by Alex Gerlis
It was around this time that Wolfgang discovered his son had a nickname – das Frettchen – which he apparently revelled in. He was sure the nickname was not meant to be as flattering as the young man clearly thought it was.
Friedrich even used it to introduce himself when he was back in Berlin. The name accompanied him to his next posting, in Amsterdam: the Netherlands seemed to be run by Austrians, and Wolfgang assured them he was close enough to be able to keep an eye on his son there. Amsterdam, he told Friedrich, was his very last chance. He had no more favours left to call on.
This turned out to be not entirely true. Once again, his son’s heavy-handedness led to the death of a British agent, in Enschede. But by now, Wolfgang’s star had risen high in Berlin: his network of contacts and his quiet influence was almost unrivalled, and he used every scrap of influence he could muster to stop his son being thrown out of the Gestapo. He agreed to a transfer somewhere so remote he’d had to look it up on the map. Surely even Friedrich couldn’t cause too much trouble there.
* * *
One of the symptoms of Wolfgang Steiner’s low mood was a pervasive pessimism and a propensity to worry all the time. As the war went on, he began to see this as a blessing: it was as if he finally had something genuine to worry about so he no longer had to worry about being worried. This didn’t mean his anxiety was unfounded, but it did mean he could be realistic. While most of Berlin struggled to contemplate the possibility of defeat, for Wolfgang Steiner it was something he’d long expected and indeed prepared for.
After the defeat at Stalingrad in February 1943, he had no doubt Germany would lose the war, though this was a sentiment he never voiced to any other person. From that moment he began to prepare for defeat and do everything he could to ensure his own survival. His innate pessimism ensured he had no intention whatsoever of hanging around Berlin. As he saw it, he couldn’t be accused of desertion: he’d wait until the battle for the city was all but lost. He was quite clear in his own mind that he would do more good for the Reich by leaving rather than remaining like some obliging fool to be killed or arrested by the Russians.
He had access to thousands of records in the Nazi Party Chancellery: not just those relating to party members, but also the records of senior military officers, criminals, scientists, civil servants and members of the SS. In his safe he kept a Leica 35 mm camera, which he knew was a risk, but one he mitigated by ensuring there was never any incriminating film in it. He was often one of the last to leave the office, giving him ample opportunity to photograph important files, especially those that were revealing or incriminating.
His influence went beyond his ability to organise and be indispensable. He became adept at finding important people in Berlin who were experiencing difficulties and helping them. He gained a reputation as someone people could confide in when they were desperate, and who could help them in a practical manner, whether that be arranging an abortion for a mistress or sorting out a debt. He had discovered a large but little-used fund at the Party Chancellery intended for the welfare of Nazi Party members and their families. He became a trustee of it and used it for medical treatment, paying off blackmailers and a variety of other claims.
And he kept notes – of illegitimate children, of senior officials with sexual interests so unusual he needed to look some of them up in the Parteikanzlei library, of others who had a Jewish skeleton – or a communist one – hidden deep in the recesses of a wardrobe.
And it was in another wardrobe – this one in his bedroom, a large walnut one with a concealed base – that he hid the notebooks in which he’d written up what people were up to, and this was where he also stored his rolls of 35 mm film.
But the notebooks and rolls of film didn’t stay there long.
He’d found another hiding place.
This was a farm in the Rott Valley, near the small Bavarian town of Eggenfelden. He’d got to know the area when stopping there overnight on his journeys back to Vienna, a trip he preferred to do by car, and had sensed the farm would fit perfectly with his plans. It was owned by a Frau Moser, whose husband was listed as missing in action on the Eastern Front, presumed dead. She was struggling to keep the farm going and was most open to the proposal of the gentleman from Berlin.
He arranged for two Czech slave labourers to work at the farm and gave her a regular sum of money. In return, she agreed he could store items in the cellar and could assume the identity of her husband, though she only agreed to this once she’d been assured he was not interested in any other aspect of matrimonial life.
Back in Berlin, it was a simple matter for someone in Wolfgang Steiner’s position to alter Andreas Moser’s records, though for the time being it was an identity he wouldn’t use. Every couple of months he’d hide notebooks and rolls of film in his Daimler and stop overnight at the farm, where he’d secrete them in the cellar before continuing his journey to Vienna.
* * *
After meeting Bormann, Wolfgang Steiner waited until the third week of March 1945 before leaving Berlin. At the beginning of the month, Friedrich had paid a final visit to the city and his father had taken him aside and insisted he listen carefully to what he was about to tell him. If he did exactly as he said, he’d have a chance of evading capture.
An argument followed in which Friedrich insisted Germany could still win the war, but Wolfgang could see that even his son realised it was a hopeless case.
‘If you do as I say, then after two or three years it should be safe enough for both of us to come out of hiding and assume new identities. In any case…’ he hesitated, unsure how to broach this with his son, ‘I have a plan. If it works out, then you and I ought to be safe. It will just require you to do exactly as I tell you and for you to curb your excesses.’ He then gave his son the new identity he’d created for him and told him where to go. At one stage he’d thought about bringing him to the farm near Eggenfelden, but had decided that might be too rash.
It was a Thursday morning when he slipped away from his house in Charlottenburg. He told his elderly housekeeper – he’d made sure not to repeat the mistake of employing a young one – that he’d been called to Munich on urgent business and would be away for a few days. He telephoned a colleague at work to say he was unwell but expected to be back at his desk first thing Monday morning.
He took a train to Nuremberg and from there to Passau. He was travelling light, just a briefcase and a small case. He couldn’t be sure what would happen when he arrived in Passau – he had no idea whether there’d still be rail services heading west – but he was in luck: the last train to Neumarkt-Sankt Veit was departing in half an hour. He bought a ticket to its final destination but got off at Eggenfelden, leaving the station through a side exit and making his way east out of the town towards the farm. It lay in a dip in the fields; above it was a small copse where he waited until darkness fell. Then, satisfied that there was no danger, he walked down to the farm.
* * *
The first three months at the farm were extremely difficult. On his first morning there, Wolfgang Steiner knew he had to undertake what was going to be a most unpleasant task. The two Czech labourers were too much of a security risk – it was hard to imagine that when the war ended, they wouldn’t tell someone about the man who’d come to live on the farm, and there was also the danger they’d run away.
He found the two of them resting at the rear of the cowshed after their early-morning chores, their backs to him as he approached. He shot the taller of the two first, hitting him in the shoulder. The other one turned round, which made his shot easier, catching him high in the chest. He finished them both off with another bullet each and stood over them to make sure they were dead.
Frau Moser was in a terrible state after that, convinced she’d be arrested, and then worrying about who’d do the farm work. For a few weeks she clearly regretted letting the gentleman from Berlin into her life, spending much of the day sobbing and exhausted from all the extra work she had to do.
I
t turned out she had no close neighbours or friends and no family other than a sister near Munich who she’d not seen for years. They agreed that if anyone asked, she’d say her husband had returned unexpectedly from the war but had become a recluse and refused to see people.
* * *
The Americans arrived in the middle of May. The man who came to collect the milk each day had told Frau Moser they were in Eggenfelden and would soon be visiting all the farms. They turned up a few days later, four men in a jeep who checked the place out and then looked at their papers. They seemed satisfied, and registered them and issued new documents.
After that matters, began to get easier. Wolfgang persuaded Frau Moser to employ someone to work on the farm for a few hours each day, during which time he’d stay in the house. She was less exhausted and slightly calmer.
He spent his days in the cellar, logging the rolls of undeveloped film and reading through the notebooks. The more he thought about his plan and the more he refined it, the more confident he was about it.
By the time they got to July, life seemed easier. No one ever bothered them and Wolfgang found the physical work had a positive effect on his mood. He felt fitter – mentally and physically – than he’d done for years.
Of course he still worried. Someone might discover he wasn’t Andreas Moser after all. And then there was his plan: as good as it was, it could still go wrong. His biggest worry, though, was his son. He had little idea what he was up to and whether he was doing as he’d been told.
The farm did have a telephone – he’d gone to some trouble to have it installed – and his only link with the outside world was Ulrich, a comrade in Frankfurt with an impeccable network of contacts himself, whom Wolfgang trusted implicitly to keep an eye on Friedrich. Once a week he’d telephone him to check whether there was any news.
Is Mother well? When do you think it would be a good time to visit the cousins?
And Ulrich’s replies would be the same.
Mother is well, you’re not to worry. No, now is not the right time for you to visit the cousins.
But in late July, his response was far from reassuring.
Mother is not good, actually: her old condition is playing up.
Wolfgang felt the air turn cold around him.
She was taken ill in Munich. I’m not sure what to do. One of the cousins appears to have found out about her.
Wolfgang said Ulrich was to find out more and he’d call back the following evening. In the meantime, perhaps he’d best go and visit Mother in Munich?
He told Frau Moser he felt under the weather and wouldn’t join her for dinner that night. He went to sit in the farmyard, thinking about what to do.
Ulrich had told him that Friedrich was in trouble, in Munich. As for the cousins, they were the Allies – an integral part of his plan.
Chapter 5
Munich, August 1945
Wolfgang Steiner arrived in Munich using the identity of Andreas Moser, the farmer from the Rott Valley. He’d had no intention of leaving the farm near Eggenfelden, where he felt safe and hoped to remain until the time came to put his plan into action.
But he’d not taken into account his Achilles heel, his son Friedrich. Ulrich’s initial warning on the telephone had been heavily coded, but when they’d spoken the following evening, he’d provided a bit more detail.
As far as Ulrich could tell, Friedrich had left the safe house his father had found for him in the Tyrol because he was bored, and travelled north to Munich of all places. The Bavarian capital was occupied by the American army and was the last place you would go if you were hiding from them. It was also a place where even the American troops not garrisoned there gravitated to when they had some free time. Despite the fact that the city had been half destroyed, it hadn’t taken long to dust itself down and start providing places where the American troops could spend their money.
Once in Munich, Friedrich had quickly begun to revert to his normal behaviour. He did at least use the new identity his father had gone to some trouble to supply him with, but he might as well have not bothered: in every other respect his behaviour was utterly reckless. If people asked where he was from – wondering about his accent – he’d happily volunteer that he was Viennese, and when the subject of the war came up, he’d give a knowing wink and would sometimes even take out his metal Gestapo identity badge, carefully allowing whoever he was showing it to a glimpse of the Reich symbol of an eagle on top of a swastika on one side, then quickly showing the reverse, with the words Geheime Staatspolizei. The only precaution he’d take was to cover his identity number with his thumb.
He hung around the area south-east of the main railway station, where every other building seemed to be a bar of some sort or the other. Some of them consisted of little more than a trestle table in a damaged building, the clientele having to take care not to lean on walls liable to give way at any moment. The area was the centre of the black market, and Friedrich was able to do some wheeling and dealing. He’d brought a dozen watches with him and used the money from selling these to fund a hedonistic lifestyle, albeit one edged with the danger of a fugitive.
But what most attracted him to this area was the brothels that had sprung up like a rash once the Americans had taken over the city. Almost every taste was catered for by women – and men – who’d never ordinarily have contemplated prostitution. But desperation had forced hundreds of them onto the streets, and Friedrich found it was a perfect outlet for his appetites.
Eventually he rented a room near the Theresienwiese fairground, where the Oktoberfest was held every year. He’d become particularly attracted to a fifteen-year-old girl he’d bought from her Polish-German pimp for a whole night in return for a watch. He’d become rather friendly with the pimp, Emil, who seemed to specialise in younger girls and, it had to be said, boys – though this was something Friedrich preferred not to think about. Emil told him that he’d done what he called ‘specialist work’ in Poland during the war; as far as Friedrich could tell, this involved helping to run and then clear the Jewish ghettos.
Friedrich was impressed, and felt he could confide in Emil. He showed him his Gestapo badge and then told him he’d been almost single-handedly responsible for defeating the resistance throughout Europe. ‘In fact, so good was my reputation, they called me das Frettchen!’
It was true the girl – her name was Gisela – seemed to have been forced into prostitution, but Friedrich found himself thinking more and more about her, and when he took the room by the Theresienwiese, he decided to move her in, ignoring Emil’s protests. Things began to go wrong after that. Gisela turned out to be neither as obliging nor as grateful as Friedrich had assumed she’d be. Nor could she cook. She spent so much time hunched on the edge of the bed crying, jumping whenever he came near her, that she got on his nerves, and her behaviour didn’t change after he started beating her.
But far worse was to happen. He was drinking at a bar north of the station one afternoon when he found himself surrounded by Emil and two of his associates.
Where is Gisela?
Friedrich said he had no idea whatsoever, and pulled out his knife and threatened one of Emil’s associates. The brawl that followed was broken up by a squad of passing American military policemen. Friedrich, whose English was good, told them the men had attacked him because he’d criticised Hitler, and the policemen escorted him out of the bar.
But as they did so, Emil addressed them in equally good English. Far from being an anti-Nazi, did they realise the man they were taking away was a Nazi criminal?
The policemen stopped to listen, and rather than laughing it off, as he later realised he should have done, Friedrich shouted at Emil and called him a fucking liar, and said he’d tell them what he’d been up to.
‘If you don’t believe me’ said the Pole, standing very calmly at the bar, ‘he told me he’s a Gestapo officer known as das Frettchen. I’m sure you’ll find him somewhere in your files.’
The captain in charge o
f the military police squad was happy to let Friedrich go once they were away from the bar, and he headed back to Theresienwiese and Gisela. He was unnerved by what had happened: he should never have trusted Emil and told him his nickname; it just went to show you couldn’t trust a Pole. But at least it seemed no harm had been done. He didn’t even think the Americans had been listening properly to the accusations.
But one of the Americans had been listening. A young sergeant, he was surprised his captain hadn’t wanted to take the matter further. When they returned to their base later that day, he checked the extensive watch list containing the names of thousands of Nazis wanted for war crimes and other offences.
And there he found the following entry:
Das Frettchen: translates as the Ferret. Known in France as le furet and in Holland as de fret. Wanted for crimes against British agents and resistance fighters. PLEASE CONTACT MAJOR LEAN, F SECTION, SOE, LONDON WITHOUT DELAY.
* * *
Even before the war ended, it had become a matter of honour in the Special Operations Executive that every agent they’d sent into occupied Europe should be accounted for. The SOE demanded that justice should be sought for every one of the many who’d been killed, and that all agents who’d disappeared should be traced.
Major Charles Lean of F Section of the SOE – the non-Gaullist French section – had been haunted since December 1943 by Christine Butler’s murder. He’d recruited her personally, though at first she’d not seemed to be SOE agent material. She was in her mid-forties, relatively recently married and working as a secretary in the RAF. But a senior officer had discovered that her mother was French, and she was fluent in the language. All the background checks on her were excellent, so Major Lean arranged to meet her at St Ermin’s Hotel to see what he made of her, and by the end of their meeting he was highly impressed. She was a determined woman who felt under-used and unappreciated in the RAF and had a passionate desire to do what she could to help France. Despite her age, she was physically strong: she spent as much of her free time as she could hill-walking, and she sailed through her medical examinations.
