Authors: Len Gilbert
Slowly but surely, the blank stares among the company became steely ones.
“Whether you wanted it or not, you are now part of this undertaking, and nothing which follows can equal your efforts here. No doubt the skies are quieter on the other side, but if you must sleep under those skies tomorrow you will never be forgiven for having survived. To other men you will be as cats are to dogs. And you will never have any real friends. Is that the end you wish for yourselves?”
A few heads shook.
“Please know that I understand your suffering. I feel the cold and fear as you do, and I fire at the enemy just like you do, because I know that my duty as an officer requires at least as much from me as your duty does of you. I wish to stay alive even if it’s only to struggle on somewhere else.
“Once the fighting here begins, I will not tolerate defeatism. You can feel certain of the same from me, and certain that I will not expose you to any unnecessary dangers.”
Those last two words were pregnant with meaning. Just one month ago the 6th Army surrendered at Stalingrad. Due to being exposed to unnecessary dangers. Jochen hoped those listening to him would understand what he meant. He certainly wasn’t in command of divisions or armies, but Jochen knew that those who were in charge of his division wouldn’t leave them all to stand and die here.
“I would burn and destroy entire villages if by doing so I could prevent even one of us from dying of hunger. Here in the vastness of the steppe we are surrounded by hatred and death, and in these circumstances our group must be as one, and our thoughts must be identical. If we achieve that, and maintain it, we shall be victors even in death…
“So be brave. We’re all nothing more than animals on the defensive, even when we’re ordered on the offensive. Life is war, war is life. Liberty doesn’t exist.”
After one night of shaky sleep, Jochen and his adjutant Otto Dinse stepped out into the swirling snow and began firing the halftrack vehicle’s engine, which hadn’t yet frozen solid. In the pitch night he could hear engines coughing all along the German side of that creek.
At 04:30 sharp, Jochen switched on his command radio and gave the order. From his lead car, Jochen watched frozen chunks of earth fly up and hurtle back to the ground as Pak artillery fired into the silent village on the other side. The response was almost non-existent. One by one, the halftracks made their way across the planks of that shaky bridge. Peiper’s vehicle led the way. He stood up and looked out into the unknown.
As his halftrack touched down on the other side, Peiper ducked into the cabin, expecting some combination of mines, mortar or machine guns. Yet, all he heard was the deep hum of his and dozens of motors behind him. Into the waning night, the battalion, with its brand new halftracks and ambulances, slinked past the Soviet lines toward Zmiev and the wounded men who were no doubt left hurt on the frozen ground.
320
Generalmajor Postel had a bad feeling when the 320th Infantrie Division was pulled from its sleepy position in France a few months ago, and thrown in to reinforce the collapsing Eastern Front. Now he was stranded by the Wehrmacht on the wrong side of a little town south of Kharkov. Just as the 6th Army in Stalingrad was just a few months ago, Postel and the 320th were now encircled.
All around Kharkov, Postel saw the German army buckle under the awesome firepower of the Soviet offensive: A white wall of never-ending rocket fire which showered men under yards and yards of earth; and menacing attacks from T-34s, which often simply ground Landsers under their treads. Both had taken their toll on those still clinging to hold on.
The retreat from Kharkov left Postel’s division with just one road back to the retreating German line. Unlike the rest, the 320th held against the tidal wave of Red attacks. When it was Postel’s turn to withdraw, the battalions supposed to be covering the only road back had also retreated. As a result, the 320th was now well behind Red Army lines, with some 1,000 of their own men injured and lying frostbitten on sleds in the crackling cold.
There was only one hope for Postel, his division, and all those wounded men: A telegraph sheet instructing him to wait for an SS Panzer Grenadier battalion under Sturmbannfuehrer Peiper, which would somehow cross the Udy creek, break through the Russian line, into enemy territory, cross the Donetz river, and pull them all out, wounded and all. There was no way this Peiper could pull of such a miracle, and Postel knew it. Needless to say, the Generalmajor had gotten no rest this evening: He was used to being a bit further back behind the line. Never this close.
From his transport wagon he could hear the attempt to rescue his stranded division: The distant thunder of assault guns. Then nothing. After just twenty minutes, the Leibstandarte’s rescue attempt was over. He couldn’t blame the Leibstandarte SS for trying. They were notorious for always giving everything they had. If the Leibstandarte couldn’t break Postel out, then no one could.
Postel sighed to himself as morning rays began pushing onto the gloomy horizon. The rest of his life, in a labor gulag no doubt, would be short and brutal. To say nothing of the fate of the rest of the 320th.
“Herr Generalmajor!”
The radio officer came running to the door. Postel opened it into the biting cold to see the young man’s excited face.
“Herr Generalmajor! It’s Peiper. He… He’s made it! He’s asking to meet you at the bridge! He has ambulances! Peiper made it through!”
Postel turned the key of his Volkswagen, and it chugged along the dirt path to their rendezvous. Somehow, miraculously, there they were. The Leibstandarte, and Major Peiper. He looked dapper despite the bulky winter camouflage. Almost 6’ tall, wiry and with steely eyes. How he got here, Postel did not know. The young man looked to be in his late twenties, very young for a battalion commander.
“Why haven’t your men crossed the river?” Striding up to the half track, Postel looked upset.
“The ice isn’t strong enough to hold the vehicles, Herr Generalmajor,” Peiper replied.
“Nonsense! They will. I’ve ordered my guns to cross right now.”
At almost that exact moment an orderly interrupted. “Herr Generalmajor. Uh, the first assault gun has fallen through the ice.”
Postel smiled. “Well, I suppose you’re right, Sturmbannfuehrer. In any case, I thank you. You’ve saved the lives of so many wounded men who require immediate help.”
“They gave us all the surgeons and ambulances available. We will provide security and stay here for the evening and let the surgeons work.”
“Sturmbannfuehrer… I must ask… How far are we from the line?”
“About 25 kilometers.”
Postel bit his lip. “They left us 25 kilometer behind. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. I can’t believe they left us for fucking dead like that!”
It was uncharacteristic for an officer to swear like that, especially in front of subordinates. Still, Peiper’s expression remained fixed.
Upset that he’d been abandoned and now even more sure that they’d never get out of this, Postel got back in his wagon and disappeared.
Blowtorch
After a long, uneasy pause, the whole 320 division arrived from the west. Peiper stood in the snow as the train of misery approached. At the front were those capable of walking, then the walking wounded, and, at the end, the badly wounded were pulled on sleds. The sleds were overloaded, and some of the least fortunate tied to the sleds and pulled along on their stomachs. They were the hardest to watch.
It was at moment Jochen remembered Postel’s clean uniform. The Generalmajor even still had his white, detachable collar on. Jochen wasn’t the only one who noticed the disgraceful paradox.
“Those poor Landsers. In much worse shape than their manicured general,” Dinse mumbled to Peiper.
“Men such as Postel must never get in the SS.” Jochen murmured back to his subordinate.
The surgeons and medics went right to work that afternoon, and the wounded were first given something to eat, hot drinks and first aid. Dr. Bruestle, the battalion surgeon, slid off his gloves and readied his skilled hands to work in the frostbite.
Until the next morning there was little else for Peiper’s battalion to do besides stand guard. Once night settled over the frozen Donetz Basin, Jochen and his battalion stood and stared hollow-cheeked into the ominous darkness. Sharing guard duty, Jochen got no more than 90 minutes of sleep that night.
Dr. Bruestle came to see Peiper first thing in the morning.
“I don’t know what happened to these men along the way, but this is ridiculous. A mess.”
“I’ve been operating all night long, and I don’t need to tell you what that kind of exposure does to one’s hands.”
“…But you wouldn’t believe it! No one from the 320th so much as lifted a finger to help me!”
“Be lenient with them, Herr Doktor. Gods know what they’ve seen. The 320th has been stranded for two days and has been in close combat for six days previous to that.”
Once Jochen gave the order, the endlessly long column, frostbitten Dr. Bruestle included, began to shuffle its way back northwards, ambulances on the road and fighting men deployed on both sides to protect each side. The air of vulnerability permeated everyone’s nerves.
Again the road back to friendly lines was eerily devoid of Bolsheviks. Those in front soon noticed a plume of smoke coming from a burned-out ambulance ahead. Jochen knew that the enemy had gotten some of the stragglers from the previous day, but he wasn’t prepared for what they would soon lay eyes on.
Three German ambulance drivers had just been torn to pieces. Two were unrecognizable. One driver’s face was smashed open with an ax.
“Watch out! There could be mines!” A lieutenant shouted to the Landsers.
Word passed from mouth to mouth. Soldiers stopped at the second ambulance and looked in without daring to enter. Two ambulance men, who had been stripped naked and mutilated, were lying in pools of black, congealed blood. The Bolsheviks amputated both of their genitals.
Jochen’s face contorted with hate. But, right at that moment there would be no time to think, because their column came under fire from a snowshoe battalion that must have sneaked into the village. Immediately the Germans pressed themselves into the snow. Some fired back.
Without hesitation, and despite the obvious danger, Peiper calmly mounted the flamethrower onto his halftrack. Jochen simply gave one motion of his hand, and with that, the halftracks left the ambulance column exposed and charged the village at top speed with all guns firing.
The Russians broke into a panic within minutes. Peiper’s vengeful flamethrower went into action, as did several other mounted blowtorches. Fires spread only slowly from one
isba
to the next; the winter cold made a house-to-house battle necessary. After what the battalion had seen, they were more than up for the task.
Machine gun fire from the halftracks chewed up wooden walls and threw off thatched roof after thatched roof. And Bolsheviks panicked and scurried out, some with their hands up. But if Jochen had told his men to take prisoners, his men just might have just shot him as well. Another Bolshevik came out with a white flag in hand and was promptly shot in the skull. One of Jochen’s lieutenants snarled and trained his rifle onto one another surrendering Bolshevik.
There were at least 500 Bolsheviks in that snowshoe battalion. None of them lived. The whole time, Jochen hardly even noticed that the adversary had reduced that planked wooden bridge to a pile of rubble.
Postel brought the ambulance convoy into the charred remains of what was Krasna Polyana village, so they wouldn’t lose their cover.
“The designated bridge team is already on it, Postel,” Jochen growled. He was not in the mood to suffer the arrogant Generalmajor for a second time.
“Understood,” Postel turned around and got back in his vehicle, unwilling to push any further the man who rescued them.
This time, the able-bodied men of the 320th helped bury the badly mutilated ambulance drivers. and did so without a word.
The improvised bridge looked able to at least hold the ambulances. In a rickety clatter, vehicle after vehicle carried the wounded and crossed into safety. Men of the Peiper battalion also pulled wounded comrades across the ice in sleighs. Within 90 minutes, the entire 320th, able-bodied or not, crossed the Udy. Only Postel’s large wagon was left behind with the SS, because the bridge couldn’t support its weight. That was the last Jochen hoped to see of Postel.
As the last vehicle reached the opposite bank, Jochen ordered his battalion back south. Those heavy halftracks stood no chance of crossing the hastily rebuilt bridge. Instead, Peiper drove back to Zmiev to later reach German lines in a long, sideways sneak parallel to the Russians. That, too, was successful.
“I’m proud of you, Jochen.”
The coarse, but oddly-soothing voice of Sepp Dietrich greeted him through the phone as he got back. Dietrich would request a Gold Cross for this, and Berlin never said ‘no’ to the Fuehrer’s commanding bodyguard.
“Thank you, sir…”
Emotion cracked through Jochen’s voice.
“…That means a lot… To me.”
Potato Masher
Cawing seagulls lead Hans to the port of Deltia. The turquoise bay was dotted with galleys and other sailing vessels, many of which crowded around various wooden docks. The other day, James had given Hans a map of the world, but Hans hadn’t looked at it until now. As Hans unfurled the map and saw three ports on the northern continent to disembark at. The map showed very little of the Northern Continent beyond the ports.
Hans decided on two things. First, he would make for biggest port on the Northern Continent, a place named Ostia. Second, he would not sneak on the boat. The jackals, which Hans learned were the main canine species in Deltia, were manning the busy port, and they soon helped Hans find an available merchant ship to Ostia. In about an hour, a planked ship with one bright red sail waded in to the nearby dock.