I stop for a moment at the door of a barn and poke my head round the corner to investigate; the building yawns in my face. Nothing but emptiness. The place is stripped bare, no harness, no farm implements, no living creature—stay!—a rat darts from one comer to another. A large heap of maize leaves lies rotting in the barnyard. I grub amongst them with greedy fingers. If only I could find a couple of corncobs… or only a few grains of corn… But I find nothing… I grub and grub and grub… not a thing!
Suddenly I am aware of a rustling noise behind me. Some figures are creeping stealthily past the door of another barn: Russians, or refugees as famished as I am and on the self—same quest? Or are they looters in search of further booty? I fare the same at the next farm. Here I go through the maize heaps with the greatest care—nothing. Disappointedly I reflect: if all the food is gone I must at least make up for it by resting. I scrape myself a hole in the pile of maize leaves and am just about to lie down in it when I hear a fresh noise: a farm wagon is rumbling past along a lane; on the box a man in a tall fur cap, beside him a girl. When there is a girl there can be nothing untoward, so I go up to them. From the black fur cap I guess the man is a Rumanian peasant.
I ask the girclass="underline" “Have you anything to eat?”
“If you care to eat this…” She pulls some stale cakes out of her bag. The peasant stops the horse. Not until then does it occur to me that I have put my question in German and have received a German answer.
“How do you come to know German?”
The girl tells me that she has come with the German soldiers from Dnjepropetrowsk and that she learnt it there. Now she wants to stay with the Rumanian peasant sitting beside her. They are fleeing from the Russians.
“But you are going straight in their direction.” I can see by their faces that they do not believe me. “Have the Russkis already reached the town over there?”
“No, that is Floresti.”
This unexpected reply is like a tonic. The town must lie on the Balti-Floresti railway line which I know. “Can you tell me, girl, if there are still any German soldiers there?”
“No, the Germans have left, but there may be Rumanian soldiers.”
“Thank you and God speed.”
I wave to the disappearing wagon. Now I can already hear myself being asked later why I did not “requisition” the wagon… the idea never entered my mind… For are the pair not fugitives like myself? And must I not offer thanks to God that I have so far escaped from danger?
After my excitement has died down a brief exhaustion overcomes me. For those last six miles I have been conscious of violent pain; all of a sudden the feeling returns to my lacerated feet, my shoulder hurts with every step I take. I meet a stream of refugees with handcarts and the bare necessities they have salvaged, all in panic-stricken haste.
On the outskirts of Floresti two soldiers are standing on the scarp of a sandpit; German uniforms? Another few yards and my hope is confirmed. An unforgettable sight!
I call up to them: “Come here!”
They call down: “What do you mean: come here! Who are you anyway, fellow?”
“I am Squadron Leader Rudel.”
“Nah! No squadron leader ever looked like you do.” I have no identification papers, but I have in my pocket the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords. I pull it out of my pocket and show it to them. On seeing it the corporal says:
“Then we’ll take your word for it.”
“Is there a German Kommandantur?”
“No, only the rearguard H.Q. of a dressing station.”
That is where I will go. They fall in on either side of me and take me there. I am now crawling rather than walking. A doctor separates my shirt and trousers from my body with a pair of scissors, the rags are sticking to my skin; he paints the raw wounds of my feet with iodine and dresses my shoulder. During this treatment I devour the sausage of my life. I ask for a car to drive me at once to the airfield at Balti. There I hope to find an aircraft which will fly me straight to my squadron.
“What clothes do you intend to wear?” the doctor asks me. All my garments have been cut to ribbons. “We have none to lend you.” They wrap me naked in a blanket and off we go in an automobile to Balti. We drive up in front of the control hut on the airfield. But what is this? My squadron officer, Plt./Off. Ebersbach opens the door of the car:
“Pilot Officer Ebersbach, in command of the 3rd Squadron advance party moving to Jassy.”
A soldier follows him out carrying some clothes for me. This means that my naked trip from Floresti has already been reported to Balti from there by telephone, and Ebersbach happened to be in the control but when the message came through.
He has been informed that his colleague who has been given up for dead will shortly arrive in his birthday suit. I climb into a Ju. 52, and fly to Rauchowka to rejoin the squadron. Here the telephone has been buzzing, the news has spread like wild fire, and the wing cook, Runkel, has already a cake in the oven. I look into grinning faces, the squadron is on parade. I feel reborn, as if a miracle had happened. Life has been restored to me, and this reunion with my comrades is the most glorious prize for the hardest race of my life.
We mourn the loss of Henschel, our best gunner with a credit of 1200 operational sorties. That evening we all sit together for a long while round the fire. There is a certain atmosphere of celebration. The Group has sent over a deputation, among them a doctor who is supposed to. “sit by my bedside.” He conveys to me the General’s congratulations with an order that I am to be grounded and to be flown home on leave as soon as I am in a fit condition to travel. Once more I shall have to disappoint the poor general. For I am deeply worried in my mind. Shall we be able to hold the Soviets now advancing southward in force from the Dniester? I could not lie in bed for a single day.
We are due to move to Jassy with all personnel the next morning. The weather is foul, impossible to fly. If we all have to be idle perforce I may as well obey the doctor’s orders and rest. The day after I fly with my squadron to Jassy, from where we have not so far to fly on our coming sorties over the Dniester. My shoulder is bandaged and I cannot move my arm, but that does not matter much when flying. It is worse that I have hardly any flesh on my feet and so naturally cannot walk. Every pressure on the controls involves acute pain. I have to be carried to my aircraft.
Jassy is a pretty Rumanian town, at present completely unscathed. To us a magnificent sight; it reminds us of home. We gape at the shop windows and are as delighted as children.
The next morning our reconnaissance discovers strong armored and motorized formations already almost due N. of Balti, probably they have even reached the town. At first the weather is bad; the country is mountainous and the highest peaks are shrouded in mist. The situation is grave; there are no longer any troops covering our front. Motorized units can get here in half a day. Who is to stop them? We stand alone. Reconnaissance reports strong opposition by flak which the advancing Reds have brought up with them. Soviet Lag 5s and Aircobras continually fly above their armored spearhead. Our southern front in Russia, the Rumanian oilfields, both factors of vital importance, are threatened. I am blind and deaf to all advice with regard to my physical condition. The Soviets must be checked; their tanks, the striking force of an army, destroyed. Another weeks goes by before our colleagues on the ground can build a defense line.
W.O. Rothmann, my loyal first shift, carries me to my aircraft. Six of the stiffest sorties in the worst of weather till three in the afternoon. Intense flak. I have to change aircraft after almost every sortie because of damage by flak. I am myself in pretty bad shape. Only the determination to halt the Soviets wherever I can still keeps me going. Besides, these are certainly the troops who tried to take me prisoner, and on the day I escaped the Moscow radio has already given out that they have captured Squadron Leader Rudel. Apparently they did not believe it possible for me to reach our lines. Have my colleagues who failed to make their escape betrayed the name of the one who did?