We had now reached the last phase of our training programme and at this point started our training in a special skill. We had to practise running cables cross-country for field-telephones. This was carried out by teams of two men, one of whom carried a heavy cable-drum strapped on his back like a rucksack. The second man carried a light, ten-foot pole which had a brass fitting at one end.
Having firmly fixed the free end of the cable to a point at the start of the run, the man carrying the drum would jog along the route where the cable had to be laid while the drum rotated and the cable unwound automatically. The second man slipped the fitting of his pole over the cable and, jogging after his mate, made use of the length of the pole to run the cable from tree to tree or across other suitable locating points. The cable had to be run as high as possible so that it was protected from damage by army vehicles or passing troops. It was essential that the cable should not work its way loose and drop down while at the same time not be liable to get damaged by the movement of branches.
The essence of our training was learning to operate at speed. In a combat zone there was no question of taking cover and we would have to operate fully exposed to sniper fire.
A major event that took place while I was in Alkmaar was the gigantic Russian onslaught against the German lines on 22 June, but we had no knowledge of this or of the catastrophic consequences it had for the German armies that were overrun. Our attention was on the happenings in France and we thought that we might be sent there, or maybe the Allies would follow up with an attempted landing on the Dutch coast. We had neither radios, nor newspapers, and information from the outside world reached us only as special announcements by our officer in charge.
In the course of our training there was one sickening exercise that we had to go through, related to gas-warfare. We first had to learn technical details of the common poison-gases which we might encounter and how to recognise them. Since the filters on gas-masks can provide protection only for specific periods, we had to practise changing filters in a gas-laden atmosphere. Having mastered the steps in normal air, and still wearing our gas-masks, we had to enter a hut in which a poison-gas cylinder was then discharged. The procedure was to start taking ever-increasing deep breaths and finally, with our lungs almost bursting, to hold our breath while loosening the filter with one hand and holding the replacement filter in the other hand. The filter was then quickly unscrewed while exhaling to counteract gas seeping past the seals and into the mask. As soon as the filter came away, leaving a large opening, we had to exhale explosively while slapping the new filter into place and quickly screwing it home. In this way, most of the poison-gas, although never all of it, could be expelled from inside the mask.
This “live” exercise was carried out only once because of the harmful effects repetitions would have on the human system. The reason why it was even done once was to bring home to soldiers the horrific effect of carrying out this exercise inefficiently. I felt that I had accomplished a very slick exchange of filters and yet I experienced an unpleasant irritation of the throat and a choking sensation for several hours afterwards. The gas we had been subjected to, code name “Gelb Kreuz” (yellow cross), was a form of mustard gas. However, we all survived the exercise. In fact, during our whole three-month training period nobody ever went sick, collapsed or cracked up in any way. Probably the schedule was so excellently prepared that our gradual physical build-up enabled us to stand up to inhuman physical demands without suffering damage.
One day when we were going through our training exercises in the sand-dunes, a minor incident occurred which was to critically affect my life a few months later. We had been told that a group of officers would be coming to watch us in operation and that we should give a good account of ourselves. I was in a foxhole when they arrived and one of the officers happened to come my way and stop beside me. He questioned me about some aspects of our exercise and I replied as respectfully as was possible from my cramped position. I seemed to have an instant rapport with the officer and my intuition suggested that he was a highly educated person to whom army life did not come naturally.
Of all the conditions under which our training in Holland was carried out, there had been nothing compared to what we now faced in the sand-dunes of Alkmaar. Although the coast was six miles away, the sand was similar to that found on soft beaches. It was not that we were being trained for desert warfare, but that our physical stamina could here be best put to the ultimate test.
As if marching, sprinting and crawling across fields and scrubland was not bad enough, doing all this in soft sand seemed to be more than I could endure. To me, the peak was reached when we carried out manoeuvres in these hated dunes wearing not only full battle-dress, including the heavy steel helmet, carrying a rifle and machine-gun ammunition, but also wearing our gas-masks!
If anybody puts on a military gas-mask in a cool room and just stands there doing nothing, he will not find it easy to breathe freely and will quickly feel claustrophobic. How I felt on those warm days in June/July of 1944 I cannot adequately describe. I suppose that I can only be grateful for the training that I had previously received, which enabled me to outlive those days and also the months to come on the Russian Front.
On 20 July, we were told by our commanding officer that an assassination attempt had been made on Hitler. He read out the official announcement which actually began with the statement that Providence had protected Hitler from the dastardly action of a group of traitors and that these would be brought to justice and dealt with ruthlessly. This information was taken in by us without any reaction apart from some suppressed whistles of surprise, but I cannot recollect that even afterwards there was any discussion about it. This again followed the standard pattern whereby nobody could suicidally stick out his neck and denounce Hitler, except in privacy with intimate friends, but neither did anybody break out into any patriotic utterances.
I have very pleasant memories of Alkmaar. I loved the beauty of the town and the variety and multitude of blooms everywhere. Alkmaar, like all other towns that I passed through in Holland, showed no signs of war-damage and gave an illusory impression that the world was at peace. Of course, the war with Holland had only lasted for four days and it was mainly in Rotterdam where a lot of damage had occurred. An air-raid had been carried out on 15 May 1940 but, incredibly, the city was short of water-supplies and German fire equipment was brought from as far away as the Ruhr to effectively deal with the fires.
We were to remain in Alkmaar for just a month after the start of the major Russian offensive on 22 June. On 22 July, we were told that we were going to the Russian Front and would be leaving Alkmaar that same afternoon. We travelled by military train, but then made an overnight stop in Hengelo, a town near the German border. Since this was the school holiday period, a girls’ secondary school had been requisitioned temporarily so that we could spend the night sleeping rough in the classrooms. It could have been a dull evening, but I found it very interesting to browse through various books and class-material that I found there.
Whiling away my time, I wrote the first lines of an Irish poem by Thomas Moore on the blackboard and put my name and address in Ireland below it: