Heinrich Gerlach - Breakout at Stalingrad

Dry mud crumbled through the thin plank ceiling of the bunker, which clung to the lip of a secondary branch of the gully like a swallow’s nest, while the wind gusted snow through the incessantly flapping door, right up to the tinny stove glowing ostentatiously red-hot but delivering little in the way of warmth. Sergeant Herbert was busy trying to plug the many cracks in the windowpanes and the wide gaps in the external walls of the bunker with paper, while Geibel was dangling his frozen heels in a bowl of hot water. Up until now, Geibel had survived the weeks of gnawing hunger without showing signs of any major ill effects, but just in the last three days had suddenly and quite alarmingly gone to pieces. His round baby face now resembled a partially deflated balloon. The warmth that crept comfortingly up his legs prompted some pensive musings.

‘Do you really think the Führer will get us out of this jam? What if we can just manage to hold out here until the spring?’

In reply, Herbert grunted something unintelligible, which could have just as easily had to do with the windowpane, from which another piece of glass had just dropped out.

‘Dear me, what’s my wife going to do without me!’ Geibel continued.

‘She’ll go and find another husband,’ growled Herbert insensitively. ‘There’s plenty more dimwits like you out there!’

Geibel wasn’t put out by this and kept pursuing his line of thought. ‘So, d’you reckon the Russians’ll butcher the lot of us?’

He cast a cautious eye over to the corner, where Breuer seemed to be napping, and lowered his voice. ‘Hey, listen, I found this leaflet that says we get given six hundred grams of bread a day if we’re taken prisoner. Imagine that, Herbert, six hundred grams! Maybe it isn’t a load of eyewash after all. And Lakosch wouldn’t have… Look, what I’m saying is, if the Russians actually take prisoners… well, I don’t mind if they keep me banged up for three years, or even longer, ten years, say. Just as long as I can get back to my wife and kid at the end of the day…’

Geibel paddled his feet round in the water, which by this stage was only lukewarm. His moist eyes gazed blissfully into the far distance. In all probability they were already back in the comfort of the family home in Chemnitz, wandering through his cosy front parlour with the moquette-covered armchairs. All of a sudden, he leaned right over to where Herbert was sitting and his voice sank to a secretive whisper.

‘Herbert, man, you and me are only small fry – just like all the other enlisted men, for that matter! We’re not to blame for this war. Why would they do anything to us? Maybe they’ll just bump off the officers… If only his nibs down there would put us in the picture!’

Saying this, he shot a pointed look down towards the rear of the bunker.

‘But he keeps his trap shut. He must know how things are over there – but will we ever get the truth out of him?’

The person Geibel was referring to was the Intelligence Section’s latest guest: a middle-aged man with a broad, good-natured face, who was dressed in a blue-grey French military jacket. He sat silently on a bench at the back of the bunker, staring fixedly at his clasped hands with his small, grey eyes, which were framed by countless little crow’s feet. He was twiddling his thumbs incessantly. This was the Russian Lieutenant Colonel Nasarov.

Herbert began to lose his cool.

‘Just put a sock in it, will you?’ he snapped. ‘God help us if you ’ve started thinking! Leave that to the horses – their heads are bigger than yours!’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ complained Geibel, ‘that’s what I always used to do. But when your own life’s on the line…’

‘Herbert!’

Breuer’s alert voice made them both start.

‘Lieutenant, sir!’

‘Have you finally sorted that business with the lieutenant colonel’s food?’

‘Yes, sir, Lieutenant! As of today, he’ll be getting the normal rations from our canteen.’

Breuer turned over on to his side again. That was all he needed right now, to be saddled with this Russian. Unold had selected him personally at the end of September from an elite camp for captured Red Army officers and requisitioned him to command the Cossack detachment. He’d arrived at Wehrmacht Staff HQ just before the Cauldron had closed, with the highest of commendations from the camp commandant, but had never set eyes on the unit he’d been assigned to lead, and thereafter had sat around uselessly at the quartermaster’s division as a silent eyewitness to the unfolding catastrophe. Yesterday, he’d suddenly turned up at the door of the intelligence division bunker. Major Siebel had sent him over. Siebel told them he had no further use for the Russian, and that division Ic was responsible for prisoners of war anyhow! Sonderführer Fröhlich had managed to assuage Breuer’s anger and the Russian had remained with them. He proved to be friendly, unassuming and helpful. Most of the time, though, he just sat quietly on his bench. And because he could only speak a few snatches of broken German, he didn’t disturb anyone. His relaxed face betrayed no agitation or disquiet, though he could scarcely have been unaware of the general situation and his personal predicament here in Stalingrad. What must he have been thinking? Perhaps the only thing on his mind was that perpetually Russian attitude, that cure-all demeanour expressed in the word nitchevo! – no matter! Fröhlich had had a couple of long chats with him, but only gave evasive answers about their outcome.

In the afternoon, Unold called all the staff officers to a meeting in his bunker. On this occasion he was not lying in bed with a bottle of cognac beside him, as he had been wont to do since their arrival in Stalingradski, but received his fellow officers dressed in his grey leather coat, ready to go out. He was even freshly shaven.

‘Gentlemen!’

Unold’s voice, which was soft to begin with, was muffled so much by the woollen blankets hung up all round the walls as to be virtually inaudible.

‘Well, gentlemen, I approached the general staff again and asked them whether they really wanted, in all seriousness, to needlessly sacrifice an entire well-qualified divisional staff, which has no further use here, by sticking its officers in the front line and wasting them as simple pistol shooters. I might as well have banged my head against a brick wall. “No further use here, you say?” Schmidt laughed when I said that. “We’ve got plenty of tasks lined up for you!”’

Breuer cast his eye over the wall cladding, installed just to spare Unold’s nerves when shelling started, and thought of all the men outside freezing for lack of blankets.

‘And now I must take my leave of you,’ said Unold. ‘I’ve been ordered to go to Army High Command with Captain Engelhard to receive new orders. I’ve no idea what they are, or whether it’s a long- or a short-term assignment. In any event, though… Farewell!’

‘So, what do you make of that?’ Siebel asked Breuer as they trudged back through the ice-bound gorge to their quarters.

‘He just never lets up!’ continued the major, ‘but you mark my words, one day he’ll just up and get a flight out of here!’

When Lieutenant Wiese paid a visit to the commandant of the headquarters, Captain Stegen, to say his goodbyes, a young officer unknown to him was already there, and in the midst of a very animated anecdote. The captain stood up and shook Wiese’s hand.

‘So, all the best to you, dear Wiese, and please give our best regards to Germany!’

Gesturing towards the unknown officer, who had also stood up, Stegen announced: ‘Your replacement is here already. First Lieutenant Tausend has just flown in. He needs to get back to his battery without delay.’