The noise of fighting, which now included the rapid fire of our 20-millimetre guns, had moved further away and I seemed to be alone. Hurrying to where our guns had been stationed I saw that one of them was still there, but nobody was around. The gun had been badly damaged, but whether by Russian bazookas or disabled by the gun’s own crew I could not tell.
Moments later I could hear our surviving self-propelled guns roaring away into the distance. I was now truly on my own and, to cap it all, there were Russian soldiers in the wood around me. My immediate guess was that a special Russian task-force had sneaked up to the gun-group under cover of darkness and had launched a surprise-attack, knocking out one of our guns with bazookas or magnetic mines. Since it would not have been possible to see the attackers in the darkness, the loss of more guns could not be risked and a fast retreat was required.
I could not feel sore at having been left behind. To stay and search for me would have been suicidal and we all knew that, in a situation like this, whoever was unfortunate enough to get separated from the rest, would have to fend for himself.
What was I to do? Mental and physical exhaustion gave way to a sense of urgency. I had to get away as quickly as possible and not rest until I had put many miles behind me before the sun rose again. With no compass to guide me, I could only hope that some stars would become visible. Setting off in what I hoped was a south-westerly direction to try to avoid meeting the Russians again, I decided to keep going for one hour and then change to a westerly direction. I would keep walking until one o’clock in the morning and then find a hiding place for a two-hour sleep. I thought it essential not to get overtired and to be reasonably fresh to make a rational decision at daybreak.
As I walked through the darkness, I felt my mental energy sagging; rather too much had happened in one day. Sometimes my mind wandered to my home in Ireland and I thought how strange it was that my parents would soon be fast asleep in bed, while I was stumbling along some god-forsaken track in Poland in the middle of the night.
7
ALONE IN NO MAN’S LAND
Soon I was no longer sure that I was going in the right direction. Running into the Russians had made me doubly cautious about my movements and I found myself continually changing direction in order to make the best use of the terrain ahead of me.
Trying to cover too much ground turned out to be a major mistake, because I had completely ignored how much the shelling might have affected me. Looking at my watch later on I realised that I could not remember anything I had done over the previous two hours. I must have walked in a zombie-like daze as a result of a delayed shock reaction. It was incredible that I had not fallen or come to any other harm in the meantime and my mind was jolted by the realisation that I could have been walking exactly opposite to my intended direction.
An ominous warning had been given to me, so I looked around for a suitable hiding place where I could rest and also safely hole-up on the following day, if necessary. I found a good spot in some undergrowth among the trees from which there would be a good view of my surroundings when daylight came. As I dropped to the ground and stretched out my weary limbs I breathed a sigh of relief. Slowly, my mind began to relax.
After a while, I established what food I had with me. It amounted to three and a half slices of bread and some dripping. I also had just half a flask of coffee. Not knowing how long this would have to last, I decided to eat only one slice per day because this would give me some sustenance for three walking days. I then ate half a slice with a trace of dripping and drank some coffee before crawling deep into the undergrowth. The ground was soft and dry and I needed no mattress to help me fall into a deep sleep.
My body-clock served me well and I awoke soon after three a.m. I felt refreshed and the befogged state of my mind seemed to have gone. The coldest part of night always precedes sunrise and so, despite the relative comfort of my hide-out, I had woken up feeling stiff from the cold that had gradually seeped through my body. I stood up and set about getting my circulation going again while I avoided making any unnecessary noise. After slowly chewing my half slice of bread and drinking some of my remaining coffee I was ready to go.
The light from sunrise gave me a good east-west bearing and I decided to move off westwards and cover as much ground as possible while looking out for anything that might guide me back to the German lines. Despite my scare in having encountered Russians in a wood, I had to avoid all open areas where possible. I could be easily recognised as a German soldier at quite a distance and I did not have the faintest idea where there might be any Russians. In addition, there was the constant danger of coming up against Polish partisans. After an hour’s march I came to the end of the wood and was afforded a good long-distance view. What I saw was an undulating landscape with quite an amount of woodlands, which was comforting. I could see a group of small farmsteads in the distance, but these were well away from the woods and I saw no towns or villages.
My next step was to pick a route that would give me reasonable cover. At the same time I had to memorise alternative routes in case I found an impassable obstacle in my way. My immediate worry was an open stretch of about half a mile that I had to cross before reaching a continuous expanse of woods. It was still early in the morning and, if I did not want to make an extensive time-consuming detour, I would have to take a chance and cross it now.
I held my helmet close to my body in the hope that only somebody with binoculars could recognize me as a German soldier, and set off quickly. I must have got to within 200 yards of safety when I heard a bullet hit a bush close to me. From the vibration of a branch and the sound of a rifle I knew that it had not come from ahead of me. It had to be from behind me and somewhere to the right and seemed to come from a sniper fairly far away.
Anticipating that there would already be a second bullet in the air and a third one just leaving the sniper’s rifle, I automatically dropped to the ground and began to crawl swiftly to my left; hoping that the sniper had lost sight of me when I dropped down. I waited for the third shot and then sprang up and ran for a few seconds in the direction of the wood before dropping down again. Once more, I crawled to one side waiting for the next few shots to be fired and then leapt up for another sprint. This time I could keep my run shorter as I managed to reach an area covered with ferns about two feet high. I was now able to cover the last stretch by crawling, but had to be careful not to disturb the ferns too much, because the sniper was still taking the odd pot-shot at me. Having safely entered the edge of the wood I did not stop for a breather, but immediately hurried on. I decided to make a slight detour, although I did not think the sniper could alert anybody to try to intercept me.
At this point I jettisoned my steel helmet and gas mask. Their weight did not bother me, but they affected my freedom of movement. A soldier’s first priority is to retain his means of protection and for this reason I had started off with my rifle, spare ammunition, steel helmet and gas mask. But I was now in an abnormal situation. I had begun to feel like an animal that could be hunted down and my first concern became territorial skill where anything affecting maximum progress had to be abandoned. The rifle could never be discarded since it gave me the means of protection if my life was threatened. My bread was in a canvas bag. Both it and the drinking flask were neatly attached to my belt with clips and were no hindrance to me.