In the 1930’s, with his winning personality, as well as a reputation for good manners, sportsmanship and honourable conduct towards his opponent, Gottfried Von Kramm was considered by some to be the best tennis player in the world. By 1937, with a Second World War looming over Europe, Gottfried was quite literally playing for his life. Tall, blonde haired, square jawed, he was a Nazi wet dream, an ideal to promote their propaganda but there was a problem. The Saxon aristocrat was homosexual and worse yet in their ideology, he was in love with a young Jewish actor, Manasse Herbst. Although Gottfried wasn’t willing to go along with any of the Nazi’s plans for him, he was safe as long as he kept winning. That would all come to a halt in 1937 when he was defeated on the court by American Don Budge at the Davis Cup. In the locker room following his manager called him “ a traitor to the nation”. Despite his enormous popularity with the public, in 1938, von Cramm was arrested by the German government and tried on the charge of a homosexual relationship. After being hospitalized for a nervous collapse after his arrest, Gottfried von Cramm was sentenced to one year's imprisonment. Cramm admitted the relationship, which had lasted from 1931 until 1934 and had begun shortly before he married his first wife. He was additionally charged with sending money to Herbst, who had moved to Palestine in 1936. After serving his sentence, Gottfried Cramm was conscripted into military service as private soldier fighting in the Eastern Front under harsh conditions but secretly involved in the German resistance movement. After the war, he would return to tennis but his “best” years of his sport were lost to war. While on a business trip in 1976 Von Cramm and his driver were killed in an automobile accident near Cairo, Egypt, when the car collided with a truck. A year following, Gottfried von Cramm was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.
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