Some statistics relating to east-German refugees forcibly demonstrate their tragic fate; In East-Prussia, 1,09 million people were evacuated by the German navy and a further 350,000 left by road, leaving behind 614,000 dead civilians. In East-Pommerania the number of civilian deaths was 375,000.
I received my last letters at the front in early April 1945. Between bombing raids in Germany and the catastrophic situation on the eastern Front, it was surprising that army mail had still continued to reach me.
In mid-April, we received an addition to our unit in the form of a heavy 5-ton German Henschel truck and a further six soldiers. The truck was diesel-engined, but unusual inasmuch as it had a small 3-speed gear box bolted onto the front end, used only for cranking the engine before starting it. What happened was that two of us, standing face to face, operated a huge four-handed cranking-handle. A stubby gear lever was first pushed into the low gear position and we would crank away till the engine was spinning freely. Then we paused an instant, pushed the lever into middle gear and brought the engine up to a higher speed. Repeating the operation in top gear, we waited for a signal from the driver. When he was satisfied he nodded, we immediately stopped cranking and he engaged the starting clutch. If the engine did not fire there was no question of continuing cranking in top gear, or even middle gear. We had to start all over again in low gear, straining to get the heavy engine moving once more. The army must have been terribly short of transport to have provided us with such unsuitable equipment in a war zone.
During the last three weeks of the war, we were kept busier than ever. It was not that there was an abundance of ammunition available for us to fetch, but rather that we had to continually re-ferry dumps so that they were not lost to the Russians over the retreat in the last fifty-five miles. Though sometimes short of fuel for our trucks, we never actually ran out of it. I suppose the obvious reason was that, important as tanks and other armoured vehicles are, they are useless if they cannot use their guns; and so my little transport unit probably took priority over them.
One day Willi Gerkens approached me with a proposal. He said the war would soon be over and we should then stick together for our mutual benefit. His proposition was that if I, with my knowledge of languages, helped him to get back to his parents’ farm near Bremen, without being taken prisoner, he would put me up until I was able to return to Ireland. He added that if I managed to locate my sister, she would also be welcome to stay at his home. We could expect the western half of Germany to be occupied by British, American and French troops and so, since Gerkens spoke no foreign language, this was quite a shrewd suggestion. The idea also appealed to me, since it would mean having accommodation that was a long distance west of Russian-held territory as well as being also close to the north-west German coast.
Soon afterwards I got one of my worst scares in the transport unit. We had gone to retrieve a stock of ammunition from a dump in an area from which most units had been withdrawn. Having arrived shortly before dawn, we worked at break-neck speed to complete loading up because we knew the Russians could arrive at any moment. I do not know why on this of all times we used the Henschel truck. Also, the engine was shut down while we were loading, probably because the driver was afraid the Russians would hear us. However, the upshot of it all was that the engine failed to start when we had flung the last cases onto the truck and we had gone through the tedious cranking procedure.
Twice already the driver had released the clutch and each time there was just a cough from the engine before it spluttered into silence. Our driver frantically waved for a fresh pair of men to take over from the first team who, in spite of the cold weather, were covered in perspiration. Another mate and I jumped forward and took over the job of man-handling the engine through its three starting gears.
Just as we were about to engage second gear three Russian armoured troop-carriers appeared about half a mile away and began to head towards us. Rather than desert the truck and head into the safety of the woods, we nodded our immediate agreement to continue with another try. By the time we got to third gear, desperately trying to get up more speed on the engine, the Russians were much too close for comfort. Our driver now held the balance of our lives in his hands. If he tried the ignition too soon, the chances were that the engine would again fail to fire. But if he waited longer for us to get up more speed then, even if the engine fired, the Russians could be upon us. Outnumbered, and with only rifles to defend ourselves, we could be wiped out in minutes.
Seconds dragged on like an eternity and still the driver held back, I could almost sense the fingers of the Russian soldiers hovering over the release of their guns as they waited to get nearer to us. I was beginning to feel that I could not keep up the cranking any longer and would myself become a drag on the spinning engine when, at last, the driver gave his signal. As my mate and I stepped back, the sweet song of the engine coming to life hit my ears and we were scrambling aboard in an instant. We had not gone many yards before the Russians opened fire, but they were crossing very rough ground that spoilt their aim and within seconds the wood had swallowed us up and we were safe.
On 16 April, the Russians began an all-out offensive with deeply penetrating movements towards the provinces of Brandenburg and Saxony. The Göring Divisions held out until 22 April, but by then Russian advances to the north of us had reached and taken the town of Bautzen, thirty miles north-east of Dresden. Our orders were to retake Bautzen and establish an unbroken Front-line. Together with another panzer division, the Göring Divisions 1 and 2 attacked shortly after midnight of 22/23 April. Within twenty-four hours, Bautzen had been recaptured from Russian and Polish troops. Indescribable scenes of past barbarity were revealed when women and girls were freed from buildings, where they had been held prisoner.
Forcing the Russians out of Bautzen was the last major German success in the East. Russian troops gave up trying to recapture the town and it remained in German hands until the war was almost over. Shortly after we had retaken Bautzen, American and Russian forces met at the town of Torgau on the Elbe. It was 25 April and Germany was now effectively split in two by the invading armies. During the last week of April the Göring Divisions fought a slowly retreating battle toward an area north-east of Dresden, but by this time they were no longer an effective force.
During my research I have come across many names of towns in battle areas that I remember well from my ammunition runs in the last phases of the war. It is so easy to glibly peel off such a list of names, but what of the anguish, the torment and the terrible human suffering associated with each of these places? As for me, not one supply run had been without incident and I treated each day as just another day to be survived. There were periods when I felt that we were spending half our time behind the Russian lines or trying to get our trucks through Russian-held territory. Amazingly enough, we never lost a truck on our runs even though they became badly marked by bullets. Similarly, the rest of the crew and I had luck on our side and suffered no casualties despite all the runs we made past Russian positions.
The news of Hitler’s death on 30 April was announced to us, but there was no mention of suicide. Grossadmiral Dönitz, who was appointed by Hitler to take over from him, purposely delayed surrender negotiations so that retreating German armies could give cover to the huge masses of refugees fleeing from the east. It is reckoned that by his action he saved between two and three million refugees being overtaken by the Russians. For me, this is an important concept because I feel that it has vindicated my own attitude and actions as a soldier in contributing in my small way towards saving the lives of civilians and German soldiers.