Right and Glory

by Right

  When they reached the road that ran straight towards the Block One entrance, but far enough away not to spotted by any of the German soldiers running around on the roof of the fort, or to become targets for them, they stopped to consider their next move. The Belgian reinforcement troops were milling around aimlessly nearby, obviously unwilling to get too close to the huge fort while the battle was still raging – which was sensible.

  ‘How the bloody hell are we going to climb up onto the roof?’ Dawson asked.

  ‘Good question,’ Sykes said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully and looking across the grassy perimeter at the massive concrete walls of the fort, which rose almost vertically about twenty feet from the plain in front of them.

  ‘We can’t scale that, even if we had ladders or grappling hooks, not with the Jerries on top firing at anything that moves, and the Belgians inside the place doing the same. I reckon if we even walked over to the wall, one group or the other would shoot us down.’

  Sykes nodded thoughtfully. ‘You’re right,’ he said.

  ‘Can we get out of here, then, sir?’

  ‘Afraid not. If we can’t get onto the roof from the outside, there’s only one other option – we’ll have to do it from the inside. Right, this is a direct order: cast away your weapon. Find somewhere here to hide your rifle – it’s essential the Belgians don’t think we’re a threat. And hopefully the Germans will still have their hands full trying to destroy the last remaining casemates and they won’t be interested in a couple of unarmed soldiers trying to surrender to the Belgians.’

  Dawson stashed his Lee-Enfield in some undergrowth near a couple of spindly trees behind a low hill, out of sight of the fort, a location he committed to memory, then walked back to where Sykes was waiting.

  ‘Are you sure this is a good idea, sir?’ Dawson was still far from convinced they wouldn’t be shot down by the Belgian sentries as they made their approach to the Block One entrance.

  ‘Actually, I’m not, but I don’t see any other way. But we have to try, Dawson. You do see that, don’t you? We have to at least get a sight of one of these new weapons.’

  Another volley of shots rang out from the roof of Fort Eben Emael, the heavy thump of one of the cannons a counterpoint to the distinctive rattle of a couple of Schmeissers and the crack of rifle shots. A thick pall of smoke hung over the area, and they both heard and saw the sudden spurt of liquid fire from a flame-thrower close to one of the casemates on the roof.

  ‘It sounds as if the Belgians haven’t given up,’ Dawson said. ‘Or some of them haven’t, anyway.’

  The two men began working their way over towards the partly demolished barrack buildings outside the fort entrance. There was a perimeter area made from steel posts strung with wire which enclosed the two barracks and provided an outer layer of protection to the fort entrance, where in peacetime passes and other documents could be checked before personnel and visitors were allowed to approach Block One. But the guards who would normally be stationed at the gate were nowhere in sight – obviously they’d been withdrawn into the fort when the attack began.

  ‘Right,’ Sykes said, stopping close to some undergrowth that provided the final piece of cover before they stepped onto the open ground that led across to the perimeter fence and then on to Block One. ‘We don’t want the bloody Belgians to shoot us down, so we do this slowly and carefully. Get out your pay book and hold it in your hand.’

  ‘They won’t see it until we’re right up close,’ Dawson objected.

  ‘I know that. But when we get to the entrance I don’t want you fumbling around in your battledress looking for it. They’ll think you’re reaching for a weapon, and we definitely don’t want that to happen.’

  Dawson nodded, acknowledging the sense in what the major was saying. He reached into the left breast pocket of his battledress and took out a small reddish-brown booklet with rigid covers. At the top were the words ‘Army Book 64’, and in the centre of the front cover the legend ‘Soldier’s Service and Pay Book’.

  Sykes took his own ID card out of his pocket, and also a large white handkerchief, which he unfolded and held in his right hand by one corner.

  ‘When we get to the gate,’ he ordered, ‘raise both arms in the air and keep walking forward slowly.’

  They could already see that gate itself was half-open. The two men stepped forward, walking side by side, down the dusty track towards the gate in the perimeter fence.

  Above and in front of them, the battle for Fort Eben Emael still raged, the night punctuated by explosions, the sound of shots, shouted orders and the occasional cry of pain as the German troops tried to eliminate the last pockets of resistance. And smoke still drifted over the roof of the fort, obscuring the action, though they could still see the occasional line of fire as one of the Germans triggered his flame-thrower. But the soldiers themselves were invisible in the murk.

  ‘If we can’t see them,’ Sykes muttered, his words an uncanny match for Dawson’s thought process, ‘then hopefully they can’t see us.’

  ‘So we just have the Belgians to worry about.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  They walked through the gate and Sykes held his white handkerchief as high as he could and waved it a couple of times, hoping to attract the attention of somebody inside the besieged building.

  Dawson wasn’t certain, but in the gloom it looked to him as if the barrel of the heavy machine-gun mounted in the Block One observation post had just swung towards them.

  ‘They’re aiming that fucking machine-gun right at us,’ he said, his voice a hoarse and strained whisper.

  ‘Keep walking,’ Sykes said, flapping his handkerchief again, ‘and keep your hands in the air.’

  The last few yards to the armoured steel entrance door to Block One seemed an eternity. Dawson had been absolutely right – the barrel of the machine-gun was tracking them, and the two men knew that even a short burst of fire from that weapon would tear them both to pieces.

  But they walked on, slowly and deliberately, both men with their hands held high, the universal sign of surrender, Sykes still waving his white handkerchief.

  Finally, they reached the entrance, a massive concrete structure with wide steel double gates set in an archway on the right-hand side, the weapon ports on the left. These were not the fort’s principal gates, just an outer set, made from solid steel up to head-height and then barred above that. The main gates themselves were located within the reinforced concrete portico.

  The right-hand side gate was open and, with the ominous black muzzle of the machine-gun still following their progress, they stepped through the gap and into the portico itself.

  ‘Thank God for that,’ Dawson muttered as they reached that temporary haven, beyond the arc the machine-gun could traverse.

  A small slot slid open in the steel door to their left, a pair of hard brown eyes stared at them and an anonymous voice shouted something in French.

  Sykes replied in the same language, and held up his ID card so that the Belgian soldier could see it. The major turned, grabbed Dawson’s pay book and showed that to the man as well. Then he said something else in French, and a moment later the slot slammed closed again.

  ‘We’re in,’ Sykes said, as the steel door swung open. ‘Inside, quickly,’ he snapped. The moment they were inside, the steel door shut behind them with a loud thud, a sound that was echoed seconds later by another muffled bang from somewhere high above them. The half dozen men in the guardhouse all glanced upwards, and one of them surreptitiously crossed himself.

  ‘Why are you here, sir?’ Capitaine Verbois, his uniform dishevelled and grubby, asked Sykes in English. Fear was in his eyes and he was clearly struggling to keep the panic at bay. ‘There’s nothing you can do to help us now.’

  ‘I know that,’ Sykes said. ‘What’s the situation here? How many men have you lost? And what’s the damage so far?’

  ‘We’ve no idea,’ Verbois replied. ‘Some of the casemates and cupolas are unmanned,
so we don’t know if they’re destroyed or intact. Others aren’t responding on the internal telephone system. We’re fighting on, but …’ His voice died away as he looked around at the strained faces of his fellow soldiers, and the realization that the so-called ‘impregnable’ fortress of Eben Emael was doomed to fall finally hit home.

  ‘You’re right,’ Sykes said briskly, ‘there’s nothing we can do to help you, not now.’

  ‘Then why are you here?’ Verbois asked again.

  ‘Because of what those Germans soldiers have done here. I told you Dawson here was an explosives expert, and he has no idea how the Jerries managed to blow a hole through the steel top of that first armoured observation point.’

  ‘Maastricht Two,’ Verbois said, nodding. ‘You saw it happen?’

  Sykes nodded. ‘We were watching from a hill some distance away. But we only saw the destruction of the observation dome. What happened after that?’

  ‘I’ve talked to a couple of the soldiers who were in the casemate and managed to get out. The charge blew a hole into the observation dome and killed two of our men. Then the Germans placed a charge under the centre seventy-five-millimetre gun and detonated it. That blew the gun off its mountings and back into the casemate itself. The explosion killed two more soldiers and wounded several others. Then the Germans attacked with grenades. Nobody else was killed, but many more men suffered injuries. The surviving soldiers were forced to abandon the casemate and retreat to the intermediate corridor level.’

  ‘And then they attacked Maastricht One?’

  Verbois nodded. ‘Yes. In a very similar manner, and unfortunately with exactly the same result. We lost both casemates within minutes of the gliders landing on the roof of Eben Emael.’

  ‘We’ve seen and heard the weapons firing from some of the other casemates and cupolas, but not Cupola One Twenty. Is there a problem there?’

  ‘Yes – the ammunition elevators aren’t working and there’s a problem with the guns. The cupola is manned, but we can’t fire the cannon.’

  Sykes nodded. That was news to him but, in view of everything else that had happened at the fort, it wasn’t exactly surprising.

  ‘And what about the machine-gun positions, Mi-Nord and Mi-Sud?’

  ‘Unfortunately, they weren’t manned. The personnel were still helping clear the barrack buildings outside Block One.’ Verbois pointed vaguely to the south.

  Again, no surprise. Sykes could almost have predicted that something of that sort must have happened. If the two machine-gun positions had been manned and working properly, they could have swept the Germans off the roof of the fort the moment the gliders landed. But it was far too late for that now.

  ‘Right,’ Sykes said. ‘We’re here for one reason only. Dawson needs to get a look at one of those charges the Germans used to blow holes through the steel domes. It could be a new kind of weapon. How can we get up onto the roof?’

  Verbois looked at the two of them as if they were mad. ‘There are German soldiers all over the roof. How can you possibly hope to –’

  ‘We’re going to try,’ Sykes said firmly. ‘We won’t involve any of your men. It’ll just be the two of us. Now, how can we get up there?’

  Verbois shook his head, then turned and led the way over to one side of the guardhouse, where a schematic diagram of the fort was screwed to the wall.

  ‘We are here,’ he said, pointing to the extreme left-hand side of the diagram, at the lowest level. ‘This is Block One. The Albert Canal is over here on the right, the east side of the fortress. These two casemates’ – he indicated a pair of square structures on the roof – ‘are Maastricht One and Maastricht Two. We’ve sealed the doors to isolate both of them from the attackers, but we could open them to let you through. The Germans got into both the casemates from the roof, so they must have blown holes in them somewhere. You could get out the same way.’

  Dawson looked distinctly unimpressed with this suggestion.

  ‘Which one?’ Sykes asked. ‘Maastricht One or Maastricht Two?’

  ‘It has to be Maastricht Two. The Germans who attacked Maastricht One dropped a bundle of hand grenades down the ammunition shaft, and that blew out the staircase.’

  Sykes nodded slowly. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘That will have to do. Can you escort us up there, please, Capitaine? And we’ll need weapons as well. Can you supply us with a couple of rifles?’

  ‘We have light machine-guns here.’

  ‘What type?’ Sykes asked.

  ‘The FM 30,’ Verbois replied. ‘Our version of the Browning Automatic Rifle.’

  ‘Show me.’

  Verbois led the way to an armoury, the doors open wide and most of the weapons missing, presumably taken by members of the garrison. In one rack were half a dozen bulky weapons with box magazines attached.

  Dawson picked one up to check its weight. ‘It’s quite hefty,’ he said, ‘even without a full magazine.’

  ‘It’s just under ten kilos unloaded,’ Verbois confirmed.

  ‘I think we’ll just grab a couple of rifles,’ Sykes said. ‘The Browning’s a good weapon, but it’s bulky and there’s a potential problem if we were to use it in automatic mode.’

  ‘The rate of fire?’ Dawson suggested.

  ‘Exactly. The Schmeisser has a very distinctive and fairly slow firing rate. If we fired this up on the roof, it would sound so different to a Schmeisser that any German soldier would immediately know that enemy troops were up there with them, and that’s the last thing we want. But a rifle shot is just a rifle shot, indistinguishable from any other.’

  ‘Very well.’ Verbois said. He selected two Mauser rifles – the Model 1898, virtually identical to the standard German infantry rifle – and handed them over. ‘The ammunition is in the box on the floor there. Take as much as you want. Then we’ll head up to the intermediate level.’

  The Mauser magazine was charged from above, using five-round stripper clips, a thin length of steel that held the rimless cartridges by their base. The box contained layers of stripper clips, each already loaded with five 7.65-millimetre rounds. Dawson and Sykes grabbed half a dozen clips each. Dawson stowed his in the ammunition pouches he was wearing on his utility belt, but Sykes’s uniform had no such containers.

  ‘Just a moment,’ Verbois said, opened another box and pulled out a black leather belt with a clasp in the form of a snake. Then he found a couple of sets of brown leather pouches, each comprising three containers, and designed to fit on the belt.

  Sykes nodded his thanks, attached the containers and buckled the belt around his waist. He filled the leather containers with ammunition, and secured the lids, using the straps which he clipped to the base of each one, then picked up the Mauser rifle and loaded it with the first five rounds.

  ‘We’re ready,’ he announced, with a sideways glance at Dawson. The big corporal didn’t look happy, but he did look prepared for combat, which was more important. ‘Lead the way.’

  Verbois nodded agreement, issued orders to the men in the guardhouse, then ordered the internal steel door to be opened. Followed by Sykes and Dawson, the Mauser rifles at port arms, held in both hands diagonally in front of them and ready for immediate use, he led the way out of the guardhouse and down a long, straight passageway, heading deep into the heart of the fortress.

  Groups of men sat or lay against the walls of the corridor, weapons scattered about them. Some talked angrily with their colleagues: others just sat, apparently dazed. A faint blue miasma of tobacco smoke filled the corridor. As Verbois led the way past them, a few of the men glanced up, but most ignored the interruption.

  A scream echoed down the passage, and the Belgian officer half-turned towards the two British soldiers.

  ‘The hospital is on this level,’ he explained, ‘but we’ve had so many casualties the medical staff are barely able to cope. Some of our men have suffered the most terrible injuries.’

  Sykes nodded. There didn’t seem to be an appropriate response to that rem
ark.

  They climbed up from the lower-level tunnel up to the intermediate level, to the maze of passageways and corridors that supplied and supported the casemates and cupolas. Other Belgian soldiers had taken refuge in these passages, some clearly suffering deep shock, others nursing minor injuries. Some were crying: whether from shock, pain, or simple anger and frustration wasn’t clear. It was, by any standards, a piteous sight.

  Verbois said nothing, just continued walking.

  A few minutes later, they arrived at a pair of massive steel doors, each secured in place by thick steel bolts on all four sides of the door itself, driven into the surrounding steel frame by a large, centrally located handle and series of bars that mechanically linked all the bolts. Unsurprisingly, the bolts on both doors were in the locked position.

  ‘We had calculated that these doors would be secure against all known types of explosive charge which could be manoeuvred into the casemate,’ Verbois said, a little sadly. ‘But that, of course, was before the events of last night.’

  ‘What’s on the other side?’ Dawson asked.

  ‘There’s a space that can be filled with sandbags as an extra layer of defence – we didn’t have time to do that – and then another steel door identical to this one.’

  Sykes looked thoughtfully at the steel door for a few seconds. ‘Do you know if there are still any German soldiers in the casemate?’ he asked.

  Verbois shook his head. ‘We’ve no idea. When our troops realized the position was lost, they grabbed the wounded men and retreated into the tunnel system, locking these doors behind them. We’ve no idea what the Germans did after that.’

  ‘So there could be a squad of crack German troops sitting behind these doors, just waiting for somebody to be stupid enough to open one of them?’

  ‘That’s possible, yes,’ Verbois agreed.

  ‘Fucking wonderful,’ Dawson said quietly, but still loud enough for both officers to hear.