The Venlo Incident

by Nigel Jones

  As I left the hotel I ran into Stiller, so seizing the opportunity I said that we should like to have a talk with him and asked him to come up to my room. None of his men were about at the moment and, as we all looked pretty determined, Stiller obviously thought it safer to do as we asked and came upstairs with us like a lamb. Von Bonin had a pistol and we had decided that if Stiller proved difficult he would not leave the room alive. The four of us sat down at a table and I started up: “Herr Obersturmführer, you told me that your orders were to ensure our safety until you were able to hand us over to our advancing troops. Now we have heard a lot of rumours which seem to indicate that you are either unwilling or unable to carry out this intention and that plans are afoot to liquidate the whole lot of us.”

  “No, Herr Best, really, I want to do the best for you—you have nothing to fear from me—Colonel Stevens knows me well and can tell you that I have always treated prisoners well—it is all the fault of Bader—I had a big row with him last night when I told him that I would not allow any of you to be harmed and he threatened to bump me off ‘mich niederzuknallen’. You can count on me to do anything that I can to help, but I can’t do anything with Bader.”

  “Well, you say that you want to help but can’t, so that’s not much good to us, as we most certainly are not going to allow you or anyone else to murder us. We have therefore decided that I shall take over command from you. Do you agree? Can I count on you for loyal co-operation?”

  Stiller received the suggestion with enthusiasm and agreed at once. He said, though, that he could do nothing about Bader and his men and that I would have to fix this up myself. “Bader is a most dangerous man. He belongs to Major Stavisky’s special detachment which does nothing but extermination; he knows that his number is up if he ever falls into the hands of the enemy and thinks that he may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.” I then told Stiller that von Bonin had established contact with General Vietinghof and that we now had the support of a company of Wehrmacht Infantry—if Bader made any difficulty, we would soon settle his hash. I then asked him to do two things. First to tell Bader about our military support and, secondly, to convene a meeting of all the prisoners in our party for twelve o’clock at Hotel Bachmann, so that he could formally hand over to me, to both of which he agreed.

  As von Bonin, Liedig, and I were leaving the hotel we ran into McGrath and ‘Wings’ Day, to whom I told the arrangements which had just been made.

  “Oh, you are hopelessly out of date, Best. It’s all fixed up. Garibaldi is going to stage a rising tonight with his Italian partisans, occupy the village and take all of us up into the mountains.”

  I was absolutely horrified at this suggestion. I had seen something of Garibaldi’s so-called partisans—just a lot of village youths who had tied red scarves round their necks for the occasion, just as a little while back they had probably cried Viva Mussolini! or Heil Hitler! How on earth could they hope to overpower the German troops and occupy the village whilst some 140 men, women and children were roused from their beds and taken to the mountains? I did not at all like to feel that my own plan was in opposition to the wishes of my fellow countrymen, but most certainly I must endeavour to scotch this idea of an armed rising. The hitch came at a most inconvenient moment too, for Bader had still to be dealt with, and until his teeth had been drawn no great reliance could be placed on Stiller’s promise of co-operation. It was then about ten o’clock and the assembly of the whole party of prisoners was to be called for noon, so there was only two hours left in which to get the whole tangle sorted out. To deal with McGrath and Day’s opposition, which received support from Stevens, I decided to invoke the forces of democracy and said that of course I did not want to force my opinions on anyone and suggested that a committee should be formed to decide our course of action.

  We went round to the town hall, where Garibaldi had established himself on the top floor, and got him to agree to the idea of a committee in spite of strong objections voiced by Colonel Ferrero, and it was decided that we should call a meeting in Garibaldi’s quarters at eleven. I then set to work to appoint the committee and in addition to Day, McGrath, Garibaldi, and Ferrero, asked Bonin, Liedig, Canon Neuhausler, Major Stanek, General Papagos, and General Priwalow, one of the Russians, to serve as members.

  Next, I went with von Bonin and Liedig for a conference with the officer sent by von Vietinghof, but found him very nervous and disinclined to take any definite action. After some argument in which von Bonin said that, as his superior officer, he would accept full responsibility, he agreed to allow his men to make a display of force by setting up a couple of machine-guns on the square trained on the SD lorry. Stiller had obviously told Bader about his conversation with us as he and his men were assembled near their lorry and were holding a conclave of their own. Von Bonin and I went up to them and said: “Throw down your arms or else those guns will go off.” To our surprise they obeyed without a murmur and, as fast as they threw their sub-machine-guns out of the. lorry, these were whipped up by Italians with red scarves who only lacked a weapon of some sort to turn them into full-blown partisans. After this was over Bader became quite humble and pleaded with us to use our influence to get him some petrol so that he and his men could move off.

  Then, up we went to the third floor of the town hall and found the rest of the committee assembled. For me everything depended on Garibaldi and on getting him to call off his partisans; I had seen a lot of him while we were both staying at the brothel at Dachau, and I felt pretty sure that he was far too intelligent a man to wish to resort to force if a peaceful solution could be found, and so I concentrated on winning him over to my side. My knowledge of languages gave me a considerable advantage for although Garibaldi, whose mother was English, could speak that language, the Germans and General Priwalow spoke only German, and General Papagos only French, so that I could always tide over awkward moments by engaging in a bit of interpreting. The main trouble came from Colonel Ferrero who absolutely refused even to listen to any suggestion that his uprising should be cancelled, and ultimately, when he saw that I was gaining the support of Garibaldi, flounced out of the room shouting that whatever we might arrange he at all events was going on with the original plan.

  The line I took with Garibaldi was that at the present juncture he must consider matters not as a prisoner desiring release but as an Italian. We were in the Tirol, in a part with a predominantly German population which nevertheless, after the First World War, had been handed over to Italy, and which he, as an Italian, certainly did not wish to see returned to Austria. Supposing he carried on with his plan for an armed rising and anything went wrong, and men such as Blum or Schuschnigg were wounded or killed. Might such an event not possibly weigh the scales against his country when the question of the future of the Tirol came to be decided? I explained what had been arranged with the Wehrmacht and told of the abdication of our jailers. Why resort to violent action when, in my opinion, everything could be arranged without friction? To my great joy Garibaldi agreed with me at once, saying that he was a man of peace and certainly preferred a solution which could be attained without recourse to force. Of course with Garibaldi prepared to call off his show the matter was really settled, but I put the whole question up to the committee and met with no more opposition. Both McGrath and Day said that they had no faith in promises made by Germans, but that possibly I knew best, whilst of the other members only General Papagos said anything. His view was that steps should be taken to get into contact with the International Red Cross at Geneva, and asked whether I would endeavour to have a telegram or wireless message sent to it, and to this, of course, I agreed.

  At noon I found all my fellow prisoners assembled in the café of Hotel Bachmann, and Stiller called out that he was no longer responsible for their safety and that Herr Best would tell them more. Von Bonin and I then climbed on to a table, and he in German and I in English and French told of the arrangements which had been made, and that everyone could now consider himself
a free man. Until we were actually relieved by allied troops though, everyone must be very careful and not move far from their billets. I then told them of arrangements which were being made for our whole party to move up to an hotel in the mountains where we could feel ourselves perfectly safe under the guard and protection of the Wehrmacht. There was a little applause and then a voice from the floor: “I notice from the names given of the members of the committee that France was not represented, and therefore propose that His Highness Prince Xavier de Bourbon should be appointed to the committee to safeguard the interests of France and the French members of our party.” I thought to myself: ‘Good old League of Nations, come to life again,’ but explained politely that when forming my committee I had not thought in terms of nationalities, but had only asked those gentlemen to help who were in a position, owing to their special knowledge or influence, best to serve the interests of all members of our group.

  We had some sort of a midday meal, and then most of the afternoon was filled with discussions with Bonin, Liedig and Ducia. The latter, I found, had known all about the Italian plot, and told me that if it had not been called off he would have mobilized the Standschutzen (Tirolese underground) and would have prevented any attempt by Garibaldi to move us from Niederdorf; he could have called up several hundred men while Garibaldi had less than eighty—we had therefore escaped the danger of outbreak of civil war in the night. Although I had told my fellow prisoners that we were moving up to a hotel, the plan was still very much in the air, and Ducia had to do a lot of running about before it was really fixed up, as the hotel was empty and locked up, and he had to get hold of the proprietress to open it up. Eventually everything was satisfactorily arranged, and it was decided that we should move there next day, and Ducia then set about arranging for transport to take us and our baggage—no easy matter at this stage of the war.

  By the time these matters were settled I was all in, and without bothering about food or anything else went off to bed. The day had not been perfect, but at all events it had at last come to an end.

  CHAPTER X

  THE 30th April, 1945, found us no longer prisoners, but yet not free; we were more in the position of some passengers in an old-time sailing ship crossing the ocean—we had mutinied and removed officers and crew, but did not yet know how our further course was to be set nor who would navigate. None of us had had news from home for many months, nor did those who filled our hearts and our thoughts have any idea where we were or whether we were living or dead. Of what was happening in the world we had only the most sketchy knowledge. We had learnt that the war in Italy was almost at an end, but knew practically nothing about events to our north, or that Berlin was invested, and Hitler near his end. There were 136 persons, men, women, and children, whose ages ranged from four to seventy-three, and who belonged to seventeen different nationalities. We had no money, no food, and no one was now responsible for seeing that we were housed and fed.

  Very few of our group of prisoners ever realized the difficulties of our position, or how grateful they should be to Tony Ducia, his assistant, Dr. Thalhammer, and the people of Niederdorf, who made themselves responsible for our well-being, and without hesitation opened up their secret stocks of hoarded foodstuffs and contributed their last reserves. Remember, these were the last days of the war; all communications were disrupted and this isolated little village in the mountains could hardly hope that fresh supplies would reach it—I know that the inhabitants fully realized the position—and yet, food, wine, and tobacco poured in, and we became the richest and best-fed people for miles around. It was a triumph of organization on the part of Dr. Ducia, and a miracle of generosity on that of the population of Niederdorf.

  For our Tirolese friends, for von Bonin, Liedig, and me, it was a very busy day, as a host of things had to be arranged before our move would be possible. First of all the proprietress of the hotel where it was intended that we should be housed had to be fetched from Brixen. The hotel itself was in the mountains 5,000 feet up and about five miles distant from Niederdorf; it was normally closed during the winter, but had now been shut since the beginning of the war, so that it was certainly unprepared for the reception of guests, and there was some doubt whether our stay there would be feasible. As soon as Frau Emma Heiss, the proprietress, arrived, Ducia and Liedig went up to inspect and brought the news that, although we would have to rough it a bit at first and everyone would have to take a hand in running it, we should be able to make ourselves fairly comfortable whilst, since it could be reached only by a single narrow road, it would be simple to put the place in a state of defence. Ducia’s next problem was to arrange for transport to take us, our luggage, and necessary provisions up —a most difficult task, but one which, with the help of the German town major, he succeeded in solving.

  Meanwhile, von Bonin was busy with the Wehrmacht, arranging for our security as far as could be done with the very slender force at his disposal. Von Bonin telephoned several times to Southern Army Headquarters and received the promise that a front-line infantry company would be sent for our protection and placed under his orders, but at the moment the only concrete evidence we had that we were under army protection was the arrival of two cases containing sixty bottles of Italian brandy and another of Asti; a present from General von Vietinghof. For my part, my task was to try to keep the members of our group from scattering too much, and to encourage those who were inclined to pessimism regarding the future. The first task was most difficult, for the idea of freedom had gone to the heads of the younger members of our party, and they had scattered wide over the whole district and, a far as I could make out, were engaged in scrounging for such delicacies as eggs and anything else to be found in farm larders. The whole neighbourhood was vastly excited by our arrival in their midst, and everyone was delighted to be able to do something for us.

  The morale of all the prisoners was good, except that some of the ladies who had been separated from their young children, and had no idea of their whereabouts, were much aggrieved because I could offer them no hope of being able to communicate with their relatives in Germany. Most of them had been imprisoned long before the disruption of communications even approached its present state, and they could not understand that there were now no postal facilities of any kind available. I did what I could to comfort them, but I was feeling so ill myself that I fear on occasion I gave way to impatience, and to my present regret gave answers which must have seemed rather unfeeling.

  Liedig went up to the hotel early in the afternoon, as we thought it better that when our people went up there they should find rooms reserved for them, just as they would have in peace time. Not only this, but we thought that it would probably be preferable if national groups were as far as possible kept together; there was also another problem—the hotel had been closed for so long that it was doubtful whether it could be adequately heated, especially since it was really only a summer resort. Although there was central heating no one knew whether there was any fuel—when we got there we found that the heating plant had been frozen and consisted of a mass of burst pipes—and, as we had a number of elderly people, some attempt must be made to provide warm rooms for them at least. Two of our ladies, Miss Elisabeth Kaiser and Mrs. Kate Gudzent, went with him, and for the whole of our stay there gave devoted service as our secretarial staff. In the early afternoon a start was made with the transport of our party up to our new sanctuary, women and children first, while von Bonin, Ducia, and I stayed until the last, sorting out all the luggage and other belongings which had been forgotten. We had told Stiller that we had no objection to him and a few of his men coming up with us if they were unarmed, and that we would speak in their favour when our troops reached us. Stiller badly wanted to come, but in the end was too afraid that even now the long arm of the Gestapo might reach him, and decided not to; eleven of his men, however, did come, one of them bringing with him his wife and daughter who had mysteriously made their appearance in Niederdorf.

  When at last I
got up to the hotel I found that everyone had been found satisfactory quarters, and that a start had already been made to prepare something in the way of an evening meal. Mr. and Mrs. Mohr, who seemed to have technical knowledge of the business, had taken charge of the kitchen with the two Dachau trusties, Wouwer and Kohlenklau, as their staff. The younger women and girls were also making themselves useful in the arrangement of rooms, sorting out bedding, etc. Liedig had reserved rooms for us Britishers at one end of the second floor; nice big rooms, but like most, unheated. The first thing, indeed, that struck me when we entered the hotel was the intense cold which was really like that of a refrigerator. We were 5,000 feet up, and the end of April is really too early for such a height; in Niederdorf it had been quite warm, but by the time we got up to the hotel it had begun to snow and from the look of it, we might be in for a heavy fall. On that evening the only rooms which could be warmed were the kitchen and a big room next to it which had apparently been the hotel café, and which became our communal living- and dining-room.

  The name of our new home was, as I only discovered after my arrival, Hotel Prags Wildbad—or, as it is called in Italian, Lago di Braies. It was a big place with over 200 bedrooms, and under normal circumstances, must have been most comfortable; the situation is absolutely perfect, and when I first went into my bedroom and looked out of the window the beauty of the view quite took my breath away. I saw below me a lake of purest emerald, entirely surrounded by pine trees growing at the base of jagged mountain peaks that seemed to shut us in away from the rest of the world; not a ripple moved the face of the water and the indescribable mountain silence, a silence that you seem to hear, filled the pure cold air. I went out on to the balcony, and in spite of the cold, could not for long drag myself away from the loveliness before me—for five and a half years I had been starved of the beauties of the world, and to me scenery is the one thing of which I never grow tired and which, however familiar, always retains its unabated charm.