Normandy, a symbol of rural peace, land abounding with milk and butter, rich in green pastures, beautiful are your hills and valleys bleeding now from thousand wounds. I love your calm strength pouring forth from your tortured soil while sitting on the banks of the easy-going Orne River and thinking of my beloved ones and our uncertain fate. Defeat was inevitable. Many will perish. In vain I tried to lift my mind above the imminent disaster. I looked to the west. The sun shining so innocently prepared to set behind the hills. Soon we will be wrapped in a dark blanket mercifully granting us the shelter we needed so badly for our nightly journey. In a zig-zag course, we drove through the darkness till morning to an undisclosed end without having advanced very far. The streets became increasingly crowded with soldiers and vehicles of all military units frantically attempting to cross each other and thus just adding to the general confusion. The biggest obstacles were the horse-drawn carts of the Russian Division, anti-Communist Tartars from the Ukraine whose existence was totally unknown to us. They really cluttered every route. We stayed away from them as much as possible. Thus we rumbled and stumbled over bumpy roads and unplowed fields watched closely by the French peasants who, I am certain, relayed every bit of information to the French underground. It was no secret. Another war was fought only a few miles behind the first line, the war between the German CIA and French Maquis. The French shot German soldiers and the Germans hung them up on trees if they caught them. I personally saw several times their corpses rocking in the wind. By night a spooky and repulsive picture.
“Don’t go further, ” something addressed me. “Return and rest.” Was it a premonition?
As we struggled along, Big Brother’s ever-vigilant eyes spied upon us from the air incessantly. There was no alternative other than hiding during day time. By nightfall, however, the entire German Army seemed to crawl out of their foxholes, flood the roads and cause an unbelievable pell-mell. The enemy was not far, apparently. Huge floodlights swinging to and fro like a pendulum illuminated the scene with a reddish glowing light. Meter by meter we dragged along hampered not only by the crowd but also by our heavy generator tied to the rear end of the truck, which made proper maneuvering difficult. As usual, I stood on the step-board to guard us against a sudden aerial attack. In a curve, the truck rolled into a deep ditch and leaned over. I fell down and landed in a narrow pit. The rear wheel came after me but got stuck, fortunately. The whole crew worked like mad to free me from the uncomfortable place, cursing and shouting. The noise, however, alerted enemy tanks stationed somewhere in the vicinity and, of course, they started shooting frantically. Hiding in the ditch I saw suddenly the shade of a tank emerging from the darkness and coming straight toward us. A comrade was hit. Alarmed I jumped up the steep embankment, ran into the flat field, and pressed my body against the ground. One guy followed, threw himself beside me, and dug his head forcefully under my belly shaking violently. What a nut, I thought, more amused than irate. Probably one of these staff boys who had never heard a whirling shell.
A few hours later we had to stop at a crossroad blocked by an ambulance and a staff car. The medic and a high-ranking officer each claiming priority threatened one another with drawn revolvers, while long columns waited patiently for a go-ahead. I can’t remember anymore how we made it beyond the impasse, but we did. I am probably not far off guessing a fire barrage settled the quarrel quickly. We continued the rest of the night incessantly starting and stopping. By daybreak, we had covered 5 miles. Our battery was dispersed, and contact was entirely lost. In mid-morning, we found our comrades again accidentally while we passed through a village. They had parked in the backyard of a farmhouse. We pulled into the open barn and everybody went out to greet them. I was the last one to follow. At the gate, to the backyard, a strange thing happened, “Don’t go further,” something addressed me. “Return and rest.” Was it a premonition? I don’t know; but I obeyed, turned around, stretched out in the strongly smelling hay, and closed my eyes, for a couple of minutes only. And it came, the inferno spewing fire and peril. Whizzing and fizzling shells poured in from all sides. I hurried to safety under the truck just in time. A frightening explosion right above me cut off my breath. A purple glow blinded my eyes. Was the truck hit? Should I run into the open fire or burn to death if the gas tank explodes? Miraculously the red veil wafted away. A comrade sprinted up from behind and stopped next to me. “Your corporal,” he said, “lost a leg.” N.N.’s breast was pierced by a shell fragment jutting out on both sides.” From his account, I received a gloomy picture of the bloody toll our crew had to pay and my feelings of compassion for the dead and wounded mixed with fathomless gratitude. Once again I had been forewarned and touched by a mysterious and incomprehensible power. The fire had subsided. Tranquility hung in the air as though nothing had happened. We crawled from under the truck and gazing up I saw a sizable hole in the roof. The red tiles had been blasted to dust. A sergeant and two landsers (GIs) came running from the backyard. Our truck was still operational except for a blown tire on the generator. It was foolishness in my opinion to still carry that thing around, but the sergeant insisted. Thus we pulled out in a hurry and left. What about our fellowmen in the backyard? The dead and afflicted? Don’t turn back! Go! Such is the law of the war. I was ordered again to stand on the step-board and watch. The temporary peace was deceptive and could change at any moment.
Approaching the end of the village, I noticed an antitank gun and two men laying on the ground. One was dead, a handsome young man with straw blond hair stretched out, face up, his curls playing softly in the wind. The other one still alive, but unconscious, rubbed his temple from which a thin thread of blood trickled to the sandy soil. My heart was grasped with bewilderment. Oh God, death seemed to be everywhere and nobody knows how the chips are falling in the next minute. We passed this sad place and turned left toward a wide valley framed by gently declining hills on both sides. The next village was about a mile away. We did not go very far. A shell exploded directly in front of us. A tire blew out. Scared to death, I jumped from the treadle. The truck hobbled away pursued by more shots and disappeared in a cloud of dust. Hesitatingly I got up and started walking. Another truck approached, but he was too fast. I missed the step and grabbed instead a chain fastened on the side. More explosions. The truck made a leap forward and sped away. I fell to the ground and saw the rear wheel rolling by only inches from my fingers. In utter despair, I was left behind alone. From the top of the hill, the gunners must have watched me as I jumped out of the road into the grass. The shells kept coming right over my head whistling and whining and exploded a couple of meters from me. My God, if one of these monsters falls short, I will be hacked into pieces. Terrified to the bones, my consciousness almost faded. “Lord, save me. Don’t let me die here alone and deserted,” I prayed with every fiber of my heart. The trail seemed to be endless. Finally, the shooting stopped. It was like awakening from a bad dream. The hunt was over. I grappled to my feet and began walking toward the village. Luckily, no other vehicle dared to cross this death valley. With surprise, I noticed the sun again, our wonderful sun. My cold body warmed up slowly as I meandered along the road. A tornado could not create greater devastation as was spread out in front of my eyes. Maimed corpses and debris were strewn all over. I hastened through that mess wanting nothing more than to leave it behind me as swiftly as possible. Fifteen minutes later I entered the village and found my group. They had waited for me. “What happened to you?” they said. “You look like an old man.” Indeed, I was. I sat down exhausted and unable to speak, feeling like somebody who had just survived his execution. The shock impaired my memory and left a blank spot until the next morning.
The calendar read 19th August 1944. A significant date. We were near T……., a small settlement not far from Falaise. It would become the last station of my career in the German Army. The village was packed with military and under heavy fire. Our sergeant decided we drive across the farmland to the other side and catch the road again. We never made it. A white horse, a wonderful animal, bewilderment in his black eyes, blocked the steep exit and refused stubbornly to budge in spite of the pulling and pushing of half a dozen landsers, frozen in fear and stiff-legged. Finally, a shot rang out; the hapless stallion fell to the ground, a victim slaughtered on the altar of the war. Rough and pitiless they pushed the horse aside eager to get to the road. What for? We were only a disorganized bunch of dissolved military units without a commander, without ammunition and food, arrested by the enemy with an iron grip. There was not the slightest capability to stage an attack. All we could do and did was to drive aimlessly around, drawing fire wherever we stopped.
One of those low-flying doves appeared circling over our heads, an unmistakable signal to hide and to hide fast because minutes later we will be shot like wild turkeys. “Come on, Guenther,” I urged and nabbed my comrade’s arm. We fled to the next farmhouse about 300 feet away. Guenther was an 18-year-old Berliner with red hair and boyish features. Because of his wit and open-mindedness I was fond of him and we developed a close companionship. We also shared sometimes very personal feelings. I remember how he confided to me his first love affair in Paris, where he met a lady who dined and wined him until he was ready for the final act in her apartment. He narrated the story with all the innocence at his disposal. His eyes scintillated and a shine of charming contentment swished over his miens. Guenther, I have not forgotten you, my last comrade, who stayed with me until we got lost in the jungle of the prison camps.
We reached the farmhouse, which actually turned out to be a complex of living quarters, barns, and stables arranged in the form of a horseshoe enclosing a sizable courtyard. We settled in a horse stable. The firing began and lasted all day long except for a brief afternoon pause, which we used to make a quick sprint to the truck in an attempt to salvage our last possession, the knapsack. The truck was punctured like a sieve. My knapsack, too. A bottle of carefully saved triple sec was smashed, and the sweet, sticky stuff poured over my only spare shirt. The trip was not worth the risk. Empty-handed we returned to the shelter, to the penetrating smell of blood which caused us almost to vomit. From the corner came the moaning of a young landser whose leg had been blasted off. He suffered terribly though a medic tried hard to comfort him. Another fellow, a boy really, sat on a bench, pale-faced, a hole in the breast, open and untreated. The medic was out of bandage material and could not aid him. A high-ranking staff officer leaned against the wall across from me. My attention was drawn inadvertently to him any time a salvo approached and exploded. His body then began trembling and his face grimaced in utter fear. Admittedly, one needed patience to sustain steadfastness in that environment for hours and endure the endless storm of howling, whining, and bursting shrapnel, while in the courtyard a heartbreaking drama occurred. Thirty horses still harnessed and tied to the wagons, died piece by piece all day long, slowly and silently. Nobody helped them. Nobody could help them. A landser ran into the stable out of breath. “Medic, please, help me carry my sergeant in. He is laying in the open field out there; his back torn up.” “I can’t,” the medic retorted, “Don’t you see I have my hands full?” He was a coward like each one of us. With a sigh of resignation, the guy took his place and gave up. Oh, merciless war. This is the greatest punishment: to be hit, suffer in pain helplessly and die forsaken by everybody. During this dreadful morning, I experienced something like a miracle. A communications truck was parked on the opposite side of the courtyard. A man stepped out, and at this moment a shell exploded almost at his feet wrapping him in a red glowing blaze. As the smoke lifted, he came over unharmed; only his hair and eyebrows were burned.
Time seemed to stay still. But like sand purling in the hourglass, even this cruel day finally passed away. The shooting stopped and a benevolent calmness beautified the oncoming evening. Guenther and I could and would no longer bear the misery and blood-filled odor. We decided to walk to the village. The first house we entered was a temporary hospital. The medic in charge ordered us to carry out a dead soldier and leave instantly. Unless you are wounded, there is no place here for you, he explained. Look for another shelter. We found one crowded with landsers sitting around and dozing. We joined them, glad to have a more pleasing company. As darkness sank over the roofs an hour-long series of detonations filled the air with tremors. German commandos blew up all vehicles and war materials. We were at the end of the road without an outlet. Or was there a chance? Some thought so when 2 German tanks appeared at 10 PM. They loaded in the wounded and invited everybody to follow. We will break through the ring, they believed, and many joined them. Guenther was also ready to go. But I cautioned him. “Don’t be silly. You just lose your life.” I convinced him and as expected the bold coup failed. At 3 o’clock in the morning, a few returned and told of the disaster. The rest had perished.
With daybreak, the enemy artillery launched another tempest of furious barrages. Most of us were already too apathetic to pay much attention. For days we had nothing to eat. Out there in the marketplace was a mobile canteen, overturned, the good food strewn all over the street, but nobody dared to fetch it. Hunger was then anyway the least of our concerns. Our minds were occupied with a more vital question. How to surrender? Who will pick us up? The Americans, the British, or the Polish auxiliary troops, who did not have a reputation for being very humane? Thus the forenoon passed by and also half of the afternoon. Suddenly I saw an American officer coming around the corner. Because of the constant shelling, he kept a brisk pace holding up a white flag. Landsers flocked to him from all sides. I saw our chance, too. “Guenther, let’s go,” I shouted. We hurled down the steps and followed the tail end of the column. The officer led us straight, out of the village. Walking along the street we spotted the incapacitated jeep of our battery. Two corpses lay on the ground covered with blankets. “Let’s see who they are,” was our first reaction. We paused while the crowd moved on. At this moment a shell exploded in the midst of the group. Six men fell down yelling for help. Everybody panicked and fled in all directions. Guenther and I, frightened to death, scudded to the open field as fast as we could. We heard the injured crying but did not stop or even look back. How often was this sad event revived in my dreams? I could have been one of them. Their cries still reverberate in my ears and are painfully locked in my consciousness. I was challenged to serve my brothers in their darkest hour and failed miserably. What a coward I was. May God forgive me.
We trodded through the acres grudgingly and exhausted. I was near a total breakdown. Guenther helped me along. Finally, we spotted 2 enemy soldiers standing in the field, 2 Negroes aiming their rifles at us as we approached with our arms raised. Helmet and belt flew to the ground. They led us back to a forest where we met a bunch of Germans who had already surrendered.