Armageddon (111 page)

“My only experience of war”: AI John Langdon.

“There was an impatience, even desperation”: AI John Denison.

“The liberation of Germany”: Turner-Cain Diary, op. cit.

“Wilhelm Pritz had endured”: AI Wilhelm Pritz.

“In Normandy, these had accounted”: PRO, WO205/1164, ORC report no. 6, appendix A.

“They would grab at any straws”: Cooper, op. cit., p. 211.

“Observers said it looked more like”: Ibid., p. 240.

“The men as a whole are not well trained”: NA, RG492–332, box 12.

“Under stress, not infrequently”: AI David Tibbs.

“There was a certain reluctance”: AI Roy Dixon.

“The willpower to keep going”: AI W. F. Deedes.

“they are performing very well”: NA, RG492–332, box 12.

“An officer of the Highland Light Infantry”: Tom Flanagan, unpublished MS, IWM, 87/1911.

“He looked for places where the enemy”: Andrew Wilson,
Flamethrower
(Kimber: 1984), pp. 194–5.

“by April 1945, one in 165”: PRO, CAB106/1069.

“The sense that, with luck”: AI General Sir David Fraser.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: PRISONERS OF THE REICH

“The SS directly employed some 300,000”: See Milward, op. cit., passim.

“They could have been quicker”: AI Nikolai Maslennikov.

“You just accepted it”: AI Ron Graydon.

“Tom Barker, from Eastbourne”: I am indebted to Tom Barker for the opportunity to read and make use of the fascinating MS memoir of his experiences as a prisoner.

“Stanislas Domoradzki, a Pole”: Stanislas Domoradzki, MS memoir, SA.

“As an officer, Captain John Killick”: AI John Killick.

“we were told by the guards”: Burt MS, op. cit.

“their morale was at rock bottom”: Robert Harding,
Copper Wire
(Chess Mail: 2001).

“A twenty-year-old Liberator gunner”: AI Charles Becker.

“I have seen men degrade themselves”: Harding, op. cit.

“Oh, you were only inside”: AI Denis Thomas.

“Richard Feltham was amazed”: Feltham quoted Sewell, op. cit.

“When news of D-Day reached”: Barker MS, op. cit.

“We were never satisfied”: Peter Campbell MS, IWM, 86/35/1.

“Escape starts as a madness”: Ibid.

“John Killick suffered a special difficulty”: AI John Killick.

“The only thing that would end”: George Millar,
Horned Pigeon
(Doubleday: 1946), p. 434.

“Their demeanour was aloof”: Lindsey, op. cit.

“the fault of that stupid Geneva Convention”: Guderian, op. cit., p. 427.

“Göring pointed out to Hitler”: Heiber and Glantz, op. cit., p. 634.

“The young British soldier walked”: Barker MS, op. cit.

“American airman Richard Burt”: Burt MS, op. cit.

“Bill Bampton, a private of the East Surreys”: Bill Bampton MS, IWM.

“Dr. Helmut Hugel, a German”: Hugel Diary, IWM.

“Jerome Alexis rode on the hull”: Jerome Alexis, unpublished MS, SA.

“I feel terrible”: d’Este,
Patton,
op. cit., pp. 714–19.

“Every day a sort of”: Sewell, op. cit., p. 168.

“In Stalag XIB”: AI Denis Thomas.

“The saga of one of these men”: AI Mikhail Devyataev.

“Boredom is usually associated”: Jerzy Herszburg, unpublished MS, IWM, 86/89/1.

“We have taken steps to improve”: RSA, Stalin files 1135/5, Beria memorandum of 10.24.44.

“In the camps, many people died”: AI Nikolai Maslennikov.

“Zinaida Mikhailova spent three years”: AI Zinaida Mikhailova.

“Edith Gabor shared with”: AI Edith Gabor.

“In my opinion, a disproportionate”: PRO, FO371/42817 WR993.

“Gennady Trofimov was eight when he”: AI Gennady Trofimov.

“Viktor Mamontov was sixteen when he”: AI Viktor Mamontov.

“People soon realized that resistance”: AI Ted Van Meurs.

“At first when they took Jews”: AI Bert Egbertus.

“For most of the population”: AI Hans Cramer.

“His attitude is typical”: Second Army MD.

“There is considerable indifference”: Turner-Cain Diary, op. cit.

“security doubts on the reliability”: PRO, WO219/3738.

“The discovery that liberation”: PRO, WO219/11.

“There were some nice German officers”: AI Cas Tromp.

“It was not so bad for Dutch people”: AI Bert Egbertus.

“Ted Van Meurs, a medical student”: AI Ted Van Meurs.

“Not a person was to be seen”: Quoted van der Zee, op. cit., p. 46.

“It is unacceptable that bad”: Second Army MD.

“Eight-year-old Roelof Olderman”: AI Roelof Olderman.

“Cas Tromp was sent almost daily”: AI Cas Tromp.

“One day, Bert Egbertus’s mother”: AI Bert Egbertus.

“So too were Jan and Tom Wempe”: AI Theodore Wempe.

“Willem van den Broek’s mother”: AI Willem van den Broek.

“My mother was crying all the time”: AI Hans Cramer.

“Theodore Wempe thrilled each time”: AI Theodore Wempe.

“Take a litre of water”: van der Zee, op. cit., p. 150.

“Jan de Boer, one of nine children”: Jan de Boer letter to the author, 11.9.02.

“A Dutchman said he learned that winter”: van der Zee, op. cit., p. 65.

“Twelve-year-old Willem van”: AI Willem van den Broek.

“the shrunken bodies were lying”: van der Zee, op. cit., p. 158.

“The expression”: Ibid., p. 190.

“Bertha Schonfeld felt irrationally safe”: AI Bertha Schonfeld.

“The British Foreign Office told the Dutch”: Norman Longmate,
Hitler’s Rockets
(Hutchinson: 1985), p. 320.

“Antoinette Hamminga, a teenager”: Antoinette Hamminga letter to the author, 1.10.03.

“an example should be made”: PRO, HW/1 3709.

“Extremely fierce fighting”: Ibid.

“Surely you must know the war”: Elsa Caspers,
To Save a Life
(Macdonald: 1995), p. 134.

“We did it just for fun”: Annie van Beek letter to the author, 11.18.02.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: COLLAPSE IN THE WEST

“whose strategic significance was”: Weigley, op. cit., p. 678.

“Ridgway told the German colonel”: Gerald Devlin,
Paratrooper!
(Robson: 1979), p. 633.

“Lieutenant Rolf-Helmut Schröder”: AI Rolf-Helmut Schröder.

“what looked like a dark”: Robert Burger, unpublished MS, SA.

“When Ike’s son John”: Bradley, op. cit., p. 397.

“The PM is increasingly”: Alanbrooke, op. cit., p. 680, 4.1.45.

“there would definitely be a race”: Quoted d’Este,
Eisenhower,
op. cit., p. 691.

“More than one major historian”: Weigley, op. cit., p. 687.

“efforts to make sure that the Americans”: Cornelius Ryan,
The Last Battle
(Col-lins: 1966), p. 185.

“Eisenhower might well have sent”: Stephen Ambrose,
Eisenhower: The Soldier
(Allen & Unwin: 1984), p. 392.

“ ‘I decided,’ he wrote in his”: Eisenhower, op. cit., p. 433.

“ ‘Apparently,’ Murphy wrote”:
Foreign Relations of the U.S.,
vol. iii (U.S. Government Printing Office: 1965), p. 229.

“If you look at the world geopolitically”: AI Henry Kissinger.

“Staff-Sergeant Henry Kissinger”: Ibid.

“There was little that was cheerful”: Tedder, op. cit., p. 688.

“Allied officers often enlisted”: NA, RG492–332, box 12.

“The leading vehicle got knocked”: Leakey MS, op. cit.

“It seemed a stupid time to die”: Hough, op. cit., p. 169.

“On the Elbe front a weakish”: PRO, HW1/3715, Ultra.

“a deficiency of leadership”: Ibid.

“Private Ralph Gordon of First Army’s”: Gordon, op. cit., p. 87.

“In Lieutenant Howard Randall’s”: Randall, op. cit., p. 134.

“Consideration was not given to sick”: Major G. Gatling, copy report held by Werner Kleeman.

“A German woman handed”: AI Werner Kleeman.

“As men of the British 7th Somersets”: Stokes MS Diary.

“Lieutenant-Colonel Ferdinand Chesarek”: Chesarek oral history interview, op. cit.

“One night a British sentry woke”: Wilson, op. cit., p. 199.

“A contemporary British report”: PRO, WO106/4348, report no. 32.

“Did he have a Luger?”: Felix, op. cit., p. 143.

“Lieutenant Howard Randall’s”: Randall, op. cit., p. 128.

“Please do not let your men rape”: AI David Tibbs.

“During street fighting in Bremen”: White, op. cit., p. 434.

“The Germans were very hungry”: AI W. F. Deedes.

“Rape became a large problem”: “Military Offenders,” USAMHI, D769AZ no. 84.

“Sergeant Colin McInnes gazed”: McInnes, op. cit., p. 161.

“A British war correspondent”: Macdonald Hastings of
Picture Post,
private communication to the author.

“In ‘Red’ Thompson’s platoon”: AI “Red” Thompson.

“Lieutenant Tom Flanagan of the British”: Flanagan MS, op. cit.

“Pitiable middle-aged lady”: Proctor, op. cit., p. 128.

“In 21st Army Group throughout”:
Report of the Army and Air Force Court Martial Committee,
Cmd 7608, 1949.

“The countryfolk and their houses and farms”: Turner-Cain Diary, op. cit.

“An escaped Canadian pilot”: Steel-Brownlie MS, op. cit.

“Outside the town of Büdingen”: AI Helmut Lott.

“The attitude of civilians was really”: PRO, WO205/622.

“It sure makes you feel silly”: Quoted Robert Kee,
1945: The World We Fought For
(Hamish Hamilton: 1985), p. 210.

“Private Denis Christian”: AI Denis Christian.

“With hindsight, it seemed”: Downward MS, op. cit.

“
Es ist alles
”: IWM, H56/704.

“Sergeant Robert Brookshire”: Robert Brookshire, unpublished MS, SA.

“There was some of the hardest fighting”: Hansen Papers, box 45B, USAMHI.

“Fanaticism is nasty”: AI Captain “Dim” Robbins.

“They were absolute sods”: AI Patrick Hennessy.

“A comrade noticed Fuller’s body”: Steel-Brownlie MS, op. cit.

“Clothing and underwear were caught”: Ibid.

“Once we got into Germany”: AI General Sir David Fraser.

“Germans are becoming increasingly bitter”: PRO, WO106/5924.

“Charles Farrell, a Scots Guards”: Charles Farrell,
Reflections
(Pentland Press: 2000), p. 131.

“A British tank officer glimpsed”: Steel-Brownlie MS, op. cit.

“In Germany it was a swan”: AI Roy Dixon.

“War is a very fatiguing experience”: AI W. F. Deedes.

“Until the very last moment”: AI Viktor Mamontov.

“The phrase ‘that’s what we are fighting for’ ”: Dr. A. R. Horwell MS, IWM, 91/21/3.

“At Belsen, I felt a curious elation”: AI David Tibbs.

“Take no initiative in organizing”: RMDA, vol. xv 5/4, p. 337, order of 4.24.45.

“A British officer complained to the Russians”: Ibid., pp. 353–4, Moscow correspondence with Admiral Archer, 5.15.45.

“After long journeys”: PRO, PREM 3/398/4 f. 276, quoted Gilbert, op. cit., p. 1312.

“If the British and Americans had not”: RSA, 9401 om.2 g.97.

“Berlin never seemed so peaceful”: von Stemann MS, op. cit.

“We pretended that, having been through”: Ibid.

“The participants appeared to take it all”: Ibid.

“Ilse Bayer, twenty-five-year-old”: Unpublished MS, “My Life in Germany,” IWM, 95/13/1.

“Eleonore von Joest, who had trekked”: AI Eleonore von Joest.

“Henner Pflug fell into conversation”: AI Henner Pflug.

“Lieutenant Rolf-Helmut Schröder served”: AI Rolf-Helmut Schröder.

“Late in March after his unit”: AI Helmut Schmidt.

“When Sergeant George Schwemmer”: AI George Schwemmer.

“In the path of Konev’s armies”: AI Helmut Fromm.

“On 5 April, Victor Klemperer sat”: Klemperer, op. cit., pp. 541–2.

“A delegation of diplomats from the Japanese”: PRO, HW/1 3715.