Nearing the end of the war in Europe, we stopped our eastern advance. I believe it was per the Yalta Agreement. We waited for the Russians to occupy our positions. You would think, with the cessation of hostilities, there would be no more casualties. Not so, ‘Murphy’s Law’ still prevailed. We continued to suffer quite a few more fatalities. Two men were killed blowing up an ammo dump. One soldier was crushed when a large barrel of wine got loose in the back of an army truck, and two drunken soldiers were killed in a jeep accident. Plus, two self-inflicted pistol wounds (accidents), one in the foot and one in the hand. After the accidents, the brass forbade us to carry German pistols.
Now the town we were in covered quite a large area. It encompassed a displaced persons camp, and I oversaw the detail that maintained discipline at the facility for three weeks, wow!
The troop was now commanded by a 1st Lieutenant, a fine ambitious officer who wanted to become a Captain. At that time and place, there seemed to be a drive to find, among the civilians, past Nazi party bigwigs. Our lieutenant was quite active in this pursuit. If he were to find a few, it would have been a feather in his helmet, and possibly a promotion.
During the final days of our advance, a displaced person attached himself to our outfit. Our lieutenant took a shine to him. He was a former Captain of the Polish Army, and our lieutenant had a need for this man’s particular talents. He was a huge burly, frightening looking man with hands the size of hams. He was called The Pole. He became the lieutenant’s interrogator.
I was attending a non-com meeting at the command post one afternoon and observed the Pole’s handiwork. He was interrogating two Hitler youth boys about 16 or 17 years old. They both were wearing short lederhosen with knee high sock (very Bavarian). They were standing at attention before the Pole who was asking questions in German, and after each question he would administer a round house blow with those huge hands. Very brutal. When the non-coms became visibly uneasy, the lieutenant stopped him immediately.
He saw the effect it was having on us. We didn’t cotton to torture. I had to admire the German boys, they stood tall and erect, even though their faces were swollen, bruised and blood red. This incident explained a lot of the screams of anguish we heard coming from the cellar of the troops command post at night. Eventually, the lieutenant was made captain, much to the delight of all of us insomniacs.
I remember going on a three-man detail to the home of a suspected Nazi. We had to tell the family to pick up the body of their father. He had hung himself……Oh, well, all in a day’s work.
Would you believe that when we were leaving this area, there were a lot of sad and apprehensive faces on the civilians waving goodbye to us! I guess the devil you know, is better than the one you don’t know.
The Russians were coming!