Елена Ржевская - Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter - From the Battle for Moscow to Hitler's Bunker

It was frosty, and fine, prickly snow was falling. Where on earth were these people headed? Who was likely to give them shelter, where, on which remote country track would they finally perish? Far from the great highways of history, from the global cataclysms and satanic dreams of world domination, these people who had known only the hard toil of a peasant life had been driven into a trap by the play of diabolical forces and now were being held responsible for everything that had happened. Neither the heavens under which they were born, nor the land they had cultivated for centuries, nor the ancient roots their families had put down in this soil counted for anything. Everything had receded, repudiating them. People are judged, brought together, or sundered by blood. It was Germans who had caused such suffering here, and now these pariahs were cut off by a front line from those with whom they had blood ties. What did they face? Where was the refuge that would take them in? For hatred and vengefulness these were irrelevancies. Who would argue their case?

Everything was a mess: the jubilant spirit of universal brotherhood, and this dark murderousness – these persecuted German peasants and the fury of the young boys pursuing them. People herded here, to ‘Bromberg’, to build a rampart against the Red Army, who, under the yoke of the enemy had lost their ties with the outside world, had so jubilantly, so inspiringly found them again, here, now. But if you can cut someone else off, expel them, is this not the beginning of a road that leads over the cliff edge? ‘If at one end of the world you cause harm, the effect will be felt at the other.’

At the entry to the commandant’s office, seated on a very serviceable stallion, the commandant, without dismounting, was issuing urgent orders in the light of the military emergency threatening the city. Along the highway a column was approaching, and the commandant peered impatiently at it, his horse pacing restlessly beneath him.

We could already make out a flag, the tricolour of France, but these people were not marching like soldiers but spread out across the highway like an odd crowd of private citizens. The French came closer and stopped, and from among the ranks of the soldiers, grey, dishevelled figures separated and grouped together to one side of the road. The commandant, high up in his saddle, was the first to notice, and was aghast.

‘Whatever next!’ he muttered angrily, leaping down from his horse, pointing with his chin and raising his stubbly eyebrows, signalling to me to follow. He walked quickly to the main road. The French greeted us as soldiers but the commandant appeared not to notice. He walked a little to one side of them where those strange, grey creatures were huddled, clinging to each other and, from a distance, looking like a ghostly, dustladen grey cloud. It was difficult to recognize them as women.

The commandant addressed them loudly. ‘Hello!’ I translated into German. ‘Once again, hello!’ he repeated furiously and with strained courtesy. The cloud stirred, and a yellow star was briefly seen on one woman’s back. That was the first time I had seen the yellow, six-pointed star, one of several the commandant had been shocked by when he saw them in the distance. Before that we had only heard about them.

These were Jewish women from a concentration camp, in sackcloth, with a blanket over their shoulders or a piece of hessian hiding those stars. Some had already cut the stars off, but those that remained were more than enough to leave you feeling pierced by an unbearable emotion. ‘Tell them they are free. You are free!’ the commandant said, beating me to it.

One woman in the crowd asked in Polish in a low, hoarse voice where they would now be sent. ‘Nowhere, of course! You are free!’ the commandant said, bestowing upon them all the conquered kingdoms of the earth. ‘See those buildings over there? There are empty apartments in them. The Germans have run away and abandoned them. Go and take them over, and everything that has been left there, all the property is yours. Take it! Did they understand you?’ he asked. I nodded.

The French soldiers, exhausted, in worn-out greatcoats, looked at us tentatively and smiled. General Giraud’s adjutant was not among them. These were rank-and-file soldiers, probably from a different camp. They went over and again mingled with the grey mass, giving the women back their small bundles and sacks. Their belongings were very basic but nevertheless a burden. The Frenchmen had carried them the ten kilometres, and lent a shoulder to those of the women who were too desperately weak. Now they bade them farewell with great warmth.

‘Vive la France !’ I said quietly and very sincerely. That was the extent of my knowledge of French, but they responded enthusiastically, joyfully.

‘Listen here!’ the major shouted. ‘French comrades…’ Not understanding what was being said to them, they rapidly fell back into line. ‘First of all, I sincerely welcome you.’ ‘Please, does anybody understand German?’ I asked. ‘Please tell the French soldiers that the major welcomes you warmly.’ There was silence. ‘I must apologize on behalf of all of us,’ someone in the ranks said in good German. ‘But we hope our contacts with Russians can take place without our having to use the language of the Germans.’

‘What’s the problem?’ the commandant asked impatiently. He was in a hurry. ‘They don’t want to use the enemy’s language for talking to us.’ The commandant grunted approvingly. ‘Do you know French? No? Well, where does that leave us?’ He looked round anxiously at his horse, which a courier had just brought up. ‘Well, that’s for them to sort out.’ ‘I can translate for you.’ A woman emerged from the grey mass of women. She moved her hessian head-covering down to her shoulders, revealing a head of blond hair and a young, enchanting face.

‘Well, fine. Comrade Frenchmen! On behalf of the Red Army I am fraternally glad that we have liberated you… This girl will now translate that for you.’ Now we could communicate effectively, by mediated translation, and the French cheered up instantly. A soldier came out of the ranks, took off his forage cap and placed it on the interpreter’s fair hair.

Watching this, the commandant had lost his thread but now resumed. ‘There is an order in respect of yourselves. Right, then, you are immediately to proceed to the city centre and join up there with the French contingent. I don’t know whether they are from your camp or some other, but so what, you are compatriots. So stick with them. So you are all in one place. No one is to wander off. Observe that order strictly. Understood?’

As I listened to the commandant’s order, I could immediately tell that something had happened, something had changed, something had ended. The free-and-easy atmosphere of even a few hours ago was over. The commandant adroitly mounted his horse and galloped off to his regiment.

One of our soldiers, perhaps, the commandant’s courier, took the liberty of shouting, ‘Long live free France!’ and was understood by the French soldiers, who clustered around him and responded, ‘Vive la Russie !’ The French marched off in free formation, waving encouragingly to the women as they departed.

The women remained hesitantly in the road. The sky was still calm.

About three days after our troops liberated Bydgoszcz and drove the enemy further west, with only a few of our units remaining in the city, a message was received that German troops to the north were preparing a counterattack on the city. You can imagine the unenviable situation in which the small Bydgoszcz–Bromberg garrison found itself as it faced a targeted blow from German troops desperately attempting to break out of encirclement. Everywhere in the city, hackles rose. The sense of community all had shared, the fervent friendship, the multi-ethnic unity was disrupted by this new reminder of the war. An augmented patrol was combing the city, looking for German spies who might have infiltrated during those hours of jubilation.