Rumors circulated that we were headed to the town of Gleiwitz.
No one knew exactly how far that was, but it became increasingly apparent that we would be walking all night. We slipped through the darkened town of Auschwitz, which was situated near the main camp. As I chewed over whether the SS had also emptied Auschwitz and Birkenau, I caught glimpses of town folk watching us through the cracks in their closed shutters. I imagined that the Poles were glad to see the Nazis leave, but were wracked with fear of what would come when the Soviets marched through their streets. For my fellow Häftlinge and I, the Red Army meant only one thing: freedom. But as a Muselmann’s fate would have it, we were being forced to flee from our liberators.
The snow was becoming deeper, filling my wooden shoes and turning my feet into icicles. I feared frostbite wouldn’t be far off. It would have been nice if my benefactor had packed a pair of galoshes with all those warm sweaters. I had no way to judge the distance we had already traveled, but I was pretty sure we had been on the move for about four hours. Deep bomb craters now bit off large chunks of the road, slowing our advance. The whole Polish countryside looked wounded and forsaken.
The wind-ravaged skeletons of trees were the only things marking the road as we started up a hill. Our ranks began to break as Muselmänner struggled to plow through snowdrifts. The gusts became more violent, causing my eyes to water and burn, and it seemed nearly impossible to get the frigid air into my heaving lungs. I wrapped my blanket tightly around me, wiping away the frozen snot under my nose.
The wind lifted the snow in eddies, covering the tracks of the men in front of me. I tripped over an unexpected obstacle—a man’s body covered by a thin blanket of snow. A few moments later I came upon another body, this one with an SS bullet in his neck.
Walking farther, I realized that the dead were forming a steady line along the side of the road. I kept my eyes on the footprints of the man in front of me. It was tempting to drop down next to the dead and drift into much-needed sleep, but I wasn’t going to heed that siren song. By no means was I going to become a mile marker.
At the crossroads on the hill’s summit, a metal sign read Gleiwitz, 55 km. The rumors were true. I stared at the sign in disbelief—thirty-five more miles? Our SS guards must surely be planning to enter that town alone. Toward the east a red aureole enveloped the horizon as the wind brought the rumble of cannons.
I looked down at the seemingly unending gray string of humanity weaving itself into the snow-shrouded valley. I was stunned by the sheer number of Häftlinge before me. I had no idea that so many Muselmänner had outlasted Auschwitz and Birkenau.
I was overcome with daggerlike stomach cramps, probably from the frozen cabbage I “organized” from the kitchen when I received my loaf of bread. I went to the side of the road and squatted among the dead bodies. Feasting crows screeched and scattered. I recognized familiar faces as the columns hobbled by me. Once I was finished, I tried to get up, but the cramps were still twisting my guts.
A growling German Shepherd sniffed at me, his stinking breath full in my face. Yapping, he circled around me, then sat down.
“Los weiter!” (Keep going!)
An SS pushed me with the butt of his gun. Not about to get shot in the head for taking a shit, I darted back into line, pulling up my pants as best I could.
They marched us until daybreak, then herded us into a bombed-out tile works that had a perimeter fence that was still in-tact. I wanted to search for Hubert, but being past exhaustion, all I did was collapse on a pile of bricks and pull my blanket up over my head. Fearing I would freeze to death, my sleep was fitful at best. A couple of hours later, the SS called for assembly. My legs were painfully stiff and heavy when I stood. How many more miles could they handle?
Back on the road, we moved like snails. Everyone was at the end of his strength, even the SS, who took turns riding in sleighs.
It was a gray day with bursts of snow flurries, but mercifully the cutting wind had ceased. Someone behind me was walking on my heels, and my right heel was already raw and bleeding and hurt like hell. I swung around ready to hit the blundering idiot. My fist dropped. It was the Vorarbeiter of Hubert’s Kommando.
“Entschuldigen sie, bitte” (Please excuse me), he wheezed.
That was a switch. I had never heard a “prominent” Häftlinge say “I’m sorry” before, but now they, too, were just striped pieces of meat in this cattle drive. I asked if he had seen Hubert.
“He must be a few rows back.”
I stepped to the side of the road and waited. Hubert saw me first. We fell into each other’s arms. “I was searching for you in the camp,” Hubert told me.
“So was I, so was I. I have a birthday present for you.”
“It’s not my birthday.”
“It is now.” I reached into my rolled blanket and tore off a piece of bread for him. The barking of a guard dog sent us back in line.
They pushed us all day without rest. The crack of rifles and pistols putting holes in the laggards had stopped turning heads. Did the SS actually think those crawling skeletons could find safe haven?
Throughout the afternoon, lines of Häftlinge from other camps flowed in from side roads and filled the gaps left by the dead. Once in a while, we had the good fortune of waiting at a grade crossing as a train went by. Almost in unison, everyone dropped into the snow as if felled by a volley of machine gun fire. When the track was clear, only the kicks and rifle butts of the SS would raise us again.
By evening each step I took was torture. I could see my blood seeping through the rags wrapped around my wooden shoes. The glands in my groin had become agonizingly swollen, which meant my feet were infected. My head was filled with thoughts of escaping, but in my condition I would only be serving myself up for target practice. I staggered on, leaning on Hubert, who would yank me to my feet every time I was ready to give up and drag me along.
I marveled at his stamina and how lucky I was. Without him I would have been a mile marker. Maybe he got the strength from the loaf we shared through the day. If that was the case, why was I such a pitiful mess?
“Any Kommando in Buna would be better than this,” I coughed.
“Mon ami, hold on. I know there’s a warm Block waiting for us in Gleiwitz.”
His lies and strong back kept my bleeding feet moving forward.
Somewhere out on that road I slipped into delirium. It was as if my head were being held underwater. I heard Hubert’s voice, but couldn’t understand his words. I thought a blurred figure standing at the side of the road was my father. Why didn’t he say hello? I wanted to go back and ask him, but the white hot Mediterranean sand of Grimaldi Beach was scorching my feet. A flash of bright light jerked me back to reality. In front of me, like moths, columns of Häftlinge followed a searchlight’s beam into the Gleiwitz camp.