Chapter Ten
Near Warsaw, Germany East
30 October 1985
“Get out of bed, swinehund,” a voice barked. “Now!”
Hennecke Schwerk — who was no longer a Hauptsturmführer, even in the privacy of his own head — jerked awake and stood up hastily. The ‘bed’ was nothing more than the cold hard ground, but he knew better than to try to sneak a few extra minutes of sleep. The Scharführers who ran the penal battalions were no better than the men they supervised, handing out kicks and beatings to anyone who dared disagree with them. They snapped and snarled as the soldiers formed a ragged line, waving clubs around as if they were swords. It didn’t take much to get hit.
Trusties, Hennecke thought. It was pretty evident to him that the penal battalions were where bad NCOs were sent to die. And if they get killed out here, no one is going to give a damn.
“We have some special work for you today, ladies,” Scharführer Kuhn bellowed. Hennecke had only known Kuhn for a couple of days, but he’d already begun to detest Kuhn intensely. “We’re going to be digging trenches!”
He waved a hand at a pile of shovels. “Grab a shovel and follow me!”
Hennecke obeyed, hastily. There was no point in trying to resist, not when no one would bat an eyelid if a soldier from a penal unit was beaten to death. And there was no point in trying to desert, either. Making it across the front lines would be difficult — and if he made it, he’d just be shot by the rebels instead. All he could really do was follow orders, keep his head down and hope that he survived a month in the unit. And then he could go back to the regular Waffen-SS…
But I won’t keep my rank, he thought. Kuhn had made it clear that Hennecke’s former rank counted for nothing, not now. God alone knows where I’ll go.
They stumbled out of the camp and headed up the road, the stragglers yelping and cursing as the Scharführers helped them along the way with kicks and swipes from their clubs. A handful of passing stormtroopers stopped to jeer, hissing and cursing at the penal battalion as they marched past. The Scharführers ignored them, of course. They probably thought the reminder of just how the rest of the Waffen-SS thought about the men in orange uniforms would help discourage desertion. Hennecke would have bet good money that Kuhn and his cronies would have landed in some trouble if half the battalion deserted. If nothing else, a group of deserters with nothing to lose would pose a security risk.
“We want a trench here,” Kuhn bellowed, as they reached the edge of the front lines. A handful of soldiers were clearly visible, scanning the horizon with binoculars, but there was nothing else in sight. “Follow the lines drawn on the ground and start digging.”
Useless makework, Hennecke thought, as he shoved his spade into the ground and started to dig. He’d been taught how to dig foxholes and trenches in basic training, but both of them were useless without armed men to hold the line. And besides, without antitank weapons, the poor bastards in the trench will just get crushed.
There was no point in arguing, he knew. Kuhn was marching up and down the line, barking orders and swiping anyone who didn’t meet his high standards. Hennecke didn’t dare glare at him as he strode past Hennecke’s position; he merely kept working, silently promising himself that he’d have a chance to deal with the bastard later. Perhaps, if he returned to the Waffen-SS, he could accidentally put a bullet in Kuhn’s back. Or maybe there’d be an opportunity to behead him with a shovel…
“Keep working,” Kuhn snapped, as he walked past Hennecke again. “These trenches have to be completed soon!”
Hennecke barely heard him. It was cold, but sweat was still dripping down his back as he dug into the ground. He couldn’t help thinking of the false spring, the warm weather that was so common in Russia before the snowstorms finally materialised out of nowhere to bury the settlements in snow and ice. He’d had enough experience in the winter to know it was going to be hellish…
He yelped as the club connected with his back. “Keep working,” Kuhn ordered. “Think on your own time!”
Bastard, Hennecke thought. He wasn’t doing any better or worse than anyone else. Kuhn just wanted an excuse to hit someone, like the tutors in the Hitler Youth. Kuhn — a violent bigoted mindless fool — was overqualified for the job. No wonder he was stuck baby-sitting the penal units, rather than doing something useful with his time. He probably won’t get out of here in a month, whatever he does.
The sun was high in the sky when Kuhn finally pronounced himself satisfied. Hennecke had hoped for food and drink — or at least some rations — but Kuhn had other ideas. He marched them past the front line and down a road until they reached the shattered remains of a military convoy. A passing aircraft had caught them in the open and strafed them viciously, tearing the vehicles apart as if they had been made of paper. And dozens of bodies, some clearly wounded even before the convoy had been destroyed, lay everywhere.
“Half of you dig a grave,” Kuhn bellowed. “The rest of you clear the bodies out of the convoy, then mark down anything that might be salvageable.”
Hennecke hurried to join the latter group. He’d done enough digging for one day, as far as he was concerned. The first set of bodies were already spilling out of the vehicle; they were easy to carry out, their tags and ID papers removed before they were put by the side of the road with as much respect as the penal battalion could muster. Inside, other bodies had been badly damaged by the enemy aircraft. Hennecke hesitated over a pistol one of them had carried before deciding that taking the weapon would be pointless. Kuhn would see him concealing it and demand answers — or worse.
“You’re not allowed to touch a weapon without permission,” he’d said, when Hennecke had been dumped into the penal unit. “If you do, you will be shot!”
He finished removing the bodies, then glanced around for anything else that could be salvaged. The vehicle itself was probably beyond repair, but there were some components that could probably be reused, if they could be recovered in time. He wasn’t surprised when Kuhn ordered his men to remove anything that might be useful, then carry them back to the camp once the funeral had been completed.
And if I die out here, Hennecke thought as they carefully lowered the bodies into the mass grave, I’ll be lucky if I get any sort of burial.
The movies he’d watched about the glorious wars of conquest had made it clear that the dead were buried with all honours. But Kuhn didn’t bother to say a word over the corpses, merely spit on them before he ordered his men to start covering the bodies with earth. The men were too tired to be shocked, too tired to argue as they buried their former comrades. Hennecke couldn’t help wondering if it was worth it. The men had been wounded even before they’d been killed.
“Back to the camp,” Kuhn ordered. “Pick up your supplies and go.”
Hennecke groaned, but he knew better than to argue. Instead, he looked at the man next to him. He didn’t recognise him, although his youth suggested he’d only been in the Waffen-SS for a year, if that. His head was completely shaved, his body scarred…
God alone knows why he’s here, Hennecke thought, sourly. It was a taboo subject, when the penal soldiers had a few minutes to themselves. No one ever asked why their comrades had been dumped into the unit. Rape, murder, defying orders, kicking the CO’s cat… who knows?