When Time Stopped

by Ariana Neumann

  After another sleepless night, I figured that approaching Högn was my only hope. Hoping that he’d remember that he had told me I’d have a week, I walked into his office and confessed the whole thing.

  “I got carried away by seeing my girlfriend and didn’t check the documents until the last night. You remember, Herr Dr., you told me I had a week?”

  Luckily, yes, he remembered.

  “Please, Herr Dr.,” I begged. “You are such an important man, you have important friends. You have so much influence, could you not help me out? What good would it do us all if I went to the trial and they decided to throw me in jail? Please.”

  And then, I don’t know if out of vanity or kindness or pity or because I was useful to him, he spoke and told me not to worry. He would do what was needed.

  “Your Czech girlfriend must be quite something.”

  A few weeks later, Högn again called me into his office. From a neat file on his desk, he handed me a piece of paper saying I had to pay a fine of 110 marks. 100 for the fine, 10 marks for the administration fee.

  “It’s all fixed, you just pay the fine. I have even arranged it so it won’t appear in your penal records.”

  Then he winked at me, as the guard had done, and his round eyes gleamed with pride. Högn had, once more, unintentionally saved my life. Not that I cared if the incident appeared in any records. I prayed that Jan Šebesta could soon disappear forever. I asked for permission to leave the building and walked the few streets to the bank in Weissensee to pay the fine immediately.

  I was beside myself with fury. How could Jan Šebesta have been so careless? If Högn had not intervened, there would have been no other option but to run away again and cross over to Holland or France in the hopes of finding a group of Maquis [members of the underground French resistance during the German occupation]. And that would have been next to impossible.

  The official papers detailing the fine and the cancellation of the court appearance found their way eventually from the German District Court in Prague to the Czech who did not exist but who was working in Berlin. Jan Šebesta was saved once more by extraordinary luck. He was also becoming more resourceful and resilient. The transformation of the young man who had left Prague was almost complete. Yet, Hans the unfortunate one, still a little careless, had let matters slip. He would never again permit any lack of attention that could cost him his life.

  Another odd scrap of paper was preserved in my father’s box. It was a torn bank receipt, the teller’s proof that on November 4, 1944, Jan paid his fine of 100 Reichsmarks to the Czech police, with an extra 10 to cover the administration fee.

  Jan continued to work at Warnecke & Böhm during the day and perform his duties as a firefighter with Zdeněk at night. By April 1944, the Allies had temporarily paused their campaign of bombing Berlin as all efforts were redirected to prepare for the advance of the troops who landed in Normandy on June 6, 1944. Berlin was not left undisturbed, though. Nuisance and diversion raids, as well as false alarms, continued to terrorize the city’s inhabitants. News of raids on other cities reached them daily. Peenemünde, the military research center that was supplied by Warnecke & Böhm, was itself targeted. Shortages of food, clothing, and materials compounded the misery.

  The Germans were now fighting on two major fronts, in the East and in the West. In spite of the Nazi propaganda machine and their attempts at absolute control of information, news from abroad seeped into Berlin, and for Jan and Zdeněk, there was hope that the defeat of Germany was near. Jan did what he could to hasten it.

  Aside from three or four things, the papers that I had obtained from Dr. Högn’s office seemed to hold very little of interest for the Allies, and I was thoroughly disheartened. The Dutchman encouraged me to remain positive and said that all information about the company’s developments for the Luftwaffe was useful. The more information I gathered and passed on, the greater the chance that the war would end soon. These words were what I repeated to myself as I sifted through each tedious note of an experiment, one slow word at a time, looking for something that might be important.

  For a while in 1944, the bombings seemed to have stopped. I pretended to be interested in creating a highly combustible substance similar to nitrocellulose that would accelerate the manufacturing of our lacquers. I asked Dr. Högn if I could have his permission to perform experiments alone. Dr. Högn agreed, as long as I worked during my free time.

  This meant that I could stay late in the labs. I was given a special permit allowing me to access the factory after hours. I had all night to search the desks for documents or notes that might carelessly not have been locked away and try to find something useful to pass on. I opened every drawer of every desk in my department but, despite my enthusiasm, found only details to add to what I had already passed on to my Dutch friend.

  I considered this a defeat and it troubled me enormously. In some way, my failure to lay my hands on something more substantial felt like another victory for them.

  * * *

  The few letters that I have from 1944 tell me very little about Otto and Ella’s state of mind. They are more staccato, and the lyrical tone has faded. While Otto made brief mentions of his protégées Olina and Stella, the letters focused largely on practicalities, parcels, and Ella’s state of health. By April 1944, Ella was unable to write and was once more bedridden in the hospital in Terezín.

  In June 1944, envoys from the Red Cross visited Terezín. The visit had been negotiated by the Danish Red Cross, who requested an inspection following the deportation by the Germans of 476 Danish Jews to the camp. The Nazis, obviously aware of the importance of this visit and its propaganda potential, prepared for it. A sham “beautification” program was implemented, which included planting gardens, renovating barracks, painting buildings, constructing a sports field in the middle of the square, and, to ease overcrowding, deporting thousands to Auschwitz. In the three days from May 16 to 18, more than seventy-five hundred people were transported.

  My grandparents managed to avoid selection. Discreetly supervised by SS officers, on June 23, the Terezín inmates acted out the charade of being content with their lot for the benefit of the three Red Cross visitors. People who were ill or malnourished were confined to their rooms. An orchestra played on a newly constructed bandstand, children were made to sing, the streets were filled with people chatting, and a football match was played on a newly laid pitch. The gendarmes were given the day off to support the illusion that the prisoners were happy. Despite the rumors that they must have heard, none of the Red Cross visitors asked a question sufficiently probing to establish the truth. The inmates themselves by then would have known of the Normandy invasion and would have been hopeful that the end of the war was near. This, in addition to the ever-present fear of reprisal, must have been a further incentive to maintain the artifice. There is no record of any of this sham in my possession; I have no postcards or letters from June 1944. Ella was in the hospital, and I cannot imagine that my grandfather, so stern and righteous, would have played much of a role in the pantomime. The Red Cross visit was deemed so successful by the Nazis that they decided to re-create the charade for a propaganda film to be shown to the Allies to counter reports of genocide. The filming lasted three weeks. The cast and crew were among the tens of thousands subsequently deported to Auschwitz in September and October 1944.

  The last pieces of correspondence that I have from my grandparents are two brief postcards to Lotar and Zdenka dated September 15, 1944, one from each of them. Ella and Otto both thanked their “golden ones” for all their letters and kindnesses, enclosed short messages for their friends, talked about restrictions, and asked for news. They explained that they would be allowed to write only once every eight weeks. Ella ended her card by saying that she thought of her loved ones constantly and prayed for their well-being.

  Ella and Otto bade their children farewell with kisses.

  There was one more communication, from Ella, the original of which was not
among the others, probably because it must have been almost unbearable for Lotar and Zdenka to read. Its contents were recalled much later by Lotar. Ella, weakened and desolate, had a note smuggled out from the hospital to report that on September 29, 1944, my grandfather had been deported alone to Auschwitz in a transport she referred to as labor.

  Otto had remained strong and healthy, and the family continued to be hopeful, given the classification of the transport, that he would survive.

  There is one more piece of paper, undated, among the letters from the camp. Initially, it baffled both the translator and me. It was a note, written by someone with little formal schooling and signed Mrs. Rosa. The writer, who was clearly panicked, scribbled that she could not find Mrs. Mother at her usual place. She promised that she had looked everywhere and asked at the camp, but no one knew where she had gone. Mrs. Rosa explained that she had been unable to deliver the package, as she had promised to do. She asked Mrs. Jedličková, which was Zdenka’s maiden name, to confirm a day and time to meet at Bohušovice station so she could return the parcel of goods in a wheelbarrow.

  Note from Mrs. Rosa

  Mrs. Rosa, anxious to return the undelivered parcel, was the unwilling bearer of the news that Lotar and Zdenka had dreaded.

  Ella was deported to Auschwitz on October 19, 1944, with her niece Zita in a special transport that included those who were unwell.

  The letters and cards were the last link between the parents and their children. When the letters stopped, the lives of Otto and Ella were plunged into darkness. It was almost impossible to have any communication with the inmates of Auschwitz and camps in Eastern Europe.

  In Prague, the offices of the Judenrat were instructed that all the remaining Jews, including those who had intermarried or worked on the Council, were to be deported. It was only a matter of time until Lotar found his name on a list. It would be impossible to hide from the Gestapo. Denunciation for reward was highly likely, given the miserable conditions that people were enduring as the Reich crumbled. Lotar and Zdenka were living in one of her apartments and did not trust their neighbors. Zdenka later recalled that decisive action was required. The increasingly obvious disintegration of the German military machine had created opportunities. Soldiers were becoming nihilistic, reflective, or desperate. Others were just running wild in a frenzy of violence, a terrifying prospect for anyone who caught their attention. Zdenka, as astute in her judgment as ever, identified an SS guard who, for some reason, was susceptible to her approach. She did not record how she prevailed upon him, whether it was bribery, a desire to protect himself in the future, or perhaps even kindness. He agreed to help.

  Early one February morning in 1945, this man, in SS uniform, barged noisily into their apartment building on Podskalská Street. He shouted, slammed doors, knocked down pictures, and threw furniture around as loudly as he could. The commotion woke all the neighbors. He acted the scene so perfectly that Lotar and Zdenka became scared and wondered whether they had been duped and the man actually intended to arrest or shoot them. He chased Lotar and Zdenka down the stairs at gunpoint and then out, around the corner. When they reached an alleyway, to Lotar and Zdenka’s great relief, the SS man declared,

  “Well, that does it, I guess. Goodbye now. Good luck.”

  Satisfied that there were now multiple witnesses to his arrest, many of whom might have been potential informers, Lotar returned as quickly and discreetly as he could to Zdenka’s apartment on Trojanova Street. Just as before, when they had sat out the aftermath of Heydrich’s assassination, only the building’s caretaker was entrusted to keep their secret. To complete her pretense, Zdenka burst into the offices of the Judenrat and, later that day, the SS headquarters and hysterically protested that her beloved and innocent husband had been taken at dawn. All those who heard her recounting the arrest concluded that it was unlikely that Lotar Neumann would be heard of again.

  Their ploy succeeded. The charade served to throw the Gestapo off Lotar’s scent. No one would be looking for him now. As an added precaution, Lotar started to use Ivan Rubeš’s identity once more. The Federation of Jewish Communities in the Czech Republic holds a record card for Lotar, bearing a red stamp dated February 10, 1945: HAFT.

  Imprisoned.

  CHAPTER 16 What Remains of Us

  On February 14, 1945, four days after Lotar was officially declared imprisoned, the Allies bombed Dresden, the German city some hundred and fifteen kilometers northwest of Prague. Allied planes had been seen over Prague before, but they had never attacked. That day, those involved later explained, a combination of faulty radar, high winds, and heavy clouds led to a navigational error. Disoriented, between 12:28 p.m. and 12:33 p.m., sixty-two American bombers descended on Prague in three waves and carpet-bombed. It was so unexpected that the city’s air raid sirens wailed only after the first bombs hit. Most people were unable to seek shelter. In those five minutes, the planes dropped 152 tons of explosives.

  More than seven hundred civilians were killed and close to a thousand injured. The crisis was exacerbated by the fact that most Prague firefighters had been dispatched to help in Dresden. Hundreds of historical monuments and buildings were damaged. One of Zdenka’s buildings, where her mother and sister lived, was hit. In the panic that followed the extraordinarily brief but savage onslaught, Lotar and Zdenka abandoned caution and ran to find them. Zdenka’s mother was hurt but was able to walk. Marie, her nineteen-year-old sister, was badly injured, with a severe concussion and serious wounds to her legs. It was Lotar, supposedly in prison, who took her in his arms and, in plain daylight, carried her down the streets to the University Hospital. There, in a bombed-out infirmary, her life was saved.

  Much of Europe succumbed to chaos in the early months of 1945 as war raged and the Reich crumbled. Berlin and Prague were no exceptions. The Russian army was advancing, and the Germans were staging an increasingly desperate defensive war. The bombing of Berlin by the Allies had started up again on February 3 with the largest daylight attack on the city to date. Thousands lost their lives, tens of thousands were injured, and hundreds of thousands were displaced as a result of that raid alone. Through the smoke and dust of the bombs and fires of the Allied raids, Berliners could see and hear that the Soviet army was drawing ever closer.

  In January 1945, my father found himself dealing with a wholly unexpected challenge. He was temporarily blinded in a laboratory explosion at the factory. This was followed by a brief enforced respite from the fire brigade as a result of having suffered a concussion while on duty. One of my documents from the box is a medical note from January 31, 1945, signed by Dr. Hermann Gysi, stating that Jan was being treated three times a week for Vegetative Dystonia, a disorder of the nerves that does not seem to be caused by a physical illness. Among its common symptoms are heart palpitations, chills, fear, insomnia, feelings of suffocation, and panic attacks. It is clear that Jan Šebesta’s life was taking a toll on his health.

  By then, four months had passed without news of his parents or any of the family members who had been sent east. Amid the work, the firefighting, the bombings, the impending arrival of the Soviets, and the fear of being uncovered, my father’s only links with his former self were Zdeněk and an occasional surreptitious telephone call to Lotar or Míla. Berlin grew more dangerous with each passing day. It was time to go home to Prague.

  In what was by now a characteristically careful way, Jan Šebesta approached the question of a transfer to Prague with complete professionalism. He made an official application for permission to return home so that he could apply his talents there and even obtained a letter of reference from Warnecke & Böhm.

  Dated April 5, 1945, the document from my box was printed on official company letterhead and read:

  Mr. Jan Šebesta, born on 11 March 1921 in Alt Bunzlau, was employed as a chemist in our laboratory between 3 May 1943–5 April 1945.

  Mr. Šebesta successfully performed all tasks assigned to him which spanned the fields of synthetic lacquer c
hemistry, analytical chemistry, the development of special lacquers and sealing materials. Endeavoring to keep up-to-date with the latest scientific advances and continuously inspecting industry publications relating to synthetics and the specialized lacquer sector, Mr. Šebesta acquired sound professional expertise. He distinguished himself by his exemplary diligence and a deep enthusiasm for the work entrusted to him. Mr. Šebesta was highly regarded by his co-workers due to his helpful and friendly nature.

  Mr. Šebesta is leaving our company at his own request in agreement with the employment office in Berlin in order to return to his home country. We wish him all the success for the future.

  Warnecke & Böhm

  I was struck by the phrase exemplary diligence. It was exactly the language that anyone would have used of the father I knew, but not of Hans the happy-go-lucky boy from Prague. If Otto had read this reference, he would have been surprised. He also would have been proud.

  The boy who had come to Berlin in the spring of 1943 was not the man who, two years later, fought his way through the crowds to leave it.

  The journey began in Berlin. I had managed to get on board outside the main station as the carriages were being prepared. I boarded an hour before the scheduled departure and I wasn’t alone. There were many who, like me, had thought to do this. I was prepared to bribe the conductor and the cleaners, but I didn’t have to. We fought our way up the step to the door of the wagons. No one really seemed to care too much about the rules anymore.

  Nothing mattered. Everyone wanted to escape.

  Everyone expected the Russian army and the Americans and their allies to meet and defeat the Nazis in a matter of days or even hours. The Germans had lost the war. Everyone knew it by then. Rumors of extreme cruelty by the Russians were everywhere. We were all scared that they’d speed up their advance and stop our train. I prayed it would not be the Russians.