Erich Vermehren

The couple returned to Germany in view of Elisabeth's failing health, and she died there in 2000. Erich died in Bonn in 2005.

The de Saventhems settled in Zürich in the 1960s with Erich managing his firm's Swiss subsidiary until he was promoted as Director for Europe in 1964. They then lived in Paris before moving back to Switzerland in 1966. They became active in the Catholic Traditionalist Movement following the Second Vatican Council. Erich was one of the founding members of the Una Voce movement, becoming its first president.

The couple received word that a friend from the Foreign Office, Otto Carl Kiep, had been arrested on 12 January 1944 in connection with his attendance at the Frau Solf Tea Party. The Gestapo summoned them to Berlin in connection with the case, but anticipating what was in store for them, they refused, and defected in early February 1944. In the hope that their families would be protected from Sippenhaft (detention for the crimes of a family member) as a result of their defection, their defection was made to appear to be a kidnapping by the British. The Vermehrens were smuggled to England via İzmir, Aleppo, Cairo and Gibraltar.

British propaganda organisations broke the news of the defection, knowing that it would cause havoc in Germany's intelligence services, especially since the invasion of Western Europe was imminent. It was believed that he had absconded with the Abwehr's secret codes. This was untrue, but according to British records, Vermehren nevertheless gave much valuable information to the Allies about German intelligence operations. Hitler now distrusted the Abwehr and Canaris, and on 18 February 1944 the Abwehr was abolished and its intelligence functions taken over by the SS Security organisation (RSHA), under the jurisdiction of Heinrich Himmler.

Despite the Vermehrens' unwillingness to openly resist the Nazi regime, they inevitably found themselves in anti-Nazi circles, several of which centered on Vermehren's cousin Adam von Trott zu Solz, and both felt that their lives were at risk while they remained in Germany. Vermehren was excluded from military service due to a childhood injury, but managed to get himself assigned to the Abwehr late in 1943 with the help of Von Trott and Paul Leverkühn, the Abwehr station chief in Istanbul.

Vermehren converted to Roman Catholicism in 1939, shortly after his elder sister Isa, when he met the Countess Elisabeth von Plettenberg, a member of one of Germany's leading Catholic families. They married in October 1941. The Plettenbergs were also opposed to Hitler, and clandestinely distributed the banned anti-Nazi Papal encyclical Mit brennender Sorge in 1937. As a result of this, Elisabeth's parents were imprisoned by the Gestapo, but she was able to secure their release after three weeks. In addition, she herself was repeatedly questioned about her "subversive" activities.

Erich Vermehren, also known as Erich Vermeeren de Saventhem or Eric Maria de Saventhem, (23 December 1919 – 28 April 2005) was an ardent anti-Nazi, an agent of the Abwehr, the German military intelligence organization, and later a leading Catholic Traditionalist.