On the other side, he was greeted by a prisoner with a razor who set to work and shaved his head, the whole operation over in a few seconds. Tony reached up to touch the bare flesh of his scalp. It felt strange and cold. He shuffled forward, to where a huge pile of clothes had been left on the floor and watched as others who had just been shaved dived into the pile and began to put on clothing. Realising that this would probably be his only chance to find something to wear, Tony joined them. He took his prizes to a corner and put them on, a pair of striped trousers which barely reached his ankles, a shirt with the same stripes but no buttons, two odd socks and a pair of wooden clogs. It felt strange, as though he were no longer Tony Kemshall but someone else who had only just come into being, who had been born fully grown into a new and confusing existence. He had little time to contemplate this feeling, before being pushed by one of the prison guards in the direction of some young girls seated at desks. It looked as though they were doing some sort of office work, and he quietly waited his turn.
"Name?"
"Lieutenant Anthony Kemshall."
The girl wrote his details in an enormous ledger next to a number.
"Hold out your left arm."
He did so and the girl began to tattoo the same number onto his arm. His shoulder ached as he strained to keep his arm still while the needle dug into his skin time and time again, the pain of the needle nothing in comparison to that in his injured shoulder.
When she had finished, Tony looked down at his arm. 507924. Little did he know just how important that number was to be.
Tony followed the other new arrivals out of the building, then stopped and stared in horror at the sight which greeted him. All around him were people, men and women, who were little more than living skeletons. They walked slowly, dragging their feet. Some even crawled, while others lay still as though they had no energy left to move.
"My God! What sort of place is this?"
Henri shook his head. "Hell, I think."
A camp guard yelled at them. "You will soon have seen so many Muselmenn that you won’t look twice. Come now to your block, or you will be beaten."
The two men moved with a smaller group into a section of the camp set aside for the quarantining of new arrivals. Both had been assigned to Block 17. They were told to sit on the lawn, the area of bare earth at the rear of the block, for no one was allowed to enter the building except at night. As Tony lowered himself painfully to the ground, Henri produced a spare shirt from where it was hidden inside his own.
"I got this when I saw that they hadn’t redressed your wounds. It’s not sterile, but at least it will keep the dirt out, and prevent your clothes from rubbing."
Tony smiled gratefully as the Frenchman tore the shirt and began to bind his wounds.
"Thank you, Henri."
The Frenchman grinned. "It’s the least I can do for a man who led an attack on the port of Saint Nazaire."
The group sat on the ground for the remainder of the afternoon, enduring the heat and the dust and the smell until a whistle blew to call them back into the life of the camp.
"Zahlappell. Alles anstellen."
Evening roll call. The inmates stood in rows of five for over two hours until an officer came to count them, checking carefully that the number tallied with that in his book. When all was in order, the new arrivals were allowed to enter Block 17 at last. At the door they were handed meagre rations, under four ounces of bread and a small piece of margarine which they were told would have to serve for breakfast as well as supper. Tony looked at it in disbelief. How was anyone supposed to survive on so little? No wonder so many of the people they had seen were on the point of starvation.
Tony looked around at his new home. On either side of the two gangways which stretched the length of the block were continuous lines of three-tiered bunks. Each was to hold four or five people. The best places, those on the top, were already taken by men who had been there longer than the new party. Tony, Henri and the rest managed to squeeze in somehow on the bottom ones, which were hot and stuffy. Lying head to toe, with one thin straw mattress below them and an even thinner blanket above, they settled down for the night. A voice from the blackness called wearily down.
"Don’t take off your clothes or shoes if you want to see them again. And put the rest of your bread ration inside your clothes or that will disappear too."
Tony had arrived in hell on earth.
JULY - AUGUST 1944
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It was four o'clock in the morning when Tony was awakened by the deafening sound of whistles. In the dark, confined space which was his shared bunk, he thought for a moment that he was back in the train. Then as people began to climb wearily from the neighbouring bunks, he remembered where he was, and rubbed the sore spot on his left arm where his number had been tattooed. It was time for morning roll-call. The occupants of Block 17 shuffled out into the dark to stand in rows of five, silently waiting for the time to pass until the count was taken at six a.m. On the way out, Tony was handed a dish of some foul smelling liquid, a herb tea, which he drank rapidly in his thirst, gritting his teeth against the nauseating taste. Fumbling inside his shirt, he pulled out the crust of bread he had saved from the night before. He nibbled hungrily on it, but it barely took the edge off the hunger which gnawed at his belly. As he joined the rest of the block in their regimented rows, there was a harsh whisper from someone close by.
"Don’t lose that dish. No dish, no food."
Tony looked around, but could not see who had spoken. Grateful for the advice, he tucked the dish inside his shirt and took his place. The time passed slowly. Before long, his wounded leg began to throb painfully. To take his mind off the pain, Tony thought of home, the green fields, the trees, the river sparkling in the sunlight. Yet as the sun slowly raised its head above the horizon, the reality of the scene forced all thoughts of Heronfield from his mind. The ragged scarecrows of humanity surrounding him looked as though they had come straight from Dante’s Inferno. Cheeks sunken, eyes deep set in black shadows, straggly hair growing in where it had been shaved, ill-fitting and ill matched clothes hanging from their skeletal frames. Tony glanced along the row of new arrivals to Block 17. He realised just how fit and healthy they must appear, to anyone who had been in Buchenwald for any length of time.
At last the count was taken. The new arrivals were ordered back to the large bare area behind the block, where they were to spend their day before evening roll call and being allowed inside once more. It was a hot day, with no shade. The new inmates sat or lay so that they would expend less energy. Some moved over to the walls of the block, where there was some shade, but this was sparse and the sun soon moved round, catching them with its full glare again. It was almost midday by the time the monotony of the day was broken. Henri pointed at some buildings on the far side of the compound.
"Something’s happening over there."
Tony looked up as enormous drums were carried out of the kitchens. He watched in horror as men from the nearby blocks rushed forward. Some soup had been spilled, and the men lay on the ground, trying to lick it up before it soaked into the dry dusty earth. Others rushed over to the dustbins and delved deeply, in the hope of finding a scrap of potato peel. Tony shook his head in disbelief.
"Those poor devils must be starving."
"How long do you think it will be before we’re like them?" Henri shuddered as he spoke. "Do you think their plan is to kill us by slow starvation?"
"I don't know, Henri. But I do know that I’ll do my utmost not to end up like them. I intend to go home when this war is over." He looked over towards the drums of soup again. "Let's make sure we get our soup. It's the only way to make sure we don't end up like those Muselmanns."
The two men rose to their feet and made their way with the other members of Block 17 to the kitchens, where a single ladle of soup was slopped into their dishes. It was thin and watery to look at, with a few tiny pieces of what looked like potato and swede floating on top. Tony t
asted it and grimaced. It was horrible tasteless stuff which made him want to vomit, but he was too hungry to leave it. There were no spoons so he went with Henri to sit in a small patch of shade beside the block, and sipped the lukewarm concoction straight from the dish. It left him still feeling hungry. He realised that this gnawing emptiness was going to be with him for as long as he remained in Buchenwald. He contemplated his situation throughout the long afternoon in the hot sun which sapped his body of liquid and energy. He was thankful when the whistles for evening roll call sounded once again, followed by the issuing of bread rations and bed.
So the pattern of Tony’s first weeks in Buchenwald was set.
All newcomers to the camp were held in the quarantine blocks for six weeks. Tony was to be eternally grateful for this time of enforced inactivity, which gave his wounded body time to heal. By the time the quarantine was over, he could move his left arm without pain, although its movement was limited. He was unable to lift his elbow higher than his shoulder, and the muscles were weak. His leg had healed too, leaving a hollow on the calf muscle where some of the tissue had been shot away. He walked with a permanent limp now, but at least he was able to walk and to stand for the interminable hours necessary for the daily roll calls.
The first six weeks also taught him how to survive in camp, lessons learned from careful watching and overheard conversations. It was obvious from the start that no one could hope to survive on the food doled out to them, so this had to be supplemented in any way possible. He soon became aware of camp currency - food, clothing, bribery - and how to come by those commodities. The first time one of their number died, Tony was surprised to see his body stripped and his possessions stolen by those who had been longer in the camp than him. But then he saw those who had acquired the items with extra food, and realised that bread could be bought for boots. It was hard, the first time he took the coat from a dead man and exchanged it for two rations of bread, but the dead man no longer needed it, and he needed to survive. Once he was lucky enough to find a dead man with some food hidden in his clothes. He took it gratefully, though he swore he would never take from the living, only from those who no longer needed the things necessary for survival. So, gradually, he acquired a spoon, a pullover, and more importantly, extra food. By the time his six weeks’ quarantine were over at the end of July, his weight had not fallen as low as many others who had come with him on the nightmare journey from Saint Nazaire and he felt able to survive in Buchenwald for as long as necessary. But that was before he learned about the work parties.
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Sarah smiled at the young American, who grinned back.
“Thanks, nurse. That was just what I needed."
He handed the empty cup back to Sarah. She placed it on the table, then took the brake off his wheelchair and pushed him down the ramp and into the gardens. A thin blanket lay across his lap, covering the place where his legs had been, legs that lay somewhere in the fields of France. Sarah pushed steadily, taking care not to jar the raw stumps. It was a few minutes before they joined the other Americans in the shade beneath the trees. A table had been set up with a radio on it, and the sound of the Glenn Miller Orchestra enlivened the atmosphere. Sarah looked at the Americans. They were all recovering from wounds received as the Allied armies pushed across France. Many of them would never be the same again, but they took their changed situations stoically. They were ready to accept the sacrifice, now that they had the Germans on the run. Sarah put the brake on the wheelchair and laid a gentle hand on the young man’s shoulder.
"Will you be all right here?"
"Yes. This spot’s fine." He turned to look over his shoulder, and grinned up at the young Englishwoman. "Why not leave me for a while and get yourself a cup of tea. If I need anything, one of the fellas will lend a hand."
Sarah nodded. "O.K. I'll be back in half an hour."
"An hour?"
She smiled. "No, definitely not. This is your first time out. Dr. Millard says half an hour is quite long enough."
"O.K. You're the boss."
"I certainly am. Now enjoy yourself."
Sarah turned and made her way back inside the hospital. She did not really want a drink, but valued the chance to be alone. As she made her way up to the room she shared with Jane, she realised that she had done a lot of thinking lately, perhaps too much. But she could no more control the thoughts in her head than the feelings in her heart. Sitting down at the desk, she opened the small leather box and took out the golden heron. She remembered the previous Christmas when she had seen it for the first time, and it had symbolised for her all that was good and beautiful in her relationship with Tony. How could she have been so blind? If she truly loved him, surely she would have seen the real Tony who was battling to show himself, even though he was forced to keep so much secret? Surely if she truly loved him, she would have accepted him as he was without need of explanation? She had come to realise over the last long difficult weeks that yes, she did love Tony more than anyone else in the world and yes, she did miss him dreadfully. She did not know what she would do if he did not come back. Yet the overriding feeling amongst all her jumbled emotions was guilt. Tony had been working so hard and had been in need of a great deal of support, but she had not given it to him. Instead, she had heaped many more pressures on him and made a difficult life even harder to bear. Realistically she knew there was very little chance of her ever seeing Tony again. She would have been able to cope with that if only she had had a final chance to put things right with him. Why had she not been able to hold him one last time, to tell him that she was sorry, to let him see that she loved him and that he meant the world to her?
The door opened, and Sarah turned to see who had entered. Jane saw her friend, fingers gently caressing the small golden tie pin, tears in her eyes. She swiftly crossed the room to take hold of her hand.
"Are you all right, Sarah?"
Sarah nodded through her tears. "I guess so. I just can't believe that he's gone and I won't ever see him again."
Jane’s voice was soft, her words sympathetic. "You’ve got to let go, Sarah. You can't waste the rest of your life mourning what might have been." She frowned. "You’re really taking this bad, far worse than you took Joe’s death."
"But don't you see?" Sarah’s voice was pleading, begging to be understood. "Joe and I knew that we loved each other. I mourned him, but at least I had the happy memories of our times together. But with Tony it was different. I sent him away without telling him how I really feel. I’ll have to live with the knowledge that he went into danger without knowing whether I loved him or not. I let him down, Jane. I can never forgive myself for that."
"But I'm sure he understood, Sarah. He wouldn’t have sent you that letter, or the heron, if he’d not believed that you truly love him."
"But I can never be really sure of that!" Sarah looked down at the heron and traced its outline with a gentle finger. “All I can do is pray that he's alive somewhere, and that one day I'll have the chance to put things right."
Jane squeezed her friend’s hand gently. "Don't count on that Sarah. Captain Dawson said you should presume the worst."
"But there was no body! He could still be alive!" Sarah shuddered. "But knowing that is almost as bad as believing he’s dead. Captain Dawson said that the SS had held him before and treated him cruelly. So if he's still alive, he must be suffering terribly." She lifted her tear- filled eyes to Jane. "I don't know what to do! Should I hope that he's alive? Or dead, beyond pain and suffering?" The tears began to roll down her cheeks, and a sob escaped her lips. "I just want him back, Jane. I want him back, and I want him to know that I love him."
Jane took her friend in her arms and cradled her head on her shoulders.
"Don't do this, Sarah. Forget the guilt and remember the good times. Remember him and be happy." As Jane whispered the words, she wondered if anyone who had been through what Sarah had since the outbreak of the war could ever be truly happy again.
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The company approached Sourdeval in brilliant sunshine. The sky was cloudless, and the bright light reflected in the sparkling rays from the river which ran parallel to the road. Bobby and Al were unaware of the beauty of their surroundings as they moved slowly forwards behind the tank. It offered them some protection from the Germans, who fired continuously at their pursuers during their long, slow retreat. The huge gun on the tank roared as it continued to roll forward. Somewhere up ahead, there was the sound of an explosion as the shell found its target. Bobby was unable to see what it had hit. He felt little inclination to peer round the heavily armoured vehicle to find out. Lieutenant Cooper approached the leading members of his platoon in a crouching run, shouting instructions, his words almost lost in the sounds of battle which raged ahead.
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