Tristan: A War Novel

By Jim Jorgen

A near-fatal plane crash has made a serious dent in the career (and body) of Lieutenant Tristan von Ohr. He is one of the German fl ying aces who took part in the brilliant air campaign of Bloody April, 1917. German aviation has revolutionized 20th century warfarethanks in part to Tristans friend Anthony Fokker.

Transferred to the air service reserves, Tristan discovers that he is a poster boy in a glorious war that is doomed to failure. Americas entry into the Great War means that a whole generation of German youthincluding Tristans buddiesis being slaughtered for no purpose. The Fatherlands chances of victory are now zero. Every day the public is being told lies about the war aims, lies about the sacrifices they must make, lies about the staggering human cost of the Second Reichs march with destiny.

Ruthless old men in Berlin are leading the Fatherland down a bloody road to disaster. Inside Tristans heart something says: No more lies. No more government-sponsored lies.

But what can he do?

He realizes that for a good Prussian boy to even question the war would be considered criminal disloyalty, and he would be punished.

But for a soldier like himself to go one step farther and desert the war means death by fi ring squad!

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Nov 23, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462064090

Jim Jorgen

After a first-class education at Harvard and Oxford and a professorship in Pennsylvania, JIM JORGEN decided to try his luck on crazy Wall Street. In early retirement he has settled down in picturesque Iowa to compose a serious of historical novels, of which this is the eighth.

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Copyright © 2011 by James Robert Jorgen.

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ISBN: 978-1-4620-6407-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-6408-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-6409-0 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 11/17/2011

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CREDITS

War is the father of all things. The sages of antiquity recognized this long before Darwin.

General Friedrich von Bernhardi

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1

The girls were not supposed to be there, of course.

The new regulations prohibited the citizens of Ostende, Belgium, from approaching any closer than 300 yards to the heavily-guarded seashore. The German Navy, including the submarine fleet, now controlled the entire port.

But the vacationing aviators seated on their deck-chairs were only too happy to have the local girls ignore the rules and parade up and down on the beach in their revealing bathing suits. Suddenly one of the girls turned and started coming towards Tristan. She stopped directly in front of him and saucily sat down on his lap. What’s your name, handsome? she said in a sexy voice. Tristan was too astonished to reply.

Then he woke up.

In the darkness he studied his watch. 2:17 a.m. There wasn’t a sound in Ward 16 except the breathing of thirty men. At his left big Gunther was sleeping as quiet as a babe. Tristan closed his eyes.

A shot rang out.

Everyone sat up. What was that? whispered Gunther, turning to Tristan.

We are under attack, said Tristan calmly.

Leipzig hasn’t been fired on since Napoleon was here in 1813.

Out in the hall could be heard the sound of people scurrying about. It was only now that Tristan turned to check Christof’s bed at his right, and his heart froze. The bed was empty. Instantly Tristan knew what this was all about, and he sadly pulled the coverlet over his head and wept. Christof was only eighteen.

A few minutes later the night orderly, Private Gehr, opened the ward door and walked into the room. He stopped beside Gunther’s bed and whispered, Captain, I’m sorry to tell you that Corporal Nicolai has killed himself.

What? said Gunther, dumbfounded.

He went into the latrine and shot himself in the heart.

Christ, where did he get the gun?

Stole it from the orderlies’ locker, I think. Private Gehr raised his voice slightly. You are not to say anything about this to anyone. That’s an order from the top.

Early in the morning Tristan was summoned by Dr. Eisner to get dressed and accompany him to the office of the hospital director to speak to a Colonel Maass from the army’s legal department.

Lieutenant von Ohr?

At your orders, sir.

You knew Corporal Christof Nicolai, I am told.

Yes, sir. I met him here in the hospital. We both had been stationed at Douai: he was in the infantry, I was in the Air Service.

How did Corporal Nicolai strike you?

He was quiet, but friendly.

Go on.

Naturally he was concerned about his terrible injuries.

Traumatized, would you say?

Troubled, I think I would say, sir.

The colonel picked up a document from the desk and examined it. I see that he had half his face shot off in an engagement near Arras, France, in April. Is that right, Doctor Eisner?

Corporal Nicolai suffered massive facial injuries from an exploding shell. We were contemplating a series of reconstructive surgeries, sir.

The colonel put down the document and said, Lieutenant von Ohr, did Corporal Nicolai say anything to you about his face?

For a moment Tristan hesitated. To lie or tell the truth? Christof gave me a photograph of him taken outside the mess hall in Douai.

And?

I should describe him as the best-looking soldier in the German Army.

And what did he say?

He did not—Tristan’s voice faltered—ever want to go home looking like a monster.

A monster? said the colonel. He turned to Dr. Eisner. Doctor?

Dr. Eisner said quietly, No amount of surgery could ever make Corporal Nicolai look normal.

The colonel placed the document inside a folder and said, Thank you, Lieutenant von Ohr. You are forbidden to say anything about Corporal Nicolai’s suicide. Is that clear?

Yes, sir.

That will be all.

That afternoon all of the ambulatory patients in Ward 16 met in the commons room to play cards or read. They sent a telegram to Christof’s mother, said Karl Gornick, who lost both a foot and an arm at Verdun. Do you know anything about her, Tristan?

Christof’s mother is a concert pianist. Right now she is in Vienna giving a Beethoven recital. I believe that she lives in Berlin with her daughter near Alexander Place. Alexander Place was the bohemian area in eastern Berlin. Tristan lived with his mother, Countess von Ohr, in the western part of the city, where life was governed by the more conventional norms of Prussian society. He seldom visited eastern Berlin.

Naturally no one wanted to talk about the death of Christof—even though it weighed heavily on their minds—so Tristan, Karl, and Gunther brought out a deck of cards and played skat for the rest of the afternoon. The movie that night was The Last Days of Pompeii. Gunther’s comment at the end of the film was: I think the hospital staff is trying to cheer us up.

A week later Tristan was conducted to the office of the principal surgeon, Dr. Sedelius.

You were a bomber pilot in Flanders, said Dr. Sedelius, with a quite remarkable record. He examined Tristan’s file. It says here that you were the first German pilot to bomb England. At midnight on January 23, 1916, you flew a Rumpler C-l to the English coast and dropped nine bombs on Kent. How old were you then?

Eighteen, sir.

Extraordinary. For that you were awarded the Iron Cross, First Class—presented by the Crown Prince himself. How did you find His Imperial Highness?

Charming, sir.

Last spring you bombed seventeen French railway lines and destroyed nine bridges. Is that right? All at night.

Yes, sir.

Why at night?

If you try to bomb in daylight, a British patrol squadron will spot you and destroy you.

I see. But how can you see your targets in the dark?

I am an expert in memorizing maps and reconnaissance photographs. Besides, sir, railways are amazingly visible in the dark.

So you were a nighthawk—and a dangerous one?

Yes, Doctor. You might say that

Dr. Sedelius set aside the file. And how did you come to injure both legs?

I had volunteered to pilot a reconnaissance plane across the lines to Arras, and on my return a French Nieuport came out of nowhere and shot me down.

The principal surgeon smiled at Tristan and said, I wonder if you could remove your pyjamas and let me have a look at your legs. Tristan did as he was told. Dr. Sedelius examined Tristan’s left leg. The scars are a bit ugly but the left leg has healed completely. The surgeon studied Tristan’s right leg carefully. I am sorry to say that the injury on your right leg has re-infected again and again. In due time gangrene will set in and threaten your life. We cannot permit that, of course. Dr. Sedelius sat back and said, What were your plans for the near future?

Sir, I hoped that my legs would heal up and I could return to flying.

For a moment Dr. Sedelius said nothing, then he took out an order paper and wrote a few lines on it. I am requesting that you be transferred to the army reserves. Your flying days are over. Tristan couldn’t believe his ears. And I am today discharging you to home.

To home, sir? Tristan was baffled.

Yes. You may return home to Berlin tomorrow so that you can have that right leg amputated.

2

At last Dr. Brandt folded up the letter he had received from Dr. Eisner. Your doctor over at the army hospital has suggested that you have a consultation with me. He says that in his considered judgment your right leg cannot be saved.

Tristan had decided in his mind to try to sound optimistic. Dr. Eisner told me that you have discovered a miracle cure for infections.

Dr. Brandt smiled guardedly. I think that it is best that we call it an experimental procedure, Lieutenant. Perhaps you could let me have a look at your leg. Tristan pulled off his trousers, and Dr. Brandt examined his right leg carefully. How did you get this injury?

My reconnaissance plane was machine-gunned while returning from France. Our camera man was shot in the head and died instantly. I managed to bring my craft down just inside our lines. Two farm boys pulled me out of the plane with some difficulty; my legs were caught in the wreckage.

The doctor gestured for Tristan to sit down. You have a dangerous infection that cannot be remedied using conventional procedures.

Yes, I understand that, Doctor.

Dr. Brandt folded his hands on the desk. Some twenty years ago a French doctor named Ernest Duchesne noticed that Arab stable boys used a salve made out of green saddle mould to cure unhealing sores.

Saddle mould? To Tristan that sounded both bizarre and disgusting.

He decided to study the therapeutic value of moulds. Eventually he made a solution of the mould and injected it into a group of diseased animals. All recovered.

Tristan was frightened but said nothing.

Dr. Duchesne wrote a paper titled: ‘Contribution to the study of vital competition in micro-organisms: antagonism between moulds and microbes.’ His paper was rejected as pseudo-science and forgotten. Two years ago I found a copy of that paper, and I decided to give his experiments another try.

And this is where I come in?

I decided that the injection procedure would be too risky for human subjects, but I have done a series of experiments using the Arab boys’ salve, and the results have been astonishing. He paused. You would be my twenty-sixth guinea pig.

There was a long silence, then Tristan said, "Over at the army hospital there was a patient who had lost both a foot and an arm at Verdun. Every morning he woke up with a smile on his face: he was born cheerful. I am not built like that: in my mind I could never accept having just one leg. His voice choked up. I would rather die than let them saw my leg off. He paused. I apologize, Doctor, for being so emotional."

No, that’s all right. We want to be very candid with ourselves. So, do you wish to give my unconventional procedure a try?

Yes. Absolutely.

You understand that this will be an experiment. Some experiments succeed, and some fail. My treatment will not hurt you, but it may fail to cure the infection. Are you willing to face a failure?

Yes.

Well then, wait here while I fetch my magic potion.

Tristan sat quietly, torn between fear and curiosity. A few minutes later Dr. Brandt returned with a jar of what looked like a green paste. I shall apply this to your injury every day for five days. He gently covered the infected area with the green salve. The blockade has cut off our supply of proper bandages, so I shall cover this up with strips of old shirts. After bandaging the leg he said, Where are you staying?

At the Pension Hubert on Ritter Street.

Good. There are plenty of amusements in that area to occupy your mind while this experiment takes its course. Can you come back tomorrow at ten and we shall have a look?

The next morning at ten Dr. Brandt examined Tristan’s leg and said, Hm. No signs of progress yet, but come back tomorrow. However, there was no progress the next day or the next day. Tristan was disheartened, but he kept saying to himself: Don’t give up. Don’t. Yet in his heart of hearts he knew that the experiment had failed.

On the fifth day Dr. Brandt unbandaged the leg carefully and said with a smile, Perfect.

What? said Tristan in disbelief.

The infection has completely disappeared. All you have left is a z-shaped scar.

Tristan wanted to hug the doctor, but instead he said, I don’t know how to thank you. You saved my life. He and the doctor exchanged understanding glances.

Then Dr. Brandt smiled and said, We come now to the mundane question of payment. May I send a statement to your home in Berlin?

Yes. My mother will mail you a check promptly.

Fine. Well, Lieutenant, I wish you the best of luck. Maybe after this dreadful war we shall meet again—perhaps at an air show.

Tristan grinned. I hope so, sir.

At the Pension Hubert that afternoon Tristan had just settled down to write a letter to his pilot friend Werner Voss, when there was a knock at the door.

Come in.

It was Mrs. Hubert. You have a visitor, sir.

I’ll be right down. He combed his hair and stared at himself in the mirror and then made his way down to the little lobby. There stood his old nurse, Klara.

Tristan, she exclaimed, and she ran forward to embrace him. How are you, darling?

I feel great, Klara. He didn’t plan to say anything about his legs—and the miracle cure.

She stared at him. You were in the hospital for five weeks.

Yes. I got messed up in a plane crash. I’m all right now.

We read all about it. Your picture was in the papers.

He put his arm around her and said, Come and sit down and tell me everything. They hadn’t seen each other for six months.

They sat down on a faded sofa and Klara began, I need hardly say that your poor mother has been worried sick ever since we heard about your accident. She telephoned the army hospital and was outraged when she was told that no visitors were allowed for patients in Ward 16. We never heard of such a thing: No Visitors. Hmph. Well, she gave them a piece of her mind, she did indeed.

Ward 16 was filled with crazies like me.

"Nonsense. When are you coming home? You