Forty Autumns

by Nina Willner

Are you prepared to use all your strength, to fight for peace with all those who love it, and to defend it to the last breath?

  Are you willing to fight side by side with us for a socialist order of society . . . to fight together with all patriots for a united, peace-loving, democratic and independent Germany?

  “Yes, we pledge!” the young teenagers shouted, the sound echoing throughout the room until it fell sharply silent.

  As the students stood on the stage, Oma watched her sweet and gentle sixth child nervously reciting the oath and wondered what life would hold for him as a man in communist society.

  In the West, Hanna and Eddie became almost inseparable, spending most evenings and weekends together. He introduced her to the American military and surviving German Jewish communities in Heidelberg. The two enjoyed exploring the city every chance they got, and began to take short trips to neighboring European countries.

  Eddie had a voracious thirst for knowledge; he wanted to go everywhere and see everything. She loved being with him but his boundless energy and passion for adventure began to exhaust her. He dropped her off almost every night at around eleven o’clock, but after a while, with full-time work and her twice-weekly Italian classes, she suggested they go out only once or twice a week. One weekend, Hanna suggested they take the entire weekend off and catch up on sleep.

  “You can sleep when you’re dead,” Eddie told her. “We’re going to Paris this weekend.”

  Eddie was completely smitten with Hanna. She was a beauty but didn’t seem to know it. She was independent, intelligent, uncomplicated. Hanna saw in Eddie an unusual zest for life. Despite what he had been through, he was always upbeat and had a great sense of humor. And he had that sparkle in his eye.

  By December, the young East German runaway and the young American lieutenant were engaged.

  At home one evening, Opa confided to Oma that his situation at school was worsening, and that he was having a hard time tolerating the authorities’ increasingly twisted demands. No longer able to stomach the regime’s attempts to turn education into a propaganda tool, he was finding it difficult to hide his growing unhappiness. He was particularly appalled that he was now required to show favoritism to students whose parents were Party officials, or who were themselves leaders in the youth movement. Opa told Oma that this kind of cronyism would one day doom the system. At school Opa made no mention of his burden but kept up the façade. Now, at his Saturday-night card games, he had to fight harder against the impulse to speak his mind and share his growing displeasure with the regime.

  One day Heidi’s teacher addressed the class: “What do we think about people who abandon East Germany?” Not waiting for an answer, she continued. By “leaving,” she explained, they had turned their backs on their country and their fellow citizens and this made them traitors.

  “Traitors,” she said, “are criminals . . . the absolute worst kinds of criminals.”

  Heidi listened intently, becoming increasingly disturbed as she envisioned Hanna’s face. Having heard the same message from her Young Pioneer leaders, she wondered, was there something her parents weren’t telling her? Were they trying to cover up for their daughter’s delinquent character? Perhaps her teachers and youth leaders knew more than her parents did. Perhaps the beautiful things that she had believed all along about Hanna were just a misguided fantasy.

  Suddenly her chest felt heavy and she had a sinking feeling. Tears welled up in her eyes and she looked around the room wondering if anyone knew that she had a sister who was a criminal.

  Communism spread throughout the world. Mao Zedong took control of China and, together with communist North Korea, fought a bloody ideological war against the West on the Korean Peninsula. North Vietnam, formerly part of French Indochina, became communist in 1954, unleashing fears that the nations of Asia would fall like dominoes to Soviet ideology. In response, a wave of anticommunist hysteria gripped the United States when Senator Joseph McCarthy sparked a series of paranoid witch hunts to unmask suspected communists and communist sympathizers in America. In a first for the United States, two American civilians, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, were executed for espionage after being convicted of providing the Soviets with nuclear secrets that helped them build their first atomic bomb.

  In the fall of 1956, three years after the East German workers’ rebellion, the people of Hungary took to the streets in an uprising against the Soviet-backed government to demand change. Moscow called in the Red Army, and thousands of Hungarians were slaughtered as the Soviets brutally crushed the rebellion. Once again, fearing war, the West had few options other than to stand idly by.

  Days later, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, in part citing the failed uprising, chided a group of Western diplomats when he lashed out at the West, threatening, “We will bury you!” The next year, the Soviets took the competition for ideological predominance into outer space as they launched Sputnik 1, the world’s first artificial satellite. The same technology could also enable the Soviet Union to launch a missile that could reach North America. In addition to the nuclear arms race, now the space race was on.

  The authorities in East Germany took every measure possible to dominate the population.

  Valuing only those they could manipulate, the regime worked ceaselessly to rid society of anyone who stood in the way of, or could potentially undermine, its goals. Among them were intellectuals who were often inclined to challenge the system, and those who did were demoted, marginalized, or removed from society, ending up in reeducation camps or in prison.

  Opa continued to appear to back the regime. At Party meetings, he was a vocal supporter when he thought he needed to be. But as a man who placed a great deal of importance on pure, objective education, he was appalled when he was forced to distribute pamphlets such as this one that attacked and belittled the intellectual segment of society:

  You have been educated, gone to the university.

  You have your Ph.D.

  You are a gifted artist, a teacher, a technician, a major writer, a scientist.

  No one needs you!

  The work of half a lifetime,

  All the sacrifice, all the learning is in vain!

  Do you think you are better than the rest

  Because you are educated,

  Because you are an intellectual

  And speak in elevated ways?

  You are like stale beer!

  There is no need for you any longer.

  Opa found it harder and harder to cope with the way the Party twisted information to feed its cause. By now, on most nights after supper, instead of plunging into Marxist theory, he retreated to his study to look over his favorite books of poetry in an effort to seek a break from it all. School officials and the authorities noticed a change in Opa’s pattern of behavior and that the passion he once displayed was no longer evident when teaching communist doctrine.

  One day, a couple of policemen, sent by someone in the local government who apparently thought Opa needed to be taught a lesson, paid him a visit. They walked into the house and carted away armfuls of his prized books on history, philosophy, and art.

  More and more Oma took to her garden alone. It was a tranquil spot where she could retreat from the tension of her everyday environment. Her garden began to blossom with vegetables, berries, and colorful flowers that she cultivated with the greatest, most tender loving care.

  In Seebenau, Kallehn was coping as best he could. No longer smoking Lucky Strikes, he now puffed on hand-rolled cigarettes made of poor-quality Russian machorka tobacco. Although forced to turn over his crops to the local agricultural committee, he was relieved that his farm had not yet been collectivized and he was still able to work his family’s land. Ama Marit worried that the final surrendering of his farm to the regime would mark the beginning of the end for Kallehn.

  Ten years in, the regime had taken control of every aspect of society. With increasing secret police control and a calculated campaign to strip citizens of their freedoms, the peo
ple of East Germany had little choice but to acquiesce.

  10

  THE FUR COAT

  LAST MEETING

  (1958–1959)

  Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence.

  —Plato

  In Heidelberg, Hanna worked at her job and in her spare time traveled in Europe with Eddie as often as she could. She sent postcards to the family in the East from every location, but became increasingly concerned when her correspondence went unanswered. Unbeknownst to her or the family, most of her letters and all of her postcards from her travels in France, the Netherlands, and England were confiscated on their way into the country. Similarly, the family’s letters were being intercepted on their way out. The rare letter that had reached Hanna arrived opened with no effort to re-paste the envelope, was missing pages, and lacked any real information about the family.

  But then one day, a postcard from Italy made it to Schwaneberg. Oma was elated and celebrated by happily placing it up on the living room mantel for the whole family to enjoy. When Opa came home, he took it down and threw it into a drawer, berating Oma for her indiscretion, telling her she was foolish for displaying it where the children could linger over it and visitors who might be informants could see it.

  Later, Heidi, now eight years old, retrieved the postcard and put it up in her room, where she ogled over its luminous salmon-colored sky and gondolas floating on the crystalline waters of Venice. Just as Opa feared, the more Heidi looked at the image, the more she became intrigued with the idea of the outside world. In school, teachers seldom spoke about what lay beyond the borders of the country, and now with Hanna’s captivating postcard from Italy stretching the boundaries of her imagination, foreign countries became a curiosity, often taking on the allure of fairy tales.

  One day in school, as the class studied the territories of Eastern Europe, the teacher directed the children to observe the map of East Germany. They discussed the major cities and towns, looked over the contours of the countryside, the hills and valleys and outlying areas stretching all the way to the border. Heidi noticed that, while all the Eastern Bloc countries—Poland, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and the rest—were depicted in great detail, West Germany and the rest of Western Europe, in complete contrast, were shown only by a perimeter outline around a vacant gray mass, as if there were nothing there at all and the area was barren of any geographical features whatsoever. Forbidden to be curious about the West, on this day Heidi braved a question: “What’s on the other side? Why is West Germany just a big blank?”

  Glaring at Heidi, the teacher responded to the class as a whole, explaining that West Germany was a dangerous, desolate wasteland, a vast chasm of darkness and of the unknown, filled with violent convicts, hoodlums, and people who preyed on others. Staring coldly at Heidi and the other children, she added, “We don’t really even want to know what’s over there. We are lucky that we live in the East and that we have barriers to protect us from the evil that lies in the West.”

  Though it had been four years since her trip to the West, and her memories were fading, Heidi still recalled her time with Hanna in the West with great fondness. She found herself increasingly conflicted between the memories she held dear and the frightening things that her teachers, youth leaders, even her father insisted were true. By the time she turned nine, she no longer wondered where the truth really lay and had decided that, though there might indeed be depravity in the West, there must also be great good. Hanna became a symbol of the good that Heidi believed the outside world had to offer.

  After working for a few years for the U.S. Army, Hanna had amassed a small savings that she wanted to send to the family in the East. Assuming West German deutschmarks would be intercepted, she took a risk to buy Oma a gift instead, then boxed it and taped it tightly shut. Several months earlier she had attempted a test run, sending smaller parcels filled with sweets and trinkets from her travels, but the family had not received them. Eager to make contact, she threw caution to the wind, posted the package, and hoped for the best.

  A month or so later the package arrived in Schwaneberg. Whether by oversight, a clerk’s mistake, or a simple act of decency, the big cardboard box arrived partially opened but with contents intact. The children squealed with delight, gathering round as Oma opened it. With their help, she pulled out the bundle from inside. Then she collapsed on the kitchen chair. It was a fur coat.

  Oma had worn the same threadbare woolen coat for as long as anyone could remember. Now thinned with age, it was no longer protective against the freezing German winters. Though the “fur” was actually a horse-hair coat, having been bought from a colleague’s aging mother, with monthly payments made over a two-year period, Hanna hoped not only that the gift to Oma would warm her throughout the winter, but that it would also confirm to her parents that she was doing all right in the West.

  Opa called the package’s delivery a miracle. At first he forbade Oma to wear the coat, knowing it would call attention, but soon he relented, allowing her to wear it on only the coldest days, after conceding that he himself had no money for, or access to, such a luxury.

  In the spring of 1958, ten years after Hanna’s escape, Oma was thrilled to receive a letter in which Hanna wrote that she was getting married. Eddie, her fiancé, she wrote, was a Holocaust survivor who, after the war, had emigrated to America, joined the military, and returned to Germany as a U.S. Army officer. Though she assumed the authorities would not allow it, Hanna invited the family to the wedding.

  Oma immediately put in an application to travel a second time to Heidelberg, hoping that the authorities would reconsider their decision not to let her travel again and show leniency in light of the special occasion. But they did not, and the request was rejected.

  In Heidelberg, Eddie’s military superiors tried to persuade him to call off the wedding. Knowing how much it meant to the young lieutenant and survivor who had staked his entire future on becoming a U.S. citizen and an army officer, they told him he risked permanent damage to his hard-earned career in intelligence if he married a former East German citizen, especially one whose family was still in the communist East. Eddie was livid, and responded, “You can’t tell me who I can and cannot marry.” With that he threatened to resign his commission over the matter. The commanding general interceded and, after a series of security interviews and an investigation that fully vetted Hanna, her U.S. citizenship papers were expedited. In the summer of 1958, Hanna and Eddie married.

  In the West, Hanna and Eddie marry in Heidelberg in August 1958. The family in the East is not permitted to attend.

  Courtesy of the Willner family

  At the U.S. Army chapel in Heidelberg, Eddie wore his blue army dress uniform and Hanna wore a simple white, knee-length chiffon shift and a pearl necklace. With no family in attendance, Eddie’s boss and an office colleague were the witnesses. The rabbi said a prayer and Eddie stepped on the glass.

  At the conclusion of the brief ceremony, they walked downstairs to a surprise reception. Nearly a hundred people had gathered to wish the newlyweds well, including the entire American and German Jewish communities of Heidelberg and Eddie’s entire chain of command, including the G2, the general in charge of intelligence for U.S. Army Europe.

  In Schwaneberg, Oma was crushed that she was barred from attending the ceremony. What has become of the world when a mother cannot even see her child on her wedding day? she thought.

  Opa, just as pained, took to pen to write this letter:

  My dear, dear Eddie, my dear son. You both have decided to get married and begin your life together in love, loyalty, and truth. From Hanna’s letter, I learned about the cruelty that you and your family endured and, because of your terrible fate, you are even dearer to my heart. I welcome you, with all my heart, into our family.

  All our children have, through generations, been endowed with good health in mind and body, ethics, morals, and a good heart. I wish you both to continue this heritage for g
enerations to come. If, at any time, you should need me, I shall welcome you with open arms. It is my deepest desire to do good deeds and I welcome you into our family.

  Hanna and Eddie honeymooned in Brussels, Belgium. While there, they attended the 1958 World’s Fair, where Eddie had been tasked with an intelligence collection mission. The fair was a huge exposition that showcased various countries’ cultures, technical innovations, and scientific advances.

  A family dinner in Schwaneberg, East Germany. Hanna’s portrait is on the wall in Oma’s direct line of sight. (Clockwise from left:) Heidi (looking at camera), Manni and his wife, Roland and his wife, Opa, Tiele (serving), Oma, Tutti, and Helga.

  Courtesy of the Willner family

  Wearing a business suit, Eddie, with his new wife, walked around the fairgrounds, eventually making their way to the Soviet Pavilion. While Hanna looked over a Central Asian costume display, Eddie maneuvered toward a mannequin dressed in the latest Soviet Army field uniform. U.S. intelligence had indications that the Soviets had developed a new fabric capable of defeating U.S. ground surveillance radars, but they needed proof. Armed with a pair of small scissors, Eddie waited for the perfect moment, then cut a corner swatch off the bottom of the uniform coat. He returned to Hanna, who was oblivious to what he had just done.

  A few months later Hanna became an American citizen. Eddie became the first American liaison officer to the German BND, Bundesnachrichtendienst, West Germany’s equivalent to the American CIA. There he worked alongside Germans, some of whom had served in the SS and Gestapo during World War II. As Germany’s main intelligence arm, the BND concentrated most of all on collecting intelligence on East Germany, running a network of agents throughout the East who consolidated information on every aspect of East German life.

  Four months after the wedding, the authorities in the East suddenly had a change of heart and, to the family’s surprise and great delight, granted Oma and Opa permission to travel to Heidelberg.