Bavarian government under Johannes Hoffmann, the Red Guards executed eight hostages on April 29, 1919. Countercoup, arrest, trial The German Army, assisted by Freikorps, with a force of roughly 39,000 men invaded and quickly conquered Munich on 3 May 1919 in a "White Terror." Leviné personally took part in the street fighting against them. In retaliation for the execution of the hostages, the Freikorps captured and killed some 700 men and women. Leviné evaded arrest at first, perhaps by hiding in the apartment of Erich Katzenstein. Leviné was captured on either 13 May 1919. Public interest in his trial was high. On 19 May 1919, Albert Einstein sent a joint telegram asking the courts to delay Leviné's trial. Leviné was tried along with Toller in early June 1919; Max Hirschberg refused to serve as his legal counsel, but Anton Graf von Pestalozza accepted. On 3 June 1919, the courts, calling him a "foreign interloper in Bavaria", sentenced Leviné to death by execution. Soldiers, bureaucrats, and members of the public passed by to see the so-called "blood-thirsty Robespierre" while he awaited execution, his wife later reported. Speech Leviné gave an inspiring speech during his trial:We Communists are all dead men on leave. Of this I am fully aware. I do not know if you will extend my leave or whether I shall have to join Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. In any case I await your verdict with composure and inner serenity. For I know that, whatever your verdict, events cannot be stopped. Aftermath In reaction to the two Bavarian socialist republics, whose leaders included many Jews, Bavaria, which was already conservative and anti-Semitic, became even more so. One of the people affected was Reiner Maria Rilke, who left Munich after soldiers ransacked his apartment. Personal life and death In 1915, Leviné married Rosa Broido (from the Polish town of Gródek), who married Ernst Meyer (1887-1930) and so became known as Meyer-Leviné, and then fled Germany when Hitler came to power and lived the rest of her life in London (1890-1979). The Levinés had at least one child, a son, whom they named Eugen. Stephen Eric Bronner considers Leviné a follower of Rosa Luxemburg (for seeking "to provide a legacy for the next generation," knowing "the soviet was doomed") and characterized him as follows: He incarnated the best of the Bolshevik spirit. He was unyielding and dogmatic, but an honest intellectual