There were only two entrances: a set of reinforced double doors at each end. Those around the corner from the field marshal’s path down the hill were the main entrance. They were accessed from an iron staircase of 13 steps and then through a small iron gate. Inside the front door wes a marble-floored foyer. Just off this vestibule, a circular staircase with brass banisters wound its way upward to bedrooms above.
The second entrance at the other end of the front was designated for workers and supplies. Adjoining the back end of the blockhouse deep under the hill were several natural cave areas. The engineers made use of them to build enlisted quarters. The men were packed into small rooms, with hooks affixed to the walls to hold the bunks. Fortunately, toilets and other restroom facilities were numerous. Additional was been made of these small underground caverns to construct several air raid shelters. The entire building was completely air conditioned and centrally heated. The floors were red and white ceramic tile, and the beige ceiling was acoustic.
The ground floor housed the generator room and the other utility rooms, including the kitchen. Inside the generator room was a special escape passage that the staff officers could use in case of an emergency. It ran underground for about a kilometer and a half before coming out into a private home overlooking the Rue Felicien David.
The walls between offices were over a meter wide, and a thick steel door to each office slid to open or close. Each door (except those to the offices of von Rundstedt and Blumentritt) had a small glass inspection port in the center, so that visitors could be visually identified before being allowed entry. Each door also had affixed instructions for occupants. Each office had a metal barrel inside carrying a charcoal gas-filtering agent, through which the air was cleansed before entering the room. However, the door must be shut completely and levers engaged for the room to be able to withstand a gas attack.
Of course, being the strategic headquarters for the Western Theater, the offices were well furnished. The interiors were generally decorated with beautiful draperies, plush furniture, and elegant walnut paneling. Just off the front entrance on the main floor was the hallway. Von Rundstedt’s office (although he seldom went there) was off that hallway and in front of the dining room. It was not very large: 4½ meters wide by 7⅓ meters long, and about 2⅓ meters high. It had two radiators for warmth in the winter, and an adjoining small restroom. The main feature in the office was an heirloom Louis XV desk. Von Rundstedt often enjoyed sitting behind it and reading a novel. Near his office was a map room, and he often updated the maps himself.
Next to his office was that of his adjutant, the room about half as large as his. Blumentritt’s office was across the hall: about the same size as the field marshal’s, but divided up into two areas: one for the chief of staff, and one for a secretary or aide.
The bunker normally held over a hundred people, although it could accommodate up to three times that number. Staff included various administrative and communications personnel, including a number of Kriegshelferinnen (Army volunteers). All in all, it was an excellent and safe location for the strategic staff charged with overseeing the defense of Western Europe.
Overlooking the bunker at the top of the hill was a French girls’ school (today the Lycée d’Albret). Its four three-storey buildings, built in 1911, have dormer windows below peaked gray-slate roofs, a common design in Europe. The buildings are laid out in a U-shape, with a playground at the mouth of the partially enclosed area. Next to the playground was a small house, once occupied by the school headmistress. This structure was turned into a complex telephone exchange, linking OB West with the major commands in Europe, Germany, and of course, the Supreme Headquarters, wherever it happened to be at that moment.
Near the bunker was built a communications center. For air protection, the surrounding area included a number of anti-aircraft positions, as well as several fire stations. The school had to be partially requisitioned by headquarters for additional personnel to work in the command blockhouse down the hill. Half of the school became a garrison for German troops, and the mixing of German uniforms and girls in pink overalls around the buildings evoked concern from the locals. Other staff members had quarters in homes on the Rue Thiers and the Rue de Lorraine.
For von Rundstedt’s personal quarters, the Villa David, located behind the girls’ école at No. 28 Rue AlexAndré Dumas, was chosen. It was a petite three-storey, twelve-room villa on a well-landscaped half-acre lot. It sat atop the gentle hill in which the block headquarters building, some 300 yards away, was partially buried. Few people knew that he lived there. A high wall and permanently secured, stout iron gates kept things that way. There were only two ways in: through a special walkway cutting through the school, or by an inconspicuous door in the wall next to the Rue AlexAndré Dumas.
In the villa, there was a mirror in every room. The old man’s bedroom was on the first floor, with a large window that overlooked the girls’ school at the top of the hill. His room was adorned with two paintings built into the wall. They were not particularly good works of art and depicted French provincial scenery. The dining room had a large cozy fireplace, with yet another mirror above it. Blumentritt lived with him in the villa: his bedroom was upstairs.
The villa of course was guarded by sentries. One stood at a sentry box in the front garden area next to the main gate, which of course was always closed. Another endlessly walked a careful perimeter around the well-tended grounds, although von Rundstedt strictly forbade any guard from stepping on the grass. His staff had worried that despite the two guards, the villa could be easily accessed. Anyone could just walk in and start trouble. Von Rundstedt had argued that, although the residence was not closed off from the city, he had never been bothered. His officers had not been happy with that. Well, too damned bad. The old man liked the way he lived, because he could enjoy a private life there that was quite comfortable, very simple yet ostentatious.
The field marshal usually worked at the villa. He avoided going down to the blockhouse unless there is a pressing situation, conference, or whenever he has to use the communications complex to make a long distance phone call.
He also entertained VIPs at the villa, although the hapless Blumentritt disliked breaking the news to him about any guests coming. Von Rundstedt always made sure any formal repast was set for 1 p.m. That way, he could always make an excuse to his guests that he had work to do or another engagement to attend. And though he never ate much, he ate even less at these engagements to encourage his visitors to finish faster. Even so, they easily bored him, and he often looked for some pretext to excuse himself from the monotonous monologue—all to the amusement of his staff. Usually, he stopped working around 4:30, at which time he entertained a few of his officers over tea.
Whenever he went to the command bunker, he left his villa through the back door. He walked across the roomy courtyard, heading for the gate in the railed fence. Next to that back gate was his modest rose garden, tended for him by his gardener, M. Ernest Gavoury. The old servant faithfully tended to all flowers there, and von Rundstedt, who loved gardening, spent many hours of his spare time talking to the old Frenchman and fussing with his roses.
The field marshal strolled through the back gate, and then through a specially built passageway in one of the buildings to enter the school recreational area. He then walked down a gentle winding path that not only provided a beautiful view of Paris in the distance (he could see the Eiffel Tower on a clear day), but was elegantly landscaped as well. The manicured lawn on each side was interspersed with all kinds of bushes, small flower beds, sycamores, poplars, and birch trees scattered around the grounds. Going down the path, he passed a small knoll on his right, similarly landscaped with trees and bushes. At the bottom of the hill, he turned right and approached the nearby bluish-green blockhouse built into the base of the knoll. The front of the blockhouse, covered with ivy, was also camouflaged, so that it was difficult to spot from either the Boulevard Victor Hugo or the Rue AlexAndré Dumas.
The compl
ex was later expanded, with several more rooms and offices being added to the basement of the command bunker, expanding it to 40 rooms. At the same time, the nearby communications network was improved and an air raid shelter added—in the beautiful garden, to von Rundstedt’s disgust.
Reference Notes
A good part of the information that was used in this book came from almost a dozen distinct sources. As with other works I have published, one of my foremost sources was the amassed material of interviews, logs, official documents, and superbly detailed data collected by Cornelius Ryan for his classic, The Longest Day. A surprisingly vast amount of information, I discovered to my astonishment (and delight) had never made it into his classic account. Among this material were three detailed personal interviews of Rommel’s trip home, given by Helmuth Lang, Hans-Georg von Tempelhoff, and Rommel’s two immediate family members: his wife Lucie and son Manfred. My heartfelt thanks to Douglas McCabe, curator of the Cornelius Ryan Collection at the Alden Library of Ohio University, Athens, Ohio for his cooperation, his insight into the material and into Ryan’s methods, and for his unswerving assistance in helping me gather the information that I needed.
My second major source was Friedrich Ruge’s daily reminiscences. The admiral kept a remarkably detailed account of the daily activities of Field Marshal Rommel.
Two other major sources that I found very useful were Hitler’s War and Trail of the Fox, both written by the now-controversial David Irving. Despite the furor that was raised over his later claims about the Nazis, Irving was and remains one of the most fastidious, detailed researchers ever, a trait I confirmed in several talks with him. This biography of Rommel is perhaps one of his greatest works, a book that stands as an impressive piece for this or any period. Despite the controversy he has stirred, his material has proven to be highly useful.
I found a surprising amount of detailed correspondence information from Reports 40 and 50, prepared by the Canadian National Defence Headquarters. Additional reminiscences and reflections of the period by German senior officers were found in the US Army Military History Institute’s Archives Branck in Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania.
Other major sources used included Fraser’s biography of Rommel and Rommel’s own papers edited by B.H. Liddell-Hart. Of course, no account of Rommel’s activities would be completed without Desmond Young’s classic biography. Additional details came from works by Hans Speidel, Paul Carell, and Gordon Harrison’s excellent accounts of the invasion. I also drew heavily from the works of Max Hastings, Samuel Mitcham Jr., and John Keegan.
My primary sources on Field Marshal von Rundstedt’s activities include the two biographies written by his chief of staff Günther Blumentritt, David Isby, and Charles Messenger. Detailed information on the units in France came from George Nafziger’s excellent works on the German Order of Battle and from George Forty.
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