After leaving the Stalag, we advanced with difficulty, putting one foot laboriously after another in the violent wind, the snow, and the dark. All in -300C.
Our progress wasn’t satisfactory, so the rifle butt and gummi blows fell on our backs. So, on top of the cold, we had the oppressive and brutal presence of the posten herding us, hurrying to put as much distance as possible between the Red Ar my and their sorry asses. But for all that, we didn’t move any faster. 2
The snow stuck to our soles and soaked through our shoddy shoes. That didn’t feel great. Certainly, those who came from East Prussia had known worse, -400C apparently, but that was no consolation.
At one point, we caught up with a Wehr macht cart, driven by a civvie. We encountered quite a few civvies on the road. They were rushing to clear out of the area, too, given the extremely fast advance of the Russkies, whose reputation as pillagers, rapists, bloodthirsty brutes, and butcherers preceded them.
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At first, the Heinie didn’t want us to tie our sled to his cart, but in the end a pack of Lucky Strikes persuaded him.
Driving a horse cart on an icy, unmarked road is almost impossible… Well, it is impossible. The inevitable happened : the cart fell into the ditch. So, we recovered our sled, leaving the Fritz to his bad luck. We didn’t lend the slightest hand to that idiot!
The posten, despite belonging to the “master race,” also had trouble staying upright. They made POWs carry their equipment and unleashed their dogs to get us moving, which only slowed down the column. I wouldn’t wish for anyone to get their ass bitten by those goddamn mongrels!
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We were still crawling forward in agony when dawn finally broke. Malicious gusts of wind slapped our faces. Our feet and chapped hands had gone totally numb.
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During a short stop to take shelter by a wall, we were able to eat a little, and then the column left again.
Those unifor ms—which we had wor n for five years, frayed and threadbare, constantly patched up as best we could—barely protected us from the cold. I wore several layers of rags—everything I could find in the camp to keep out the cold. I had even cut a blanket into strips and wound them around my waist under my overcoat as a wind breaker. My morale was well below zero.
Around 5 :00 p.m., night fell on that goddamn shithole of a country.
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We slowed our pace to distance ourselves from the others and, once we were at the end of the pack, we left the column—Roger, me, and a few other guys— abandoning the rest of the group.
Papa, is this an escape? We’ll see…
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