The German Iscariot

By Henry Rondel

The German Iscariot...........

...............follows RAF pilot Martin Cohen’s escape from Menzenschwand German Prison Camp, taking him to the British Embassy in a neutral Switzerland intent on profit by financing the Wehrmacht war machine.

Master of four languages and mentored by MI6, Martin is secreted at the Berne Embassy as an ‘illegal’, charged with investigating the disappearance of operatives from their ‘escape line’. There he uncovers fraud, rivalry and murder, just as the Russian victory at Stalingrad raises doubts on whether Germany will win.

Frauleins interfere, brilliant detective work; Martin discovers that a Nazi convoy is to transfer looted gold from a Zurich to a Lucerne bank. He encourages the UK, Russian and US Ambassadors to unite and open a Second Front. The convoy is hi-jacked. Civilians are killed, and the Swiss President declares war on the UK.

Colonel-General Strasser, (The German Iscariot) escapes death at the hi-jack; he plans vengeance and death to his enemies within and without the 3rd Reich.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley
• Release date: Apr 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463675182

Henry Rondel

The Author, selected Henry Rondel as a nom de plume which would be unrecognisable, and allow him to dissociate himself from it, to people who know him. {It’s the sex you know!} As a boy, Henry had 3 ambitions: county cricketer, farmer, and millionaire husband with three children; when John Lennon came along, he added ‘paperback writer’ to the list. It remains to be seen whether he is a good paperback writer. His next book, a sequel to The German Iscariot, is almost complete, with a working title; ‘The Hunt for Colonel Strasser’; this chronicles Martin’s hunt to seek out and get revenge on SS Colonel General Strasser, before the Colonel ‘gets him’ amid the confusion at the end of Hitler’s war. Henry intends it to be gripping, with a hook even more exceptional than Sir Pelham opening ‘The Second Front’, and Switzerland declaring war on the United Kingdom. Henry hopes you enjoy reading it as much as he enjoyed writing it, and asks you to look out for ‘The Hunt for Colonel Strasser’. A ‘rondel’ is the type of insignia marked on all RAF planes in WW2... 3 concentric circles, red, white and blue.

Book preview

About the author

The Author, selected Henry Rondel as a nom de plume which would be unrecognisable, and allow him to dissociate himself from it, to people who know him. {It’s the sex you know!}

As a boy, Henry had 3 ambitions: county cricketer, farmer, and millionaire husband with three children; when John Lennon came along, he added ‘paperback writer’ to the list. It remains to be seen whether he is a good paperback writer.

His next book, a sequel to The German Iscariot, is almost complete, with a working title; ‘The Hunt for Colonel Strasser’; this chronicles Martin’s hunt to seek out and get revenge on SS Colonel General Strasser, before the Colonel ‘gets him’ amid the confusion at the end of Hitler’s war. Henry intends it to be gripping, with a hook even more exceptional than Sir Pelham opening ‘The Second Front’, and Switzerland declaring war on the United Kingdom.

Henry hopes you enjoy reading it as much as he enjoyed writing it, and asks you to look out for ‘The Hunt for Colonel Strasser’. A ‘rondel’ is the type of insignia marked on all RAF planes in WW2… 3 concentric circles, red, white and blue.

Dedication

To my wife, Frieda.

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The German Iscariot

Published by Austin Macauley at Smashwords

Copyright 2018 Henry Rondel

The right of Henry Rondel to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All Rights Reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with the written permission of the publisher, or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is

Available from the British Library.

www.austinmacauley.com

The German Iscariot, 2018

ISBN 9781786297655 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781786297662 (E-Book)

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd.

First Published in 2018

AustinMacauley

CGC-33-01, 25 Canada Square

Canary Wharf, London E14 5LQ

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Body in the Spree the prequel by Henry Rondel to The German Iscariot ends:

Early morning trams full of Berliners, standing, lungs full of cigarette smoke, going to work, faced Pilot Major Hans Strasser, as he stood taking fresh breath on the stone steps, wet from overnight rain, leading down from SS Headquarters, to the Bendlerstrasse. His feeling of relief wasn’t matched by his second-hand appearance following 48 hours of questioning in the hands of SS Colonel Franz Rheinlander. Some 48 hours, three nights, fearing death by the same firing squad that had shot brother Gregor.

Change had come quickly; two days ago death seemed hours away; this morning promotion had been promised – Colonel Hans Stressor; ‘A solid basis for getting revenge’ he thought.

Taking a deep breath, he walked carefully down the steps, turned the corner and was lost in the crowd.

The German Iscariot

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Chapter 1

Dawn: Cold and Clear

Two bodies lay five yards apart, knees drawn up as if asleep. Patches of blood showed darkly below the shoulders, where the bullets had struck. Their jackets had absorbed the blood. None had trickled onto the stubby stalks of stiff grass crushed beneath their bodies, grass cut in swathes every fortnight, growing between the two barbed wire fences circling Prisoner of War camp – Stalag 843. Although the jackets of the RAF uniforms were patched, worn and drab they were recognisable as British Forces uniforms.

One solitary guard, his rifle at the slope, Alsatian obedient at his side, shifting his rifle left to right walked rather than marched, along the path worn bare inside the inner perimeter fence. This patrolling guard under orders to circle every seven minutes, never even glanced at the bodies; 60 yd behind him, stood the watch tower, a silhouette, from which the deadly shots were fired, a windmill without sails, its colour weathered the same as the prison huts, constructed out of the same tall pines from the embracing forest.

The complete absence of prisoner onlookers and other guards, suggested that the killing had occurred much earlier that night. The sentries inside their warm guard post curled up warm and comfortable, were snatching as much sleep as breaks between sentry-go would allow.

The RAF prisoners-of-war, uncrowded in warm stout wooden huts, lay awake staring at the ceiling. Their bunks lined both sides of the long huts, bunks like the watch tower, made out of the trees logged from the forest when Camp 843 was constructed six months earlier. A small stream ran deepest alongside the end hut, under the two wire fences, before snaking away into the forest. On a quiet night the gurgle of running water was the only sound to be heard. An elaborate wire contraption ensured that the stream would not be an easy escape point.

Colonel Hans Strasser, the camp commandant of both Menzenschwand and other camps, did not attend morning Appels. Roll call was held regularly on a site in front of the command centre. This morning was an exception, the site was changed, Appel was being held as close as possible to the inner wire, and as close as possible to the bodies of the two dead airmen still lying slumped on the ground.

This wasn’t the only unusual event the men had been in position for over a quarter of an hour when a single engine, twin-winged aircraft flew over their heads to land on a postage stamp on the smooth slope beyond the admin block. A car brought Strasser the area camp commandant from the aircraft to Appel.

Colonel Strasser was tall, and had unusually long hair for a German military man; comically he regularly stretched his false right arm behind his head to scratch his left ear. His right arm had been lost in a glider accident. This unusual habit was so pronounced and so frequent that the camp comedians, and each hut had one, had added this mannerism to their standard routine imitation of Hitler’s strutting mannerisms of clenched fist, and short form salute, just bringing his lower arm across his chest. Strasser’s ear-scratching routine of the left ear by the right hand, married to goose stepping and rigid marching, never failed to raise the spirits of their captive audience.

These jokers had other standard moves. One was to run around the hut, arms stretched, mimicking the drone of a Junkers bomber, and with a pillow under their jumper to crash land on the floor. Then, imitations of Stuka dive bombers were abandoned after Sammy Cardoza cracked a rib. A miserable comic turn was to attempt to scramble up to a top bunk imitating Hermann Goering saying ‘Guns before butter, guns before butter.’

Even less successful were imitations of a limping Joseph Goebbels, with grotesque rhetoric, and exaggerated Nazi salutes. There was always Gairmany calling, Gairmany calling – Lord Haw-Haw’s radio call sign, and cruel imitations of King George’s embarrassing stutter, and banal routine impressions from ITMA, from ‘Can I do you now sir’, to I don’t mind if I do.

The most excruciating take offs of all were Wilfred Pickles’ How much in the kitty, Mabel?

11/6.

Oh, Ah, Applause!

Roland Paste in Hut four was known throughout the camp as ‘Tommy Handley’ so accurate and frequent were his take offs.

A subdued Appel, the names, the saluting, the heels clicked, no ribald answers and complete silence when the names of the two dead airmen were called, the men awaited the command to fall out. It never came. From the silence four men were called out, marched around the wire to the camp entrance; three picked up spades, one picked up a pick-axe. They were then marched back inside the inner wire then brought to stand at attention, beside the bodies, in full view of the prisoners lined up at the other side of the inner wire.

With the burial party in position, Colonel Strasser flanked by two guards, strode over to the wire, standing less than 2 ft from the bodies. Facing the parade he drew his pistol from its brown leather holster, turning, then pausing, he raised his arm, firing two shots into the head of the nearest body before emptying the magazine into the head of the second corpse. A mixture of minced bone and blood flew into the air.

Gasps of horror came from prisoners and guards alike.

Without a word, flanked by two guards he strode away.

Inside his office he stood upright before the cheval mirror, adjusting the angle of his cap then his tie. He smoothed out his jacket and satisfied, he moved behind his desk, and lit a cigarette.

Colonel Strasser thought of himself as handsome and intelligent, and operating below his level of capacity, thwarted by losing his hand and by being the brother of Otto Strasser, an early intellectual supporter of Hitler, later to be brutally executed as a disloyal Nazi follower. His men thought him strict, firm and austere. The RAF airmen in the prison camp took their cue from Wing Commander Digby, SBO [Senior British Officer] who thought Strasser to be a cold, calculating, solitary individual, very bright, with embedded Christian values, well educated, and someone he could and had to do business with.

The prisoners, Wing Commander Digby, even the German guards were surprised, shocked and stunned at the unnecessary public brutal demonstration of power. It was not till a minute after Strasser had disappeared from view that movement returned, orders were shouted, awkwardly. Trying to avoid slivers of bone and spatters of blood the burial party picked up the bodies of the dead airmen.

One man lifted the shoulders, two lifted the feet, the spades balanced on top of the bodies, the four men carried the bodies back along the wire, through the gap and the outer wire, on to the fringe of the pines, where they carefully laid them down. Shown where to dig they took up the spades and the pick-axe, they dug out a single shallow grave. Ordered to stand back, the guards kicked the dead bodies rolling them over into the grave, and stepped clear.

Kneeling into the grave to shield and arrange the corpses side by side, Jack Welland, shortest and bulkiest of the burial party, knelt and with his back to the escorts, swiftly emptied the pockets of his dead comrades. Stepping out of the grave, he picked up the pick-axe and the party took up their spades once more, covering the muddied bodies with gleaming, black peaty soil.

Just the single grave was dug, now invisible, the grave remains to this day, hidden unmarked without headstone or recognition, abandoned by the Luftwaffe and the RAF, a visible reminder, a prick of conscience, to no one, not even Martin Cohen, the airman most affected by the atrocity.

Tom moved, he moved, I saw him move, Martin hissed, he was still alive. None of his comrades had noticed, many had shut their eyes, others had turned their face away.

Their comrades, 300 yd away, could only look forlornly on. It proved little relief when the burial party hurled their spades down, in front of the guardhouse.

The airmen stood and sat around in groups as they were made to wait outside for over four hours whilst the guards searched the huts, gleefully throwing their possessions all over the place.

It was long past noon when Major Feldmann reported meagre results from searching the prison huts; he thought the long time period between the shootings and the search had allowed escape material to be well hidden, ‘probably there’s a tunnel and they put everything in it’. Colonel Strasser nodded.

Where are the prisoners’ escape documents? Show me their papers to help them get out of Germany. Do we know their planned escape route?

Major Feldmann froze, instantly he knew he had been negligent and was about to receive an almighty reprimand for failing to examine the corpses’ clothing.

‘Why, why, why, had Strasser fired his Luger and made such an unpleasant mess of the bodies?’… But he knew the gruesome bloody mess didn’t excuse him for failing to strip search the bodies.

There weren’t any, we didn’t find any papers. The way he said it, Strasser knew searches hadn’t been made. You said to leave the bodies where they fell as an example to the prisoners, Feldmann added lamely.

You didn’t look. Didn’t look. Strasser snapped angrily.

Feldmann said nothing, his silence said it all.

It’s most important we know what documents they were carrying. Strasser was angry at Major Feldmann, and at himself. He had made a mistake in allowing the bodies to remain on view for hours without examination, a mistake in not issuing a specific instruction to strip the bodies. He thought for a minute.

‘They’re buried, burying them without a religious service was an error, digging them up will look bad,’ finally deciding, Feldmann, you, you personally, at 1 am precisely, take two men, dig the bodies out, strip search them. Keep the searchlights away, in fact switch them completely off whilst you are there, say a prayer if you wish, But I don’t want any priest around. Put the bodies back as you found them, clothes back on, swear your men to secrecy, we don’t want any of this getting out and we certainly don’t want the prisoners to see you doing it.

Major Feldmann selected two dour old warders. He spent an uncomfortable 24 hours. He reported back the following morning.

Nothing, we found nothing.

The digging party must have emptied the pockets from under your very noses. Colonel Strasser had changed his schedule deliberately so as to be at Menzenschwand. He was angry,

How can you have been so stupid? Did a bit of blood and bone upset you, you’ll see a lot more blood and bone in Russia? You’d better draw winter vests, you’ll be in Leningrad in a week.

Strasser fumed. Feldmann shivered.

I’ve got to be at Hildenheim Airfield by three o’ clock. Udet is flying in. Rapping the table, he stressed, "Nothing about the shooting, nothing about an escape, nothing about any of this is to go into the camp journal. We continue to draw rations for the same number of prisoners as before.

It must never be mentioned again. Do you hear Corporal Muller, do you hear Feldmann? Order your men. Strasser rose to leave. Nothing whatsoever. He got up, the men saluted. He left.

Three days later, what he had seen had permeated Martin Cohen’s soul. From that hut, from the corner window by the corner bunk, he gazed out with unseeing eyes. Two men were dead, and it was his fault, it was his plan of escape. Yes, the dead men had volunteered, and Digby and Charles, the escape officer, had chosen them for the escape, not him. It should have been him, it should be him lying dead, but Tom wasn’t dead, ‘I saw his head move’… only Tom was chosen, and he wasn’t because Digby had serious doubts whether his two broken legs had mended sufficiently to give him the balance and power required for the gymnastic leap over the inner fence.

However, our story doesn’t start here, it doesn’t start even after the war had started, it certainly doesn’t start at an RAF prisoner of war camp at Menzenschwand in southern Germany. It starts in 1936, some three years earlier, and some three years after Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, about the time Austria was annexed and a uniformed Hitler proudly strutted triumphantly into Vienna.

No, our story properly starts in that very same forest clearing before a single tree was felled and before a single hut was built, and it starts with that very same RAF airman, Pilot Officer Martin Cohen… schoolboy Martin Cohen.

Martin was Czech-born, his father working in Germany for a Swiss textile engineering company, living with his wife and only son in Rothstein on Ebbs, SW Germany. Speaking Czech at home, German at school, watching American films whenever he could, such was his quick intelligence that by 11 he wrote and understood English, Czech and German, speaking English with an American accent.

He was particularly interested in planes whether fighters, bombers or gliders and recognised their outlines whether German, French, Swedish, Czech, American or English.

His friends were German, his teachers and his schoolmates accepted him happily and though not a formal member of the ‘Hitler Youth’ he joined in many parallel activities, particularly enjoying social walking on long weekends at Nature Freunde Houses.

Using a National Lottery, the National Socialist Party financed the Nature Freunde movement – town rambler organisations which bought and renovated good old country houses, enabling workers and their families to enjoy cheap, communal, healthy holidays.

As a member of the School Air Corps, he never missed a lecture had attended a course on gliders and light planes. By 13 he had both flown in, and piloted a Storch trainer.

One particular occasional young instructor was a Luftwaffe pilot. Hans Strasser who made a good impression both on Martin and his friends, was tall and handsome, had long blond hair and scratched his ear with his opposite hand around the back of his head.

Although Martin’s mother was German there was Jewish blood in her veins; this particular summer holiday he went to stay with his grandparents in their detached house in the village of Fishbeck, north of the Alps. Not expected to carry out household chores his main task was to dig, weed and tend the long narrow garden, cleaning the forks and spades kept in an old wooden coach house at the bottom. His engineer-father travelled widely. His employer, the Ruti Textile Machinery company of Switzerland was internationally known, and this holiday visit slotted into his work timetable.

One fine morning, Martin walked further out of the village than before, following a winding path through the woods outside Fishbeck. Eventually the trees opened out, the path became lighter and wetter, sunlight glinting off grass and leaves. The stream crossing his path was cleared with a bound, ahead, and although the fawn saw him it didn’t move. The instant Martin saw it, he stopped, stayed perfectly still and without moving his head, stared at the small brown fawn. Neither moved, time stood still, then slowly it shuffled back. Martin held out his hand, at which the fawn turned and silently moved back down the glade, merging into the trees.

Back bent, to keep a low profile, Martin walked slowly down the glade, but the fawn was not to be seen. Finally despairing of seeing it again, he retraced his steps, jumped back over the stream and ran back to tell his grandparents. He returned the next morning with granddad, food in his pocket and in his knapsack, but the fawn didn’t appear.

Back to back they sat down, they waited, leaning against the trunk of an ancient oak shattered by lightning, its broad trunk leaning over at a shallow angle. It was easy for Martin to scramble up the trunk to the first split branch, but though he could see in all directions, the fawn was not to be seen. They ate the middle of the sandwiches, leaving the crusts on a rock hoping that the fawn would find them and be there waiting for more the following day.

Martin returned with food the next day, and the next day, and the next. In the glade, he crawled between the bracken fronds hung with frog spit as silent as snow, always the food had gone, but having seen a wolf in the distance Martin was never certain whether it was birds, the wolf or the fawn who welcomed his daily visits, and ate the food.

The fourth morning, moving silently down the glade he almost trod on a greenish yellow snake sunning itself on a patch of smooth grass. The way Martin reacted mirrored how Martin handled himself throughout his life… he stopped, he considered the situation quickly, he slowly retraced his steps and went another way around…not knowing whether the snake was poisonous or aggressive. He didn’t test it, he avoided it.

So it is in that glade, home to the fawn, the wolf and the snake, that our story really begins.

As an RAF prisoner Martin never saw the fawn again, what he did see, peering out into the forest, above and beyond the bodies of the two dead airmen, was a tall, brown deer standing motionless, then antlers swaying, moving along the line of the dark pines, head turned towards the camp. Finally, it turned, bowed its antlers under a low branch and entered the trees. He never saw it again, neither did he forget it.

Back home from holiday, two separate events forever changed Martin’s view on life.

Hitler was to open a new stretch of autobahn, bypassing Rothstein and integrating the area into the extensive autobahn system of roads so well and wisely constructed by the Nazis.

After opening the new road, ‘the Hitler Strasse’, Hitler was to drive down the connecting road to visit Rothstein on Ebbs.

Martin had never seen such extensive preparations; first Stephan Koch, Gauleiter of the SW Region brought his entourage into town, taking over the Golden Bear, the 13th century coaching inn on the old Roman Road, running parallel to the new Hauptstrasse. Guards in smart black uniforms bearing impressive insignia and carrying guns, were posted outside the Golden Bear and at both ends of the road.

Roads along the route were repaired, all public buildings were painted; the dilapidated allotment huts lying along one side of the route disappeared overnight, a scruffy yet serviceable toilet was pulled down and not replaced, with the area around enclosed by neat wicker fences, made and erected by the ULF – Unemployed Labour Force.

Street signposts were repainted or replaced and several names were changed – ‘Commercial Strasse’ was changed to ‘Hermann Goering Strasse’. This new sign was particularly splendid, but the paint on ‘Hermann Goering Strasse’ had hardly had time to dry before Goebbels made a lightning visit, for the sign to be taken down, and replaced by an even grander ‘Luftwaffe Strasse,’ draped with black Luftwaffe swatches and a red and black ancient Germanic flag. A model of a Messerschmitt fighter was erected opposite the 50-year-old statue of Bismarck.

Householders along the route were encouraged to spruce up their properties, swastikas and replica Prussian flags were on sale in the market at half the normal price. After a quiet discussion Martin’s mother bought a swastika and hung it out of the front bedroom window, but Martin detected an undercurrent of uneasiness, and knew that his father was unhappy.

‘Rosenbaum’ a small jewellery shop on the Rothstein high street, had its windows shattered, its contents looted, and Jude painted on the door. The day after the looting, scaffolding and wide wooden sheeting was erected in front of the damaged building, completely hiding it from view. Martin heard his parents say that Mr and Mrs Rosenbaum had left Germany to go to live with relatives in New York.

There were low voice conversations between his parents. Because of work, Mr Cohen had a phone, at a time when telephone calls were an event. Three times in the same evening his mother rang her parents. Each time she turned her back on him, facing the wall so he couldn’t hear what she said. Something was frightening her… catching the muttered name of ‘Rosenbaum’ he remembered his mother’s name before marriage was ‘Rosenbaum’. Until then, ‘Rosenbaum’ had never registered with him as different or unusual.

Behind the scenes there was a big row between the Gauleiter and Rothstein’s mayor over whether the ribbon to ceremonially open the road should be where Hitler entered the autobahn or where he left it to enter Rothstein. A compromise was reached: there would be two arches and two ribbons, one at each end. The arches were built. Two days before the opening the row reached the ears of Goebbels. No – he decided there would be one arch, Hitler would only stop once, at the entrance to the town where there would be spectators, not out in the countryside. Storm troopers pulled the first arch down within an hour, smashed it up, took it down to the river bank and burnt it, kicking the ashes into the river, to the anger of the anglers’ club.

Bright and clear, the day of Hitler’s visit dawned. Early in the morning final inspection tours of Rothstein were made by the Gauleiter, the Mayor, and the SS. Schools were closed, all schoolchildren were given the day off. At the school premises, the Hitler Youth, the fire brigade, the War Veterans, all who had been chosen to line the route, assembled early. Coffee, fresh bread rolls and jam were spread out on tables; all were in high spirits.

Escorted, Hitler’s new drop-head Mercedes with its hood up and Hitler in the back, drove swiftly out of Munich. Entering the new section of new motorway, his car stopped, the hood was retracted, the formal motorcade fell in behind the Mercedes and all cars slowed to a stately pace, but as spectators thinned in the open countryside, the cars regained speed. Hitler’s open top black Mercedes, drove down the centre of the autobahn, a flag streaming out from the bonnet.

Fifty metres behind the Mercedes, in a ‘W’ formation straddling the full autobahn, were five pre-production models of Beetle Volkswagens, all painted in the strong red and blacks of the German flag, the cars reminding everyone of Hitler’s contribution in the introduction of a ‘people’s car’, not only through his political impetus, but also for sketching its overall shape. Splendid, upright young soldiers drove these cars and sitting beside them were women from Goebbels’ selected film units.

The VIP cars followed further back. Among them was a full film unit, a personnel security force [Hitler was never short of enemies or guards], motorway construction workers, and local party leaders. There were no generals, no admirals, and no what the Italians called ‘prominenti’, Saubel, Bormann, von Schirach, being virtually unknown.

The only exception was. Goebbels, the Propaganda Minister, and Hitler’s greatest admirer. He kept himself separate and conspicuous, continual hand movements pointed the film crew to where they should shoot. His cameramen stood out among the Brown shirts, Black shirts, and Blue shirts of the various National Socialist organisations.

Reaching the end of the new road, the motorcade turned off onto the pavee, the special slowdown road, unique to Germany’s autobahns, and stopped.

Hitler got out. On one side of the pave, five SS men came to attention. As a sergeant shouted, they raised their rifles firing five consecutive shots into the air. Hitler pulled at his grey gloves, he saluted, walked to the other side of the car and again gave his full extended arm salute to the five comrades from the Great War, veterans from the Frei Corps, whose main task had been to protect the Nazi party parades and to beat up the Bolsheviks. These were the men chosen to form up as the honour guard.

The front passenger door had now been opened, and entering by it, Hitler climbed up, standing upright in the cleared space where the front seat had been taken out of the Mercedes, canopy folded and tied down for maximum visibility. It dared any assassin to do his worst. All known local agitators had been arrested and were working behind the hill.

Slowly the cars moved forward, now leaving a much bigger space behind Hitler’s car. Crowds were thicker and noisier, as the first car passed over the 16th century hump-backed River Ebbs bridge, the bump causing Hitler to grab hold of the special rail in front of him. Even so he nearly fell over the low windscreen.

Hitler saluted with his short flick from elbow to shoulder, the crowd cheered, leant forward and saluted him even more. Hitler turned and saluted – the crowds cheered and saluted and shouted ‘Sieg Heil’. Not just the crowd – even the buildings, as if hit by an earthquake, seemed to sway in adoration of the man who had restored Germany’s power and honour.

Everyone was there, everyone was cheering, everyone pressed closely together in a common celebration. There were prolonged outstretched salutes with people reaching forward – the better to see, straining the muscles of men and women, boys and girls alike, all celebrating and all cheering their hero. Germany proud and poised for greatness once more.

The station’s enclosed forecourt was ringed by Liefstandard SS men, Hitler’s elite protectors. As Hitler entered there were more salutes, more cheering, more photographs, until Hitler stepped down from the Mercedes, away from the car. He turned, facing outwards towards the townsfolk, raising his hand for silence as if to speak.

Then something remarkable happened:

The noise in the forecourt dropped to a murmur as the band trailed off to nothing. Outside in the main square, orchestrated by the massive SS drum, the rhythmic chant began:

Bang… bang. Bang Bang Bang

Bang. Bang .Bang ‘Sieg Heil’

Bang… bang. Bang Bang Bang

Bang. Bang. Bang ‘Sieg Heil’

Bang… bang. Bang Bang Bang

Bang. Bang. Bang ‘Sieg Heil’

After the second repetition the audience in the forecourt took up the refrain to shout

Bang… bang. Bang Bang Bang

Bang. Bang. Bang ‘Sieg Heil’

The chant was taken up by the whole town. There has never been anything to match it. Not at Wembley, not at Madison Square Garden, not on the Champs d’Elysee, not anywhere.

Thus did Rothstein achieve fame.

As this continued, the camera fixed high on the roof was lowered down, to close and focus on Hitler’s face. It was a climactic moment.

After a minute the unseen director in the square gave the signal: four even bigger bangs on the massive drum.

The chanting stopped. Silence reigned.

Relaxed, pausing for just 20 seconds, accepting everything as the norm, turning on his heel, Hitler walked onto the station platform, no speeches, no handshakes, no real acknowledgement of officialdom, mainly recognition of the black shirts and the brown shirts and the people with his short-armed salutes, as he walked along the lines pleased and smiling.

At the end of the line was Marta. Smiling and with a friendly gesture he bent forward, spoke and took the posy from Marta, a lovely girl from Martin’s class at school, fondly patting her head. Rather than passing the posy back to an aide he carried it like a bridesmaid, keeping it in his hand until he reached the train, transferring it to his other hand before climbing up into the waiting carriage. There he turned and in a most unusual even awkward gesture threw the posy up in the air, for it to fall on the empty red carpet.

Hundreds watched live, millions saw it on newsreels, as it fell on the red carpet laid parallel to the rail track. Millions were to take away that vision of Marta a simple posy, and Hitler, on cinema screens throughout Germany and Europe. Hitler hadn’t passed the flowers back to an aide he had cherished them like a bride, when he at last threw the posy back out of the carriage window, the whole of Germany reached out to catch it before it fell.

On board the train whistle sounded… 30 uniformed girls and boys of the Hitler Youth, previously lined up along the refreshment room wall, ran forward to board the third and last coach of the train, waved in by youth leader Axelman.

Steam was already raised, and bursts of white cloud gusted out from under the carriages. Leaning out of his cab, the engine driver saw the silk flag, hand sewn with a swastika, flutter. He pulled down on the brass chain, and the steam whistle sounded stridently three times. The train pulled out into bright sunlight heading along the Ebbs valley floor, distant direction Salzburg.

Thirty boys and girls were sat peering out of the windows next to tables laden with sausages, mustard and covered pots of boiled potatoes, plain good food, waiting for the Fuhrer to appear before they got the signal to eat.

Hitler had made no speech, had eaten no food, taken no drink, had not held private conversations, had made no direct enemies or direct friends, yet he had enthused the entire population of Rothstein, and thanks to Goebbels and his newsreels had influenced the opinion of the world. Rothsteiners just wanted to cheer and be there, and remember.

Along with the cheering, and waving, 24 medieval guns, borrowed from Tubingen University, were fired from the green sward down by the river Ebbs. Later in the day, families sat at long tables in the square drinking beer, eating sausages and cheese and onions out of hot rolls, an oompah band in full Bavarian dress leading the singing and dancing. It was free, the Party had paid.

Later, the SS, the Brown shirts, the Gestapo, the Nazi Party organisers, disappeared into the back street bars. The police made no arrests until the following Thursday, when following complaints, they caught two boys knocking on doors and running off. The Magistrate called for the boys’ parents to appear. He gave them a lecture, telling the boys they had dishonoured their parents, and should be ashamed.

Newsreel pictures of Hitler’s visit were rushed out and shown at the Rothstein cinema, called ‘the Zeppelin’ from noon the following day. The cinema owner gave everyone who visited his cinema on the first day, a small commemorative badge of Hitler, a zeppelin, and the name Rothstein. [One of these badges sold for 500 deutschmarks in 1983, 50 years after his succession to power, a second in 2013, 80 years later, made 5,000 euro.]

This small cinema was packed from noon to midnight for over a week, as people from neighbouring towns drove into Rothstein to see it.

This newsreel, edited by Leni Riefenstal, Hitler’s friend [with Goebbels as ever, as Hitler’s guardian of image always looking over her shoulder], ended with the scene in the station forecourt with the repeated shouts of ‘Sieg Heil’ and the slow wind down to the close up of Hitler’s face.

This scene on Goebbels instruction, after consultation with von Ribbentrop, the Foreign Minister, was omitted from the overseas version.

The separate edition was paid for by his Ministry, and distributed free throughout Western Europe and the USA. This oversee edition closed with the children greeting Hitler as he opened up the pots of boiled potato on the train, though the private edit presented to Hitler himself, finished with Marta, and the posy lying on the red carpet.

The Cohens’ house carried Mrs Cohen’s swastika; it was hung from a stick out of the front bedroom window. Hitler’s photo was stuck to the mail box. Ten years later, and 1,000 miles away, Martin’s father was heard to say: "Yes, I was a Czech, living in Germany with a secret Jewish- German wife. Yes, I did show a photo of Adolf Hitler. Yes, I did cheer and wave and salute. Yes, we did buy and fly a swastika. Yes, we had never told Martin that momma was Jewish.

I didn’t have a hooked nose and no I’m still alive, I wasn’t daft then, and I’m not daft now.

Wise beyond his years Martin wholeheartedly joined in the celebration; as a member of the school’s Air Corps he put on his uniform, was inspected and with the other cadets lined the route before the Ebbs bridge. The inspecting officer was the tall, young officer with long blond hair who had the most unusual habit of reaching around the back of his head and scratching his left ear with his right hand. He had given the talks on gliders.

Inspection over, he talked affably and informatively with the boys, only then was it apparent that he had only one hand. Martin remembered Hans Strasser as the young glider instructor. Diffidently, he approached quietly from the side

I’m sorry you’ve lost your hand, sir.

Yes, an accident, they won’t let me fly any more I’m afraid, was the reply.

After the train had left, after the motorcade had split up, the cadets, the Frei Corps, in fact everybody, surged into the main square where everyone cheered and sang, food and drink were brought out on tables, and there were scrambles until all the free beer was gone. There were bands, girls and boys joined hands, they sang and danced, it was a splendid time, even the rough lumps of bread were eaten – but Martin was puzzled.

When the celebrations were over, leaving his pals, walking home over the narrow pedestrian bridge, crossing the River Ebbs, trying to fit the words of Lily Marlene to the Horst Wessel song, he stopped, checking there was no one about. The apple juice making its presence felt, he unbuttoned his fly, and pulled out his cock to piss over the low parapet into the river. The moon reflected on the silver rainbow arch, but the height above the river and the murmur of the flow, killed all sound. Looking down by the light of the silvery moon, he frowned, ‘Why had he been circumcised? What did it mean? Why was it important?’

Marta, the girl with the posy, appeared in all the newsreels. She went to his school, was in his class and though much smaller, was in fact the same age. Marta and Gretel, her friend, liked to walk home, hanging on, with Martin and his friends. Now she was a star and they all wanted to know all about it.

It was lovely, was all she could find to say. I can’t remember, when they asked what he said, and when they asked what she had been told to say if he chatted, she repeated I don’t remember, it was just lovely

Away from Rothstein, working with gliders and airplanes, Martin missed the regular Saturday parades of Brown shirts strutting all over town. He also missed the horrible incident and the trouble on the Saturday following Hitler’s visit. Two naive Jewish boys came in from Immenstadt to spend time with a cousin and her friend and to see the film. Afterwards, sitting in the best corner of an empty beer cellar seemed a reasonable thing to do until a gang of Brown shirts came in intent on drinking, rowdiness and trouble. Noticing the black cap above a hook nose, one pointed at them

OUT.

The girls rose at once, but one boy, his glass half full, was slow to respond. At last he began to get up only to be pushed down.

Let’s have his hair off! Two lads held him down while another pulled off his cap. Knives appeared and his hair was hacked off his head. There was a roar from the door, the victorious football team had arrived back from the game. Rudi, the Jewish boy, swung an arm fighting wildly back at his attackers. From the back of the room three shots were fired. Without a sound Rudi fell to the floor. He was dead.

There was consternation, but the only result was for his body to be slung out of the back door where it was picked up by the council the following morning.

Rudi’s companions didn’t stop to see how he was, they got out of the bar as fast as they could go. They ran to the nearest parents’ house. Drowning in tears, they told what had happened.

Their letter recounting events was delivered by hand to a half empty Rathaus before noon the next day. No arrests were ever made, though the police at Immenstadt did make several visits to the remaining boy’s parents, and money was eventually provided towards the cost of a low key funeral.

National Socialism

RECORD OF

UNRECORDED DEATHS

1933 – 1945

US Colonel John Murphy found this soft-backed book in a back office in the National Socialist HQ at Augsburg towards the end of 1945. He took it back with him to Clearwater, Minnesota, where it can be found to this day at the Bible Hall Museum, Black Hill St, Clearwater. A copy of this unrecorded death is at the back of this book.

The second major event to alter Martin’s outlook occurred a month later; Karl Schindler, a boy one class ahead of Martin, and a fellow member of Naturefreunde, denounced his parents as being anti-Hitler, anti-German, and pro Bolshevik. The Gestapo, the SA, the SS and the local police all visited the school. They questioned pupils and visited their homes. Karl Schindler and his parents disappeared, were never spoken of, and were never seen in Rothstein again.

Martin had never liked Schindler, the affair troubled him and he began to think Jews, even good German Jews, like his parents, had no safe place in Rothstein. ‘Don’t like Karl Schindler,’ he thought, ‘or anyone who tells on his parents.’ That same evening the local police came to their house. Martin was sent out to buy food at a distant shop and deliver it to distant friends. Neither parent told Martin what the visit was about.

***

Chapter 2

The Cohens’ mail box was secured at the top of a stout wooden stake at the side of the front gate. Every day Martin was tasked with bringing the mail into the kitchen.

All the letters were addressed to his father, so he was excited when he pulled out a long, heavy, yellow envelope stuck with two large Swiss stamps carrying a red cross, addressed to Martin Cohen, c/o 26 Waldheimstrasse, Rothstein en Ebbs, Germany.

Excitedly, he took it indoors. Although it was addressed to him he didn’t feel he should open it. Nor did his mother.

We must wait till Dad comes home, she said.

The Swiss stamps gave Martin a clue as to the letter’s contents; Uncle Gregory, a widower without children, lived in Switzerland and had recently died. His parents had gone to the funeral and had openly speculated whether they or Martin, his only nephew, would get any of his money.

At tea time as they sat at the kitchen table, Dad slit open the imposing envelope. Taking his time to peruse the letter in silence, finally he looked up.

Good news, he said, swivelling towards his wife, Uncle George has remembered Martin in his will. He picked up the folded piece of paper which had fallen onto the table when he opened the envelope. He unfolded it. It’s a cheque for 23,000 francs. He passed the cheque for Martin to look at, without it leaving his grasp, then passed it to his wife. Finally he refolded it and tucked it into his wallet.

Before Martin went to bed there was a family discussion. During the long enjoyable family conference, Dad gave instructions he sought to mask as advice, Don’t tell anyone about this money, they don’t need to know. Mum and me, we’ll deposit it safely and it will earn you interest at 4% every year, and the money will still be there when you need it.

He was firm in answering Martin’s question.

Can I spend some now? What is 23,000 Swiss francs worth?

No. There’s no need to spend any, we’ll save it son, it’ll be there when you go to university, when you buy a house, when you leave home, when you get married. It’s a nest egg, to be looked after, you don’t break nest eggs except in an emergency, you look after it until you really need it. You can’t spend it now, there’s no need to.

How much interest do I get?

We’ll have to check the rate of exchange is and what the interest rate is – it changes every day.

Next they discussed how and where to save it – the local Rothstein Savings Bank will not pay much interest – the cheque is in Swiss francs – if we have to change it into German marks or Czech currency you’ll be charged a conversion rate and you’ll lose money on the exchange rate and other foreign currency charges. he paused, his use of ‘we’ and ‘you’ had become interchangeable and interesting and for a moment Martin began to wonder who the money belonged too. He really couldn’t see why it couldn’t be deposited in the local Savings Bank, owned by the Nazi Party.

Martin knew enough not to ask if he could keep the money in cash in his money box, after all he was already the ‘assistant accountant’ for school scholars’ funds. His father was still planning what ‘the family’ had to do. He resumed, Mother, how about us all taking a short holiday – I’ve to call back in at HQ Ruti shortly, how about a few days away in the Swiss lakes near Interlaken. We’ll put the money into a Swiss bank account, we’ll put it in your name Martin, so that there won’t be any bank charges or currency conversion fees, then if there’s a war your money will be safe.

At the time Martin wondered why his father mentioned war, everyone at school said that the Swiss were cowards and had never fought anybody. He knew that Switzerland never went to war.

What his father didn’t say was that he did not want money to be held in Germany or Czechoslovakia as he sensed a war