Mediciones

along, plus two drivers with their vehicles. Two volunteers are needed,

to lug the mess buckets around. Küpper and I volunteered yesterday— the roster goes around from bunker to bunker and it’s now the turn of our one.

It’s almost dark when we move off. We’ve got one Steyr 70 MTW personnel carrier with a soft top and a 1½-ton Opel Blitz 4×4 with a tarpaulin cover. We drive off into the dusk with our lights dimmed. The kitchen wallah knows the way, but he says that there can be no talk about a Hauptkampflinie* in Stalingrad as amidst all the ruins the front

shifts hour by hour. Not long ago our line lay north of the tractor factory, but as of yesterday it is apparently further to the south, in a sector known as the Tennis Racket. The Russians are supposed to have a chemical factory there which they are defending, and so they have set up a bridgehead.

‘We need to ask for directions,’ Unteroffizier Winter says to us. Well

then, let’s go! We can only hope that we find them soon.

We are now driving purely by the light of the moon on an MSR. Traffic comes towards us and also over takes. To the right is the railway line running from Kalatsch to Stalingrad. Just beyond Woroponovo station we turn off to the left, and after a few kilometres we’re already well inside the ruins of the city. We drive through shallow craters and over heaps of rubble, avoiding debris and overturned telegraph poles. Thick, acrid smoke from smouldering fires chokes our lungs; to the left and right are burnt-out wrecks of various bits of military equipment. Our driver zigzags slowly towards what looks like a small forest or park.

We are now standing on top of a small hill and can see something of the city. More black smoke and smouldering fires—a terrible sight, and we can feel Stalingrad’s hot breath. This must be how Rome looked after Nero put it to the torch .The only difference is that here the inferno is made worse by the screaming shells and lethal explosions, increasing * Literally, ‘Main Battle Line’, or MBL.

the madness and giving the onlooker the impression that he’s witnessing the end of the world. The further we penetrate into the city, the closer the shells fall around us.

‘The usual evening blessing from Ivan,’ remarks the medic.

It was supposed to sound lighthearted, but it falls flat. He is sitting cowering on ammunition boxes, as I am. My heart is hammering in my throat; fright has gripped me. Now there is a new noise in the air—like the rush of a thousand wings. It is increasing in intensity and seems to be coming directly at us.

‘Get out! It’s the Stalinorgel\' yells the medic.

We jump out of the wagon and dive for safety underneath a large burnt-out tractor. The rushing noise passes us, and then the explosions rain down around us just like fireworks. A splinter the size of a man’s hand spins by my head and hits the ground beside Kíipper.

‘That was a bit of luck,’ says the medic.

Behind us we hear yells and cries for the medic.

‘Someone from the anti-aircraft position must have been hit— that’s the one we drove by,’ says Unteroffizier Winter, who has just

jumped into a hole. ‘Come on, let’s go—we’ve got to get on.’ We climb back on to the vehicles.

The medic says that the Stalinorgel is a primitive rocket launcher,

mounted on the back of an open truck .The rockets are fired electrically. They can’t hit a precise target, but by using this weapon Ivan can saturate a large area of ground—and God help those who find themselves inside it without any shelter.

We are now driving very carefully. Many places have had to be thoroughly cleared so that vehicles can get through the wreckage. We meet other vehicles, who seem to have the same idea as we do. Many of them are loading up with wounded and dead—they can only do this at night time, when, in theory, the Russians can’t see what’s going on. But the enemy does know what’s going on, and he is pulverising the area

‘Nähmaschinen in the air—we can often see these biplanes quite clearly,

silhouetted against the fiery glow in the sky.

Tracer rounds climb high into the sky, and in front of us we can hear the rattle of machine-gun fire. I can tell it’s Russian fire by the sound. Hand grenades are going off and we can hear yelling, so we come to a halt amidst the ruins. Winter disappears, returning some minutes later

‘Our people are supposed to be in the same area they were in yesterday,’ he says. We’ll move in as close to them as we can, and then we’ll have to carry the stuff the rest of the way.

The vehicles move off again, gingerly, a yard at a time. I can see two burnt-out Russian T-34 tanks. We pass them and come up to a large building with big open spaces, like a factory. In the background, standing out against the glow of the fire and rising out of the ruins, is a tall chimney, looking for all the world like a threatening finger pointing up to the sky. We pull up in the shadow of the factory

We start to unload, but Russian artillery shells are falling precisely where we want to go. Some of them land pretty close to us as well. A fire flares behind us—a vehicle has been hit. There is another big blaze nearby—probably a petrol dump or something like that. We wait, all ready to go.

There are craters in front of us, lumps of stone and piles of debris, and between the screams of artillery shells and the thunderous roar as they explode I get goose pimples .We move in zigzags, clambering over stones and beams; stumble; lie flat on the ground; get up again; and continue on.

‘Stay close together,’ croaks Winter.

In the glare of a fire I can see men running, then some hand grenades go off. Several figures run past us, bent double. Winter gets up and speaks to them. I can recognise an officer’s uniform.

‘We’ve got to move further over to the right,’ he says afterwards. ‘A couple of hours ago they threw Ivan out of this area. Now there’s hell to pay because he wants to take it back.’

We creep carefully forward, then we come to an open space littered with clods of earth and concrete blocks with iron rods sticking out. This was perhaps once a bunker, destroyed by our bombs. A long wall rises at the other end; three pillars are still standing.

‘They are supposed to be there, somewhere,’ says Winter, pointing to the wall.

We can’t go any further. Ivan is firing like mad at the churned-up ground which we have to cross. Has he spotted us yet?We crouch down behind the concrete blocks, but the shells are landing so close to us that I can sense the hot metal on my face and can feel the muscles on my back cramping up. In front of us tracer bullets shoot up into the sky; rifles and machine-guns crackle. Is Ivan on the attack?

The shooting gradually dies away. ‘Go, now! To the wall!’

It’s Winter, barking out his orders .We run through the confusion of rubble, wire and lumps of iron. We can’t see anybody. We slither along the wall and come to a basement entrance.

Suddenly there’s a shout from somewhere, as if from the grave: ‘Hey mate, get out of here! What do you want to do? Bring Ivan down on our heads?’ A steel helmet sticks up from the ruins.

We’re looking for our unit,’ I hear Winter whisper. ‘Which one?’

Winter tells him.

‘No idea. We don’t belong to that crowd. But if you’re looking for the ones who chased Ivan out of here this morning, you’ll find them about fifty metres further to the right in that large factory building. But get out of here—and thank your lucky stars it’s quiet at the moment.’

The head with the steel helmet disappears again. He call this quiet? We hardly dare lift our heads out of the dirt! During a short lull we stumble on, pieces of broken glass crackling under our feet, shadows springing out of the ruins. Immediately tracer bullets zip towards us and bursts of machine-gun fire hit the wreckage all around like a

hailstorm. We hurry onwards, the mess buckets clattering against the blocks of concrete. A shadow appears beside us.

‘Are you the supply blokes from the 1st Squadron?’ comes the question out of the darkness.

‘Is that you, Domscheid?’ Winter demands in return.

‘Yep! I’ve been waiting for you for two hours to show you the way! ’ Are we relieved! Domscheid is an Obergefreiter. He tells us that they

carried out a counter-attack this morning and are now positioned a bit further forward in the factory building.

Winter swears. ‘Every time we come you are somewhere else. One day we’ll probably deliver these supplies straight to Ivan.’

‘Oh, that’s been done before,’ says Domscheid. Last night, four men from the 74th Infantry Division walked right into Ivan’s hands, with food and ammunition. During the counter-attack this morning only empty containers were found—there was no sign of the men.

We creep behind Domscheid, tracer whizzing in from both sides. I stumble and bang a metal strut with my canteen, making an awful row. Immediately a Russian machine gunner opens up and a strip of tracer bullets lights up the night. Ivan is pretty close! We lie down flat; the shots sing over my head and explode against the concrete block. The chalky spray drizzles down my neck, mixing with my sweat. I roll forward and pull the two mess buckets behind the block. Küpper has also let go of his mess bucket and is hauling it to safety. He is lying a couple of paces further forward, next to a protective wall. I want to catch him up and I take a pace forward—only to fall into emptiness. Hands grab me and pull me up.

‘ Hang on! ’ says a deep voice. And then: ‘ Where did you come from so suddenly? We were just about to fire on you—you were bloody lucky!’

Domscheid tells them.

‘Christ, do you have to use this particular street? We’ve got Ivan sitting right on our backs here.’

‘I came by here just two hours ago and Ivan was further forward,’ Domscheid says.

‘Yes, but in the last hour not so. Max, do you have your sprayer ready?’ asks the low voice.

‘Of course—as always,’ comes the answer.

‘Good, then we ’ll give you covering fire .You can get through behind us, across the street. Now—off with you!’

On their first burst of fire we dash off. Küpper is faster than me and nearly pulls my arm out of its socket because I’m still holding on to the other handle of the food container. Ivan shoots wildly back. Then the artillery opens up. In between I can also hear the thud of the mortars.

The rounds loop towards us and explode all around .The bombardment seems to go for us like a wild animal, and we squeeze together in a bombed-out basement. I duck further down with each explosion, expecting the basement to collapse any moment and bury the lot of us. The earth above shakes—just like in an earthquake, I should think. My nerves are a-flutter. I’d never imagined I could be so terrified.

You can’t do anything—not a thing. The only solution might actually be to get out and run. But where? The only advantage is that death will come more quickly. For heaven’s sake, they are forever going on about the ‘proud, successful German advances’ in the Army news bulletins, but here in Stalingrad I haven’t seen anything of that. The only thing I understand is that we are holed up in these ruins like cowering rats, fighting for our lives. But what else can we do, given the Russian superiority?

The driver and the medic are sitting next to me, with Winter and Küpper on the other side. Küpper is as white as a sheet, and we are all staring at the ceiling, which already has a huge number of cracks. Domscheid has the strongest nerves: he is standing by the entrance, staring out into the darkness. As far as Küpper and I are concerned, these few hours in Stalingrad have certainly dampened down our enthusiasm for war—and we haven’t yet had any ‘personal contact’, as

it is so nicely put. My thoughts now are concentrated solely on how and when we’re going to be able to get out of here safely. We’ve been in this god-awful heap of ruins for hours, and we still haven’t reached our unit.

Domscheid tells us from his position at the entrance that Ivan is shooting at the slightest thing. Because our machine guns opened up, Ivan probably thought we were mounting another attack and wanted to make quite sure that it was nipped in the bud.

‘If only he knew that we are quite happy keeping our heads down for the moment—until we get our replacements that is,’ says Domscheid. ‘We’re supposed to be replaced by fresh troops, according to our

Wachtmeister.’

‘He who believes is indeed blessed,’ murmurs the medic.

Finally the barrage is lifted—after what seems to me like an eternity. We jump up—Domscheid knows the way. He makes for a ruined factory building, knowing that someone has been lying there under cover, watching everything. Softly, he calls out the code-word while we are still some distance away, and gives his name. We go to a basement entrance, which is half-covered by wreckage. Domscheid leads us through a corridor to a room, where, in front of the doorway, an iron plate has been placed. I can see two Hindenburg lanterns, which provide just enough light to clear the darkness in the room.

Domscheid makes a droll introduction: ‘May I present our new battle headquarters.’

A heap of sacks and a few rags are strewn on the ground, and lying on top of them, curled up, are two Landser; another one is sitting on a

couple of stacked-up ammunition boxes. Startled by the noise we have made, the two Landser jump up and help us into the room with our

containers. Both men appear to be very tired—and who knows when they might next get some sleep? I can barely distinguish their faces under all the dirt and stubble. But I guess we all look about the same.

Then a Wachtmeister comes in. He says hello and offers his hand to

Weichert. I recognise him—he’s the one who pushed the old Russian 41

fellow’s head into the bucket at the well. He tells Winter that the one remaining officer in the group became a casualty this morning, and that now he was in charge of this sector. The men are positioned in front of and to the side of this area, hidden in the ruins. The fighting ebbs back and forth, and no one really knows where the Hauptkampflinie really

runs. Casualties today are one dead and two wounded, and they’re already on the way to the main medical centre.

‘This is the craziest place imaginable. The Russians are often only twenty or thirty metres away, sometimes at hand-grenade range in front of us. No more than 200 metres in front of us there is a deep trench, and this trench leads right down to the banks of the Volga. From there Ivan gets reinforcements every night. For days now we’ve all been waiting impatiently to be relie ved, or at least to receive reinforcements, but we’re beginning to doubt whether they’ll ever come.’

This last sentence is only whispered to Winter, but with my sharp ears I still understand what he has said. So they’ve got their doubts. That makes me think. The warm food and the coffee must by now be frozen solid, even though the containers have double skins and are supposed to be insulated. Winter has brought a fair supply of solid methylated spirits along, and a solid-fuel burner to heat up the food. The food is ice cold, but not frozen solid. It’s a good, thick noodle soup with lots of canned beef—much better than what we get in the bunkers .These men have more than earned these decent rations.

Winter is pressing for us to start getting back. An hour has passed since we left our bunker. The Wachtmeister needs more ammunition,

which we’ve got on the trucks. He details five men to go with us. On the way there the Russians lob more heavy shells into the area. We run after the lead soldier at the double and stop only briefly each time a large shell lands nearby . . .

We jump up on the trucks and sit on the empty ammunition boxes. The dead soldier we are taking back with us lies in the front, in his body bag. There is supposed to be another road we can take going back. The

driver says that the route across the village of Petschanka and past another kolkhoz to Vavarovka is shorter going from here. Because of the

frost, all the roads are quite passable. But first we have to work our way through the ruins. Every now and then the vehicles drive down into a trench and come up the other side, and we’re catapulted towards the back and have to hang on to the tailgate, the ammo boxes sliding after us and slamming into our jackboots. Just keep going, I think—just get out of here. When it all starts up again we need to be well out of range.

We go through another deep trench and have to help push the truck back out again .We pass several other vehicles, and some VW jeeps with officers as passengers pass us. The MSR is rough, but hard and solid.

‘How far is it now?’ I ask the medic, who is looking back at us from