War Brothers

by Patrick Slaney

  ‘I was just walking in the park,’ I said as confidently as I could muster.

  Just then the couple who had been on the bench joined us. The man was carrying the envelope that I had just placed under the stone.

  I was in big trouble now as, although it was in code, all the details of the Me262 and its engine were set out in my note. Even if they couldn’t decipher the note, I would be shot as a spy.

  I was frog marched along the pavement towards a car. The left hand side rear door was opened, and I was forced into the back.

  Both SS men got into the back of the car, one on my left and one on my right. The male member of the twosome from the park got into the front still clutching the unopened envelope. There was no sign of the lady.

  The car brought us to the local police station which was doubling as the local SS offices. I was pulled roughly from the car and then thrown into a cell. I heard a loud click as the lock was turned. The worst had happened, and I now was a prisoner of the SS.

  I had always feared being captured by the dreaded Gestapo. I had heard so many stories of the methods that they used to obtain information and how people taken by them just disappeared. I was about to find out first-hand what it would be like, and I wasn’t looking forward to it.

  I had been caught red handed delivering the note. It would be impossible for me to plead innocence as they had the hand written note and it wouldn’t take terribly long to prove that it was my writing.

  There was a rough wooden bed without a mattress against one of the walls of the room on which I lay down. I closed my eyes and mentally prepared for the ordeal that lay ahead of me. The dank smell of a prison cell surrounded me.

  My thought process went along the following lines:

  I was clearly guilty so they wouldn’t waste their time trying to prove that I was a spy. They must have captured my contact and extracted details of the drop-off point. What else were they aware of?

  I anticipated that the Gestapo would want to know where the information was going and who my contacts were in whatever country I was spying for. They would also want to know why I had changed sides and had agreed to work for the enemy. Top of their list would be to find out the code I was using, so as they could find out what information was in the note that they had in their possession. Obviously they would want to know what other information I had sent back to my contacts.

  My basic analysis in some way made me a feel a lot more confident. I now reckoned that I knew what I had to defend. I made a decision there and then that I would die rather than give them the information that they wanted from me. I owed that to my father and Chris. If I was fortunate, the end would come quickly.

  They left me, with my thoughts, in that cell all day. The room was about two meters by three meters. It had been painted a dark green many years ago. There was a single bare bulb glaring from the ceiling. I recalled my experience at Witley Park when I had been pulled from my bed in the middle of the night and stuck in a room such as the one I was now in. Being November the temperature outside was getting near to freezing point so this room, bereft of any heating, was intensely cold. The pee pot in the corner gave off the strong smell of urine.

  I glanced at my wrist watch when I heard the key turn in the lock. It was 8:00 pm.

  They took me to another small room where there was a table and a chair. I was told to sit down and wait for the officer to arrive.

  After another hour had passed, the door opened, and an SS officer came in accompanied by a Private who stood guard at the door.

  ‘Oberleutnant Bekker you are a disgrace to the Luftwaffe. I want you to take off your uniform now.’ He leant towards me and ripped off my shoulder flashings which indicated my rank.

  I stood up and took off my uniform, which left me dressed in my shirt, underpants and socks.

  ‘You are a traitor and a spy and will be shot. You have betrayed your fellow test pilots, and I have a good mind to get them to make up the firing squad.’

  I sat there and said nothing.

  ‘If you decide to co-operate and tell me everything that I need to know then I will spare your life and you will be sent to a normal prison. If you don’t co-operate, then you will be shot. Will you co-operate.’

  I continued to sit there saying nothing.

  ‘You are a silly man. We know that your mother lives in Lubeck, and if you don’t tell us what we want to know she will suffer. Surely you don’t want her to suffer?’

  What bastards they were. I had never envisaged that they would go after my mother. Would she understand? I still couldn’t give them the information that they wanted.

  ‘My mother knows nothing about this. She thinks that I am still an officer in the Luftwaffe, and she knows that I escaped from a POW camp in England and came back to Germany. She is also aware that I am a test pilot based at Leipheim.’

  ‘We shall have to tell her what a scum you actually are then won’t we?’

  ‘Please leave my mother alone.’

  ‘She will be brought to the same place as you are going. Tomorrow, you will be transferred to a castle in Munich, which is our main interrogation centre. I can tell you for certain that you will not get out of there alive unless you decide to cooperate. I will give you till tomorrow morning to make your decision. If you tell me everything, then I will not send you there, and your mother will be able to remain in Lubeck.’

  He got up and left the room. I was taken back to my cell where some bread and water had been left for me.

  In the morning, after a night in which I barely slept, the same SS officer asked me if I had decided to give him the information he required. I told him that I would never tell him anything.

  Shortly afterwards they tied my hands and feet together and loaded me in to a car with two guards and I was driven to Munich.

  I wasn’t taken into the castle itself, but was taken around the back to some outbuildings which had been the stables and carriage houses for the castle at some stage. They had been converted into very basic cells. The remainder of my belongings were taken away from me, and I was issued with a loose fitting brown prison suit.

  The SS Officer in Leipheim had told me that nobody got out of this place alive, so this was where I would be tortured and end my days. He had also said that they were bringing my mother here.

  In the early morning, they came for me.

  Two burly guards entered my cell and grabbed hold of me. I was brought to one end of the building, to a large room that looked as if it was the interrogation centre. There were all sorts of pieces of strange apparatus around the room which I reckoned I would find out all about in time. I was strapped into a chair.

  The largest man that I had ever seen entered the room; he was twice the size of the guards who were large men. Wearing black trousers, leather boots and a tight fitting leather jacket he looked very intimidating. His face was large and round, topped off by an unusually tight haircut and he had muscles bulging out from everywhere. He had a very mean look. If I hadn’t been scared, I was now.

  He came towards me and grabbed my hair, lifting me and the chair off the ground. I winced with the intense pain.

  ‘Do you want to start telling us something before I get going on you more seriously?’ he asked me.

  I was afraid that if I tried to speak I would groan or indicate in some way that he was hurting me, so I remained silent.

  He put me down and then quickly picked me up again. The pain I felt doubled in intensity. He held me in one hand and slapped me hard across the face with the other.

  He had plenty of ways of inflicting pain, and he kept going until finally I passed out.

  I regained consciousness, naked and soaked through. A bucket of cold water had been thrown over me, to bring me round. I looked up to see an SS Officer staring down at me.

  ‘Are you ready to talk ye
t?’ he asked me.

  I shook my head. I was in so much of a daze that I couldn’t speak.

  ‘Take him back to his cell,’ he ordered the two guards. ‘Your mother should arrive later, and we will see if you are man enough to talk to protect her.’

  They shoved my sodden prison suit into my hands, which were tied behind my back, and dragged me back to my cell. I was thrown onto the wooden planks of my bed. They hadn’t untied my arms and my legs, so I had no alternative than just to lie there, still naked.

  As I lay prone on the bed staring up at the ceiling, I noticed that the light coming through a window close to the roof, way above my head, vanished to be replaced by darkness. It must be night again. They came to get me shortly afterwards.

  I was firmly tied to the chair, and waited, in trepidation, for my torturer to begin his process again. Instead of the ‘hulk’ the SS officer came into the room and stood in front of me.

  ‘Your decision not to give us information has now caused the death of your mother. Are you proud of that?’

  ‘What are you talking about? I haven’t even seen my mother.’

  ‘If you had told us all you know she would be alive today.’ He put his face really close to mine as he made that statement. I smelt the smell of his stale sweat.

  Was he trying to scare me and was this some trick he had decided to use to break me down.

  ‘She was being flown from Lubeck to Munich today, and the plane was shot down by your RAF friends shortly after it took off. All on board were killed,’ he said triumphantly.

  ‘I don’t believe you. It is a ploy to get me to talk.’

  ‘It is no trick and your mother is dead.’ He spat this last statement out at me, turned around and stormed out of the room.

  I was stunned. My mother had been killed. It hardened my resolve, there now was no way that I was going to tell them anything. This war had killed my brother and now my mother. I would be next.

  I was left strapped into the chair with my thoughts for a further two hours. The SS Officer came back into the room, accompanied by the ‘torturer’.

  ‘Do I have to give Heinrich the order to interrogate you further or are you going to see sense and give us the information that we need?’ he asked me.

  ‘I am not going to tell you anything.’

  The Officer left the room and my body and mind had to endure further suffering. I passed out again at some stage. He would throw water over me to bring me around and then start the process again. I was proud of myself as I was holding out and was still determined to hold out as long as I could remain in charge of my body and mind.

  Chapter 46

  I woke up on the bed in my cell, but didn’t remember being taken there. I had no idea how long I had been tortured for. I was still just about alive, so that was a positive, but how much longer would I be able to withstand the pain. They had untied my hands, so now I was able to pull on my prison suit to cover my nakedness.

  My battered and tortured body just wanted to rest, and, at this stage, I would welcome the release of death. My body and mind had suffered enough and couldn’t take much more of their treatment. If I had bed clothes or something else that I could make into a rope I would hang myself; however, they had anticipated my thought process and I had nothing that I could use to kill myself.

  There was no heat inside the outbuildings, and moisture glistened on the inside of the walls over the moss that had grown there. I was frozen stiff, and what clothes I had were wet through after my soakings in the torture room.

  In the morning, they came to collect me and bring me back to the torture room. They retied my hands behind my back before we left the cell. I was surprised to see the SS Officer waiting for me when we entered the interrogation room.

  ‘Good morning Oberleutnant Bekker, I want to apologise for the rough treatment that you have been receiving from the hands of Heinrich here. We should be treating you a lot better, and we haven’t even given you any food to eat for a few days.’

  I stood there in amazement. It was the last thing that I had expected. I actually relaxed a bit.

  ‘We are going to bring some hot water to your cell so as you can wash and shave like a true German Officer and we will also bring you some food. We cannot expect you to behave as a Luftwaffe Officer if we do not treat you as one.’

  ‘Thank you, I would appreciate that,’ I said, very surprised by the new approach.

  The ropes tying my hands and my legs were removed, and I was returned to my cell. The door of the cell wasn’t locked when they left me, so I was free to go.

  Should I make a run for it?

  I washed in the hot water that they brought and pondered my changed circumstances.

  I wasn’t convinced by the change of attitude. They did bring me some food for breakfast, and they brought me a tunic to wear, but why did they leave the door unlocked. It must be a trick, and they wanted me to try to escape. They would shoot me as I was making a break for it. I would stay put and not give them that opportunity.

  In the evening, I was brought back into the torture room to meet the SS Officer.

  ‘We have treated you as an officer today, so are you going to behave like a German Officer and finally tell us what you have been up to and who your contacts are?’ The friendly attitude had disappeared.

  ‘I think that you know the answer.’ I smiled.

  ‘You will be taken back to your cell now. I want you to think very carefully about your situation. Tomorrow you will be shot if you have not agreed to give us the information and the code.’ He spoke unusually slowly, making sure that I knew exactly what fate lay ahead for me.

  I was taken back to my cell for the last time. I would never give them the code and the other information, so I was as good as dead. They would take me out and shoot me the following morning. I had already worked out that even if I told them everything they would still shoot me. I was dead one way or the other.

  I lay down on the bed, listened to the familiar noises of the prison and shivered. Whether I was shivering from the cold or from fear I don’t know, probably a bit of both.

  The dominating thought in my head was:

  I had let down a lot of people who depended on me; Major Richards, Chris, my father and Sergeant Paul Young, to name four. Was there anything that I could have done? I was probably stupid to proceed when I saw those two people sitting on that bench close to my drop-off point. If, If, If...

  Then my thoughts went to Francette. I would never see her again. I hoped that she was safe. At least I had experienced love in my life and had very fond memories of making love in her bed at Witley Park.

  As I lay in my bed, lost in my thoughts, I heard a noise in the passageway outside that sounded like rats scratching at the door. The outbuildings had plenty of openings where the rats would be able to enter the building. I hoped that one wouldn’t come into my cell as I had fear of the horrible creatures.

  The noise of the rat was replaced by the sound of a key being inserted in the lock, so it obviously wasn’t a rat. They must be coming to get me again; perhaps this was the start of my final moments. The guards who came to get me usually made a lot more noise. I was curious as to what was going on.

  The door slowly opened, and a person came through into my cell.

  ‘Markus, its Walter,’ a voice whispered.

  ‘Walter who?’ I asked, anticipating another trick.

  ‘Walter Peters, your old friend from University in Kiel,’ he replied in a whisper. ‘Keep quiet, I am here to help you.’

  Walter was dressed as an SS Officer.

  ‘Here, put this on.’ He handed me another SS uniform that he was carrying.

  I did what I was told and quickly pulled on the trousers, a shirt and a tunic.

  ‘I remember that you are a size 48, so I brought you boots to
fit.’ He smiled.

  The boots fitted perfectly, and I topped it all off with a peaked SS Officers cap.

  ‘Let’s go Markus. Follow me.’

  He carefully looked out the door and seeing that it was all clear, led the way to a door at the rear of the building, which he opened with a key. We came out on the side of the outbuildings farthest from the main castle. He led me along paths through the wooded land that surrounded the castle until we came to a road which he told me led into the centre of Munich.

  Walter stopped in a dark gateway where we couldn’t be seen, and he took out a small torch.

  ‘Markus, here are your papers. I managed to get these put together for you together with a rail pass to Frankfurt. There is a train that leaves at 5:30 am and I suggest that you are on that. You need to get out of Munich as soon as you can before they discover that you have escaped.’

  ‘Walter, how can I thank you enough for what you have done. Will you be safe? What happens if they find out that you helped me?’

  ‘You are the only brother that I have ever known Markus. I had to help you. It was an act of fate that I happen to be based at the castle and that I heard you were being held in the outbuildings. They won’t suspect that an SS Officer with my record would do anything like this.’

  ‘Walter, thank you so much for risking your life for me. They were going to shoot me today, and that would have been the end.’

  ‘I know Markus. You had better get going away from this place.’

  I gave him a hug and left him. About thirty minutes later I arrived at the station.

  My plan was to take a train as far as Frankfurt and then find an airfield where I could steal a plane. I then would fly to the South of France.

  Chapter 47

  As I expected my papers were checked at the station before I was allowed to proceed to the platforms, but Walter had done a good job, and I wasn’t stopped. I was a bit worried that the black eye and split lip that I had as a result of the activities of Heinrich would give me away, but there being a war on meant that there were others in uniform looking worse than me.