Opening Moves

It served little purpose, for within the next hour the surviving Bulgarian guards were also being rounded up and summarily liquidated by a detachment of NKVD stationed at NeuPolla, which had eventually responded to the garbled radio summons from the camp commandant. His Major’s rank didn’t save him either, for despite his protestations, the recently returned NKVD Captain Skryabin blew the man’s brains all over the wall to save on the time and expense of a mock trial, and probably to cover his own complicity in events.

The telephone lines had been brought down by the first contact of the Yak, and their destruction did much to inhibit the immediate organisation but, even so, resources were slowly brought to bear to contain the escapees.

NKVD and regular army units were mobilised and by the end of the night, some thirty-five hundred Soviet troops were involved in the search. Ninety-seven Germans had already been apprehended outside of the camp and all but three of them were summarily dispatched with a bullet in the head or a bayonet. Those unlucky three were nailed to telegraph poles in Zwinzen to die a lingering death as examples to the local community.

2302 hrs Friday, 3rd August 1945, Gopfritz am der Wild. Soviet Occupied Lower Austria.

As the Russian search effort was still in its infancy, Rolf’s group continued to strike out for the possible safety of the railway line, both helped and hindered by the hammering rain and winds. Speed was of the essence, as it was decided to put as much distance as possible between the camp and the group before Soviet security efforts were fully organised. The two Austrians constantly consulted about direction but the trail was blazed by a young officer of the Brandenburgers whose field craft in such matters made him the obvious choice for the role.

They stumbled across the line and followed it northwards, hugging its eastern side as they progressed further away from the camp. There was a narrow escape at a crossing point when the group unfortunately timed their sprint across the road with the passing of three trucks full of Soviet infantry. That they were not seen was probably more due to the driving rain dampening the spirits of the Russians than anything else.

The group made speedy progress, following the rail line around in a long curve until it finally ran almost southeast and disappeared into a village.

Rolf made the decision to cross to the north at a point where rail line and road were most adjacent and the group swiftly made their way over.

Not a moment too soon, as more Soviet infantry and some of the hated NKVD arrived from the north-west and started to drop off sections of soldiers to form a physical barrier against anyone coming from the direction of the camp.

Immediately the blocking deployment bore fruit.

South of the railway line, two German prisoners, one of them an old comrade of Rolf’s, were caught in a vehicle searchlight. Shouts and rifles rang out simultaneously and one man dropped like a stone, obviously shot in the head. Rolf’s comrade tried to drag the wounded man to cover but both were shot at point blank range by a young submachine gunner, eager to be able to tell his family that he had killed his Germans.

Whilst it was unfortunate on both slain prisoners, it was extremely fortunate for Rolf and his men, as the young officer in charge of the group oriented his troops all to the south on the supposition that his men had killed the first arrivals.

Rolf’s group moved silently away in the opposite direction, crossing swiftly over another railway line that snaked northwest, its rails picked out by the increasingly frequent lightning.

Silently but swiftly the group moved through the gardens and back ways of Hauptstraße and Nordrandweg, the good Austrian people staying firmly in their homes as gunfire mixed with thunder in the night.

The escapees gathered together in an overgrown walled area between Nordrandweg and the rail line, right opposite a junction spot where the single line became three and a small rail yard was formed.

It was immediately apparent that there was little military presence in the area. With the exception of a GAZ jeep and Studebaker truck parked up outside an obvious headquarters building in Bahnhofstraße, no signs of danger were apparent, so it might be that the driving rain had been more in their favour than they first thought.

The group hid up and surveyed the scene. Apparently the village was called Gopfritz an der Wild but no one, not even the Austrians, was any the wiser for knowing that. As they examined the lie of the land the sounds of an approaching express reached their ears and before they knew it a sixteen car military freight train hammered straight through and off into the dark, bound west for places unknown.