by Leo Kessler
Von Dodenburg, crouched in the bushes fifteen metres away, looked up the dirt road. No sign of any other Amis. He nodded to Matz, gripping Schulze’s Schmeisser and held up his right hand, fingers outspread. Matz indicated his understanding. Five seconds and they would move in. Behind them a semi-conscious Schulze groaned.
‘I remember our trucking company was billeted in this apple orchard in Normandy with the little apples just coming out and fuck me if the whole lot didn’t go and die in a week from the gas fumes.’ He flung away the empty can of hash. ‘Now what do you guys say to that?’
‘Yeah, it must be tough,’ the younger of the two infantrymen said, the blue of the combat soldier badge decorating his dirty khaki, ‘pretty damn tough in the Service of Supply. You ought to get a transfer to the infantry, soldier.’
‘Aw you guys are pissing me,’ the driver said smiling slowly.
‘No,’ the other soldier began, ‘we know you guys are—’
He never finished the sentence. Matz stuck his machine pistol into his back Then von Dodenburg was standing in front of them, Walther pistol levelled at their bellies.
‘Hands up!’ he snapped in his heavily accented English.
The three Amis standing around the parked ‘deuce and a half truck shot up their hands, their eyes suddenly fearful as they recognised the silver SS runes worn by the black-clad, hard-faced officer with the pistol. Von Dodenburg ran his swift gaze over them. The two infantrymen had dumped their rifles, and they were only armed with bayonets. The truck driver was unarmed.
Von Dodenburg nodded to Matz. ‘All right, Sergeant, take those two heroes,’ he indicated the pale-faced infantrymen, ‘and get Schulze – and watch how they treat that shoulder of his. I don’t want the bastard bleeding again!’
‘Yessir.’ Matz pushed the two infantrymen forward. ‘Move,’ he ordered. The soldier with the combat infantry badge bit his lower lip fearfully. ‘You can’t shoot us, sir,’ he stammered. ‘Not in cold blood.’
‘I can,’ von Dodenburg answered with a chill smile on his haggard unshaven face. ‘But I won’t – just yet. Now move.’
A few minutes later Schulze was stowed in the back of the truck, bedded down on the driver’s blankets, with Matz and von Dodenburg crouched beside him, their weapons levelled at the terrified Amis’ heads through the slit at the back of the cab.
‘Now listen,’ von Dodenburg said carefully after the burly driver had switched on the truck’s engine. ‘Your lives depend upon our getting to Aachen safely. If you make a mistake,’ he clicked his tongue significantly, ‘you are dead.’
‘But the MPs, sir,’ the driver protested. ‘They might stop us.’
‘Your problem,’ von Dodenburg answered coldly, though his mind was racing, trying to imagine what problems might arise in their five-kilometre journey to the city. But he knew this was the only way to get through. The kilometre they had struggled across the fields since they had abandoned the Tiger in the tunnel had been a nightmare. Both he and Matz was exhausted. They had been unable to carry the wounded delirious sergeant-major any further. There was no other course open to them.
‘All right, ‘he snapped, ‘let us get started.’
The driver crashed home first gear and slowly the two-and-a-half ton petrol truck started to drive away.
Everything went smoothly until they reached the outskirts of Aachen itself. Now the steady stream of vehicles heading for the front started to congest. Twice they had to get off the muddy, pitted roads to let long ambulance convoys hurry by with their sirens howling and signs in their windscreens announcing in blood-red letters CARRYING CASUALTIES. The traffic still moving forward was mostly armoured now. They crawled by rear defence units, dug in grimly on both sides of the road, gripping their weapons in sweaty palms, as if the enemy might come storming out of the smoking rubble of the suburbs at any moment. They passed a road sign reading: ‘RAISE DUST AND YOU’RE DEAD, BROTHER! THIS ROAD IS UNDER ENEMY FIRE!’
But they didn’t need to be told that. The sledgehammer of sound was beating down regularly. Peering out of the sides of the truck, von Dodenburg could see the terror reflected in the faces of the infantry trudging towards the front. Their eyes shone hotly as if tears were close, their flesh was ashen and their mouths trembled every time another shell struck the quaking ground ahead. All other vehicles had vanished from the littered, cratered road by now. They were alone with the infantry.
‘Sir,’ the truck driver gasped, muscles rippling as he swung the vehicle around another crater, ‘Somebody’s gonna stop us soon … What we gonna do then?’
‘Leave that to me,’ von Dodenburg said hoarsely. ‘You keep on driving.’ He looked at Matz and then at Schulze, lying on the dirty floor of the shaking truck, his breath coming in shalow gasps. He put his hand on the sergeant-major’s burning hot forehead. He told himself fiercely that he was going to get the rogue through. Germany would need men like the loudmouthed, cocky ex-docker in the terrible days to come. ‘Don’t worry, Matz,’ he urged. ‘We’ll get through.’
Matz, the veteran, pursed his lips scornfully. ‘I’m not worried, sir. I’m a regular, you know, sir. Not like this asphalt soldier here.’ He jerked a dirty thumb at his companion of many a drinking and whoring session. ‘I was wondering whether you’d recommend me for acting sergeant-major when that goldbricker goes into hospital. I mean while he’s having a good time getting a fly feel at the nurses’ tits, lying between clean sheets, I might as well get a bit of the glory. It’ll look good on my records. Might get me a bigger pension.’
Von Dodenburg shook his head. ‘Shit on Sunday,’ he cursed, using the soldier’s expression, ‘you’re even a worse rascal than Schulze, Matz. Yes, you’ll get your temporary promotion. That is if we ever get out of this mess.’
‘Stop,’ shouted the bareheaded lieutenant, leaping up out of the rubble to their right, carbine at the ready. ‘Jesus wept, are you guys sick of life? This is the goddam line!’
The burly driver hit the brakes. Helmeted heads raised themselves cautiously from the brick rubble on both sides of the road. Von Dodenburg, his heart beating wildly with shock, recognised the high-pitched burr of a Spandau somewhere ahead in the smoke-shrouded scene. The German front, he told himself.
‘Well?’ the lieutenant demanded, when the driver did not speak. ‘What the hell are you doing so far forward with a gas truck? I thought you guys from the Red Ball Express didn’t get this far up the front.’3 Still the driver didn’t speak. Somewhere behind them a mortar started to howl obscenely. The red-faced lieutenant did not even jump. It was clear he was a veteran. Suddenly he noticed the three soldiers’ strange silence.
‘Hey, you guys,’ he commanded, raising his carbine. ‘Let me have a dekko at your ID.’ He turned to his platoon sergeant. ‘Joe, come on over here—’
Matz fired. The men in the cab ducked too late. The two infantrymen’s heads were blasted apart. Blood and bone flew everywhere. The windscreen shattered into a sudden spiderweb. The lieutenant standing in front of the truck flew backwards.
‘Drive on!’ von Dodenburg yelled frantically.
The driver, the side of his face and shoulder soaked in blood, crashed home the gear. The truck shot forward. Zig-zagging crazily, it roared down the street in first gear, followed by the wild angry fire of the GIs. Blinded by the shattered windscreen, the driver careened into a lamp post. He wrenched desperately at the wheel. Th truck skidded to the right with a wild howl of protesting tyres.
‘Hold the bastard!’ Matz screamed in German. ‘Hold it, man!’
Too late. The truck crashed into a heap of rubble. The driver shot over his wheel, smashed through the shattered windscreen and lay still, his head twisted at an unnatural angle, his neck broken.
‘Here!’ von Dodenburg grabbed Matz’s machine-pistol and fired a wild burst towards the Ami’s lines. Answering slugs pattered against the Americans. ‘Grab a hold of Schulze – quick!’ he gasped and fired another long burst at the GIs trying to edge their
way in the cover of the shattered building towards them. The answering fire stopped momentarily.
Matz slapped Schulze hard across the face. ‘Come on – wake up,’ he yelled. ‘We’ve got to make a run for it.’
Schulze groaned, but his eyes remained obstinately closed. Matz slapped his shoulder. Schulze screamed. His eyes opened.
‘What?’ he gasped.
Matz grabbed his good arm and tugged. ‘Get to your feet,’ he hissed. ‘The Amis are only twenty metres away!’
Weakly the big NCO allowed himself to be hauled up and led, swaying wildly, to the edge of the truck. Matz dropped first and cursed with pain as his wooden leg thrust itself into the socket. Schulze followed and collapsed on his knees. Matz hit him again. A thin trickle of blood flowed from his nose. Slugs were hitting the ground all around them now.
‘For Christ sake – move!’ von Dodenburg cried. ‘I’ll cover you – MOVE!’
Like crippled caricatures of soldiers, the NCOs began to stagger towards the German lines, while their CO knelt and tried to hold the Amis off.
‘Hold your fire,’ a voice ahead commanded. ‘It’s two of our lads – from the Wotan!’
Sobbing like an athlete at the end of his tether, weaving from side to side with the strain, Matz supported the half-conscious bulk of the big NCO in the direction of the voice. Together they stumbled through the fallen masonry, tripping over the tangle of fallen wire, eyes narrowed against the thick acrid smoke; while behind them von Dodenburg swept the street from side to side keeping the Amis back. And then they tumbled into a hole, and helping hands were grabbing at them, and figures dressed in the black of the SS Wotan were shouting with joy: ‘It’s Matz and big Schulze … Matz and big Schulze!’
‘The CO,’ the sergeant-major gasped just before he passed out. ‘The CO.’
They needed no further urging. In one crazy rush the panzer grenadiers were out of their holes and charging down the street, firing from the hip as they ran. ‘WOTAN … WOTAN … WOTAN!’ their battle-cry was flung from their open mouths with fanatical, new-found energy. And von Dodenburg, crouched in the doorway of a destroyed butcher’s, trying to fit his last magazine among the long-abandoned hooks and wooden chopping boards, let his Schmeisser drop into the rubble, relief overwhelming him. His men were coming to rescue him.
At almost that very same instant on that October 16th afternoon, a patrol from Colonel Cox’s infantry, led by Staff Sergeant Frank A. Karswell, set off to make the first physical contact with the men of the 30th Infantry. The Big Red One veteran did not get far. The patrol had just reached the main Aachen-Wuerselen highway when the enemy artillery barrage descended upon them. The patrol dropped as one and let the blast and heat sweep over them. Someone screamed and there was the smell of burning flesh. The burning houses to left and right swayed like gigantic loose back-drops in the theatre. When the survivors scattered for cover in the lull between the salvoes, Staff Sergeant Karwell was not with them.
His men had lost heart, all save the two skinny scouts, Privates Krauss and Whitis. ‘I’m for going on,’ Ed Krauss yelled above the roar of the barrage. ‘What about you, Evan?’
Whitis nodded. Leaving the rest behind, the two of them continued, creeping cautiously through the burning, smoking moonlandscape, their bodies tense, waiting for the burst of mg fire which surely must come and cut them down at any moment.
A hundred yards. A hundred and fifty. Still they had not been halted. Suddenly Krauss stopped. ‘Look – GI uniforms!’ he gasped.
Even Whitis narrowed his eyes against the smoke. ‘Hot damn,’ he breathed, ‘you’re right, Ed.’
Almost at that same moment, the strange GIs spotted them. ‘Hey,’ they yelled joyfully, ‘We’re from K-Company. Come on up!’
‘And we’re from F Company,’ Whitis and Krauss cried back. ‘Come on down!’ Obediently the other infantrymen started to file down the battle-littered, smoke-shrouded hillside to shake the hands and slap the backs of the two lone scouts.
It was 16.15 hours and Roosevelt’s Butchers had finally linked up with the Big Red One. The Aachen Gap was closed at last; Germany’s Holy City was cut off from the Reich.
Notes
1. Field-Marshal Montgomery’s grandiose plan to ‘bounce’ his way into Germany had come to nothing when his First Airborne Division had failed to hold the vital bridge at Arnhem in September 1944.
2. American award for being wounded in action.
3. Red Ball Express. Supply route reaching from the Normandy beachhead to the front.
FOUR: THE END
‘There was an Austrian – a Jew to boot, if I am not mistaken – who wrote a long time ago, “In the time of the sinking sun, dwarfs cast shadows like giants”. The sun is going down, von Dodenburg, and I do not want to live in the time of the dwarfs.’ SS General Donner to Colonel von Dodenburg.
ONE
There was no sound save the harsh stamp of the young lieutenant’s highly polished jackboots on the concrete of the hotel drive. Next to him the three Ami officers moved noiselessly in their rubber-soled combat boots. From the windows the curious, hollow-eyed staff officers stared down at the scene, while the HQ’s battleworn defence platoon fingered their weapons uneasily.
At the regulation ten paces from the Battle Commandant who was waiting with von Dodenburg at his side, the young lieutenant halted, clicked his heels together and flung up his arm in the German greeting.
‘Heil Hitler,’ he shouted smartly.
‘Heil Hitler!’ Donner returned the greeting.
The grey-haired Ami colonel, flanked by the two officers carrying the white flags, looked startled by the greeting. But Donner ignored them.
‘What are these men doing here?’ he rasped, although he knew quite well what the Americans wanted.
‘Beg to report, General,’ the young lieutenant said formally, ‘that these officers are enemy parliamentaires. They wish to speak to you, sir.’
Donner nodded curtly and turned his terrible face fully to the Amis, noting with pleasure the look of horror on the face of the youngest of them. ‘Does any one of you speak German?’
The grey-haired colonel said, ‘Yes, General, I do.’
Donner wrinkled his nose and flashed a significant look at von Dodenburg. The SS colonel read his unspoken thought: the Ami officer must be a Jew. ‘Well, then, what do you want?’ he asked briskly.
The Ami colonel pulled a piece of paper from the pocket of his stained combat blouse and cleared his throat pompously: ‘I have a message here from my Corps Commander, General Joseph Collins. He has asked me to read it to you, General. I shall read it first in the English original and then in German.’
‘My good man,’ Donner rasped, trying to control his temper, but raising his voice so that the spectators hanging out of hotel windows could hear, ‘you can read it in Chinese, if you wish. All I am interested in is the German version.’
The grey-haired colonel flushed. He bent his head over the paper and began to read: ‘The city of Aachen is now completely surrounded by American forces. If the city is not promptly and completely surrendered unconditionally, the American Army Ground and Air Forces will proceed ruthlessly with air and artillery bombardment to reduce it to submission.’
The American looked at Donner significantly. Donner stared at some unknown object in the far distance, as if he were bored by the whole business. Behind him, von Dodenburg allowed himself a faint smile of admiration. The Police General was putting on a great show, for a commander who was completely cut off from the main force and whose total fighting strength was reduced to five thousand men, of whom Wotan’s five hundred survivors were the only troops of any real fighting quality.
The Ami shrugged and began to translate. When he had finished he looked up at the German general standing on the bullet-chipped steps of the hotel and asked: ‘Well?’
Donner fixed him with his glassy stare. ‘Well, what?’
‘Do you want to surrender to my Corps Commander?’ He licked h
is dry lips. ‘You know the consequences if you don’t, General?’
Donner laughed scornfully. ‘Consequences! You can no longer bomb us without endangering your own troops. If your ground people attack, they will have to fight us from house to house, from street to street. Aachen will become another Stalingrad for your Army. Can you afford to pay that price?’
‘Well, then, what message do you want me to take to General Collins?’
‘Message? A very simple one. He can go to hell – and if you aren’t out of my area within the next five minutes, you will precede him there forthwith!’ He turned to the elegant Army lieutenant. ‘Take these men back the way they came.’
The American colonel’s mouth dropped open. Across from him, Major Schwarz, black eyes gleaming fanatically, dropped his hand on his pistol holster significantly. The Americans took the hint. Swiftly they turned and started moving back down the shell-littered road, carrying their white flags with them disconsolately.
Donner did not even bother to look at them. Instead he turned to the spectators.
‘Listen, soldiers,’ he rasped. ‘Our position is not so desperate as some of you might think. We are dug in in an excellent position. We have food for two months. Reichsmarshal Goering has promised personally to keep us supplied with ammunition by air and already the Führer’s planners are working out a scheme to break open the Ami ring around the city and relieve us. I expect, therefore, that each and every defender of the venerable Imperial City of Aachen to do his duty to the end, in fulfilment of our Oath to the Flag. I expect courage and determination to hold out.’