None But The Brave: A Novel of the Surgeons of World War II

by Anthony A. Goodman

  Kurtz was losing it. He hopped from foot to foot. Hamm could see his eyes darting wildly from side to side, scanning the neighborhood for signs of soldiers or MPs.

  “Erschießt sie! Erschießt sie! Lasst uns töten sie alle!,” he said to his comrade, urgently, harshly.

  Schneider wondered if Hamm also understood that the man was telling his partner to shoot everyone. To kill everyone. Hamm had understood the word for shoot but could do nothing, pinned down as he was by the force of the cocked gun against his head. It was that awful day in the operating room all over again; he was helpless in the face of a German’s weapon, but this time it was an American made gun.

  McClintock, still on his stomach with his face in the ground and Kurtz’s foot now placed squarely on his back, had nowhere to move. Each time he struggled, the foot only pressed in harder, making it almost impossible to breath.

  Schneider then heard Lange say, “Kurtz, Ich möchte dass Frau,” that he wanted Molly for himself. And in that moment, Schneider’s previously controlled outrage exploded. As Lange started to move in toward Molly, still standing a few feet away near the corner of the building, Schneider lunged upward. He drove his shoulder into Lange’s chest, knocking him to his knees, while grabbing for the gun hand. At the same moment McClintock, feeling Kurtz’s foot release from his back, charged at Kurtz, aiming for the pipe in the German’s hand.

  As Lange struggled to regain his footing, Schneider grabbed the muzzle of the .45 with both hands. He wrenched hard, twisting the gun away, swinging the muzzle upward. He had lots of leverage working for him as he angled the gun further and further up. The German’s fingers and wrist began to crack. Then a deafening explosion filled the air next to Schneider’s ear as the .45 fired. In a final adrenaline-fueled effort, the German wrenched the gun free and slashed the butt backhanded into Schneider’s temple, striking the same place as was hit by the pipe. Schneider fell to the ground, sprawled helplessly on the wet street, barely conscious, bleeding profusely.

  Lange aimed the .45 with both hands directly at the center of Schneider’s chest. Then, there was another tremendous blast. The German’s eyes widened in disbelief as he slumped to the ground in a heap, his chest instantly soaked with blood.

  Schneider recovered in time to see Molly, her own .45 emitting a fine wisp of smoke into the damp night air. Shaking, but in complete control—rage in her eyes—she paused only for a second, assuring herself that the armed man was dead, then swung the gun steadily toward Kurtz.

  Momentarily stopped by the shock of seeing his friend dying, Kurtz recovered and wheeled to his right. Filling his field of vision was Molly, the big .45 in her hands, pointing straight at him. She—this small woman in a military uniform—had killed his friend.

  Molly, now registering the shock of her spontaneous act, did not want to shoot him, wishing for all the world that he would just run away. She was quietly whispering, “Don’t move. Don’t you dare move. Not one step.” It actually sounded more like a plea than a command and the young man knew it, as did Schneider.

  Taking advantage of her perceived weakness, he lunged at her, leaping across McClintock. He raised his pipe and swung it toward Molly as both Hamm and McClintock tried to get back into the fight.

  A second blast shook the street.

  Kurtz’s chest exploded, showering all of them with blood.

  Molly remained completely still, never taking her eyes off the dying Kurtz, never moving her gun from its target, tears beginning to stream down her cheeks.

  Hamm moved immediately to Molly’s side, while McClintock went to check on Steve. Putting his arm around Molly, Hamm took the gun and put it in his pocket. Molly said nothing, only now fully registering the shock of what she had done; she, who saved people from the very same wounds she just inflicted. She had just killed two strangers in the street. She, who shot animals only for food and never for sport, and never ever would have dreamed she could have shot another human being. Only minutes before, it would have been unthinkable.

  Hamm, with his arm still around her shoulder quietly whispered, “Molly, it’s OK. You’re OK. Steve’s OK.” With that, she looked into his eyes, hugged him and said, “Oh God, Hamm, what have I done?”

  Schneider was now sitting up, McClintock by his side. As Molly knelt and put her arms around Steve, Hamm reached into his jacket and pulled out his white and blue Tallit, the prayer shawl he had worn for the Seder. He wadded the shawl into a ball and pressed it against the bleeding wound in Schneider’s temple, asking McClintock to hold it in place.

  Hamm then eased Schneider down on his back and elevated his friend’s feet across his own thighs, to help restore some blood volume.

  As the three sat on the wet ground, McClintock and Hamm took turns maintaining light pressure on Schneider’s head wound, while Molly hugged him to her chest, whispering quietly into his ear, trying to soothe him and herself, through her tears.

  No one had time for even a glance at the dead Germans.

  They all kept a wary vigil for signs of more trouble. Hamm now well aware that the gun was in his pocket, wondering if he could use it with the same cool expertise that Molly had just moments ago.

  Soon the quiet of the night was interrupted by the wail of sirens. Two jeeps and an ambulance raced into their street. Some frightened German citizen, watching from behind blacked-out windows, had sent for help.

  The MPs and medics helped Schneider into the ambulance while Molly climbed in alongside him. McClintock waved off the ambulance attendants, covering his own wound with his handkerchief.

  McClintock and Hamm went together to talk with the MPs briefly and then climbed into the jeep to follow the ambulance back to the military hospital.

  Kurtz and Lange lay where they died. The MP’s gathered quietly and began taking notes. It took them less than thirty minutes. Then, with the bodies removed, they returned to their jeeps and drove off.

  The rain began again just as they left. It would continue for several hours more, washing the street clean of blood until no traces of what had happened there that night remained. And the street was silent again.

  Epilogue

  15 April, 2004

  The Home of Dr. Jacob Hammer

  Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

  I was seated at the head of the Passover Seder table for the very first time in my life. At sixty-four years old, it seemed kind of late in life. But, the happy reason was that my father, John Hammer, had lived to such a ripe old age that he had presided over these family holidays for more than sixty years. The unhappy part was that he had died recently. My earliest memories of these Seders start around the age of six, when Dad had just returned from War. Since then, the myriad Seders have melded, and only the last several are clear in my memory.

  The crowd around our table had increased over those years. My newest grandchild, Noah, was only six months old and was serving as the table centerpiece in his little baby cradle. He was the second child of my son, Edward, who had just turned forty. A proud older father. Now there were sixteen of us seated for the dinner, crowded and noisy and jubilant. Only my younger brother, Richard, was missing. He was doing Passover with his wife’s family this year. Mother was not happy about that.

  My wife, Marjorie, had been busy all day, consumed with coordinating the many complicated dishes that would make up the Seder. I barely saw her until we all were seated around the table.

  Soon I would open the Passover Haggadah and begin to read, “We were slaves unto Pharaoh….” However, we were still waiting for two more guests.

  It was a noisy reunion. The young cousins were growing wilder by the minute in anticipation of the Seder. They ran from room to room, chasing and hiding from one another; and screeching with joy when they were found. They had not seen each other for many months, and a warm chaos and tumult everywhere filled my living room and kitchen.

  Meantime, my mind drifted back upstairs to my study, where, on the old roll-top desk—the desk my father had used for fifty years—s
at an old cardboard box I had opened earlier that day.

  We had buried Dad nearly three months before. After a long struggle with cancer and an agonizing several months for everyone, he had finally left us. It was a terrible end to a rich and full life. The long and painful process of dying from his cancer was something we all knew he did not deserve. His symptoms made his life miserable. As both his son and also a doctor, being unable to relieve his suffering, I suffered with him. After he died, I spent many hours alone wondering if I had really known him. He was a dear and wonderful man. His patients loved him and his colleagues respected him. He was always solid and unruffled, no matter how serious the event—a great virtue in a surgeon. Most certainly, he was a role model to me as I struggled through my own long surgical education.

  My father’s name was John, but everyone who didn’t call him Doctor or Doc called him Hamm. For as long as I can recall, everyone has called me Jake. Most Jews do not name their children after a living relative, so I had not been named after my father. But we shared initials. I still have his old-fashioned black leather doctor’s bag with his—our—initials monogrammed in fading gold leaf.

  To have been his son was a great blessing, an honor. I don’t know if I ever told him that. What a shame I missed the chance. I suppose I’m not alone in this. Maybe we should have practice funerals to remind us of what is important.

  At Dad’s funeral, throngs of people came to tell me how much they loved him and what he had meant to their lives and to those he had befriended and those whose lives he had saved. I wondered if they, too, had failed to tell him so while he was still alive.

  Yesterday, my mother, Allison, flew in from Arizona to be with us for the Seder. She was doing as well as could be expected, for she loved him deeply, and I know she missed him terribly. The two of them shared a fairy tale life. They had married young and raised their family under the burdens of the Great Depression. They had weathered my father’s long surgical residency and the years of separation during World War II. But they thrived together through it all.

  Dad had been in surgical practice only a few years when America entered the war in Europe. He was just getting on his feet, paying off his education debts and building his home, a family, and a reputation. Life was starting to look good. But the war was so enormous and Hitler’s evil so heinous that Dad, along with many of his friends, volunteered and went straight into active duty. After a short training period, he changed out of his long white coat and into the khaki uniform to become Major John Hammer, U.S. Medical Corps. He told me he never did get used to being called Major.

  “They called me a few other things from time to time, Jake,” he said once, “but I won’t go into that.”

  I was only five when the war ended, so the odd part for me was that when he finally came home, he never talked about his war experiences. Never.

  He was away for more than three years, and when he came back, instead of returning to his practice, he signed on with the Veterans Administration Hospital and took care of the men he served overseas. He could not leave the job unfinished, could not desert his men.

  Over the years, as the war receded in everyone’s memory, I never learned what he did over there. Of course, I knew he operated on the wounded, but I had no details. There were no war stories. As far as I knew, except for two of them, he never contacted his old war buddies either. We were waiting for them now.

  Unlike my generation in Vietnam, where everyone came home with something to say about the war, my father’s generation was reluctant to talk about their experience. While I knew well the horrors of war surgery—I served in a unit in Vietnam myself—I grew up knowing almost nothing about World War II except what I read in books. It was as if the soldiers simply packed up one day and left home to do a job that needed to be done. Several years later, they returned and said no more about it. End of story. There was no debate over the right and wrong of it as with Vietnam, no rioting between the hawks and the doves. I don’t think there were many doves when it came to fighting the Germans and the Japanese. The country was not torn apart the way Vietnam tore my generation apart. To Americans at the time of WW II, Hitler was evil incarnate, and his Thousand Year Reich had to be stopped. Nobody denied that. When it was over, the men and women came home again, changed out of their uniforms, and went back to work as if they had never left. Oh, yes, there were the wounded and the sick who needed care. So, men like Dad took on the job. But for almost all who served, the war itself was a time that needed to be forgotten, tucked away in the dark dusty attics of their minds.

  When I picked up Mom at the airport yesterday, she had two suitcases. While she was unpacking in the guest room, I helped her put things away. She emptied one suitcase and then asked me to put the second one on the bed. She opened it, revealing an oblong cardboard box inside. I thought she must have brought presents for the children and the grandchildren. But the box was not for them. It was for me.

  “Jacob, I want you to see this,” she said. She was probably the only person who still called me by my formal name.

  “I was cleaning out the house a few weeks ago.” She sat on the bed next to the old box, while she continued talking. “I need to lighten my load. I don’t want you to have the awful job of going through my things when it comes time for me to die.”

  I started to speak, but she held up a hand.

  “I know what you’re going to say, but don’t. It doesn’t matter. What matters is this,” she said, pointing to the box.

  It was in good shape for its age. I was amused and puzzled to see the word Oxydol on the side, the name of a laundry soap my mom had used for forty years. I thought of other brand names from my childhood, like Ipana toothpaste, also long gone.

  On the top of the Oxydol box were the remnants of tape, brittle and yellowed with age. Mom pulled off some of the new tape she had applied to keep the box closed. She carefully crumpled it up and placed it in the wastebasket next to the small writing desk by the bed. She had always been very neat.

  Then she opened the flaps, stepped back, and pointed to the contents.

  I was puzzled and more than a little anxious. I had no idea what to expect. Photos, perhaps? A will? What?

  On the very top was a small leather case, like a jewelry box, clean and unscratched, although I knew it had to be very old. I looked at Mom and then opened it. Inside was a military medal that I recognized immediately.

  “You know what that is?” Mom asked me.

  “Yes, it’s the Bronze Star. For valor in combat.”

  I never received one of those in Vietnam, and I had been jealous of colleagues who did.

  “Dad’s?”

  She nodded.

  “You knew about this?” I asked.

  She shook her head no, and shrugged.

  I put the precious medal on the nightstand. Deeper in the box I found little books, but they were not just any books.

  “What are these, Mom?”

  “Look at them, darling.”

  I reached in and took out the top one. It was a light brown leather-bound volume, heavily worn along its edges. Small pieces of the desiccated leather flaked to the floor like dry leaves. Mom bent and picked the little leather pieces off the carpet and deposited them into the wastebasket.

  Near the left side of the front cover were gold-tooled letters, slightly worn as well.

  DAILY

  REMINDER

  The edges of the pages were colored a faded red. Along the book’s spine was the date, also in gold, worn and barely readable:

  1943

  On the inside of the cover was a calendar for that year, and I noticed that my birthday—my third birthday—had been on a Monday. I had no recollection of it, but of course Dad wouldn’t have been home to celebrate it with me anyway. He was already overseas. Still, the date had been circled so that he would remember to send me something. I sniffed the pages, hoping there would be something of him there. A cigar odor, perhaps. Something. But, there was nothing. Not a trace. The b
ook had been published by The Standard Diary Company of Cambridge, Massachusetts and contained a page for each day. The pages had blue ruled lines like a composition book. On the first page was the printed heading:

  Friday, January 1, 1943

  1st day—364 days to follow

  New Year’s Day.

  The diary began in my father’s familiar handwriting. Difficult, but not illegible.

  Spent New Year’s Eve at Evenlode with Steve. We did some ‘pub chasing’ and finished off our last Vat 69.

  I was surprised to see my father write about pub chasing and Vat 69, since I never knew him to drink. I calculated that about that time he would have been in England, training and getting ready for the invasion of Normandy, then still a year and a half away, and Top Secret.

  There were more leather bound diaries, exactly like the first, labeled 1944 and 1945. I closed the last book for a moment and put it down on the bed.

  I found myself becoming inexplicably angry. Why was I only seeing these nearly sixty years after the war ended? Why hadn’t Dad shown me these?

  Mom said nothing. She only watched me go through the box. Beneath the diary was another book, also old, but not as worn, as if it had lived its life inside the box, protected from the world, rarely handled or read. The Khaki cover had a capital letter A inside blue and red concentric circles: the insignia of the US Third Army—the army of occupation in Germany after the war. Patton’s army.

  Beneath the Third Army insignia in red letters were the words:

  PASSOVER SERVICE

  MUNICH ENCLAVE

  Munich, Germany, April 15–16, 1946

  “Oh, dear God….”

  There were English and Hebrew words, with black and white woodcuts surrounding each page. I saw the now familiar pyramids and cremation ovens, Egyptian slaves and Nazi guards, gas chambers and fertile fields. I shivered and closed the book. Mom remained still. I put the book aside on the night table without reading any further.