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South of Marienwerder, West Prussia
Nazi Germany
January 28, 1945

 

Something had changed. Hermann Lang was sure of it. As he slowed his locomotive to a crawl, he peered into the darkness, his dimmed lights barely giving him a track’s length of visibility, having one’s train well-lit never wise in case Allied aircraft made it a target of opportunity.

Yet something had definitely changed. He knew these tracks like the back of his hand. He had been here scores of times, usually to pick up ore from the mine somewhere in the darkness ahead, sometimes to deliver supplies or workers. When the war was going well, which it hadn’t been for some time, these runs were made in broad daylight, or at night with lights ablaze.

But no longer.

His hometown of Berlin was under near-constant bombardment by the Allies, and whispered reports were that the Russians could be on their doorstep within months.

The Thousand-Year Reich would soon be defeated.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He had grown up during the Great Depression, far worse in Germany than anywhere else in the world thanks to the punitive Treaty of Versailles. The war reparations Germany had been forced to pay as punishment for its actions, were crippling.

And Adolf Hitler had offered a way out to the impoverished, desperate citizens of a defeated Germany.

To fight back.

To take back what had been stolen, and rebuild.

He had embraced the idea, almost from the beginning. He had even joined the Party, thinking it was his patriotic duty, though mostly because it meant you went to the head of the line for jobs. He was fortunate he hadn’t been required to fight. As a trained engineer, a skill in desperate need, he had been spared that horror, though most of his friends hadn’t.

It racked him with guilt every time he saw the dead and wounded, or heard another widow or mother cry out in agony when the telegram arrived.

He just prayed his wife never received such a message.

Though with what he had been told yesterday, he was terrified he would be the one receiving a telegram.

What had his wife been thinking? Speaking out against the Reich? The very idea seemed nonsensical to him, completely unbelievable, though not because she was fiercely loyal to the Führer. It was because she wasn’t an idiot. She knew what could happen.

And that was why he had refused to believe the accusations.

Until the names of three other women were provided, all friends of hers, all women that regularly gathered to gossip.

And it was apparently one of these sessions that was reported to the Gestapo, probably by one of the women whose husband needed to prove his loyalty for a promotion.

They had threatened to take her in for interrogation if he didn’t cooperate, and he knew what that meant. He would never see her again. Too many disappeared these days, convincing him it had little to do with people fleeing the city, and everything to do with the Gestapo rounding up anyone they suspected of not being 100% loyal to the cause.

The lights caught a glint of metal, and he recognized the gates of the mine outside Marienwerder. In the shadows, he saw the silhouettes of several guards and a couple of canine units, but the entire area was under a complete blackout.

This was the strangest run on which he had ever been. They had called him in at the last minute, just before he was about to head home to Berlin to see his wife for the first time in months, and sent on what was a regular run except for the cargo.

What that cargo was, he had no idea, and the pickup location was unusual. Königsberg. He had never picked up anything destined for the mine from there before, though perhaps others had. Those who served this region worked most of the routes, rotating through them to relieve the boredom.

But this load he was transporting was like no other before. There were only two boxcars, already hooked up and sealed when he had arrived, and the train had been surrounded by SS soldiers. He had been ordered to leave his fireman at the last junction, left to travel the final leg by himself.

That was unheard of.

If he were going anywhere else, he’d think his cargo was some top-secret military equipment. But he wasn’t going anywhere else, he was going to a regular old mine, one he had heard was due to be shut down as it was now almost barren.

The locomotive jerked to the left unexpectedly, and he leaned out the window, peering into the dark, his dim lights glimmering off brand new track.

Something had changed, but this wasn’t it.

Then it dawned on him.

There were no sounds. Normally when he was here, over the engine he could hear equipment operating, men shouting—the sounds of everyday life at a mine. Even with minimal lighting at night, the mine still operated, its materials essential to the war effort.

But tonight, there was nothing beyond the sound of his engine.

And a dog barking in the darkness.

A flashlight shone in his face and he raised a hand to block the glare. Somebody hopped on the running board, the beam lowered.

“Just keep going, I’ll tell you where to stop.”

Hermann nodded, then sweat broke out over his entire body as he caught a glimpse of the SS emblem on the man’s collar, a skull and crossbones on his hat. He kept them moving forward, slow and steady, his heart pounding hard as he tried to appear calm.

And why was that? He had done nothing wrong. He was doing his job and doing it well, as ordered. If he had arrived unexpectedly, or in some incorrect fashion, would this man have climbed on board and told him to keep going as he was? No, there would have been cursing and beratement as was typical of an SS officer.

Yet he was still terrified of this man.

And it was the second time in one night he had encountered the SS.

First at the beginning of his run, and now at the end of it.

He was certain that whatever cargo he carried was of the utmost importance to the SS, and if it was important to them, it was important to the Reich. The SS were the Schutzstaffel, or Protection Squadron, under the direct command of Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler himself, and fiercely loyal to the Führer, the Nazi Party, and the ideals of the Reich.

And with a notoriously low opinion of anyone who didn’t have their insignia on their collar.

He spotted the entrance to the mine, but it wasn’t the usual one. The tracks were still new, and he had never been this way. In fact, he had never known this entrance existed. Either a new shaft in the mine had been opened, or an old one had been reopened. Whatever the answer was, he was about to find out, as his dim lights that failed to pick up the emptiness that surrounded the tracks outside, suddenly lit the tight confines of the tunnel they were now in with little problem.

And it was all old construction.

Very old.

In fact, if he had to guess, this area of the mine had been shut down for years if not decades. As they slowly rounded a bend, he spotted a bright glow ahead, and moments later the train emerged into a large hollowed out area filled with several other boxcars, all with crates being offloaded. Dozens of men he recognized from the mine were moving the crates, and they appeared exhausted. He counted at least a dozen SS coordinating the effort, all fresh in their crisp uniforms, not a hair out of place as they did none of the manual labor.

“Stop here.”

“Yes, sir.”

He brought his train to a halt, the screeching of the brakes piercing in the confined space, only the SS wincing with pain, the workers used to the noise. He was quickly uncoupled and directed ahead, then switched onto a siding track and ordered to reverse out. He kept his eyes on the job, trying not to look at the goings on, and as they were about to leave the lighted chamber, the SS colonel swatted him on the shoulder.

“Back it out then wait for me, understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

The colonel hopped to the ground and began barking orders for the two cars he had just delivered to be opened, but not unloaded. Hermann wondered what made his cargo so special to be left aboard, though decided asking such questions, even of himself, was unwise. As he reversed out of the mine and returned to the crisp January air, he again could see little in the overcast sky beyond the shiny new tracks and the snow covering the ground. He brought the locomotive to a halt and put it in idle, waiting for the return of the colonel.

I wonder what he wants.

It could be as simple as a lift back to the city. It wouldn’t be the first time, though he couldn’t recall transporting an SS officer unscheduled, and definitely never where he would have had to share his cab, as there were no passenger cars on this train.

As he waited, he could pick out the shadows moving around him. The mine might be closed, but the security detail seemed larger than normal.

“Turn off your lights!” shouted someone from the darkness.

“Yes, sir!” He immediately complied, cursing for being so foolish. When underway, there was a need for at least some minimal lighting ahead, though to be honest, at high speed, if the tracks were out ten feet beyond, you were screwed no matter what. At least, though, you’d have a few seconds to say a prayer before your fate was sealed.

But at idle, the lights should never be on in blackout conditions.

A flashlight bobbed ahead, and his now adjusted eyes spotted what appeared to be the SS colonel, followed by several armed soldiers.

“Get down!”

Hermann’s eyes narrowed, wondering what possible reason this man could have for wanting him out of the locomotive. “Sir?”

“Now!”

The soldiers all aimed their weapons at him as the echoes of gunshots and the screams of men erupted from the tunnel.

Oh my God!

It was then that he realized what was happening. The miners were being executed, as they had seen what had happened here on this dark, cold night.

They were witnesses.

And so was he.

He hit the reversing lever, throwing the train into full reverse as he ducked. Gunfire pelted the locomotive as the three soldiers opened up on him. The glass shattered, showering him with shards, and he kept his head down as the train slowly gained speed.

But not fast enough.

Someone grunted on the other side of the door, one of the soldiers obviously having jumped on board. He rushed to the other side of the cab, though it was too late.

“Halt!”

He spun around to see the SS colonel half through the window, his flashlight in one hand, his Luger P08 pistol in the other.

“Please, don’t! I swear I won’t tell anyone what I saw!”

“You’re right about that.”

The trigger squeezed once, then twice more, Hermann shaking with each hit before he sank to the floor, his blood unseen in the dark, but the dampness of his shirt and overalls leaving little doubt what was happening.

That and the searing pain.

And as the life drained from him and the brakes squealed, bringing them to a halt, his heart hammered out its last few beats as he paid the ultimate price for a desperate Reich and a desperate leadership that he could only hope would die soon, before it took his daughter, as it had taken his daughter’s father.

He closed his eyes and pictured his wife, her golden blonde hair an ideal in the Reich, and wished he had made it home to see her one last time.

And ached at the thought of the telegram she was about to receive.

Goodbye, my love.