Writing for Fun
April 2016
Vengeance - Bob Wendelkin
The story I'm about to tell you I believe it to be true as I heard it from a man who experienced the event. It happened at the end of the last war; the war had been over for a year or so and I had been stationed in Germany and I had completed my service and I was returning to England to be demobbed. I was returning from Germany by rail and started my journey from Essen where I was a part of the Royal Signals.
It was a long journey that travelled across North Germany then in to Belgium and finally a boat from Ostende and then home. As I was going through Cologne I went into the corridor to look out of the window to look at the city. As far as I could see the railway was up on an embankment and either side of the railway for about quarter of a mile the ground had been cleared. I could see the two spires of the Cathedral standing all alone amongst bombed buildings. Looking at the devastation of Cologne and other bombed cities I had seen in Germany I couldn't help thinking if we hadn't won the war then someone in England would have been charged with war crimes. The train stopped and I left the train to get a cup of tea as we had a wait over. When I got back to the train and returned to my compartment I found that I had acquired a travelling companion. It was clear that he was in the Medical Corp of the Army. I introduced myself and as we were of equal rank we could communicate without any problems of rank.
The train pulled out of the station and started its journey to the German boarder at Aachen. He told me that he too was on his way back for an enquiry. I asked him what sort of war he had, this is when he told me this story.
He had been in the Medical Corp and had flown in to Arnhem. When the attack collapsed and the boys began to evacuate he drew the short straw and had to stay and care for the wounded. Eventually the Germans came into the town and he was captured and became a POW; because of his profession he was given the task of looking after the other POW's health. Whether the Germans knew the war was over for them he found that the Germans he met were virtually the same as us.
Then in May 1945 the war ended and he was given duty to look after the sick Germans as German Doctors were thin on the ground. He said he was moved around and eventually he was moved into one of the few undamaged houses in the town. Here he could run a surgery for the public until such a time that a German Doctor could take over.
The owner of the house, a Herr Kauffmann, never went into any detail when he asked him what he did in the war. All he would ever say that he did his duty like many thousands of other Germans. When pressed he would always change the subject. Time passed and gradually after a few months the health of the local population began to improve.
My travel companion went on to say what he thought about, the civilians as they had quite strict rations even tighter than the people at home. His great sadness was to see old ladies selling precious bit of their history to get a little more money to buy some black market food for their families. Perhaps even more sad was to see young girls who had nothing but themselves to sell.
The train then pulled out of Cologne and we were on our way to Aachen and we settled back in our seats and he continued with his story.
He found out that Herr Kauffmann had a wife but she had been killed by the Russians during their attack on Berlin where he said he was stationed in that city. He said he had managed to escape and make his way to his home. He said he was so surprised to find that it had escaped most of the bombing of the city and only a small amount of damage had been done to the garden.
Everything seemed to settle down and there was smooth running in the surgery. The Germans were so grateful when he was able to treat some of their illnesses with Penicillin – at that time the Germans didn't have the ability to make any form of anti-biotic. The British Military Authorities were so very much afraid that there might be an epidemic of some kind.
One day after he had completed his morning's surgery a jeep pulled up in front of the house. A man dressed as an American Captain and his Sergeant came to the front door and knocked. He went to the door and opened it as Herr Kauffmann was in the garden trying to grow some vegetables for the table.
The Captain followed by his Sergeant came into the hall.
Then the Captain asked if a Herr Kauffmann lived in this house.
My travel companion told him that he did and that he was in the garden and said should he call him.
The Captain who had a slight accent in his voice, told him not just yet.
My companion then said, 'As an American you seem a long way out of your Zone.'
The Captain said they were looking for War Criminals.
My companion said he thought that the War Crime Trials at Nuremburg were over.
The captain replied, that the main trials of the Mr Big were over they were now on the trail of the underlings who actually carried out the murders with that he produced a photograph of a Standartenfuhrer SS Officer and asked if it was a picture of Herr Kauffmann.
He said he looked at the picture and he told the Captain that it certainly looked like him.
My Companion said he then asked the Captain what he had done in the war?
The Captain said he was only detailed to bring him in, he then asked if he and the Sergeant could check on Herr Kauffmann.
He then said Kauffmann was in the garden and the way to the garden was through the kitchen. He said he didn't go with them as he had some work to do.
About ten minutes later the Captain came to the door of his office and said that the matter of Herr Kauffmann was completed and that he and the Sergeant where now leaving.
My companion said he continued with his work for about an hour then stopped for a cup of tea. He looked for Herr Kauffmann to make him his tea but he was nowhere in the house. He then went into the garden to find Herr Kauffmann laying face up in the vegetable patch; he had been shot though the back of the head and was quite dead.
He then told me how he called the Military Police and they contacted the Local Police as it involved a German National. The Captain had pinned he photograph of Kauffmann in his SS uniform on the body's chest. Seeing this photograph the Military Police lost interest and left.
The Local Police then told him that there was a group of Germans who dressed up in American uniforms and searched out lesser Nazis who were involved in the Holocaust and knowing that it was unlikely that they would come to justice and they took the Law into their own hands and exacted their own Vengeance.