Now, “at last,” I was going to experience war at the front — and ordeals far worse than anything I had yet known.
We used the huts and bunkers of a temporary Luftwaffe airfield for a rest that was indispensable. Most of the field had been abandoned by the Luftwaffe, which had been forced to withdraw farther to the west. Some fighter planes were still there, in various states of disrepair and covered with ice, but a rump ground staff had moved out most of the equipment on big sleighs pulled by tractors.
We were allowed several days to restore ourselves in these more or less comfortable circumstances. However, the moment we began to look better, the authorities plunged us back into the thick of things. For the fighting troops of that sector, our company represented a considerable and unexpected supply of manpower. We were divided into fatigue parties and assigned various jobs. Three-quarters of our men were put to work preparing positions for 77s and even for light machine guns. This meant shoveling masses of snow, and then attacking the earth, which was as hard as rock, with picks and explosives.
Hals, Lensen, and I had managed to stay together. We were in a group that was ordered to supply an infantry section about ten miles away with food and ammunition. We were given two sleighs, each with a troika of shaggy steppe ponies. The distance was not great, our equipment was better than we’d had on our last tragic expedition, and thinking that we could easily manage the round trip in a day, we accepted the job as an easy one.
There were eight of us altogether, counting the sergeant. I was on the second sleigh, which was carrying grenades and magazines for spandaus.[5]
Sitting on the back of the sleigh, I had plenty of time to observe the dreary, empty landscape. At rare intervals, small stands of spindly trees thrust up from the immaculate white ground. They seemed to be engaged in an unequal struggle with the overpowering whiteness; it seemed to be gaining on them, slowly but surely. There was nothing else to be seen in this countryside, which must surely be inhabited by wolves — nothing except for the opaque, grayish-yellow sky. We seemed to have reached the far end of the world.
After a short time, we were following a depression in the snow which we took as an indication of a path. As we came to the edge of a thick forest, a soldier jumped up from behind a pile of wood, and stood in front of our first sleigh, which came to a dead stop. After a few words with our sergeant, he stepped aside, and we entered the forest, where we saw a spandau in action, manned by two soldiers, and further on an ant-like swarm of soldiers and innumerable gray tents. There were a great many big guns, light tanks of the Alpenberg type, Paks,[6] and mortars set up on sleighs. A slaughtered horse had been pulled up into a tree, and was gradually being transformed into steaks by soldiers whose coats were spattered with blood. We were besieged by soldiers who asked us for mail, and cursed us when we said we didn’t have any.
An officer checked our orders. The company we were to resupply was farther to the east. He sent an orderly to guide us. We continued through the woods, which concealed some three or four thousand men, and then crossed a series of small, partly cleared hills; I can still see them with absolute clarity. The white snow was crossed by three telephone lines which had been more or less covered over.
“Here we are,” said the orderly, who was on horseback. “Beyond this crest you will be under enemy fire, so go as quickly as you can. Follow the telephone line. The company you’re looking for is about a mile and a quarter from here.”
He saluted in the prescribed fashion and went off at a trot. We looked at each other.
“Well, here I go again,” said our sergeant, who undoubtedly was a long-time Rollbahn veteran.
He waved us forward, then stopped us.
“We’re going to try and get there really fast. Don’t be afraid to beat the horses. If the Russians see us, they’ll open fire, but it usually takes them a while. If things get too hot we’ll leave the sleigh with ammunition, because if that goes anyone closer than thirty yards will never see his mother again.”
I thought of the attack on the convoy near Kharkov. “Let’s go,” someone shouted, to prove he wasn’t afraid.
The sergeant jumped onto the first sleigh and waved us forward. We soon reached the top of the hill. The horses, panting from the climb, stopped for a moment before dashing down the other side.
“Get going!” shouted the sergeant. “We can’t stay here!”
“Use the whip!” Hals shouted to the fellow who was driving. Our sleigh was the first to start down. I can still see our three plucky ponies jumping through the snow like rabbits, from one depression to the next, churning up a white cloud which undoubtedly was visible a long way off. The three of us huddled behind the driver, in the center of the sleigh, perched on dark green boxes which carried a disquieting inscription in white stenciled letters. We were all feeling nervous, and had forgotten the cold.
I tried to watch the horizon through veils of white dust, despite our jolting progress. I thought that I could dimly see a group of isbas in front of us. All around us, shell holes of a remarkable symmetry mutilated the immaculate whiteness of the slope. Despite our precipitate speed, I noticed the curious borders of these excavations, which the earth thrown up by the explosions had tinged a light yellow. They looked like enormous, stylized flowers, with dark brown centers and yellow petals which turned very pale, almost white, at their outer edges. The holes which had already been there for long enough to be partly filled by new snow made a subtle variation in this curiously decorative pattern.
We reached the bottom of the slope without incident. There were a few heavily damaged isbas, and several large guns almost buried in the snow.
We stopped beside an isba whose roof sloped right down to the ground. The wall nearest us was of open lattice, and we could see some engineers working inside. They seemed to be taking the building apart. A few men came out carrying pieces of wood. Then a plump sergeant with a white garment pulled over his coat came up to us.
“Unload right here,” he said. “The engineers are preparing a shelter. It’ll be finished in an hour.”
A loud explosion made us jump. To our right, we saw a yellow flash, and then a geyser of stones and dirt, which spouted almost thirty feet into the air.
The sergeant turned calmly toward the noise. “Goddamned dirt,” he said. “Harder than a rock.”
We concluded that these fellows were engineers playing with dynamite. The corpulent noncom looked at our orders.
“Ah,” he said, tapping a box of cans with a gloved finger. “These aren’t for us. But our supplies are already three days late, and we’re living on our reserves which we’re not supposed to touch. If this goes on… You truck drivers certainly take your own sweet time! That’s why fellows up front die of the cold. When you haven’t got anything inside, you know, you can’t keep going.” He slapped his belly.
Judging by his waistline, it was hard to imagine that he’d fasted for long. He must have had a private store of food hidden away somewhere, because it was clear that, despite our best efforts, the front lines were extremely short of supplies.
“You’ll have to get over that way,” he pointed down the track. “That section is holding a piece of the Don bank… and you’ll go there on your hands and knees, if you know what’s good for you.”
We set off across the snow-covered chaos, following a trail marked by trucks half buried in snow. Beyond an embankment, some big guns and heavy howitzers were hidden by a heap of piled-up snow. Once we had passed them, they simply vanished from sight: their camouflage was perfect.