5. Februar 1949
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| Building site of the concrete high-rise | 
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5 Feb 49[1]. My starvation diet starts to work: 123 pounds (61.5 kg). I am written K3 and only need to work 6 hours a day. I always ate my daily soups, but I sold the more nutritious bread or saved it until Sunday. Then I roasted it on the stove and ate it as bread soup with the sugar I had also saved. It is not without danger, because if the Russian finds out about it, I will be punished for self-mutilation. The fellow officers in the squad room all know about it, of course, but even they are not all trustworthy any more. Nevertheless, they admire my steely consistency as I sit starving next to them while they eat their meals.
There is a communist in the Antifa who is working hard to obtain Soviet citizenship. But the Russian has no interest in such creatures and gives him the cold shoulder.
I work in the carpentry. It’s a big hut with all kinds of woodworking machines, circular saws, planing machines and the like. We are currently building prefabricated parts for barracks. The individual parts consist of 2 x 3 metre panels. They are double-walled and the cavity between the two walls is filled with sawdust. The only big disadvantage is that the boards from which the panels are made are still made of fresh wood. They are cut from the logs that we felled in the forest just a week ago. When we hammer in the nails, the water splashes out with the last hammer blows. Later, when the boards have dried out, there will be finger-thick cracks from which the sawdust will trickle out and then the wind will whistle through.
There are no safety devices on the machines. Recently, I was standing in one part of the barracks when a shoe-sized block of wood suddenly whizzed past my head. It had been hurled by a circular saw in the other half of the barrack.
Today we cut “drankis”[2]. These are very thin, narrow battens that are used as a base when plastering walls. They are nailed together crosswise and then form a net-like mesh on the walls onto which the plaster is then thrown. I enjoy cutting, you just have to be careful not to get your hand too close to the unprotected circular saw.
The iron cannon stove in the barracks provides pleasant warmth. The Landsers often stuff it so full with the abundant wood waste that the pipe almost starts to glow. When the Natschalnik sees this, he almost faints. He grabs a bucket of water and tips it into the red-hot stove with such vigour that it almost explodes with a rumbling puff.
The men in the laundry often talk to our Russian interpreter, a very pretty, fair-haired, blue-eyed girl. She speaks German without an accent. The launderers tell her, among other things, that they have several suits at home. Finally, the interpreter asks: And why do you need several suits?
I am supposed to dig a large pit on the ramp with my brigade. It’s supposed to be an earth bunker for petrol drums near the electric stanzia. We’re already two metres deep in the ground, but the work is difficult because the loose sandy soil keeps slipping. The fat Jewish senior nachalnik rages because it’s not going fast enough for him. Then he resorts to the usual method: he has me arrested as the brigadier responsible and accuses me of sabotage. To make it as effective as possible, he makes a big fuss. He had the entire ramp crew of over 100 men line up, put me between two guards in front of the front line, shouted something about sabotage and arrest and then had a guard take me away to the camp. In the meantime, he had informed the Soviet camp commander, and when I arrived at the gate guard, he was already sitting in the guardroom. He was accompanied by his adjutant and his wife, who looked at me with curiosity all the time. It must have been an exciting moment for her, as she had certainly never seen a saboteur up close. When I caught sight of her as I entered, I immediately realised that I wasn’t shaved.[3] And so, although unfortunately not a ravishing sight, I certainly offered her an unforgettable one:[4] a saboteur with a frosty face and stubbly beard.
The interrogation didn’t take long. The German “interpreter”, a comrade from the camp nobility, didn’t speak much Russian, but he translated the meaning correctly. I understood that much. There wasn’t much to explain either: You couldn’t dig steep walls two metres deep into the loose sandy soil without the sand slipping. That seemed credible to the commander too. He was calm, rational and not unfriendly. He spoke little and mostly just listened to everything. Incidentally, he is also Jewish. At the end of the interrogation, he threatened me almost fatherly with a warning finger. Then I was taken to the camp.
I was sent to Günter Heuer’s forest commando for three days so that I was out of sight of the head honcho on the ramp. After three days I returned to the ramp and that was the end of it.
The brother of that bastard of senior nachalnik is much nicer. I have an almost friendly relationship with him. He was the warehouse manager at the ramp, and when a special consignment, such as sugar, arrived, he often held something back for me.
Even before a consignment of goods arrives, you can tell whether they are ordinary or rare products. The more valuable the consignment, the greater the number of nachalniks and other people standing around in front of the warehouse. They want to secure as large a share as possible before the actual sale begins.
I have also exchanged smaller banknotes for 100-rouble notes with the magazine clerk several times. He once asked me why I was doing this. I replied: Saving for a rainy day. - Once I went into town with him in the lorry to do some errands. We were standing on the pavement when a girl walked past. He made a definite motion with his hands, but when he saw that the girl seemed to notice, he was very embarrassed. He’s a decent bloke, nevertheless. - In the garden of a nearby house, a woman was beating carpets. She was the wife of a major.
We are working on the ramp. There was something we didn’t please the guards with. Basically, the guards just had to watch over us, but this one kept grumbling and barking until I shouted angrily at him: “Man, quit shouting so much!” Then he started at me and shouted: “What, you’re calling me ‘pig’!!?” He hits me in the chest with the butt of his rifle and is furious. Instead of “quit shouting”, he understood “pig”. It was a misunderstanding, which, however, can sometimes end fatally.
There are often blows and punches. In particular, a nachalnik on the ramp slams frequently. This is also forbidden. Prisoners must not be beaten.
There is now a constant stream of interrogations in the camp. Every other evening, one of us officers is called to the politruk. I write down my military background beforehand because they want to hear it. One evening, it’s my turn too. The politruk reads my CV. Of course, he doesn’t believe a word of it, and after reading everything, he slowly and impressively tears the page in half before my eyes. I have to write a new one straight away, and the pretty interpreter hisses at me unfriendly: “But write clearly, because you can do it!” So she remembers my tiny but very clear block letters on the Red Cross postcards. - We never learn anything about the results of the interrogations. It just happened that one night someone was suddenly taken from the bunk and disappeared.
Camp roll call is held every morning and evening. The whole camp workforce has to line up and is counted. One day, a soldier had lined up in shorts. The Russian sub-lieutenant indignantly asked him if he had ever seen a soldier in shorts. “Yes,” says the soldier, “in our Afrika Korps!” Everyone laughs and the Russian remains silent, embarrassed.
For a few days, we are busy with ancillary work in a concrete high-rise, the shell of which has been completed and is said to have been built by a German engineer. From the upper floors we have a sweeping view over the dark green countryside. To the north, you can see the bright ribbon of the Minsk-Moscow rollbahn, which, according to reports, was improved by the Germans during the war. Close below us is the narrow strip of the Moscow-Berlin railway line.
Our camp is located directly on the Minsk-Moscow autobahn. Almost opposite our camp gate is the entrance to a military training area on the other side of the road. We often see the Soviet tanks rolling around the vast area, covered in thick, yellow clouds of dust in the summer. Next to the driveway to the military training area is a small house that serves as a warehouse. This is where the Red Army soldiers, the families of the officers and guards of our camp, people who live nearby and ourselves shop. We only had to cross the street diagonally. The storekeeper is - of course - Jewish. She used to live in Germany and is very friendly. When I entered the shop one day, it was very full. The woman didn’t make me wait, however, but handed me my kleb[5] (bread) to the back over the heads of those waiting. Nobody complained.
I’m a lumberjack again. The forest is glorious in spring. The fresh green of the birch trees and the young shoots of the spruce trees bring friendly, light green colours to the forest. It’s getting warm already. We hammer nails into the birch trunks, where the sap is now beginning to rise. We catch the water that gushes out of the small wound in tin cans that we have hung under the hammered-in nails. When they are full, we drink them up. We believe it is healthy and quenches our thirst.
I’ve been a food divider again for a while now. I still get suspicious looks when I stir the ladle around in the food bucket and fill the mess kits. But I stir thoroughly so that everyone gets some of the thicker pulp at the bottom of the kettle and not just the watery soup on the surface. I also don’t take a drop more than I give to the others. I’m not greedy and get by with very little. Maybe I’m a easygainer. Even Werner Gräser is happy with me. I had a somewhat strained relationship with him for a long time, because as his brigadier in Smolensk, I often charged lower percentages to his account than to the other comrades because of his poor work performance.
It was like this with the percentages: the brigadier gave separate percentages to each individual member of his brigade, depending on their work performance. He had a certain scope of discretion. For example, he could chalk up 80% to one worker whilst giving 120% to a better worker in order to reach 100%, if this was possible. However, the benchmark always remained the daily standard, i.e. the work performance that the brigade had to achieve. If the brigade had only achieved 70% of its target on one day, the brigadier could only distribute the percentages within the framework of this 70%.
My brigade now has a very pleasant assignment: late shift on the ramp, from 2pm to 10pm. We can sleep late in the morning or at least stay in bed when the other brigades have to go to work. We have breakfast in peace and quiet and only go out after lunch. And when we come back in the evening shortly after 10 pm, many of our comrades haven’t even gone to bed yet. There’s not much work to do either. Not many lorries come out of the forest in the afternoon, and almost none at all after 5 pm. The Russian drivers also like to finish on time, often quite early. As the other ramp crews, who have been working here since the morning, also go back to the camp at 5 pm, we are alone on the site from then until 10 pm. There are no more nachalniks to be seen. Our only job is to unload the lorries coming out of the forest. They almost only bring 2 metre logs. The lorries are almost all American Studebaker, 4-5 ton trucks.
The hardest part for me is always the start of the shift. I’m still pretty exhausted from starving (which I’ve given up as hopeless in the meantime. I won’t be released any earlier). And when I climb onto the first lorry straight after lunch, I’m so tired and weak that I struggle to get up. The weakness passes in the course of the afternoon. There aren’t many lorries anymore and there are long breaks in between.
The drivers are sometimes slightly drunk, and then they say things in conversation that they certainly wouldn’t say if they were sober. Once we got talking about the Jews. They are not well-liked in Russia either, and the driver said that we had killed far too few of them. It’s not the first time we’ve heard such and similar remarks. It is understandable.[6] Intelligent and enterprising Jews are in key positions everywhere, even here in Russia. I see it in my neighbourhood. The vast majority of magazine administrators are Jews, and given the chronic food shortages in the Soviet Union, they are in a key position. Many political commissars are Jews. Thanks to their knowledge of German, they are also indispensable in many other places. Our ramp is a prime example. The two most important posts were held by Jews: the senior nachalnik and the magazine administrator. The Jewish pogroms make it clear that they are as unpopular here as elsewhere. They suffer the same fate here as the enterprising Indians in many African countries. And probably for the same reason.
It’s after 5 pm. Our brigade is alone on the ramp. No more lorries. We are sitting in a small log cabin. There’s just enough room for the 8 of us. The hut is close to the fence. A Russian civilian has joined us. He’s a bit under the influence, but that doesn’t detract from the cheerful conversation. Eventually the Russian rises and says a cheery goodbye before leaving. He suddenly turns round in the doorway and looks at us with fierce anger. He pounces on us and begins to beat us furiously. Attracted by the noise, the guard rushes over, grabs the Ivan, pushes him out of the door and chases him out of the square. While we are still discussing the incomprehensible incident, the drunk appears outside at the fence. He is completely contrite and begs us with folded hands: “Kamerati! All right again?” We wave him off, but he raises his hands pleadingly. Then he pulls his wallet out of his pocket and wants to hand it to us through the fence. He wants us to share the money. But we tell him to go away.
I have experienced scenes like this repeatedly. Laughing a moment ago, the Russian turns to anger in a matter of seconds, and vice versa. The Russian soul will always remain incomprehensible to us.
After 6 p.m. there is never another vehicle and we have wonderfully quiet evenings on the square. We have nothing to do until 10 pm. Even the guards never show up. We sit together in another little hut, enjoy the evening silence and talk about everything that moves us. We talk about home, the prospects of returning home, our families, our jobs. We talk about the meaning of life and religious questions. The clear stars twinkle above us in the blue night sky. Rolf Hillebrand, meteorologist, shows us the Earth’s shadow clearly visible in the dark night sky. These are wonderful evenings. We are almost cheerful and content. - Of course, we have also laughed on previous occasions. We have laughed quite often. There were enough funny situations and otherwise bearable times. Then I always had to think about Carola, who might be worried about me while I was laughing here.
Another marvellous thing was the evening shower that we enjoyed after work. When we returned to the camp at 10 pm, we went to the washroom in the camp laundry building, where the launderers always had hot water ready for us. Then we soaped each other up, splashed around and rinsed ourselves off by pouring whole buckets of warm water over our heads and bodies.
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- ↑ in the original erraneously 48
- ↑ дранка is a plaster base, but also means roof shingle
- ↑ Even later, he was reluctant to shave!
- ↑ This must have been particularly embarrassing for him, given his otherwise not inconsiderable effect on women!
- ↑ Хлеб, probably understood as “kleb”, but better transcribed as “chleb”
- ↑ A motive for murder may be understandable, but it remains murder.