Brothers Beyond Blood (7 page)

After a long day riding in the truck with several wounded soldiers, we came to a small town. I don’t remember the name. Many of the buildings had been bombed and the American Army officers had taken over what was left of the Rathaus, or city hall. I assisted the wounded soldiers to their medical tent, and then went looking for an officer.

I found an officer with gold leaf-shaped pins on his collars. “Excuse. Please, sir.” I tapped him on the arm. He was just standing with his hands on his hips, surveying the rubble. This officer had dirty trousers tucked into his boots, a short jacket and a helmet with a red star in the front.

“Yeah, what?” he muttered without looking at me.

I tapped him again, tugging on his sleeve. “Sir, I need information, please.” He was taller than me and outweighed me by at least fifty kilos. I held my pass under his nose.

“Eh? What’s this?” He snatched it and read it quickly. In a second he thrust it back in my hand. “What can I do for you, kid?”

“Sir, I need ride in vehicle.”

“Yeah, sure, don’t we all? Where do you want to go, kid? New York?”

I frowned. New York? Why would I want to go to New York? “No sir, south. Near Austria. There is a camp there called Landesberg.” Now I had to lie to this man. “I think it is for
Landsmannschaft, sir.” I had to find Hans, and if I had to lie, I would do it. I felt bad. In fact, I felt terrible, but if I told him that I was going to try to locate a guard from a death camp, he would have me locked up.

“Landenshafter? What’s that, kid?”

“It is a camp for refugees, sir. The word means displaced persons.” I thought fast. “I think my brother may be there. He is all I have left in the world.”

“Yeah? Too bad. We’re still fightin’ a war.”

Ach, was this where my search would end? I could not give up yet. “Please, sir, don’t you have a Red Cross vehicle going south or a supply truck? I will ride in the rear or even on top.”

He eyed me from under his helmet. “You wanna get to this here DP camp pretty bad, eh, kid?” He extracted half of a cigar from his breast pocket and lit it with silver lighter. In a moment he moved it to a corner of his mouth.

“Yes, sir. My brother may be there.” I felt bad lying to this officer, but maybe I wasn’t lying. My brother Isaac could be in that camp. He could still be alive.

“O.K., I’ll tell you what. We’ve got some ambulances heading south in a couple of hours with wounded. The Army has a hospital set up in Augsburg. That’s as close as I can get you. It’s about ten or fifteen miles from that camp. You know the camp you’re heading for was a concentration camp, don’t you? How do you feel about that?”

I shrugged, “I have come from Kefferstadt, sir.”

He said nothing, just looked appraisingly at me, frowning.

I felt he deserved more. “It was an extermination camp. There were fewer than one hundred of us left when the Americans came.”

The officer put a hand on my shoulder, “I’m sorry, kid. It’s a screwed-up world.”

“Yes sir.” What else could I add? Even I knew what he alluded to.

“You see that medical tent there, kid?” He pointed to the large khaki tent with the huge red crosses on fields of white painted on the canvas. I had helped take the wounded soldiers there. It was a very busy place. Though the German soldiers were nearing their end, what fighting that was still going on was fierce.

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, you be in front of it at,” he looked at a large wrist watch, “fifteen hundred hours. That’s three o’clock for you civilians, okay?”

Since the war had started, we Germans had kept the twenty-four hour time.

“I’ll see you get a ride out of here. If I’m not there, just tell them that Major McReady said it was okay.” With one last squeeze on my shoulder, he pushed by me and strode into the Rathaus.

This would probably be my last ride. I went off to find some food and something to drink. A dining tent had been set up for the medical personnel, and I walked into it. Of course I used Major McReady’s name and got a heaping plate of some kind of pinkish meat, mashed potatoes and some green beans from a long serving table heaped with food. Against the side wall of the tent was a table holding a large silver container full of coffee and thick mugs. I was in heaven. All this food would have fed everyone in our camp for a week.

At the appointed hour I stood before the medical tent, two apples in my pockets. The Major spoke with a thin redheaded man with the now familiar Red Cross armband, and I was motioned to the rear of an ambulance. The Major shook my hand and wished me luck.

Inside the truck were four soldiers on litters. Two had no legs, just bloodstained bandages. One was swaddled in bandages from his chest to the top of his head and the fourth had a shiny cream on what was left of his burned face. His hands were tied to the sides of the litter, probably to keep him from scratching at the wounds. He moaned incessantly. I should have been horrified, but after what I’d been through at Kefferstadt, I think I was immune to human suffering. What did that make me?

The countryside was a combination of blasted holes, toppled and burned trees and peaceful farm country. The small villages were fairly normal but the larger towns had been bombed and attacked by heavy artillery. I saw a few bodies, and, in one town, a man’s corpse hanging from a street sign. In another town I saw several women being herded by a mob and pelted with stones. Their heads were shaved and their clothes torn. I heard one man yell, “Collaborator!” In almost every village and small city, American soldiers wearing armbands with the letters MP on them were acting as police, traffic controllers and generally bivouacking troops, usually in the largest and fanciest houses. To the victors belong the spoils. I would never know. I had never lived in a Germany that had won a war. The only spoils I ever saw my good German neighbors making off with were the possessions and property of the Jews.

Late the next afternoon, after getting two more rides, I stood in front of the gates of the DP camp at Landesburg. Across a wide road and dirt field, I saw the barbed wire and gates of the guards’ camp. It looked remarkably like my old home, Kefferstadt. After all, it had previously been a concentration camp.

The DP camp was very busy, and all sorts of people were coming and going. While I stood before the gate, a truck pulled up and several men in black and white striped camp suits like I had worn were helped out. Their heads were shaved; they were gaunt and weak. They looked like I had, like scarecrows.

Two civilian women rushed out and told the truck drivers where to take the men. A large, tent sat inside the gate to the right. It was obviously the medical clinic. There were large red crosses painted on the roof to discourage aircraft from bombing it, either Allied or German, though I doubt that there were many Luftwaffe airplanes still flying.

As I started across the road, a motorcycle came roaring toward me. It sounded inordinately loud. A German soldier sat astride it, waving a grenade over his head. It was one of the can-shaped ones with a handle sticking out the bottom, a Model 24
Stielhandgranat
e
. I knew it was filled with steel and iron scrap. He was shouting something, but I could not make out what he was saying over the roar of the motor.

The cycle hit me a glancing blow as I tried to avoid it, but I managed to deflect his arm and the grenade sailed over my head and rolled under an empty nearby truck. I covered my head and dropped to the pavement. I looked out of the corner of my eye, and saw the rider throw up his arms and fall backwards off the wildly swerving cycle. I thought I heard shots. Absently, I noted that it was a German military BMW R75 cycle, dark gray in color with white letters painted on the petrol tank.

Just then, the grenade exploded. A great blast of hot air flipped me over and drove me backward. I saw the truck heave upward and then fall slowly onto its side, the canvas aflame and petrol spilling out. I knew it was about to explode. At the same time I was peppered by numerous particles. That was the last thing I remembered.

We heard the blast that came from the front gate and ran in that direction. I bumped into Karl on the way and he gasped, “What has happened?” We ran. “Is it an air strike?”

“I do not know, Karl.” A glance at Heinrich only brought forth a shrug.

Along the gate, several guards were facing us with rifles at the ready, nervously looking over their shoulders. About fifty of us crowded the fence, trying to see the street and what was happening. A cloud of smoke hovered above the street, partially obscuring a large truck lying on its side. Soldiers and civilians swarmed around a man laying in the street and, farther up to our left a motorcycle was smashed against a utility pole. I saw a German helmet still rocking in the dirt by the side of the road.

Several more men ran up and loaded the fallen man onto a stretcher. I couldn’t see very well, but they were treating him as if he were still alive. I wondered what had happened.

“Do you think it was a bomb in the truck?” asked Karl.

“I do not believe so,” I replied. “It looks like something happened with a soldier of the Fatherland involved.” I looked around and called, “Does anyone here speak any English?”

A boy stepped near me and said, “Yah, I speak some. I spent one year going to school in London.”

“Gut. Ask one of the soldiers what has happened, bitte.” I grasped him by the arm and pulled him before me. He looked daunted as an older soldier shouted something at him, and he tried to pull back. I held onto his arm and urged him again, “Ask him.”

“Please, sir, what took place here? Was someone killed?”

The soldier poked the rifle at us and shouted, “Some Nazi son-of-a-bitch tried to blow up the DP camp. They got him though, shot him right off the goddamn cycle!” He grinned and poked again with the rifle, “You boys git on back there a ways.”

My friend asked, “Was it the soldier they were carrying on the litter?”

“Naw, it was some civilian who got knocked down by the cycle and probably got blowed up by the grenade. The guy ridin’ the cycle is dead. I saw them put a blanket over him.” He squinted at us, “Why? Was he a friend of your’n? Did you guys know he was comin’? Maybe to break you fellas out?”

“Oh, no, sir. We just hoped it was not an air strike.”

My new friend said his name was Josef Kreisher. Karl, Heinrich and I introduced ourselves and we moved off to a corner of the compound where we squatted in the dirt while Josef explained to us what the guard had said.

Behind my back I heard one of the other prisoners say, “I wish it had been an air strike and obliterated that nest of vermin across the road.” He spat in the dust. I looked at him, a sergeant major. “What are you looking at, young swine? Do you know what they are going to do to us, all of us?” He stuck his tongue out and tilted his head to the side, holding a hand over his head. “They are going to hang us.” He spat again and walked off with two other sergeants.

I gulped and looked from Karl to Josef.

“Do you really think they will hang us, Hans?” asked Heinrich.

I shrugged. “I do not know.” I contemplated this for a long moment, and then said, “Would you, if you knew what was done in our camps?”

Everyone fell silent after that comment.

After looking around furtively, Josef whispered, “You must be very careful with what you say around some of the older guards, my friends. Remember, they are very committed to the Fatherland and to the Fuehrer. Being captured is a blow to their pride and they look down at any of us who were just, um, there?”

“But the war is over, or nearly so. What good does it do to continue to support the party?” I asked, befuddled. That some men would like to continue to obliterate Jews was something that had not occurred to me.

Josef leaned forward again and spoke slowly, “There is a faction, at least in our camp, who took an oath to continue to uphold the Reich after the war is over. These men swore that they would infiltrate the postwar government, if the Allies even let us form a government, and keep the spirit of the Third Reich alive.”

Karl just shook his head, “But to what end? They have rid Germany of the Jews, the Gypsies, the homosexuals. Who is left to attract their anger?”

Josef just shrugged, “Do not worry. They will find some new group to blame for all our troubles. If it could only be the Gestapo or the SS or even the military.”

I sighed. Would this foolishness never stop? Millions and millions dead from this insane war and some want it to continue. I have to get away from this place, away from Germany. I looked at the tall fence and the guards patrolling the perimeter. Impossible. I guess that is why none of our prisoners have escaped.

Oh Herschel, where are you now? If they are going to hang me soon, now is when I need you most.

Chapter 14 - Herschel’s Story         

I opened my eyes and looked up at raw wood rafters. Was I still at Kefferstadt? My head ached and the rafters blurred. I tried moving my extremities. My left toes were all right, but my leg wouldn’t bend. All my fingers wiggled and my arm muscles tensed but my right arm ached. What had happened? Where was I?

A face hove into view. A woman looked at me and smiled. “Finally awake, sleepyhead?” she asked in curiously accented German.

“What happened? Who are you?”

She smiled warmly. “I am Sofie, a nurse here. And you are going to be up in no time.” She patted my hand and sat on the edge of the narrow bed. Her fine brow furrowed, and I saw small flecks of gold in her hazel eyes.

“What happened to me, Miss Sophie?”

“You knocked a grenade out of a crazy man’s hand. Unfortunately, you were too close to it when it exploded.”

“What is the extent of my injuries? Will I be disabled?” I was in a panic. Sixteen years old and my life was over.

“Oh, nein,” she chuckled. “You are a strong young man and will heal rapidly, and of course, we need the bed for much more seriously injured patients, yes?”

“But my leg. I cannot bend it. Is it broken?” I tried again to flex the knee. I could feel it, but it wouldn’t bend. I tried again, this time harder. A jolt of pain shot up to my hip.

“No, not broken. It was dislocated and you have a bad gash on it. We have sewn up the cut and strapped your leg to a board to give it a rest. In two or three days you will be hobbling around on it. I have asked some men nurses to carry you to a tent in the nearby camp. I will look in on you, and we will send you some food each day until you are able to come to the mess tent by yourself.” She patted my hand and said, “You are in a hospital, just down the road from the camps. The American military moved us into an empty warehouse building until we can get one built in the camp.”

Sofie touched my leg through the sheet and smiled again, “You know, you are something of a hero, young man. If the German soldier had made it through our gate and detonated the grenade, we would all most likely be dead. For all of us I would like to say thank you, young Herschel.”

“You know my name, Sofie? How?”

“In your trousers was a scrap of paper from an American doctor asking other American soldiers to assist you.” She frowned and gripped my hand. “You were in Kefferstadt. We heard of it. I am so sorry. Why did you come here? So far.”

Ach, I have to tell another lie. I befoul myself. “I hoped my brother Hans would be here.” Why did I say Hans and not Isaac? Isaac, my real brother, I had not heard of or seen for more than three years. I had trouble picturing his face, but Hans’ face I knew, I saw clearly. His close cut straw colored hair, blue eyes and funny nose with the small bump on it. Just a boy like myself really and not far, just across the roadway. How was I to get him free?

Sofie nodded, her lower lip between her teeth. “Perhaps. The camp grows bigger every day. There are more than one thousand here now and more are arriving. When you are better, go see Maria at the registration tent. She will have a list of guests.”

“Guests?” I snickered. Sounds like the camps. “Are there more of the prisoners coming here?”

“Yes,” she replied with a sigh. “We never expected so many. The Americans are raising tents, and then will be building barracks as quickly as possible. They are gathering the former prisoners, those who wish, of course, from all over this part of Germany and Austria.”

“Gut. So, many have survived? How is that possible? Do they know how many were executed?”

Sofie hung her head and I could see tears slide down her weary face. In an almost inaudible voice, she whispered, “Millions. The last I heard was more than five million.”

“Mein Got, so many.” I was quiet for a long minute.

“So there were several camps?” I was curious. I thought perhaps that the main camp at Dachau and our camp were the only ones.

She laid a hand on my arm gently. “Reports are still coming in but we have had reports of more that ten thousand camps all over Germany, Poland and, in fact, all of the occupied countries.” She shook her head wearily, “I fear they will find more. You know how precise and accurate we Germans are.”

“Am I the last Jew in Germany?” I asked in a small voice.

“Nein, Herschel. There are many survivors here. I am so ashamed of my countrymen.”

“Then you are Deutsch? From where?” I was curious about this woman. She was older than me, but only maybe ten years. Her hair was a dull blonde. She was strongly built, like my mother. She wore a wrinkled khaki blouse and a dark skirt and no jewelry that I could see.

“I moved to America with my parents when I was a girl. My father was in the export business. I worked for the American Red Cross and when I heard about,” here she hesitated, searching for the correct word, “the atrocities, I insisted on coming back to help.”

Alone? No family? “A husband?” I asked quietly.

She wiped a hand across her eyes, smearing the tears. “My husband is dead,” she said. “He was a sailor. His ship was torpedoed. One year ago.” Abruptly she stood and searched her pockets for a handkerchief. “I will look in on you tomorrow, Herschel.” With that, she spun on her heel and left me.

The war. This war. Everyone has a story. Everyone is surrounded by tragedy and death. And it was all due to that damn fool, the Fuehrer, Adolph Hitler. I lay back and pulled the blanket over my head.

From the next bed came a voice, “Go on, hide under there. I will guard you."

I jerked the cover down and sat up, furious, “And who are you, swine, to listen in to my conversation?”

He grinned and replied, “I am Mendel.”

“Mendel? Mendel what? What is your family name?”

He kept grinning, though it was more forced now. “No family. All gone. My new last name is Israel, for that is where I am going. To Israel, Canaan, Palestine, call it what you will. As soon as I am able.” He flung back the blanket and pointed to his leg, or where his left leg used to be. It was gone from just above the knee. A clean bandage covered the stump.

“I will walk soon. They told me the people here will make me a new leg. I will become a pirate perhaps?” And he lay back laughing.

When he stopped, I asked, “Where did you lose the leg, Mendel? In one of the camps?”

“No,” he replied. “In the forest, fighting the Nazis. I was shot, and the wound became infected. The Amis came, and I was sent here. So, I am Mendel and you are Herschel, eh? The hero?” He laughed his infectious laugh again. “The war is nearly over, Herschel. Why don’t you come to Israel with me? We can both be heroes!”

Just what I wanted to be, a hero. “No, Mendel, not quite yet. I am searching for my brother, Hans. Perhaps when I find him, we will both go to Israel.” I lay back wondering how I would free Hans.

Mendel turned on his side toward me and spoke, “We will build a great nation in Palestine, Herschel. Someday I will be the president or Prime Minister or Fuehrer or whatever they will call him. Maybe king?”

Now I laughed, “Yes, King Mendel the First. And I will be Prince Herschel!” This game playing, though fun, was tiring. I gave Mendel a wave and drifted off to sleep.

When next I woke, an elderly rail-thin man was sitting by my bed. He wore a patchwork skullcap and had the beginnings of a scraggly gray beard. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and recognized him from my camp. He was the other Rabbi. I tried to remember his name. I used to just call him ‘Rabbi’. He was from Warsaw, I think.

“Horowitz,” he said. “And you are Herschel. How are you feeling, young man?”

My brow must have been furrowed or he could read my mind. “They tell me I’m going to be all right, Reb Horowitz. And how are you?”

“Gut, gut. Clean clothes. Plenty to eat,” he fingered his clean shirt and smiled a weary smile. “Not much kosher, but…?” He shrugged as if it were not important. “Soon you will be moved to a tent where I am in residence. I assured the lovely Sofie that I would look after you until you were walking again. Is that all right with you, young man?”

I shrugged and assured him that this was fine with me. I gestured to Mendel who was now fast asleep, “Can we bring Mendel too?”

The Rabbi shrugged, “I have no issue with that. If they will let him go, he is welcome.”