The Miracle Typist

by Leon Silver

  ‘Hurry up,’ the captain barked again. ‘They need you.’

  Tolek’s feet were lead. Heart thundering, choking back tears, Tolek embraced his comrades, seeing on their faces the thought that if he survived this time, he would be a god in their eyes.

  A deep breath and he went. On his way through the blanket-covered doorway, he bumped smack into the colonel returning from the front, covered in dirt and soot.

  ‘Where are you going, Miracle Typist?’ The CO yelled the blessed words over the battle noises, shoving Tolek back into the room, both hands extended.

  ‘I’ve been ordered to replace the supply sergeant, sir. Two have been killed.’

  ‘What? You? Who ordered you to go?’

  The captain spoke up, telling the CO there was no one else left to send.

  ‘Then send me,’ the CO roared, veins popping out through the black soot on his throat. ‘If you’ve no one else, I will go. Give me your equipment, Miracle Typist.’

  The captain found someone else to send and the man got seriously injured.

  The soldiers had a saying, ‘Bullets have names on them…’ Which the cynics countered with, ‘But artillery shells are less discerning.’ Maybe a shell had had Tolek’s name on it, he just hadn’t been in its path.

  In mid May the Poles again stormed the mountain, winning the mountain’s key German defensive positions, capturing the monastery and breaking the Hitler Line to open the way to Rome.

  Later that day, the poppies song was performed by Alfred Schütz’s orchestra at General Anders’ headquarters to celebrate the victory. In front of a backdrop of draped tent canvas, on a wooden platform, a dozen musicians and a lamenting singer performed to the soldiers sitting on the grass that sloped up the hill, including Tolek and Jan and the Third Carpathian Rifle Division. The audience sang along in low, sad voices as the song reached into their hearts.

  One of Tolek’s office duties was to type up statistics: of the Second Polish Corps, 923 dead, 2900 injured and 300 missing in action. Fifty-five thousand Allied troops were killed or wounded, along with 20,000 Germans. He also typed the officers’ handwritten recommendations for promotions and decorations for enlisted men and officers. Tolek had a certain flexibility in the wording and phrasing because no one checked the typed forms against the originals when they were signed by the ever-busy officers. He could make the candidates shine. Recommended soldiers often encouraged Tolek to ‘put in a good word for me, colleague’ or to ‘remember me in your typing, comrade’.

  Tolek did occasionally help out a colleague, building up a brave effort here and there. What did the degree of bravery really matter? They were generally all brave soldiers. Fearless and dedicated. Tolek did well out of this duty, making many friends who owed him favours.

  His friendship with Wojciechowski, the Catholic cook who had fallen in love with a Jewish girl, flourished. Wojciechowski was recommended for bravery in battle on the mountain – everyone was equal in fighting from cooks to Miracle Typists – and Tolek built up his bravery so he received the Gold Cross of Merit with Swords medal. After that time, Tolek’s culinary selection was hugely elevated, and he now dined on beef tripe soup and veal in a blanket. Wojciechowski planned to marry the Jewish-Greek-Egyptian girl and become a war-decorated chef in her father’s Alexandria restaurant.

  But the tantalising food didn’t make up for the grinding disappointments. Despite the multiplying Stars of David in the cemetery, Tolek rarely saw a Jewish name on these recommendation lists, just the occasional token one. Even in death and disfigurement, the Jewish soldiers were not accepted as equals.

  The anti-Semitism scourge weaved a river through official Polish Army policy to the top of high command. A friend of Tolek’s, a private named Rosen, a survivor of Monte Cassino, was another victim. He was out on patrol one night on Monte Cassino with four other men, scouting the German defences for weak spots. They stumbled into a stronghold, were ambushed and shot up, leaving all five seriously wounded. The men spent weeks in hospital. The four Poles received the Cross of Valour for battlefield bravery, but the Jewish soldier got nothing. When he was released from hospital, he confronted his CO, demanding to know why.

  ‘Would I have received the honour if my name had not been Rosen?’

  The CO said he would investigate. Nothing came of it, of course. Tolek knew the CO had left Rosen’s name off the list in the first place.

  * * *

  On 24 July 1944, Jan Bielatowicz came crashing into the admin tent. His eyes were dancing, and he waved a piece of paper as though it was the Germans’ capitulation.

  ‘From Stanisław Kot… He’s now the Minister of State in the Middle East.’

  ‘Really?’

  Jan nodded emphatically. ‘That’s not all. There’s been a full Lwów uprising against the Germans by the underground forces of the Armia Krajowa. Kot told me this was coming; it was a secret, now it’s official. Operation Tempest, a country-wide uprising to clear the way for the Soviet advance on the Eastern Front.’

  Tolek took a big breath and sat down. ‘They’ll liberate the ghetto?’

  Jan didn’t answer. He waved the dispatch, then read from it. ‘ “The Red Army is mercilessly pushing the Wehrmacht towards the west. The headquarters of the AK decided to launch Operation Tempest, a series of local uprisings to seize control of cities where German forces are preparing their defences against the advancing Soviet Army.” Our country is finally being liberated by our own forces. Big celebrations tonight. Free drinks in the canteen later.’

  Regaining his equilibrium, Tolek got up, muttering, ‘Do you think the Polish population will be running out into the streets to throw flowers to welcome the liberating Russian tanks?’

  Jan waved the comment away. ‘There is other news, Tolek. It’s not confirmed, but during a telephone call from Kot this morning – when he told me that the Lwów uprising is now public knowledge – he also said to tell you that he has some information that Klara and Juliusz could well now be hidden by a Catholic priest in the church in Bóbrki.’

  Had the Mazurs arranged this? Was it getting too dangerous for them to nurture the two candles from the Klings’ menorah in their house? Tolek slammed his hand down hard on his desk in frustration. To be so far and so helpless.

  After Jan left, Tolek searched everywhere for the typed note he’d received in the desert. He couldn’t find it anywhere. In a panic, he searched more frantically – boxes, drawers, pockets – but it was gone and so was Juliusz’s drawing. He still had Klara’s telegram and the photos, but he hadn’t spotted the folded papers for a while. Perhaps they had been lost in the frantic Monte Cassino days? Uniforms were dirtied and ripped and often changed in haste. The notes must’ve fallen out, buried with the rest of the Monte Cassino sacrifices. Part of humanity’s expanding graveyard. Perhaps it happened the morning they watched the captured Germans being marched down the ‘quiet’ side of the mountain, when the group of eight were blown to pieces.

  Despite this discovery of his loss, Tolek squeezed his face with glee. Hidden by a priest. This was good news, because even the Germans wouldn’t harass priests, that would upset the local population and make them join the underground. If Jan’s news was correct and the Russians were fast advancing, any day now his family would be liberated from the German yoke and hopefully manage until he got home. Tolek went hot all over at the prospect of being reunited with his family.

  16 Farewell to fatherland

  One month after the Lwów uprising celebration, Jan Bielatowicz published an article in The White Eagle dedicated to Jewish-Polish soldiers entitled ‘KADDISZ’:

  This is the Kaddish – the prayer that Jews say when mourning their loved ones.

  K A D D I S H

  Mourner

  Let the glory of God be extolled, let His great name be hallowed, in the world whose creation He willed. May His Kingdom soon prevail, in our own day, our own lives, and the life of all Israel, and let us say: Amen.

  All Gathered and Mourne
r

  Let His great name be blessed forever and ever.

  Mourner

  Let the name of the Holy One, blessed is He, be glorified, exalted and honoured, though He is beyond all the praises, songs and adorations that we can utter, and let us say: Amen.

  All Gathered and Mourner

  Let His name be blessed for ever and ever.

  Mourner

  Let the name of the Holy One, blessed is He, be glorified, exalted and honoured, though He is beyond all praises, songs and adoration that we can utter, and let us say: Amen.

  All Gathered and Mourner

  From now let His great name be blessed for ever and ever.

  Mourner

  For us and for all Israel, may the blessing of peace and the promise of life come true, and let us say: Amen.

  All Gathered

  Help comes from God who created heavens and earth.

  Mourner

  May He who causes peace to reign in the high heavens let peace descend on us, on all Israel, and all the world, and let us say: Amen.

  Such unusual feelings are aroused when Benjamin plays the piano!

  He plays anything one asks him to. When you look at him play, you see an attentive almost statue-like face, resembling the face of Goethe. He does not play often – only when there is a piano around, and when he himself is free from the duties of the battalion dispatch rider. Benjamin is quite a different person when he plays ‘Aida’ or the ‘Symphony Pathetique’ and when he carries six lunches for the entire orderly room. Two different personalities. Strange, mysterious, like his people. For Benjamin originates from Zaolzie, he is a Czech citizen, a musician who has travelled all around the world and when, during his stay in Palestine, attempts were made to persuade him to stay there, he refused and – at the age of 40 – he is still a fusilier in the Polish Army.

  An old soldier from the Carpathian battalion is standing nearby. (Benjamin is playing Oginski’s ‘Farewell to Fatherland’ – how strange it sounds). The Carpathian is not saying anything.

  His Semitic profile does not express any hatred. I remember that profile; covered with the dust of Libya in the hard conditions of the battlefield. When, pale and weary, he would lean over a folding canoe in Tobruk next to which a missile from cannon ‘Pavia’ had just exploded. Or returning from a nightlong patrol in Gazali. On no other occasion are the Jewish facial traits as prominent as during war-time in fear and fatigue. A Jew from Bóbrki, he admitted it himself, was forced by his wife Klara in Lwów to go in September, into the wide world to fight to the end together with the Poles. He has remained faithful to his duty until today, although he has never considered himself to be a hero.

  How different is the world of Torah, black gabardine coats, tallith and grimy tomb of Sarah from the real life around – the life of Europe challenging with explicitness and straightforwardness. How far away from Ancona, Perugia and Scapezzano is the world of Brody, Bóbrki and Bobowy!

  While playing Benjamin mutters something to himself and although he listens carefully to what people ask him to play, he appears to be somewhere far, far away.

  There were only a few of them that managed to come to the banks of the river Cesano. They evaluate their numbers as 1%. Instead of 10! But they are here, they fight clenching their teeth and have still faith in Poland. They are the best of them all. The disputes between us and the Jews have not been settled yet. But the righteous Polish republic will never forget those who were among her best sons.

  They offered her Life – Man’s most precious possession.

  ‘Peace’ is the most significant word in the ‘Kaddish’ prayer – the highest human ideal on Earth. Those Jews who felt a bond with the tragic fight for Poland gave up Peace, instead they chose the sword.

  The Italian sky was not to be seen any more by the deceased Leon Pastor, Lewi Gruenberg, Izaak Ancewicz, Teodor Baum, Abram Tenenbaum, Maurycy Unger, Abraham Wurzel, Henryk Zegzc and others. They died on the ridges of Cassi, on the banks of the river Chienti, Musone, Misa and Cesano, in the mountains near Recanati, Osimo and Ancona – the sons of the small streets of Bielsko, Zywiec, Tarnow, Podhajec, Lap and Lidy – they all crossed the land of their Prophets and yet they decided that Poland was the country of their choice.

  A priest-marksman died from a bullet of a German soldier and his tomb stands now among the rocks of Hill 593 like the Ark of the Covenant between Poland and the Jews who have Poland in their hearts. Langsman, a volunteer, died from a German bullet on the foregrounds of Ancona sent on a patrol, but his brother still serves in the Polish Army. Through their deaths they pronounced the Maccabean ‘Kiddush Hashem’ – the word of the most sacred sacrifice. For them there was nothing more sacred on this earth than this word. And one must have faith in such sanctity.

  Benjamin is playing Chopin’s ‘Funeral March’; the Semitic profiles are getting ready for the night patrol. Only one per cent of them all. Their lips cracked, they whisper ‘If I forget about you, my Polish Jerusalem, may my right arm wither.’

  The heart of the Polish nation has been beating for them, and always will.

  Jan Bielatowicz1

  An ode to the Polish fighting Jew. A public acknowledgment in the Polish Government and armed forces newspaper. Tolek felt this article gave the Polish fighting Jews a boost. Legitimised by journalistic decree. Poland was indebted to them. He also thought the war and the long campaign had done nothing to reconcile their differences. Not just those of Tolek and Jan – the differences between the two nations, races and people.

  And of course more than that. Much more. The article was a public recognition of the sanctity of Judaism. No more a dark religion. No more the advocates of child kidnapping, blood sacrifices and well poisoning. They could now be proud and blend in to the real life of Europe. They were not such a bad tribe. In fact, they practised a humane religion.

  But Jan had to have his dig, didn’t he? Only one per cent were fighting for Poland, instead of ten per cent, as the rest had deserted. The reasons why the numbers were so low were conveniently withheld.

  New hope stirred in Tolek’s chest for his family. The Poles had been keeping the Jewish families safe at home while the soldiers fought together for the motherland. But the hope caught in Tolek’s throat. Could the homeland uprising news, the speeding up of the end of the war, have influenced the timing of this article?

  The troops were resting in an abandoned, half-destroyed farmhouse behind the front lines near the Italian town of Ancona. The chickens and livestock had long been eaten by passing soldiers. Fruit rotted on the trees. A few Polish farm boys whooped loudly, joy-riding a tractor they had somehow managed to start. Weary soldiers slept outside in the sunshine, leaning against the crumbling walls. Some ate with distaste from cans, or played cards. A normal military bivouac.

  Tolek stopped at a large glassless kitchen window that the farmers must’ve used to survey the livestock.

  ‘How are you, Janek?’ he called out to Jan, who sat at the table.

  ‘Good,’ Jan replied. ‘You?’

  ‘Good.’

  Turning to face Jan, Tolek stumbled on upturned kitchen drawers. Rice and dried pasta crunched under his boots. He ran his finger through the dust on a large kettle, leaving a trail. This was the first time Tolek and Jan had met since the article had been published weeks earlier. Tolek had discussed the piece with other Jewish soldiers, going over it line by line. They were as nervous about it as him. As much as the article said, they felt that it had left out so much more. They feared what would be revealed when the war was over. Had the Jews at home been punished just for being Jews? Had the chronic anti-Semitism taken revenge on their families?

  The front moved erratically in all directions. Jan had been kept busy covering the military successes and attending political meetings, helping to form plans for postwar Poland. Now he sat behind the table on a remarkably well-preserved kitchen chair. He leaned on the table, the bottle of Johnnie Walker before him already half empty. There was a wooden box fo
r a guest to sit on and an extra glass. Again Tolek had the feeling of having been set up, of walking into a trap, just like that first night in the canteen at Latrun. The Correspondent’s blue eyes gleamed as he poured whisky into the empty glass.

  Tolek sat down and took a swig of the whisky, swirling it around in his mouth with a whooshing sound. He swallowed. ‘ “The dispute between us and the Jews is not settled yet”? When will it be settled, Correspondent? I don’t understand. What do you know that I don’t?’

  ‘I don’t have any information that you don’t. I felt it was my job as a war correspondent to point out to the population at home that we had old accounts to settle.’

  ‘You have no information? You have streams of information. Your close friend Stanisław Kot? Surely he knows everything that is going on back home? You’ve just been to London, right? It’s two months since the Lwów uprising. What’s happening, Mr News Hound, what is the word on the streets in Poland? Any news of my hidden wife and son, my mother and brother, from your resistance contacts?’

  Did Jan blink before answering?

  ‘The national uprising, Operation Tempest, has stalled. Germans rounded up thousands of young men in Kraków and Warsaw. They are threatening to kill them and many more and destroy both towns if any more armed disturbances take place.’

  ‘Please, Janek – I don’t understand your article.’ Tolek leaned closer across the wobbly table. ‘What bad news have you got? Why have you suddenly changed your mind about the Jews? For the past few weeks you’ve been a supportive, considered colleague. You’ve nourished me with news of my family. We’ve laughed and toasted together to a common victory – a postwar chance to start over, to reconcile our differences.’

  Jan gulped down his drink. ‘I saw it as my duty to point out that the Jews, by nature, are treacherous and disloyal. Poland has given refuge to three million Jews who are mostly anti-Polish, communist sympathisers. They deserted the Polish Army in droves at the first opportunity in Palestine. “We count their numbers at one per cent instead of ten.” And I was being generous.’