Alice Herz: A Fiery Martyr for Peace

Alice Herz’s dramatic act of self-immolation in protest of the Vietnam War on March 15, 1965, was the first by a U.S. citizen. However, it received little to no mention in the American news media. When she died in Detroit Receiving Hospital ten days later on March 26, the New York Times made only the briefest mention of her passing, noting incorrectly that she “came to the United States in 1933.” Indeed, her arrival in the United States, along with her daughter Helga, would not happen until 1942, after several harrowing sailings from Vichy France to Havana Cuba and, then, eventually on to New Orleans. That physical journey from her native Germany to Detroit, Michigan, will form an integral part of Alice Herz’s story recounted in this chapter. Foremost, however, will be her political commitment to pacifism that defined her life’s work as well as her final fiery desperate act.