by Nigel Jones
That afternoon I had just settled down before my typewriter to take down the German three o’clock war report when Eccarius came in with a very disturbed look on his face and said: “Herr Best, you are leaving us.”
“What’s that?” I said. “When?”
“Now, at once. The car is at the door waiting for you. You are to pack up all your things as quickly as possible—within an hour if you can manage it.”
Even after my musings of the morning, this news came to me as a great shock. I had been static for so long that I simply could not imagine what a change would be like nor how I was to set about packing and the rest. Paul, who was in the cell at the time, looked as though he might burst into tears at any moment, but Eccarius shooed him out and told him to get plenty of large card boxes so that I could start packing—I had only one suit-case which would hold but a fraction of my possessions. Paul came back with Max and Johannes, all carrying boxes, and we set to work. We filled my suit-case and five large cartons, but even then my wardrobe was far from empty. The clothes which I had given for safe keeping in the cloak-room could not be found, but it would in any case have been hopeless to attempt to take them with me also—what use to me anyhow were evening clothes on such a journey as I was probably undertaking?
Just as we had nearly finished packing Kaindl came in to bid me good-bye, and to assure me that when we had seen each other in the morning he had had no idea that I should be moved so soon. “It is better for you, Herr Best, and I wish you good luck and a safe return to your wife.” I thanked him for all his kindness and we shook hands warmly. I was really fond of the little man and was very sad to leave him behind to face such treatment as would be accorded him as commandant of a notorious concentration camp. All, I think, were sorry to see me go, for they probably looked upon me as their only advocate when they fell into enemy hands.
Eccarius brought me my rations, including two loaves of white bread, which he said I had better take with me. I had quite a lot of cheese, butter, and jam which I had saved up and packed all my foodstuffs in a little handbag. Eccarius also brought me another pound of tobacco, so that I now had almost two pounds in all. Then the move was made with Paul, Max and Johann and the two trusties carrying my baggage. Near the entrance all the warders were drawn up to say good-bye, and really we were most of us near tears. Funny, but I felt quite attached to my old home. Waiting for me at the door was the stout jailer who had led me so gently into Gestapo Headquarters on my first arrival there on the ioth November, 1939. Then he had been a rough-looking man dressed in a sweater and flannel trousers, now he was a smartly dressed Obersturmführer. He was most friendly, and said how glad he was to find me looking so well: “I never thought, when you left us, that I should ever see you alive again. I can’t tell you how surprised I was when I was ordered to go and fetch Herr Wolf from the camp.”
We went out of the door together and to my horror I saw a German Black Maria, or as they call it, a ‘Grüne Minna’. So far I had always been transported in private cars, and I felt it a great come down to be expected to travel by prison van. As far as I could see there was no one else in the van and there was plenty of room for all my luggage. Actually, there were two other passengers, the little Russian and the Englishman from No. 45, but they were shut in two little pens near the entrance of the van which I did not notice. A friendly Hauptscharführer who also remembered me from 1939, got in with me, and he was kind enough to leave door and window open so that I could see where we were going; he also told me that our destination was Berlin, but that he had heard I should only stay there for a day or two and would then travel farther south.
It was most interesting to me, after watching so many air raids on Berlin from a distance, to see something of the damage from close quarters. On the road between Oranienburg and Pankau we passed a fair number of burnt-out cars and lorries but most of the country houses seemed, as far as I could see, undamaged. As we entered the suburbs though, the picture rapidly changed until, as we approached the centre of Berlin, destruction seemed almost complete and nothing but rubble and gutted-out buildings were to be seen. Our van bumped crazily along a narrow pathway which had been cleared through the masses of rubble and it was often difficult to believe that I was passing through a great city. I saw an archway with a notice board ‘Adlon’ hanging crookedly from it; all that was left of the famous Hotel Adlon, then came the huge treasury building, fire-blackened walls standing amidst piles of bricks and stone.
Our car stopped before some ruins and I was told to get out. I was led through the remains of arches and past short stretches of walls about six feet high until we came to a hole in the ground from which some stone stairs took us into the basement prison of what had once been Gestapo Headquarters. I was booked in much as one is at an hotel, and taken to a cell about eight feet by four, in which there was nothing but a small table, a stool, and a bed folded up against the wall. I had been allowed to take with me my bag of food and other things which I needed for the night; the rest of my luggage remained at the reception desk. I was locked in and for the first time in five and a quarter years, I was alone. I didn’t like the experience, indeed, I felt almost frightened.
There was no light in the cell and only a feeble glimmer through the fanlight over the door from an oil lamp in the passage, nor was the prison heated. The building above us had been bombed and gutted in a raid on 3rd February, and central heating plant, water supply and drainage had been put out of action. Although electric current was available there were no lamp bulbs to replace such as had been broken, of which that in my cell was one. As is so often the case after a fine winter’s day the evening had turned very cold, and although I put on an overcoat and a thick dressing-gown I found it impossible to get warm. I made a meal from the provisions which I had brought with me, refusing the two unappetizing looking slices of bread and scrape which were offered me by a trusty, and accepting only a cup of peppermint tea. Then I decided to go to bed, all standing in the hope that I might find some warmth in sleep. I had only been lying down for a few minutes when a warder came to the door and said, “Don’t undress. The Tommies are on their way, and when the alarm goes you will have to be ready to go to the air-raid shelter.” Soon there were the customary three siren wails of the preliminary alert followed after some minutes by the cacophony of a full-dress alarm. The warder opened the door and told me to follow him. With him was the little Russian with whom I was able, when the warder turned aside, to shake hands for the first time. We had known each other for so long and lived together so much in thought that we really met now as dear friends after a long absence.
We were led along the passage in which was my cell and down some stairs which brought us to another similar row of cells. I was deeply sorry for the people who had to live in them, for the atmosphere at this lower level was absolutely poisonous and smelt like an open cesspool. From here we went through a number of passages whose roofs were heavily buttressed with pit poles, through a kitchen, out into a sort of court, and then by a zig-zag approach into a brightly lit concrete air-raid shelter. This seemed to house a number of offices and was probably the place where the remaining Gestapo officials worked. There was a largish square hall which was apparently open to the general public, for people, amongst them women and children, streamed in from outside. We had to stand in one of the passages leading to the offices where we were joined by Obersturmführer Gogalla, my stout warder friend of 1939. I took the opportunity to complain of my accommodation and of the lack of light and heat. “Don’t blame us,” he said, “it is your people who have done the damage. There are thousands of Berliners who have to live in cellars under the wreckage of their homes, who would be glad to be as well housed as you. You have no idea how horrible life is here. I have lost everything, and my wife went to take refuge with relations in East Prussia which has now been overrun by the Russians, and I have had no more news of her. You will be leaving here tomorrow or the day after and will soon be in more comfortable quarters. Obergruppe
nführer Müller has given orders that you should be well looked after.”
No bombs fell in our neighbourhood and only a few Mosquitoes flew in on this occasion, so the all clear soon sounded and back we went to our cells. Three times that night this programme was repeated, and on one occasion a bomb fell near enough to rock our shelter, and when I got back to my cell I found my bed covered with splinters of glass from the window which had been blown in. In the morning there was a most unpleasant warder on duty who refused to let me out to wash and shave. We had quite a row which ended in my asking to see Obersturmführer Gogalla. The fact that I asked for him by name seemed to impress the warder, who changed his tone and began explaining that water had to be fetched from a stream some distance away, and that until it was brought no one could wash; he promised to let me know as soon as it arrived. It was after ten before I got out, and then I had another squabble before he would let me operate my electric razor from a light plug in the passage. I had a basin of clean water to wash in but was told not to let it run away as it would have to serve for another twenty prisoners. Of the w.c.s, the least said the better; it was merely a selection of the one which seemed slightly less full than the others—altogether, the whole thing was very beastly and not at all what I was used to. Back in my cell I spent a miserable cold day. I was brought some soup, which was just eatable, at noon, and for the rest just sat or lay on my bunk and shivered.
That night there were only two alerts. On one of these occasions when the warder unlocked the door of the cell next to mine a man, dressed in a leather jerkin and very thin-looking grey trousers, rushed out as though he were going to make a dash away from us along the passage. When we came to a better-lighted part of our route I saw that it was the Englishman from No. 45, of whom I had once caught sight as he came from his bath. We were held up on our way to the shelter in one of the passages and had opportunity to exchange a few words. He knew me right enough and told me that he was Squadron-Leader Falconer and that he had been captured three years before in Tunisia; since then he had had no news from home and his people probably thought that he had been shot. I was to see a lot of this gallant officer in the future, and shall always be grateful to him for the loyal way in which he always backed me up.
Generally when I went to the air-raid shelter I saw Gogalla who was always very friendly. He said he was sorry that it had been impossible to evacuate me earlier, but through the bombing everything was at sixes and sevens, and the senior officers were so busy seeking new and safer cover that it was almost impossible to find them. He believed that I was to go south, probably to Dachau, but so far no orders had reached him, and until they did he could do nothing. Next day there were two very pleasant young men on duty, both of whom remembered me from 1939, and welcomed me as an old friend. They were absolutely amazed that I should still be alive as they had been told when we left for Sachsenhausen that both Stevens and I had been beheaded; this had been officially reported in the SS paper Schwartze Korps. They were really very nice to me. One of them found a lamp bulb for my cell, so that at all events I could read, and in the evening they took me into the orderly room, where there was a big stove, so that I was able to have a thorough warm up. I was much amused at the way in which they turned on the B.B.C. ten o’clock news as though this were their regular habit; no secrecy about it and they let me listen in with them. There was another raid before midnight, but after that it was calm and I managed to get quite a good sleep.
The unpleasant warder was on duty again next morning and I had a real set-to with him before I could wash and shave; Gogalla came in shortly after to tell me that I should be leaving that evening so I complained to him about the warder’s behaviour. After that I had no more difficulty, in fact, he became quite friendly and said that he had only been rude because he was so worried about his wife and children, who were in the area overrun by the Russians. I comforted him by telling him that he should not believe the reports of Russian brutality which were only propaganda and the usual Goebbels lies. He cheered up and after that could not do enough for me. I was genuinely sorry for these poor fellows for really, when one got to know them, it was obvious that they were more the victims of circumstance than the brutal sadists which they are commonly pictured to be. Once they felt that I listened to their stories with real sympathy they showed themselves in their true colours.
I know that I shall be classed as pro-German, but really the question of nationality does not enter into it at all. I am afraid that I completely lack the power of seeing people under some classification as Germans or Frenchmen, friends or enemies. They all seem to me to be so much alike once one knows them, and to me most of these Gestapo men were just ordinary German working men who had been put into uniform and taught that blind obedience to orders was a sacred law. It was a curious thing too, but through my long training as a prisoner I had reached a point where I felt completely sure of my ascendancy over these people. I think that it must be a similar conviction which enables a lion tamer to enter a cage of wild animals unscathed—when I look back I am really astounded at the risks which I took without at the time being in any way conscious that I was doing anything dangerous.
We were to have set forth on our further travels at 10 p.m., but there was another alert and it was nearly midnight before a move was made. When I emerged from the ruins I found another prison van waiting, and when I got in I was to my horror and disgust pushed into one of the cages near the entrance and the door was slammed to. The cage was about eighteen inches wide by two feet deep, with a six-inch ledge at the back to act as seat; at face level there was a small square of wire netting. Through this I could see Falconer and the little Russian in the two opposite cages. Both were considerably shorter than I and possibly were able to sit, but my long legs kept me tightly jammed between the front and back partitions and I could make no contact with the seat however much I twisted myself sideways. The idea of a long journey like this filled me with dread.
As soon as we started off though the guards, the same two men I had found so friendly the previous day, opened the door of my cage and I was able to sit on the floor and stretch out my legs. The other two poor fellows remained shut up for the entire journey, and I felt very guilty to be travelling in such comparative comfort; I was even able to get some sleep though every time I dozed off I was soon jolted awake as our van rolled over some scar left by bombs on the smooth surface of the Reichsautobahn. In the back part of the van where there was seating accommodation for eight people, I saw four of my fellow prisoners from Sachsenhausen whom I had already seen in the air-raid shelter at Berlin; they were the lady and gentleman who had occupied cell No. 38 after the Bears had left, the man, said to be a German general, from No. 9, and another lady who only reached the Bunker a few days before I was evacuated. I could not help envying their comparative comfort and tried to induce the guards to allow Falconer, the Russian, and me to join them, but there was nothing doing. The journey seemed interminable, especially as we could see nothing outside and had no idea what progress we were making; actually, I had a strange illusion that the car was travelling in circles.
At last we came to a stop and our guards opened the door and got out. The electric light was turned out and as the door opened fresh air and a gleam of sunlight brought us new life and hope. We were dirty and tired, filled with the wish to get out and go somewhere, anywhere, but for a long time nothing happened. We seemed to be near a concentration camp for a loudspeaker nearby was blaring out orders regarding the formation of working parties, and every now and again there was the sound of men tramping past us in wooden soled boots—a familiar sound to me. As time passed our guards became more and more agitated and both got out and became involved in argument with other voices. From what was said I gathered that our arrival was unheralded, the commandant could not be found, and in any case, there was no room for us. An agitated voice kept repeating: “Ausgeschlossen! Das gibt es nicht. Hier ist überhaupt kein Raum. Ihr müsst halt weiter.” (Impossible! That can’t b
e done. There is absolutely no room here. You will just have to go further.) To which our men protested that they had orders to come here, and that after they had unloaded they must return at once to Berlin.
Naturally we prisoners took advantage of the opportunity to get acquainted. I gave Falconer and the Russian cigarettes and then one of the ladies, the one from No. 38, came up and spoke to us. She was a Mrs. Heberlein who, with her husband, the late German Ambassador in Madrid, had been kidnapped by Gestapo agents whilst staying with relatives in Spain. She was Spanish but her mother was Irish. She told us that the other lady was the wife of General Haider, the late Chief of the German General Staff, and the man a General von Rabenau. The little Russian, Molotov’s nephew, introduced himself as Wassilli Kokorin, flying officer in the Russian Air Force. Gradually we formed an animated group exchanging accounts of our experiences and our guards were by then so bewildered and agitated that they made no efforts to stop our fraternization. Falconer and Kokorin were still penned up in their cages and all that we could do for them was to stick lighted cigarettes through their wire gratings for them to smoke. As Falconer was bankrupt of tobacco I said that he could have about a quarter of a pound of mine which I had with me in a pouch.