“What shall we do with the bodies?” asked Wendorff.
“Who cares? Leave them for the rats,” said Knispel, entering the room with his Sauer poised for action.
“Leave Stenner for his comrades to bury… but bring Lehmann.”
Normally they would have simply tossed the body on the back of the tank, but von Schroif insisted that Lehmann was carried inside the tank. After some difficulty, they finally managed to get the lifeless body of Walter Lehmann into the tank, and von Schroif gave the order to depart. They rolled back to the supply point in confused silence with the dead body of Walter Lehmann jammed in among the spent shell cartridges. Just short of the supply point, von Schroif unexpectedly ordered them to stop beside a large, spreading oak tree. Together they manhandled the black-clad body of Walter Lehmann out of the radio operator’s hatch and laid him by the tree.
Wendorff sat motionless in stunned silence. “This is the vision I saw. A body brought from our tank… from my hatch… but it’s not me. Not me!”
Knispel and Wohl exchanged glances and rolled their eyes, but von Schroif simply looked, a faint smile coming to his lips. And then he spoke. “Now there is a good death for you.”
With that, the body of Walter Lehmann was laid to rest under the spreading boughs of the oak tree. There was no ceremony. It was just one more cadaver among the thousands dotting the Russian landscape that day. The crew simply leapt back into the Tiger and roared back to the welcome embrace of the supply area.
The rasputitsa came hard and early that year, and in no time they were once again up to their knees in thick, cloying mud. After the Tigers had been successfully recovered and repaired, they saw mercifully little action in the next few days. In his quieter moments, SS-Hauptsturmführer Hans von Schroif wondered how the new tanks would fare in this unforgiving new season. The second Russian winter, which was now looking ominous, was just around the corner, but someone else would find out if the Tigers would survive the extremes of the Russian winter. They would soon be on the move for sunnier climes. The orders had just arrived. They were to be sent to join the fighting in Africa. The crew was thrilled at the prospect of some desert sun on their backs, away from the gathering misery. Amidst the hurried preparations, one task stood out, one that von Schroif had been looking forward to.
“SS-Panzerschütze Otto Wohl, may I have a word with you?” asked von Schroif.
“Of course, SS-Hauptsturmführer,” replied Wohl.
“I have received some correspondence from Dr Kurt Arnholdt at the Henschel works. He has asked me to thank you for your reports concerning the new Tigers. Not only that, but, without going into too much detail, he has intimated that some of your recommendations may be incorporated in future revisions of the Tiger.”
At which Otto Wohl beamed with pride.
“And one more thing. He asked me to pass this on to you.” Von Schroif handed his loader a book-sized package. “You may open it now, if you wish.”
Otto Wohl hurriedly tore off the wrapping paper to reveal a superbly illustrated little booklet, the Tigerfibel.
APPENDICES
Ritter von Krauss is the pen name of a former German army officer who was the author of a large number of manuscripts for novels based on his experiences as a tank man in the first and second world wars. Although von Krauss is not his real name, the literal translation, Knight of the Cross, has been widely interpreted as an indicator that the author is a Knight’s Cross holder, a decoration gained as a result of his service in either the Wehrmacht Heer or the Waffen SS.
There are at least forty surviving von Krauss novels in manuscript form, all of which are thought to have been written between 1954 and 1968, during the time when the author is believed to have lived and worked in Argentina. They range from fully-fledged novellas to story outlines a few thousand words long.
During the 1990s, as part of the negotiations for the sale of the rights to the novels, the manuscripts and the supporting documentation formed part of an extensive legal due diligence exercise and were studied and verified by a number of experts. This allowed the sale to proceed, but with the strict stipulation that the author should not be identified and that no publication could take place during the lifetime of any of the author’s children. As a consequence of this condition, the manuscripts went unpublished in the 20th century. The main barrier to publication during the author’s life time was a legal challenge by the author’s estranged children based on the legitimate fear that the family might be identified and associated with von Krauss, who is reputed to have been active behind the scenes in the movement which became the Hilfsgemeinschaft auf Gegenseitigkeit der Angehörigen der ehemaligen Waffen-SS, the campaign to restore pension and other legal rights to Waffen SS veterans. His family strongly disapproved of his work in this sphere and, as a consequence, the publishing contracts to this day contain strong non-disclosure clauses preventing the publishers from identifying the author or commenting on his identity.
Following the death of the last of von Krauss’ children, the way for publication was finally cleared and Tiger Command!, the first published Ritter von Krauss novel, finally appeared in e-book form in November 2011. The film Steel Tempest, which is based on von Krauss’ experiences in the Ardennes offensive, also reappeared in 2011, with the author properly credited for the first time.
Originally, von Krauss served in the Great War where he was rumoured to have briefly been part of the unit which drove the A7V, the first of the German tanks, into battle. During the early years of the war von Krauss is believed to have served as a motorcycle despatch rider and to have been an associate of Kurt Ludecke, who was later to emerge as a member of Hitler’s inner circle. It has been widely speculated that he was on good terms with Sepp Dietrich.
He is known to have been descended from an aristocratic family and von Krauss suffered the humiliation of being reduced to poverty in the 1920s when hyperinflation wiped out the fortunes of both von Krauss personally, and the entire family. Following the Great War, von Krauss is thought to have served in the Freikorps and to have spent time in Russia, working on tank development at KAMA.
It is thought that his failure to find a place in the 100,000 man army of the Weimar Republic was the spur which led to his joining the Nazi party. It is also understood that von Krauss spent time in the SA where he knew Ernst Röhm as a result of an introduction by Ludecke. This is borne out by the fact that both Ludecke and Röhm appear in fictionalised form in the von Krauss manuscript Freikorps!
There are many references which are interpreted as being autobiographical and it is conjectured that, as a result of his experiences in the hungry twenties, von Krauss may have become a committed National Socialist and, in any event, undoubtedly harboured life-long Nationalist aspirations. He was obviously a strong supporter of the Grossdeutschland vision which led to the creation of The Third Reich. He may have therefore been an obvious and easy convert to National Socialism, however, von Krauss was clearly not an anti-Semite and his novels display no trace of this aspect of National Socialist policy. In common with Ludecke and many others, von Krauss appears to have assumed that the anti-Semitic aspects of the party manifesto were a side show to the main event, which was the unification of the German speaking peoples into a Socialist state.
During the 1920’s von Krauss is thought to have come to a breach with Ludecke when a number of business ventures designed to revive the von Krauss family fortunes also came to grief, leaving von Krauss penniless. It is thought that this was the event which drove von Krauss to seek employment by joining the fledgling SS, although he was initially highly disparaging of this outfit, describing himself as nothing more than “a glorified advertising sales man.”