Stuka Pilot

Once again my battery is exhausted. I must drink… eat… rest. Up to now I have not seen a living soul. Take precautions? What can I do? I am unarmed; I am only thirsty and hungry. Prudence? Prudence is a virtue, but thirst and hunger are an elemental urge. Need makes one careless. Half left two farmhouses appear on the horizon out of the morning mist. I must effect an entry.

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 girl: “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. “