by Albert Holl
When the last note has been sung, nobody says a word. Only by the slamming of the door are we brought back to the present. Knippschild appears again with some satellites and brings bedsteads. Even he, who as a Communist is an atheist, had not dared to disturb our simple Advent celebration, but had waited listening at the door until we were finished. I wondered what impression our simple songs had made on him.
And again it is evening. The camp food carriers brought all the meals of the day, including the evening soup, into the church. In order to tempt our palates, they have brought an especially thick soup at the cost of the general camp. A turnip soup and goulash are included. Sugar, bread and butter are visibly featured in the display.
Schuck appears, accompanied by an NKVD second-lieutenant. Colonels Wolff, Weber and Hanstein, as well as the Senior Surgeon Dr Spiegelberg, are ordered to the Guards lieutenant-colonel. Schuck stays with us. He knows all the tricks as he was formerly a warder in Jelabuga Prison and believes that he can catch us out in his own way. On the assumption that we are like the Russians, he summons the spy Nissen, who has been completely exposed by us. Nissen, a lowly creature, had not taken any food until then out of fear. Now that he is ordered to eat by the duty officer, he grasps greedily at it. He can take whatever he wants from our food. Schuck plies him with ever more food. Goulash such as Nissen would never have expected in his wildest dreams is pressed upon him. But none of us react to this. We are not Russians and cannot be tricked into eating in this way.
I lay down to rest. However, this time I am not on the cold stone floor, as on the previous night, but on a bed. Suddenly I hear my name. The NKVD second-lieutenant is back again and looking for me. I get up and follow him.
Soon we are in the administrative building in which the camp commandant has his office. I know it well. The second-lieutenant leads me along the second floor to the far corner of the corridor, which is in complete darkness. I sit down on a stool. Soon Schuck appears. From his smile and some words, I gather that his trick with Nissen has pleased him greatly.
From the adjacent room I can hear the notes of Offenbach’s ‘Tales of Hofmann’. I can also make out voices. Apparently a ballerina is dancing. I often have to cough as a consequence of the night before. My mood is such that my greatest enemy could say the greatest untruths dispassionately and indifferently about me to no effect. Either I am dealt with as a human being or they will have to take drastic measures against me! Torture will not defeat me, and the moment I realise that my last hour has come, the Russians will experience another wonder!
I can hear the angry voice of the Guards bully from a nearby room. Apparently the colonel is there. Suddenly a door is slammed. Kudriatschov quickly disappears down the stairs wiping the sweat from his brow. He seems to hurry ahead. Some female creatures come from the dancing room. They have strongly painted faces and are wearing fur coats and dainty white felt boots on their feet. What a contrast in this country that alleges no class differences any more, when I think of the lumpy figures one can see going about the town. I have never seen such a big difference in the clothing as right here in Russia until now! But perhaps this goes with Communism, like the various rations that the Party and army have here.
I am shocked out of my thoughts. It had to do with a person I met, Special Leader Heinrich. We talked quietly together, watched by the NKVD second-lieutenant, who spits strongly and frequently on the floor. He orders me to follow him through the music room, in which some of the women are hopping around, although I do not watch them, then through a further room that was empty and then into the Guards lieutenant-colonel’s room. Here, in addition to Kudriatschov, there is also a female interpreter, the head of the operational detachment and the political major. Bowing slightly, I remain standing at the door without acknowledging the occupants. My eyes are directed at a big map that shows the front lines with red flags.
The female interpreter addresses me: ‘Captain Holl, you stepped forward in the church this morning. What did you want to say?’ Without changing my expression, I answer in a quiet monotonous voice that their indifference could not deny: ‘I have done my duty as a soldier. A year ago the Guards lieutenant-colonel told me that he would destroy me physically and mentally. I see now that he was in earnest. I am reckless and defenceless, but not dishonourable! I request that I be shot!’ I directed my gaze at the map. A fit of coughing shook me and my nose ran. I blew my nose with an old rag. The Guards lieutenant-colonel then spoke urgently to the interpreter, who translated: ‘It is wrong and not good for you to do away with yourself. Just think that Germany will need you after the war. You are still a young man and must live to support your people!’
With a scornful expression I looked at him slowly: ‘The Guards lieutenant-colonel need have no fear that I would commit suicide. I leave it to him to destroy me! As long as I am in the church and my fate lies before my eyes, I reject all nourishment!’
Still sweating, and hardly able to hide his nervousness, Kudriatschov signals that I can go. I am led through the outer room in which the colonel was sitting, as I had rightly suspected. We exchange no words but look at each other earnestly and decisively. A few minutes later I am back in the church. I recount my experience to those comrades who want to know.
After about half an hour the colonels return. The camp commandant tries again to persuade people to eat with all kinds of expressions, but comes up against a block of granite. We do not make the least concession. Even Sonderführer Heinrich, who could converse with Kudriatschov without an interpreter, made this absolutely clear. Lieutenant Nowak this morning and I myself this afternoon have shown him that we are taking this seriously. Now comes the waiting.
We huddle in small groups around the stove that has meanwhile been brought in and the Russian camp carpenter Klement, who must have made the blinds for the windows of Block VI, is keen to hang long raffia mats over the vast windows of the church to keep out the cold. Large amounts of wood have been brought into the anteroom of the church during the day. As I have been feeling hungry for months, I do not find the hunger so bad.
Colonel Wolff has been taken off alone to speak with the Guards lieutenant-colonel. We suppose that this will be the last talk, as Kudriatschov must avoid sending a message to Moscow in any case. Forty-five minutes drags by and midnight passes. Suddenly Colonel Wolff is back again.
Quietly and clearly, with an earnest tone, he speaks. ‘Gentlemen, I ask you please not to break out in happy howling, or make any stupid remarks. Please pack your things, we are going back to Block VI. Krause, please ensure that the food comes with us. Those of you who can carry wood, take it with you. Everyone back to Block VI.’
His instructions were carried out quickly and quietly. Schuck is already standing there with some soldiers to take us back to Block VI. We are full of joy over this victory, as well as over the reverse we had inflicted on our country’s traitors. How they will gawp when they find the church empty in the morning!
Within an hour the status quo has been restored. Everyone is back in their old room and has already had something to eat. Once the stoves have warmed up properly we all lie down for a well earned night’s sleep. The NKVD spy Nissen has not been sent back to the block, on grounds of expediency, but has gone to the Work Battalion instead.
BACK IN BLOCK VI
The final preparations for our Christmas celebrations to begin on Christmas Eve are complete. Every member of the room has thought how he can prepare a small Christmas gift for his friends. Especially keen is Luftwaffe Captain Freimann.
The main ornament in our room is the Christmas Crown, which took weeks of work to make and even survived the strike in the church. The base of it is formed by the Advent Cross. As we could not get any pine branches, it was carved out of wood. An octagon shape, it has candles on four corners made out of matching water cylinders filled with kerosene. On each of the remaining four corners stands a pine tree carved out of wood. Between them have been inserted fairytale figures such as the Rat Catcher, Tom
Thumb, Little Red Riding Hood, and Snow White, but the Christ Child and St Nicholas are also there. About thirty centimetres above the octagon hangs a hexagon decorated with the divisional emblems of all the members in the room, and above that is a square bearing allegorical wooden figures of the seasons, spring, summer, autumn and winter. All the remains of the coloured crayons to be found have been used, but also medicines and even painted bricks have been used to establish colours. The individual garlands are fastened together with thin wire so that the Christmas Crown resembles a pyramid.
Also everyone has saved, according to their needs and ability, a slice of bread and a little sugar, as well as fat. It is not easy to do, as with constant hunger the urge to eat up all the scraps is very great. Several men who are unable to trust themselves give their saved bread to a comrade to keep.
Rooms 3 and 4 have as their centrepiece a carved Christmas crib, of the sort which is also to be seen under every Christmas tree at home. The artists are Second-Lieutenants Mohr and Hofmann. The room associations each have their private celebrations, but the whole block is also celebrating this great German festival, in which the choir with its Christmas carols forms the focus. All of us turn our thoughts on this day particularly to our own homes, and this most German of old festivals reminds us not to disown our German heritage. Our prayer to our Lord is: Give our people their peace again!
The fateful turn of the year 1944/1945. We sit together in a festive mood in Room 10. We have cleaned up our already frightfully tattered uniforms as well as we can. Captain Dr Hollunder conducts a review of the past year, 1944. Factually and clearly he presents his account, and the time already passed once more runs through our minds’ eyes. Captain Schmidt, Mayor of Brieg, also gives an outlook on the past year. He is especially knowledgeable about the seriousness of the situation, and shows us the storm clouds gathering over our people: today it is more necessary than ever to remain true to our people.
15th February 1945, my third birthday in captivity. Our choir wakes me from my sleep singing a local song from the Rhine. Captain Knauff also has his birthday with me, his third in captivity, having become a prisoner in Veliki-Luki. He too had a song for his birthday.
As we return to our room after roll call, we remain transfixed in happy surprise. A whole table full of gifts for the birthday boys is standing there. My eyes fall on a little wooden figure of the ‘Manneken Pis’! I consider with amusement the image of the little fountain figure that I have passed in my home town so many times. My countryman and friend Hans Mohr carved it for me as a greeting from our home town. It even has the town’s arms carved in wood. Almost every one of my comrades and fellow sufferers has given me special pleasure today on my birthday. Those who have never known real hunger can hardly understand what it means to give half a day’s bread ration to a friend so that for one day in the year he can have a full meal. 300 grams of moist bread baked in clay! At this time when other men are throwing away their honour from hunger, this is beyond price!
The day ends with a good-natured celebratory hour, to which close friends from the other rooms have been invited. The arrangements have been taken over by some comrades from the room, and also our master narrators Dr Mewes and Gerischer come for a chat.
The news penetrating the block by both legal and illegal means is getting ever worse. Long debates start among some comrades. Others have heavy thoughts about the fate of our people. I am also depressed by this news, but I simply cannot believe that the most difficult fight by our people can end in such a sad way! I have confidence as before in our leadership. The enemy news service seems to me deliberately directed at undermining our morale and depressing us! In individual cases I can see that the news is having an effect on their behaviour. Sacha and Pfeiffer, for example, have recently spoken in such a way that one has the impression that they regret having backed the wrong horse. I once spoke with them about it but have since held myself back in such situations.
When we look out of our window, the administrative area, which is outside the camp, lies before us. Next to it is the Russians’ shop. How well the people live here is shown to me by observing them from our room. A middle-aged Russian woman in the usual poor clothing has got some butter in a container and is sitting on a step right opposite our block licking this expensive item of food, which was obviously not intended for her. Furtively she looks to right and left, anxiously hoping that no one has seen her. After she has refreshed herself for a good quarter of an hour, she gets up and goes off without noticing us.
On Heroes’ Memorial Day we remember our fallen comrades with heart and soul. More than ever it is clear to me that we cannot betray the German people. The deaths of so many of our best men awakes in us a powerful sense of obligation. My best friends remain on the battlefield and many a comrade under my orders fell to enemy hands. How could I ever look a German mother in the eye if I should betray the living and the dead?
For several days the food has been getting progressively worse, even worse than it was before. We have the impression that we are being cheated by the German kitchen staff. However, the Russians appear to have a hand in this. As in the previous year, there has been no sugar or bread for several days. Allegedly this has to do with transportation difficulties. The Kama is frozen over, halting the winter supplies of vital products, and now we have to wait until the Kama is navigable again.
The anger of the block’s occupants grows from day to day. It reaches its climax on the 6th of April when the whole block goes on hunger strike with the demand that we want whatever is available in our own hands so that we can feed ourselves. After long negotiations between Colonel Wolff and Kudriatschov, the latter agrees to Colonel Wolff setting up our own kitchen for the block. We now believe that our situation will improve.
The next morning, however, Schuck appears and informs us that we must pack our things as Block VI is to be cleared. So this is the Russians’ retaliation. It has become obvious to them that such a strongly united group as the men of Block VI will inevitably become less manageable. The demands that we made yesterday had shown our understanding of the weakness of the Russians and were detrimental to the Anti-fascists. Kudriatschov now intended to divide us between the two Jelabuga camps. My group was marched off to Cloister Camp after a detailed baggage search.
With sack and pack, like the departure of the children of Israel from Egypt, we wandered through the melting snow of Jelabuga’s streets. The Anti-fascists had already prepared well. As we arrived in darkness, the room seniors were already ready to call us to their rooms. After one and a half years I was back in the camp from where I was supposed to go before the war tribunal.
The camp senior here is Lieutenant-Colonel Wölfel, who had had to clear the field in Kama Camp as the Russians had taken his Knight’s Cross for a theatrical play. Because of his monocle and his high-pitched voice, we called him ‘Broken Willy’.
Lieutenant Hein and I were taken to Room 21 in Block II by a prisoner of war whom I did not recognise in the darkness. We were shown to a place in the corner. Without being able to discern much in the darkness, and not knowing with whom we had to share, we laid ourselves down. We did not accept the invitation to go to supper. Nor did we go to breakfast in the morning but we did attend the muster parade. We could see that most of those in the camp no longer wore army insignia on their uniforms but rather the colours of the National Committee and the League of German Officers.
I was happy to see a few old faces here in the camp, including my former regimental adjutant, Lieutenant-Colonel Brendgen. He told me that most of the occupants of the camp in the summer of 1944 were at the middle point of their captivity and were being schooled by old League of German Officers, in which the Kashport, as the porridge bowl was called here, had played a prominent role. Now the majority of these prisoners were members of the League. Only a few had stood up to the pressure and the interrogations, and they now quickly made contact with us. They had only heard rumours of the stalwarts isolated in Block VI. We were represe
nted to them as abnormal and criminals who were unwilling to understand the signs of the times and accept the League of German Officers. So much greater was the surprise, then, as the new prisoners saw these ‘Criminals’ and ‘Abnormals’ with their own eyes. On the afternoon of the 7th of April the hunger strike was re-established when the head of Convent Camp, Captain Grusev, assured us that work in the camp was voluntary.
UNDER THE TERROR OF THE LEAGUE OF GERMAN OFFICERS
Several days later I realised that this assurance was just more lies when I was assigned to wood sawing with some comrades. Although the wood cutters were firmly assigned people, they wanted to mislead us by doing this. With my comrades I flatly declined to comply. In reprisal the duty officer, a second-lieutenant, known to us as ‘Jumbo’ because of his bulky appearance, made us stay standing at attention outside the camp until the evening under the supervision of a sentry. Jumbo hit Captain Schmelzer with a stick, which made him resist and ended with him taken to the lock-up.
It had already gone 2000 hours when we were allowed back into the camp, but the matter did not end there. In order to set the whole camp against us, our lunch would not be served until 1400 hours instead of the usual 1200 hours. The grounds for this were given to the camp as our refusing to work. With an amused smile, however, I noticed that the camp commandant Wölfel and his staff had the lunch ‘that was not yet ready’ at the usual 1200 hours. The camp inhabitants had to wait for another two full hours.