KRIEG (War) Page 4

  “You damned dogs!” screamed Ernst. Another shot. There was some kind of noise behind me. I struck again, but this time weakly.

  “Split the door!” called someone.

  I turned the ax over. A number of shots rang out. One shot was very close to my head so that it sang in my ears. I swung. The ax set well, but the door was very strong. I forced the ax out of the wood. Shots!

  “Over there!” screamed Ernst, and ran with a number of others from the passageway toward the factory. I didn’t turn around, but continued to strike the door. The rifle fire became heavier. It appeared to me also that shrapnel was coming in.

  “Give it to me!” said someone behind me. I gave him the ax. At the moment there was no fire in our direction. I could see nothing of Ernst.

  “Push!” called the other guy. We leaned into the door, which already had a tear. It cracked and opened. I reached for my rifle and ran inside. In the corridor stood a man and a woman with raised hands who were blocking the way.

  “Get out of the way!” I yelled. I pushed the man aside and walked up the stairs. I jerked open a door. Two children stood inside trembling. I didn’t have any time for them. More men came running after me. I went to a window. There lay the factory. However, fruit trees partially obscured it. To the left lay some men behind a grass-covered wall who fired at the factory. That must be Ernst.

  “Occupy all windows!” I yelled. “Those cursed trees!” I ran out. In their fear the children ran right in my way. I jerked open the next door.

  “Over here!” I called to two men, who were coming up the stairs. “Shoot at anything that shows itself in the factory!” These people were all so slow!

  I walked downstairs. The man and woman were still standing with their hands in the air and looked at me expressionless. I walked down to the windows that looked out on the factory. Here the trees didn’t disturb the view as much. There was firing from the upstairs windows.

  Over at the wall I saw Ernst stand up and walk back toward us. Two men followed him. However, there were more over there. How many I couldn’t tell. I went to the door.

  “Damned rabble!” screamed Ernst. “If we get them they will be shown no mercy!” He was out of breath and panting with rage.

  The other two came running up, one with a shot-up helmet. He took it off. Blood ran out, over his forehead, down the right side of his nose toward his mouth. He stuck his tongue out and licked it up. “Take a look and see what it is!” He bent his head down. The hair was caked with blood in a short line.

  “It’s just a graze,” said Ernst. “It doesn’t appear to me to be too bad,” he laughed.

  “Herr Feldwebel!” said someone. “There appears to be an entrance to a cellar here.” He pointed to a square board in the floor. The man and woman watched and still held their hands up.

  I pulled the hatch up by the small, iron ring. There were narrow steps going down. Ernst said something to the man. He walked away and came back with a candle.

  Ernst and another man climbed down. I suddenly remembered the wounded along the earthen wall. I struggled inwardly with rage at my helplessness.

  A civilian climbed from the hole with a malicious smile on his face. I had a bad feeling about him. He turned around and looked sneeringly at the man and woman with the raised hands—Ah, this is all so ghastly! Why has no one told them that they should take their hands down?

  Ernst came up and held up a pack of bullets to the smiling man. He shrugged his shoulders and said something. Ernst deliberated with both of the men. The man from the cellar answered only with a sneering grin. The other one moved his hands from forehead to heart and in the meantime kept raising his arms above his head. My fear grew.

  “It’s no use here!” said Ernst suddenly in German. “They will be shot under martial law!” That’s what I had been dreading, but now suddenly I was completely calm.

  “Excuse me, Herr Feldwebel!” I said and wondered at my calm. “That may be according to martial law, but would it not be better to tell them if they go over and carry in the wounded the problem will be taken care of?—There are probably still wounded on the street, also. And the Belgians certainly won’t shoot at their own countrymen.”

  Ernst looked at me thoughtfully. “They certainly haven’t earned it!” He turned to the men, who had apparently been tensely following our conversation by all appearances without being able to understand any part of it.

  Ernst sent them away and placed a man at the door with the instruction to shoot immediately if they made an attempt to escape. I went to the woman and motioned for her to take her arms down. She did it. But someone came through a door and she, trembling, raised her arms again.

  “The dogs!” growled the guard at the door. “Take care!” he yelled over to them and raised his rifle. I looked behind him outside. “That gang!” he reviled, “they are letting that wounded man’s legs drag on the ground! But now they are taking better notice.”

  The house was small for so many people. Outside artillery screamed and thundered. The Belgians carried the wounded into the next room and went out again.

  I climbed the stairs in order to look across the Maas at the other shore. The river appeared calm in the sunshine. It must already be the afternoon. I pulled out my watch. It had stopped. Yes, I had not slept during the past night and so had forgotten to wind it.

  After a while I went back downstairs. The man from the cellar had a bandage on his arm and swore softly. Now he didn’t laugh anymore and appeared strong and serious. Through the open window I could see the dead lying. There lay Zache with waxen face and hands that appeared like wood.

  “Herr Feldwebel,” I said. “Can I go back across to the others?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Here, have some Schnapps.”

  I drank it down. I wondered that he was so affable. In garrison he had always been so unapproachable.

  On the other side nothing had changed. I went upstairs. Ziesche and the others greeted me in friendly fashion. I sat down on a chair in the corner. It was good that none of them noticed anything. Around me they were all busy, but I had no idea what they did. My head felt about to burst. There was a roaring in my ears.

  I have no idea how long I sat like that. Someone took me by the hand. Perle led me to the table. They had fried dumplings in fat and also had bread and coffee. I ate silently, bent forward so that no one could see my face. I noticed that Lamm looked at me often, as if he wanted to say something encouraging. I looked up and wanted to ward it off. But as I saw his eyes and saw that they were friendly the floor began to spin under me. I lay across the table and cried. Perle stroked my shoulders. If they all just wouldn’t worry about me so.

  Half consciously I noticed that Perle came in. He must have gone out somewhere. He brought his rucksack. I wasn’t capable of watching what they did. After a while he took me by the arm and laid me on the floor with the rucksack under my back and his coat as a cover.

  I thought from somewhere far away: Is it all right for me to do this during a battle? However, it was too far away.

  ——————————

  I was awakened by Perle kneeling by me wanting to pour coffee into me.

  “Boy, do you look dirty!” I said.

  He laughed and said: “I put out a fire upstairs.” He pointed with his thumb toward the ceiling.

  I stood up and sat at the table. I was wonderfully refreshed. I had known instantly when I woke up all that had happened and now it was different. The happenings had retreated far into the background. I felt wonderfully pure and light like a child.

  Outside it had become still. Only in the house could I hear speaking and moving about. Soon afterward the order came to assemble on the right. It was already getting dark. The street was full of marching people and vehicles. Here and there houses burned, especially on the other shore. Over there before the glowing windows columns moved toward the right and appeared unnaturally large. Up the heights walked wide lines of riflemen. We had won.

  The comp
any assembled in a small wood and was supposed to stay there until we could be ferried across. Our brigade commander, General Hanne, sat on the street with the chair back between his legs and his chin resting on it staring into the flames of a burning house.

  I sat down on a narrow meadow path beside Lamm. It got darker and darker.

  Across the way a melted rain gutter fell into the street. A damp wind blew sparks across the peacefully flowing Maas, which appeared curiously gray like a snake. Further along where it turned to the left the conflagration made it into a stream of fire.

  “I had thought,” said Lamm, “that in war one would become hard. Are you so disgustingly soft also?” He stood up, somewhat unsteadily, and lay down to sleep. Had he deliberately used the familiar form of speech with me? (Germans use du and dich when addressing family or friends. The English equivalent is thee and thou, which we only use when addressing deity.)

  “Are you coming to sleep too?” asked Perle. “I brought your pack from the kitchen. They brought your baggage, and that of the others on patrol, up forward with them.”

  We felt for our places. The lieutenant was already asleep next to our new squad leader, Unteroffizier Pferl. I lay down between Ziesche and Perle and slept, quite damp and cool.

  Into France

  The next morning we stood around the field kitchen and drank coffee. I showed Eckold the house above the stone quarry. “That house burned down yesterday too, didn’t it? We searched it the night before. It was weird in there.”

  “You didn’t spend the night in there, did you?” said Eckold.

  “No. Why do you ask?”

  “Ha, you were in a lovely murder hole! The equipment of two Hussars was found in there. They drove the horses into the meadow. But with their fresh brands they couldn’t be made unrecognizable.”

  “And what became of the people?”

  “Well, they were shot dead and the place set on fire.”

  That was sort of what I had thought during the night. But that it should be exactly so was too simple for me. I didn’t really trust Eckold that it was this particular farm.

  We were loaded on ferry boats made with two pontoons and the engineers transferred us across the river. They had already been rowing all night and were still rowing strongly.

  On the other bank, captured Frenchmen stood in their blue uniforms and watched blankly. We assembled and marched along the bank of the Maas for a while. There were barricades with shooting positions built along the railroad embankment and in the gardens. We had not been able to see anything of it from our side of the river.

  The sun burned us on our backs. In the street were French packs, kaeppis, and overshoes.

  “Here someone even threw his coat away,” said Ziesche.

  “And there lies a rifle,” said Unteroffizier Pferl. “They must have thought only of how they were going to get away. A troop like that will not be battle ready for the foreseeable future.”

  The higher we climbed the more there was lying around: coats, pants, shoes, rifles, bayonets, and knobby, blue canteens. That was really a victory!

  “Here are packs of cartridges,” said the lieutenant. “Pick them up so that we can throw them in the next creek. If we don’t the damned Belgians will be shooting with them if they meet a man alone.”

  “Shouldn’t we also make the rifles unusable, Sir?” said Ernst. We tried to break off the stocks from the rifles, but the wood was too good. Then we tried to break off the sights for aiming, but they remained damnably fast.

  On the right were four abandoned field pieces in a depression in the meadow. A munitions wagon stood on the road and in front lay three horses in tangled traces.

  We became increasingly hotter from the continual climbing and looking. I saw something that should have made me very happy: discarded artillery munitions, complete stacks of rifles, blankets. However, I could no longer be happy. From the background the impressions from yesterday came creeping. Were my actions yesterday as I had dreamed them to be in my first battle? Had I not dreamed of heroism, that I would carry an officer out of the fire, or strike down a black Moroccan in terrible combat?—Was it so necessary that I experienced something so terrible? First taking off, even if it was just behind the house, but that as my first action in the field! And then to make myself such a laughing stock by shooting at the stone wall of a quarry! How was that possible? How should the enemy be located behind a stone quarry wall?

  I didn’t want to think about it anymore. I wanted to forget everything. However, it rose up again and again and each time it was gloomier.

  We marched through a village that was already just about burned down. In the houses beams still glowed. There was a stench. As a child I had experienced a fire in a neighboring village. There some cattle had been burned. But this wasn’t the same. These were people.

  “There’s one lying in there,” said Ziesche. As I turned to look we were already past.

  In the evening a cannon roared close in front of us. The marching column halted. Lieutenant Fabian, who was at the moment on foot, ran forward. In a few minutes he came back.

  “The cursed Belgians fired on our point from inside a house. The lieutenant and three men are dead. They had barricaded themselves so well in the house that a cannon was brought forward and with direct fire set the house aflame.”

  We marched again the next day. Again there were burning villages from which the Belgians had fired. Again there were glowing beams, collapsed roofs, and the smell of burned people. This country disgusted me. I was no longer enraged at the Belgians, at least not for the most part. Instead I had a horror of them and of the war, this ghastly war with its racial hatred. How would things be in France, our old enemy?

  We drew near to the French border. There was a burning village. Suddenly a roof collapsed next to me. Sparks swirled up around my feet. It was so hot that we began to run.

  Then we came to a small forest. Fabian checked the map. “The French border is on the other edge of this wood.” We came out of the forest. Ahead of us in the sunshine lay a village. We marched in. The people stood at their doors with very friendly faces. Is this what France is like?

  Le Mont

  To the right at some distance lay Spruce woods, square and withered. Other than that there were only brown plains in the sunshine and ahead of us the marching column in the dust. That’s the way it was since morning. Sometimes we stopped and then everything continued.

  In the distance rumbled cannon.

  The sweat didn’t run. It just made the dust wet. One’s rifle pressed at one’s shoulder. One’s hands were thick and without creases.

  A house stood by the road, windows and doors open. Inside was a disheveled bed. On the table were eating utensils and glasses. Before the door were broken bottles and chairs. The inhabitants had fled ahead of us.

  We came into a forest. The road ran straight ahead. To the left rumbled advancing artillery. To the right a munitions column halted. And between these we staggered with hot, tender feet.

  The artillery remained stationary and the munitions column began moving. A dispatch officer came from forward and wanted to pass through. Artillery fire was now before us. We marched forward.

  The sun disappeared behind the trees. The forest had a black, uneven mantle. The artillery moved forward again and the sound of iron droned in our dull ears. In the twilight the horses became moving lumps.

  Suddenly they halted ahead of us. We bunched up and stood. You couldn’t sit on the ground because it was so narrow between the wagons and horses in the darkness.

  “Have you got anything to drink?” asked Perle with a sluggish voice. I unhooked my canteen and gave it to him. Then I drank also. The water was thick and warm.

  We stood. Some laid or sat down after all. Then we began moving again. Suddenly I ran into the man in front of me. Things had already halted again. We sank down, and stood up; it continued.

  I felt some cool air on my face. A red light shone, around which it was completely black. T
he walls of forest gave way. We stumbled over railroad tracks. To the left came a house. Past that we curved into the meadow.

  “Platoon leaders!” called the lieutenant softly. “Gentlemen, we are spending the night very close to the French. Ahead of us are only a couple of guards. We have to sleep with our rifles in our arms, no light and no noise!”

  In the meantime the field kitchen had arrived. On its covering an oil lamp stood behind a board.

  We had a prisoner to be guarded. He sat in a round pile of hay and looked at our field kitchen with amazement. The man was over thirty years old, and everyone in the company knew already that he had three children, came from near Paris, and that it was terrible for the French to continually decamp and run away. I thought to myself: a real city slicker; knows everything, but understands nothing. Suddenly I had a hatred for all such garrulous people, also for all our people, who waited on him just to be able to gossip with him. He enjoyed it all in his pile of straw.

  The lieutenant came to me. “We have to make another patrol to establish contact with our neighboring regiment on the right. I want to know where the next pickets are located.”

  Some distance away from us we could see lighted windows. Noise carried over to us. As we came closer we recognized chairs and a table from the house. Skat was being played. From inside came loud voices.

  “Where is the next outpost?” I asked.

  “Here in the house,” one nodded and continued playing.

  I went inside and bumped into a captain. “As liaison patrol I am supposed to find out where the next sentries are located.”

  “I don’t know. Go into the next room.”

  In the next room sat or stood a number of people, including a Vizefeldwebel drinking red wine.

  “As liaison patrol I am supposed to find out where the next sentries are located.”

  “Our sentries are about four hundred meters forward, probably in contact with your sentries. You can go check for yourself.” He continued talking. The people laughed.

  I went outside. “Now we are going forward to the sentries.” Ten minutes earlier I might not have been so quick to decide. I liked the cool way the South Germans here regarded the war. Why were we so terribly serious?