‘I think I’ll be having nightmares for weeks.’
‘You won’t be the first. Remember Miss Best? She had nightmares when we returned from the excursion last year.’
‘Let’s hope I don’t have them then.’
She leaned her head against my shoulder and remained there for the duration of the journey. It was then I realised how much Lisa had come to mean to me. If it hadn’t been so sad, I could have easily fallen in love with her, but a man in his fifties, with a young woman in her twenties reeked of desperation. Lisa already had a man in her life; she had no need of me. Nevertheless, I knew that I would give my life to protect her, just as I would for my own children.
Chapter 16
We disembarked from the coach at the mediaeval barbican and walked into the town. After returning to the Royal for a quick shower, I led Lisa once more into the former Jewish town of Kazimierz.
‘Where are we going?’ she asked.
‘Wait and see; somewhere appropriate after today.’
I took her down into the old town to the square with an open green area in the middle surrounded by an iron fence in the shape of menorahs, the seven branched candelabra that was symbolic of Judaism. At the head of the square was three storey building built of old brick, buttressed by blocks of white stone. As I led her in through the doorway to the restaurant within, the sounds of accordion and fiddle music drifted from inside, that mixture of the joyous and the soulfully plaintive that epitomised Jewish folk music. I took her into the dimly lit restaurant, where we were led to a table lit by candles. The trio of players, an accordionist, violinist and double bassist made conversation difficult and unnecessary. I ordered for us both and in the gaps between the music, we talked about what we had seen that day. The Jewish cuisine, whilst not kosher, was still good and traditional. Lisa ate hungrily, I picked at my food; I never felt like eating after Auschwitz. Nevertheless the Polish beer that accompanied the meal went down well and after a visit to Auschwitz, I felt I had earned it.
At the end of the meal, we left the restaurant and walked through the darkened streets. A light rain was falling and Lisa huddled beside me sheltering under my jacket. The streets were mostly deserted as we made our way back to the Royal. Damp, but happy I led the way into the vaulted bar and we ordered another beer as a nightcap. Ascending the stairs, we stopped in the dimly lit corridor outside Lisa’s room.
‘The archive tomorrow then?’
‘Yes, it should be open at 10.00 tomorrow. Can I borrow your laptop tomorrow?
‘Sure, what do you want it for?’
‘I thought I’d upload the photograph I took that had Miller/Muller in it. It’s possible the archivist might be able to tell us where it came from.’
‘Good idea.’ She lingered outside her room with the key in the lock reluctant to leave me. ‘Ian, thanks for today, I won’t say it was fun, but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. It’ll be something I’ll always remember.’
She turned and hugged me. I wrapped my arms around her, never wanting to let her go, but I knew that if I was not careful, I would do something stupid that could change our relationship for ever. I kissed her on the top of her head and let her go.
‘You’re welcome kid, have a good night, don’t have nightmares. I unlocked my door and went into my room, closing the door behind me without a backwards glance.
Part of me was kicking myself for not taking the chance Lisa had appeared to offer, but the rational part of my mind told me that even if she had responded, it would have been a mistake that we would both come to regret. Even so, as I climbed into bed and turned out the lights, I could not help feeling if only...
The 5.00 A.M. tram shook me back to consciousness after what felt like only a few minutes sleep. I swore foully and turned over burying my head beneath the pillow. It had no effect; the next tram rumbling by roused me from the light doze I had managed. By 7.00 I had given up and went for a shower. Looking in the mirror, I noticed that I was looking rather hollow-eyed, early mornings did not agree with me, being with Lisa might make me feel young again, but my body did not fully agree.
At 7.45 I called Lisa’s room. She answered brightly.
‘Hiya Ian, you ready for breakfast?’
‘Sure am. Can I come round and upload that photograph first?’
‘You’re welcome. I’ll fire up the laptop now.’
I gathered the camera and a USB card reader and knocked at her door.
‘It’s open, come in.’
Lisa was sat on her bed, a picture in blue jeans, the legs rolled up to her shapely calves and a light blue strappy top that showed off her figure to its best. Her hair hung damply round her shoulders and she looked good despite the minimal make-up. She waved a hand towards the laptop in the table beside her.
‘It’s all yours.’ I removed the flash card from my Nikon SLR and inserted it into the reader, plugging it into the port at the side. A moment later we were able to view the photograph blown up to fill the screen. The photograph was in black and white as one might expect from the 1940s, nevertheless, it was possible to zoom in and examine every detail of the image of the man we knew as William Miller. The blonde hair was still there, but closely cropped beneath the cap with its deaths head badge. His face appeared a little more gaunt than in the Spanish photograph, which gave his nose a more aquiline appearance than I remembered. He looked stockier than her had earlier. His uniform carried the SS collar badge showing four small rectangular pips, matching Miller’s known rank of Sturmbannfuhrer, I recognised the rank badge from our previous research. On his left breast pocket was a silver badge showing a German helmet with a swastika over crossed swords and a star on which there seemed to be some sort of white cross, but the detail was blurred.
‘What’s the importance of those badges there?’ Lisa asked pointing to his left breast pocket.
‘I’m not sure, but if you look closely, the other officers don’t have it. It’s beneath his medal ribbons, so it doesn’t appear to be that kind of award. It’s a pity there’s no internet access here. We’ll just have to come back to it later.’
We left the room and descended the stairs to the dining room. In the reception area I noticed a pay-as-you-surf internet machine. As soon as we had eaten, I sat at the machine and pushed in the relevant zloty coins. The machine activated and I used google to research Nazi military badges. There was no sign of the star, but on the third screen of images I saw the silver badge with the helmet. Clicking on the image I was taken to a militaria collectables web site.
‘Well?’
‘It seems to be a wound badge.’
‘Miller had been wounded?’
‘Apparently.’
Returning to her room, we examined the image on Lisa’s laptop again. Zooming in more closely we examined the picture of Miller. Starting from his head, we worked down the picture, looking for more detail.
‘Look!’ Lisa was pointing to Millers left hand that was holding a cigarette.
‘What?’
‘His hand, he’s missing his little finger. I’m sure that finger was not missing in the Spanish photograph. Move over!’ She took my place at the keyboard. ‘I scanned the Spanish picture into the laptop while you were back in Suffolk. Here!’
She called up the original image and we leant over the screen. It was not easy to make out as the image pixilated as we zoomed in, but we could see enough to be sure that he had a full complement of digits on his left hand.
‘It’s a good bet that’s what he got his wound badge for. I’d have thought it unusual; most missing fingers would have come from frostbite on the Russian Front, but he was never there. An explosion would have removed more fingers, unless he was just very lucky. Von Stauffenberg, you’d know him as Tom Cruise, lost a complete hand and two fingers.’
‘You’re treating me as blonde again! I remember what you taught us about Stauffenberg and the July bomb plot. I always thought how unlucky it was not to kill Hitler. He had the luck of the devil, a bit
like Miller in some ways.’
‘Come on, we’ll be late if we hang about here and we might need a complete day in the archives. We have tickets to fly home tomorrow, remember.’
We walked down to Kazimierz once more, a pleasant stroll in the morning sunshine that had replaced the light rain of the night before. This time the wooden doors of the Holocaust Archive were open. We entered into the gloomy exterior. A slender young woman of about Lisa’s age, with dark hair and olive skin came up to us.
‘Czy mogę ci pomóc?’
‘I’m sorry, we don’t speak Polish. Do you speak English?’ I asked hopefully. The guide books said most young Poles spoke English; it would be just my luck to find the one who did not.
‘I do speak some English,’ she said in accented English ‘but I am afraid not very well.’
‘Your English is much better than our Polish’ I smiled. The young woman smiled in acknowledgement.
‘How may I help you?’
‘We’re researching an SS officer who…er… served in Auschwitz from 1942 to 1944 as an advisor to the Commandant. We were hoping that that you might have information here in your archive.’
‘I do not think the word served is the correct term for anyone who committed the atrocities at Auschwitz.’ She said stiffly.
‘You’re right, I could not think of the right word. I did not mean any offence.’
‘I understand, I am sorry if I was a little abrupt, but I am sure you can understand that anything to do with Auschwitz is a sore point with anyone of Jewish heritage.’ That explained the Mediterranean appearance of the young woman. ‘I am afraid that we do get the occasional Holocaust denier here, trying to spread their poison.’
‘I can understand that, I’ve never been able to comprehend how those idiots have the nerve to call themselves historians.’ She smiled at this and held out her hand.
‘I am Ania.’ I shook her hand.
‘I am Ian, this is my student Lisa.’
‘You teach history?’
‘Yes.’
‘Our archive is considerable and it does take time to go through the papers.’
Lisa’s face fell. ‘We only have today; we have to return to England tomorrow.’
‘Luckily for you, in the years since the end of Communism, we have scanned many of the documents into our computer to allow more rapid research. If you would come this way, we will see what we can find.’ She led us deep into the building and up a flight of stairs to a room in which there were eight computer terminals in a room with no windows. She indicated a computer terminal.
‘Would you like to work here? There is a database of known names of SS men that you can search and each name you find is linked to the scanned documents we have about that person. Do you read German or Russian, or would you like me to remain and help you?’
‘That would be very kind.’ Lisa replied. ‘I’m afraid we are reasonable historians, but poor linguists, like most English people. We would appreciate your help, if you are free.’
‘It is a very quiet day, we have no-one booked in, so unless we get more people arrive unannounced, then I am at your disposal. What was the name and rank of this officer?’
‘Wilhelm Muller, Sturmbannfuhrer when he came, he arrived at Auschwitz sometime after May 1942 and was posted back to Berlin in August 1944.’ I said.
She gave a sharp intake of breath. ‘That is one man I know is in our records. He was a well-known war criminal, who was never brought to justice.’ She tapped away at the keyboard.
‘There.’ She pointed to the screen on which Muller’s name appeared with a list of attached links. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘Everything you can tell us. If possible we would like copies of the relevant documents.’
‘I can do that, but there will be a charge of five zloty for each copy.’
‘That’s no problem. What documents do you have?’
‘This is his service record from Auschwitz. This is a report from Konrad Morgen of the ReichsKriminalPolizeiAmt into corruption at the camp. These are testimony from surviving witnesses. This relates to the Russian investigation into Muller as a war criminal. And these are photographs that relate to Muller.’
‘Could we start with the photographs?’ Lisa asked. ‘We have one photograph we think is him that we found displayed in Birkenau.’ She pulled out her laptop and woke it. ‘There, we’re almost sure that this is Muller.’
‘Let us see.’ She called up a jpeg on the screen, examining the caption underneath. ‘This is Muller.’ She said pointing to one of two men in the picture with a number of young women.
‘That’s definitely him.’ Lisa stated. ‘Can you print it?’
‘Certainly.’ Ania pressed a key. ‘There it is done.’
We went on to print five other photographs and then Ania went on to call up and translate Muller’s service record for us.
‘Muller, arrived Auschwitz on March 24th 1942. He had been sent by Heydrich, it does not appear that he was too welcome, as he was seen as a spy, reporting back to the SD on the lack of progress in converting Birkenau to a death camp. It was Muller who encouraged Commandant Hoess to begin using the White House outside the camp as an ad hoc gas chamber. Having overseen the beginning of the extermination, he left here on June 1st for Prague, returning on July 17th. It seems that he had been wounded when he returned, there are attached medical records that show a hand injury caused in action in Czechoslovakia sometime in June, for which he received the silver wound badge. On his return to Birkenau, Muller was the officer responsible for the exploitation of Jewish belongings. He arranged for the finding, cataloguing and collection of Jewish valuables. He was responsible for the storage and “repatriation” of the contents of Kanada. In October 1943 he was one of the officers investigated by Obersturmbannfuhrer Konrad Morgen of the financial crimes section of the RKPA. There is a whole separate document on that. There does not appear to have been enough evidence against Muller, so he remained in his position until 10th August 1944, when he was transferred back to Berlin and the SD on the orders of Obergruppenfuhrer Kaltenbrunner. The file ends there.’
‘That’s really useful, thanks Ania.’ I said. What about the report by Morgen into corruption? I saw something about that in a television programme, but that’s about as much as I know.’
‘And that’s a lot more than me!’ added Lisa.
‘There was great corruption amongst the SS at Birkenau. It came to light when a package containing two kilos of dental gold was intercepted by customs. It had been sent by an officer in Birkenau. There had long been suspicions that there were fewer valuables than expected coming out of Birkenau. There were stories of lockers containing piles of currency from all countries as well as gold, diamonds and pearls. There were also allegations of fraternisation between the SS guards and some of the more attractive female inmates. This led to Morgen’s investigation.’
‘What does Morgen have to say about Muller?’ Lisa asked. Ania called up another document.
‘He went to Auschwitz in August 1943, as part of an investigative commission with three other SS officers, Reimers, Bartsch and Dr. Fischer. Along with Commandant Hoess, he made a through tour of the facility, including the gas chambers and crematoria. He describes how he met SS guards in Birkenau and was surprised to find them dozing and staring glassy-eyed. The exception was Sturmbannfuhrer Muller, who seemed to be alert and in control. The practice of having attractive oriental Jewesses cooking and feeding these men, with suspicions that the relationship was more intimate, scandalised Morgen. The excuse was given by Muller that the men had a hard night’s work ahead as several transport trains were due for processing. Morgen describes how a locker search found cash and valuables secreted by the men. He estimates that there was a discrepancy of somewhere in excess of fifteen million Reichsmarks, which would be about five million dollars. He names three SS officers he believed to be implicated, Gerhard Palitzsch, Hans Aumeier and Wilhelm Muller. There was enough evidence to court
marshal Aumier and Palitzch, but the evidence against Muller was destroyed, when the barracks where it was deposited burned down on 7th December 1943. It seems that Muller had powerful political connections and the case against him was then dropped. The missing money, in the form of foreign currency, gold and jewellery was never recovered.’
I whistled, ‘Five million dollars in 1943, that’s the equivalent of over fifty million dollars today!’
‘Convenient that a fire came to Muller’s rescue, after his earlier activities.’ Lisa commented.
‘That’s probably what gave him the idea; it also served to remind the powers that be of their debt to him.’ I turned to Ania. ‘What were the Russian War Crimes charges against him?’
Ania called up the relevant document. ‘My Russian is rusty, but I believe this says he was accused of organising and carrying out mass murder, theft and crimes against humanity. However, he was never caught. Russian investigators scoured their occupied zone and alerted American and British investigators, but he was never apprehended.’
This had taken us about four hours, but we now had a fairly comprehensive account of Miller/Muller’s activities in Poland. We collected and paid for the documents that Ania had printed for us. Then thanking her for our help, we left the Holocaust Archive and walked out into the afternoon sun.
‘Do you think Miller escaped with all of those missing valuables Ian?’
‘I don’t know. Even if he escaped with a third share, that’s still over fifteen million dollars in today’s money. If he had that, he would certainly have had the wherewithal to organise his disappearance in 1945. That’s more than enough to create a new identity and re-invent himself after the war. Our problem is that we’ll never be able to track him. If the Nuremburg investigators could not trace him in 1945, we haven’t much chance after all these years.’
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