Unlikely Warrior

by Georg Rauch

  In one of the postwar years, a nearby coal merchant delivered a load of heating materials sufficient to heat our apartment for the entire winter. He said someone outside the country who preferred to remain anonymous had paid for it. I was happy to believe the coal was a gift from another Jewish couple who had successfully escaped.

  My parents divorced after the war, and I remained particularly close to my mother. She did achieve that full and happy life that she had assured me she would enjoy, even were I not to return from Russia. She would have loved being an artist herself, but the circumstances of her life, including two world wars, weren’t to permit this. Probably that’s why she especially enjoyed being in the company of the young artists who were around our apartment after the war.

  When Russian tanks occupied Hungary in 1956, thousands of Hungarians came streaming over the Austrian border with no more than the clothing on their backs. Many slept on the streets of Vienna the first few nights, but my mother was soon again in her element. She sprang into action, mobilizing family and friends to take in as many refugees as possible.

  Beatrix Rauch died at eighty-one in 1970, and up until her death she continued to study important books by physicists, poets, and philosophers. She was a fine pianist, and music always remained a major pleasure in her life.

  GLOSSARY OF GERMAN WORDS

  Anschluss

  annexation of Austria to Germany, in 1938

  Bussis

  kisses

  Cremeschnitten

  Napoleon-type pastry

  Freies Deutschland

  “Free Germany,” German newspaper published in Russia

  Funkeigenheiten

  abbreviations of wireless operators’ names

  Funker

  telegraphist

  Grüss Gott

  “Greet God,” typical Austrian greeting

  Hauptmann

  captain

  Jawohl

  affirmative, yes

  Komissbrot

  rye bread

  Lebkuchen

  hard gingerbread, a Christmas favorite

  Mensch

  “person” or “man,” used as a slang term of address

  Mischlinge

  Hitler’s term for persons one-quarter or one-half Jewish

  Mutti, Mui

  mother

  Naschmarkt

  famous street market in Vienna

  Obergefreiter

  lance corporal

  Oberleutnant

  lieutenant

  Oberstleutnant

  lieutenant colonel

  Papi, Papschi

  father

  Pfennige

  smallest German coins

  Pioniere

  Army Corps of Engineers

  Rollbahn

  wide military road

  Schnapps

  brandy

  Schnitzel

  thin, breaded cutlet, normally of veal

  Schütz

  private

  SS

  Schutzstaffel (protective squadron); paramilitary organization that was a major component of the Nazi party

  Tante

  aunt

  Unteroffizier

  sergeant

  Vaterland

  fatherland

  Volk

  people, nation

  Waffen-SS

  elite police and military units of the Schutzstaffel

  Wehrmacht

  army

  GLOSSARY OF RUSSIAN/UKRAINIAN WORDS

  arestant

  prisoner

  banki

  glass jars used in a medical procedure that draws blood to surface of skin for therapeutic purposes

  Boche moi

  Oh my God!

  Gospodi

  O Lord!

  karascho

  good

  kasha

  buckwheat groats cooked in water

  kolchos

  barn

  machorka

  crude tobacco substitute

  Ponimaesch?

  Do you understand?

  ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR

  Phyllis Rauch grew up in Ohio and received her bachelor’s degree in English at Bowling Green State University and her master’s degree in library science at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She studied German at the Goethe Institute in Rothenburg ob der Tauber and then worked at German libraries, including the Internationale Kinderbibliothek in Munich and the Amerika Gedenkbibliothek in Berlin. She met Georg Rauch in Vienna in 1965 and they were married the following year.

  Fluent in Spanish as well as German, Phyllis has written extensively in Mexico for English-language magazines, newspapers, and Web sites and has also worked as a Spanish-to-English translator. As an innkeeper in central Mexico, she welcomes visitors to her home and to Georg’s art studio (www.losdosmexico.com and www.georgrauch.com).

  Unlikely Warrior, Phyllis’s first book-length translation, has been a labor of love.

  Farrar Straus Giroux Books for Young Readers

  175 Fifth Avenue, New York 10010

  Text copyright © 2006, 2015 Georg Rauch

  All rights reserved

  First hardcover edition, 2015

  eBook edition, February 2015

  macteenbooks.com

  eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

  Rauch, Georg, 1924–2006, author.

  Unlikely warrior: a Jewish soldier in Hitler’s army / Georg Rauch; translated from the German by Phyllis Rauch. — Revised edition.

  pages cm

  Previously published as The Jew with the Iron Cross: a record of survival in WWII Russia. New York: iUniverse, 2006.

  ISBN 978-0-374-30142-2 (hardback)

  ISBN 978-0-374-30277-1 (trade paperback)

  ISBN 978-0-374-30143-9 (e-book)

  1. Rauch, Georg, 1924–2006. 2. Jewish soldiers—Austria—Vienna—Juvenile literature. 3. World War, 1939–1945—Prisoners and prisons, Soviet—Juvenile literature. 4. World War, 1939–1945—Personal narratives, Jewish—Juvenile literature. 5. World War, 1939–1945—Participation, Jewish—Juvenile literature. 6. Jewish soldiers—Austria—Vienna. 7. World War, 1939–1945—Prisoners and prisons, Soviet. 8. World War, 1939–1945—Personal narratives, Jewish. 9. World War, 1939–1945—Participation, Jewish. I. Title.

  DS135.A93R388 2015

  940.54'1343092—dc23

  2014041184

  eISBN 9780374301439