Battleship Bismarck (63 page)

Instead, the Canadians attacked House V, an officers’ quarters on the other side of House VI. Its occupants had withdrawn into the cellar and barricaded themselves there. The Canadians thereupon decided upon a different tactic. From outside, they used fire hoses to flood the cellar. And as only a few Canadians were needed for this operation, many of them had the unexpected, welcome opportunity to look through the rooms on the ground floor. And there were so many things to discover: beer, cigarettes, German medals, rank badges, cockades, valuable objects of every sort. Stimulated by the beer, they took these “souvenirs” home in their pockets.

In the meanwhile, the water had nearly filled the cellar and done its job; the German officers climbed out, dripping wet, with “hands up,” the way the Canadians had shouted at them to do. Their captors, whom the alcohol had gotten out of control, greeted them with blows, shoves, and kicks, readying a regular gauntlet for the Germans to run, with the aim of avenging the injuries their comrades had received during the conquest of the cook house—it was not a very sporting conclusion to the capitulation of House V. The Canadian camp technical officer, Captain Brent, especially aroused the Germans’ anger. In an absurd victor’s pose, he let his swagger stick dance indiscriminately on the heads of the German officers as they came up.

And thus the first day of the Battle of Bowmanville came to an end. The Canadians sought out the army officers who were on their list from House V and handcuffed them. Yet this was only a portion of the total to be handcuffed and the battle itself was still in no way decided.

The next day, the Canadian camp commandant for the first time proposed a deal to the German camp leader. If all the army officers on the list would voluntarily report to be handcuffed, some of the officers from House V who were being held outside the camp as security could return to their quarters. Yet Captain Brent’s swagger stick had left bad blood. To their “Nein” to the Canadian’s proposal, the Germans joined the recommendation that the captain had better not let himself be seen near them again. And insofar as the other army officers were concerned, the Canadians could haul them out for themselves. The situation remained at this stalemate, even after the visit of a representative of the Swiss protecting power, who rushed to the scene from Ottawa. The latter’s attempts at mediation also failed, for by now passions were running high.

Under the circumstances, it was only a question of time until “war” would resume. First, however, the Canadians had to bring in reinforcements from another garrison to make up for the personnel losses they had suffered through injuries. In their absence, the second day of the battle would have passed uneventfully—had it not been for the fact that Captain Brent deemed it necessary to disregard the Germans’ warning and inspect the camp. Of course, he had to view the damage to the buildings. Naturally, his swagger stick was not forgotten and his movements were closely watched by the Germans. And at a suitable point, out of the field of vision of the nearest guard tower, the fist of a German officer laid him low—“This, Captain, is for your swagger stick!” Surrounded by a group of Germans, Brent was bound with ropes and paraded through the camp. But this was too much for the guards in the towers and they fired live rounds. Sand spurted up near the edge of the still-intact group. Now, however, there was nothing for it but back into the building, with bullets striking close behind. In the end, one German was tagged. Three shots had already hit near him, in the building’s window frames and masonry work. Before he could vanish inside came the fourth, right through the thigh. Admission to the hospital withdrew him from the struggle. The Veteran Guards now freed Captain Brent from his bonds. And for him the incident was now all over. In succeeding days he showed no desire for further retribution.

The third day of the Battle of Bowmanville would be decisive in the Handcuff War. An active Canadian battalion appeared, turned in its ammunition, as before, readied itself for the assault, helmets on, with bayonets and baseball bats, as usual. Three buildings had still to be stormed, Numbers I, II, and IV. Soon the struggle broke out around them. Barricaded they had been for days, with tables and beds upended against doors and windows; and behind them the defenders, pillows tied on their heads for lack of helmets, bearing as small arms fire axes and tent stakes, as projectiles jars of marmalade. Where the Canadians could not break through the doors and windows, they climbed to the roofs, cut holes in them, and dropped through into hand-to-hand combat; it was a marvelous brawl. Stones, jars, vases flew, water spurted from fire hoses, bayonets stabbed, wooden clubs struck bodies, indiscriminately, blood flowed, unconscious men lay all around, flooded cupboards spit their water back out, glass splintered and tinkled.

Inevitably, the Canadians emerged the victors. “Wasn’t it a wonderful fight?”

The German officer, wounded by a bayonet, looked up at the Canadian who had posed the question. He saw only a single eye in a red waste that once had been a face. “It was quite all right,” he replied.

The total wounded of the “Battle of Bowmanville” numbered forty-four German prisoners and thirty-eight Canadians.

Even though in the end we lost, we had at least shown our spirit and made the handcuffing of our army comrades not so easy. And this turned out not to be so bad, after all. The ritual required those concerned to appear in the morning to have handcuffs put on and in the evening to have them removed. And so they did. Except that, with the resourcefulness that prisoners of war cultivated, they quickly discovered how they could remove them for themselves: for example, slide the handcuffs’ connecting chain along the edge of an iron bedstead, give a gentle twist of the wrist, a strong tug, and the chain sprang apart. This procedure caught on and soon the Canadians had to use another type of handcuff. But these, too, could be slipped off and lay around uselessly all day long. In the evening they were fastened on again in time to be officially removed.

In the meanwhile, efforts to negotiate an end to the Handcuff War were keeping the international wires hot. The belligerents involved, their protecting powers, and the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Carl J. Burckhardt, made one proposal after another, to no avail. Finally, on 12 December, the British lifted the
handcuff order. Thus the handcuffing era at Bowmanville ended at 1300 on 12 December. However, the German government for its part held stubbornly to the handcuffing of the originally selected British prisoners of war. And it would be a long time until it declared its readiness to reach a similar understanding with Burckhardt. At last, on 20 November 1943, Reich Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop consented to the ending of the handcuffing episode on the German side, under the prerequisite of strict discretion: German prestige must not suffer in consequence!

In Bowmanville the Handcuff War had a bureaucratic epilogue. The Canadians charged the Germans damages for the government property destroyed in the “battle.” They wrote the German camp leadership: “$80,000 from you, payable from the current allowances of the officers.” The Germans countered: “And from you $80,000 for damages to German property and ‘missing souvenirs.’” This went on, back and forth, for a while. In the end, both sides renounced all financial claims from the Battle of Bowmanville, ratifying the agreement with all due formalities.

For the time being what remained were holes in windows and doors, traces of the battle of past days. Icy Canadian winter storms blew into the quarters, driving snow onto tables and beds. We patched things up the best we could. But the major repairs could be accomplished only by the Canadian camp administration. It did so, if more than slowly. Not until the spring of 1943 were the last damages resulting from the Battle of Bowmanville made good.

In the meanwhile, suddenly and without a transition period, the sunny autumn weather that still prevailed in the days of the Battle of Bowmanville had come to an end. As fitting for a Canadian winter, our camp was soon buried in snow. Outdoor activities gave way to occupations in our quarters, to instruction and studies.

Contributing to this was the fact that the year 1942 did not appear to have brought a decision in the German campaign in Russia or an end to the war any closer. All estimates of the length of our captivity were lost in uncertainty. It was therefore no wonder that more and more officers devoted themselves to studies of long duration and that new study-and interest-groups took form. Besides our law we soon had an economics “faculty.” Other subjects also found their fanciers: mathematics, medicine, botany, history, philosophy, foreign languages and literature, music, graphology and shorthand, to name only a few. Such tendencies increased from then on and a year later, in the winter of 1943–44, the German camp leadership directed every
occupant of the camp to take part in a winter study group or else to submit an independently prepared academic treatment of a subject of one’s own choosing the following spring.

I restricted myself to my law studies, which sufficed to fill my days, but soon added shorthand to them. The reason was to be able to write faster during lectures. Later, interested linguistically, I also learned English stenography, the so-called Pitman System. This phonetically constructed method rewarded me with the additional advantage of perfect instruction in pronunciation. For the reproduction of an English word according to Pitman also indicates its correct pronunciation. And thereby one can correct himself in individual cases.

All of this did not detract from our athletic activities; quite the contrary. In the big gymnasium men did acrobatics on the equipment, climbed ropes, bounced on trampolines, performed gymnastics with and without medicine balls, and played fast-paced basketball. What a sweat that can work up! In an adjoining building was the heated swimming hall, with shower room, ready for use all day long. Swimming competitions were held from time to time. Outside the courts used for tennis during warm weather were converted for ice sports and carefully kept in condition for them. A vigorous hockey game was the rule, but a place was reserved for figure skaters. To be on the ice on a still, sunny day with a temperature of minus 5°C—truly heavenly! We could also skate at night under artificial illumination. Skiers made long runs over the hilly terrain outside the camp; there were even little slopes. Indeed, we could keep ourselves in good condition, physically and mentally, at the Bowmanville camp. There were scarcely grounds to complain over the living conditions.

Through the intercession of our international patrons, our intellectual life was soon enriched by weeks’-long lecture series and individual presentations by foreign guest professors. They came mostly from the university at Toronto, only sixty kilometers away. Their subjects: “The American Revolution,” “The Constitution and History of the U.S.A. from 1800 to 1850,” “Characteristics of French Canada,” “Indians of Canada,” “History of Canadian Transportation,” “The English Novel from Defoe to Dickens,” “Great English Authors.” After the lectures there was sometimes an opportunity to ask questions.

Participation in these events was generally lively; I attended nearly all of them, then enjoyed reading up for myself on the subjects treated. If we were rich in anything, it was time. Yet no other professor left so deep and long-lasting an impression on me as Professor D.
J. McDougall, an historian at the University of Toronto who had been blinded in the First World War. His knowledge was immense and profound; when he spoke, man and message were the same. He lectured, not only at Bowmanville but at other camps as well, on “Characteristics of the British Constitution and its Reforms in the Nineteenth Century,” “The British Government and the Cabinet System,” “The Labor Party,” “Cromwell and the Problem of Military Dictatorship,” “British Rule in India,” “Constitutional Principles of the Commonwealth”—all viewed from the perspective of a constitutional historian and sociologist. Time and again he cited what he perceived as the fundamental principle of government: “That which concerns all should be determined by all”; I told myself that as long as I lived I would never forget this theorem, so far removed from the reality of the Reich, where such constitutional postulates had been extinguished, at the latest, by the public book burning of 10 May 1933.

McDougall always closed his presentations with an hour for questions and increasingly lively discussion. It was on such an occasion that in private conversation with Franz Schad, McDougall made respectful mention of the German historian Franz Schnabel. He knew many of the works of this native of Mannheim, above all of course, his
Deutsche Geschichte im 19. Jahrhundert
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esteemed the liberal traditions of western Germany alive in the author of these works, his firm support of the Weimar Republic, his early independence of historical judgment. It had fascinated him that Schnabel wrote German history, not in purely national terms, but in a European context—Germany as a European nation, before the background of European events. Sooner than many historians on the North American continent, McDougall had recognized Schnabel’s wisdom and political maturity and regarded him as a man of the stature of Leopold von Ranke, the nineteenth-century German historian who is regarded as the founder of modern historical methodology. The deeply humanistic way of thought evident throughout Schnabel’s works had made a strong impression on McDougall the humanist, just as had the accuracy with which Schnabel described and evaluated English historical phenomena on McDougall the Anglo-Saxon. That Schnabel’s fears for the freedom of the individual in the approaching age of the masses had not met the approval of the Brown authorities, that indeed his “whole direction” led in 1936 to his dismissal from the position of
full professor at the Technical College in Karlsruhe, raised him still higher in McDougall’s eyes. He believed that through his works Schnabel had saved the honor of German historians. Schnabel’s tenets were also his: “The true value of the past can temporarily be obscured, but never destroyed. For whoever lives must die; but the great bearers of the German state and the German spirit have done more than merely live; in the 19th century, too, they have concerned themselves with eternal values.”
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