Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity | Wallenberg, Raoul

[AUGUST 4, 1912–JULY 17, 1947]

Swedish diplomat

Raoul Wallenberg has entered history as a humanitarian activist who took considerable personal risks to save men, women, and children from impending genocide. In the summer and fall of 1944, and until his disappearance in January 1945, Wallenberg was affiliated with the Swedish Legation in Budapest, Hungary, where he conducted a special rescue mission to save many thousands of Hungarian Jews from deportation to the Nazi extermination camps. Wallenberg had no kinship to the victims; he was a Lutheran by faith and a neutral Swede by nationality. Yet he accepted a difficult and dangerous assignment in a foreign country—a mission which he carried out with skill, determination, and courage.

Early Life and Humanitarian Appointments

Wallenberg was born in 1912 in Stockholm to an aristocratic family of...