years old.

Whole his life Wilhelm Canaris believed that he had a Greek blood in his veins and that he was a descendant of Konstantinos Kanaris.  In reality, his family wasn’t of Greek, but of Northern Italian descent, originally was called Canarisi, and lived in Germany from the 17th century.

Last night, when we could not sleep and talk a lot about everybody and everything, I told this story to my husband.  He loved it, as much as I and my brothers loved it, when we have heard it for the first time..