pickThis is a memorable, moving account from a Viennese Jew who ended up in Hitler‘s ranks, on the Russian Front. He was open about being Jewish, and somehow allowed to live, and be used in the German war machine. There are unforgettable accounts in this book, (and one wonders what else did he not write)? He immigrated to America, later to Mexico, and continued to paint and finally write down his story of survival. Recommended!
Looking through the window of the station restaurant, I could see people sitting at tables with white table cloths, dining with forks and knives. After a few minutes, a waitress in a white apron came out and asked whether I was hungry. She let me inside and maneuvered me to a table decorated with a bouquet of purple asters. Then she brought the food for which I obviously wasn‘t able to pay. There must still be good and generous people alive,
The night wasn‘t very dark; there must‘ve been a fairly full moon behind the clouds. We moved like phantoms, bending and gathering the potatoes into our sacks. Suddenly we heard the short blast of a whistle, and the train jolted. The two who were up top had quite a time of it, falling rather than climbing to make it down and off the car before the train picked up too much speed.
Once again I‘ve reached a low point in my life, a low that I wouldn‘t have believed possible. What a wretched thing it is when human beings go off to fight and kill their fellow men. Soldiers are sitting around me on the rain-softened ground, bent double from pain, sobbing. Young men are withering and fading away like cut flowers.
My strength is exhausted. My nerves and senses are also losing their clarity. I wandered alone, against my will, through a country I didn‘t know, whose language I didn‘t speak, whose enemy I didn‘t want to be. They shot at me, and I shot at everyone who stood in my way. I fed myself on stolen food. I ran past the wounded who cried out to me without helping them. I ceased being a human. I can‘t help myself anymore. And I‘m so terribly tired.
The afternoon sun had tinted the heavens red when the tanks appeared on the bank behind us and began firing. We threw ourselves back into the water and swam toward the reeds that divided the river in half. Many died before they reached the water; many drowned. The remainder of us made it to the reeds, where we stood in the muck with the water up to our chests. The shots whipped through the thin blades and splashed off the surface of the water.
On my last day of wandering through Braila, I stopped in front of a bookstore display and discovered, attached to the inside of the window, a map that aroused my interest. It was one of those beautiful maps published by Freytag & Berndt, and it showed all the countries of southeastern Europe. The mountains were brown, the plains shades of green, lightning in tone as the altitude dropped. The roads, railway lines, rivers, all were drawn in. I was
Shortly thereafter, a machine gun set its sights on me, and I sprang as fast as I could into an artillery crater. Because of the heavy wireless on my back, I fell face down into a horrible stinking mass— a rotting horse cadaver. At first I couldn‘t find a hold in the soft mush threaded with bones. The heavy box on my back pushed me down yet deeper, and, seized by an almost hysterical panic, I begin flailing and thrashing around like a
I went up into an attic, and a young Romanian of about twenty years fell into my hands. He really has no excuse for being here at the front, because all the civilians have been evacuated, so he had to do whatever I said. I made him climb up a cherry tree in the Russian line of fire to pick two buckets of cherries for me, and afterward I let him go. Then
I stewed the cherries, masses of them, in three buckets. Now I‘m sitting here with sticky
One day some mail from home arrived, including pudding powder and raisins that were very quickly transformed into a thing of beauty, a bright yellow vanilla pudding, cooked in an old steel helmet and turned out on a board ready to be eaten.
What an incredible, special memory!
My surroundings had consisted primarily of blood, filth, and lice. In such a state of mind and body, what an experience to open a suitcase and be assailed by the aroma of forgotten cleanliness and elegance. What I saw was incredible. French perfume, champagne, old books bound in leather. I stretched out my mud-encrusted hands to feel the unbelievable softness of pure silk.
We had passed the last houses and ruins on the outskirts of town and were headed out into the flat, marshy fields. There thousands of vehicles had been left standing up to their axles in the mire. Stinking horse cadavers with legs pointing stiffly toward the sky lay next to artillery cannons and mountains of ammunition crates that stretched as far as we could see. Bomb craters filled with water were everywhere.
We marched for thirty kilometers. Left at 5 a.m. and reached our destination at about 11:30 p.m. Quite a few collapsed along the way and will be listed as missing. Probably somewhere in these unending fields they have frozen to death. One never knows. A few vehicles also disappeared. All that was left of us arrived here, more or less frozen.
The world and its people are so small and meaningless compared to the universe and to the great and beautiful thoughts some people are able to produce. One shouldn‘t rack one‘s brain over such silly, stupid things as wars and weapons. You only become gloomy, probably melancholy, and it is a strain on the nerves.
I dream of things I remember as wonderful and beautiful. A splendidly white tablecloth, clean dishes, with a big dumpling; real goulash, cucumber salad, a pudding with raspberry jam. A clean glass of clear water, a few flowers on the table. Here you let a day from back home pass in front of your eyes, one like so many that were taken for granted, and you notice for the first time all the things you used to ignore, but that were so marvelous.
Unlikely Warrior: A Jewish Soldier in Hitler's Army | 
