KÖTZTING, BAVARIA, GERMANY,
MAY 16–21, 1945
For the first time in his life, Alois Podhajsky was flying—aloft in General Collier’s personal military airplane en route to 2nd Cavalry headquarters at the Skoda Castle, in Zinkowy, Czechoslovakia. The Austrian was on his way to meet the man who had saved his Lipizanner: Colonel Hank Reed. Podhajsky’s mission was to inspect the horses that the 2nd Cavalry had just brought to Kötzting, and to pick out his mares and foals for transport back to Austria.
Podhajsky was understandably nervous. He had received the barest of information—only that the mares from Piber were believed to be among the horses recently captured by the 2nd Cavalry. Were they safe and healthy? Had any been lost? Podhajsky did not know. As he looked out the airplane window, an appealing panorama spread out below him; from such a distance, he could detect no traces of the war that had ravaged the Continent for six straight years. As the small plane approached its destination, Podhajsky could see the vast grounds of the castle of Baron von Skoda, surrounded by acres of ornamental gardens. The small plane circled over a meadow, then made a perfect landing on the castle’s grounds.
Awaiting Podhajsky’s arrival was an American major who escorted him into the opulent baroque building. They walked briskly through a maze of long hallways, past American sentries in olive drab stationed at the entrances to vast rooms hung with highly varnished oil paintings in gilded frames. The major led Podhajsky to a comfortable bedroom and invited the traveler to make himself at home. He informed the Austrian that the commander of the 2nd Cavalry, Colonel Reed, would join him for dinner. At six P.M., the major returned and escorted him to meet the colonel.
Podhajsky was introduced to a man with a warm smile and friendly manner who immediately set him at ease. Podhajsky was surprised and flattered that Reed had invited him to sit at the officers’ table in the mess. During dinner, the two men discussed their favorite subject—horses. Reed told Podhajsky that he had recognized the Austrian’s name. The head of the riding school at Fort Riley, Colonel Tuttle, a member of the 1936 Olympic team, had greatly admired Podhajsky’s dressage performance in Berlin. Upon returning to Fort Riley, Tuttle had named one of the school’s horses after the Austrian—they called him “Podhorski.”
Reed then filled in the Austrian on what had transpired over the course of the last two weeks. He explained that the Americans had captured the stud farm intact, but that the farm lay in territory that now belonged to the Russians. Fearing that the Americans would soon pull back and the Russians would seize the horses or the Czechoslovakians would claim them as Czech property, Reed had made the difficult decision to move them overland to the village of Kötzting, in Germany. Fortunately, the horses had arrived safely, but conditions were dangerous—he wanted to return the Lipizzaner to Austria as soon as possible.
Podhajsky explained to Reed that there was just one hitch. Not all of the Lipizzaner in Hostau had come from Austria—some had been brought there from the stud farm in Lipica, Italy; others had come from the royal Lipizzaner stud of Yugoslavia; still more had been brought from other locations. Reed was alarmed to hear of this unexpected complication, having anticipated that all of the Lipizzaner would be returned to Vienna.
THE NEXT MORNING, REED and Podhajsky set out for Kötzting—a drive of about forty miles—in Reed’s jeep, with O’Leary at the wheel. Their route took them southwest through the Czechoslovakian countryside. The spring day was breathtaking, with flowers studding the verdant meadows and a few high clouds hanging in a clear blue sky. As they drove, they passed buildings plastered with banners declaring, “We Greet the Red Army!” No similar signs welcomed the American forces.
Reed noticed the Austrian staring at the pro-Soviet banners. “The inhabitants of this country do not love us much and can hardly wait for us to leave,” he said to Podhajsky. “Now you can see why I moved the horses to Bavaria as quickly as I could.” Reed did not have to say more.
As they drove, Reed told Podhajsky that the arrangements for the horses in and around Kötzting were makeshift and temporary, and that there was not enough fodder to support the local population of horses, much less the new arrivals. Reed explained that the horses had been parceled out in twos and threes into pastures and cowsheds that were entirely unsuitable to such valuable bloodstock. His men reported that the horses had arrived safely, but he could not vouch for their condition since. So, as they approached, Podhajsky was nervous, fearing the worst.
When they arrived, they were greeted by Lessing, overworked and exhausted but eager to welcome his former colleague. Lessing and Podhajsky had met the previous year, when the Austrian visited Hostau to check on his mares. Their relationship had been cordial, as the two had discussed the horses’ welfare over coffee in the veterinarian’s home. Though Lessing still considered the Austrian his friend, he saw the scarlet armband that Podhajsky wore to signal loyalty to his country, and was surprised that Podhajsky refused to shake his hand or look him in the eye. Lessing was hurt by the treatment—they had shared a love of horses, and both had worn the Wehrmacht uniform. But their common past could no longer overcome the politics that had come between them: Lessing was a defeated German, Podhajsky was a liberated Austrian, and this fact made their personal circumstances entirely different. Lessing was an American POW, and the director of the Spanish Riding School was a free man.
As Reed, Lessing, and Podhajsky toured the stables, Podhajsky instantly recognized the mares from Piber, calling out to them by name. The white horses looked up and whinnied when they saw the familiar face. Podhajsky walked among them, easily picking out the ones branded with a P and a crown over it. There were 219 Austrian mares in all. Forty or so Lipizzaner that did not come from Austria had been brought to Hostau from Yugoslavia and Italy, and some had been foaled at Hostau, but Podhajsky pointed out that each horse’s provenance could be readily determined by its brands. Hank Reed knew that courts and tribunals would decide where these horses should end up—for now, he just needed to get them out of Kötzting. He asked Podhajsky to take all of the purebred Lipizzaner to Austria for safekeeping until their proper final destination could be sorted out.
Podhajsky reflected on the situation in St. Martin. Already, he had trouble caring for his seventy stallions. Could he really agree to take so many more horses and be responsible for them? He hesitated only a minute before agreeing to find temporary homes for the Lipizzaner from Lipica and from the royal Yugoslavian stud farm. This would leave behind about fifteen Lipizzaner, those gathered from other places. The following day, Podhajsky returned to St. Martin in General Collier’s airplane, determined to find enough stabling in and around St. Martin for all of the new horses. Reed had promised they would arrive within a week.
ON MAY 22, QUINLIVAN and Lessing prepared to load the Lipizzaner onto the trucks that would transport them from Kötzting to Podhajsky’s home base at the Arco Castle, a distance of sixty miles. At Reed’s behest, the Americans had assembled forty German trucks. Each would transport about fifteen of the 219 mares and foals being returned to Austria; the rest carried POWs to act as grooms, as well as food and supplies for the horses. German prisoners of war had been conscripted to drive the trucks and to serve as grooms for the journey. Members of the 2nd Cavalry accompanied the convoy in motorcars and jeeps.
Quinlivan and Lessing supervised the loading of the mares, making sure to steady them as they walked up the makeshift ramps. Some of the horses walked sedately, others took the ramp in a single bound, and still others seemed hesitant and needed to be coaxed. As soon as the last horse was loaded, the Americans gave the signal for the convoy to move off. What was left of the group of captured horses—including the Arabians from Janów Podlaski and the remaining Lipizzaner—would soon be taken by the 2nd to a captured German stud farm where Reed had found room for them. Witez had survived his long journey in remarkably good condition. He had shed his winter coat, and dapples spread across his haunches like faceted jewels. His mane was silken, his eyes bright, his spirited expression undampened. The stallion’s fate remained in the hands of the 2nd Cavalry.
SINCE RETURNING FROM HIS visit with Reed, Podhajsky had spent the week desperately looking for stabling for the mares. On the night of May 22, he got a phone call from the XX Corps headquarters telling him that the mares were being delivered by truck to a nearby airfield—that very night. They would be there by ten P.M. Podhajsky forgot his fatigue and headed directly to the spot. The night was cold and clear and very dark; the floodlights that once lit the fields no longer functioned. The only illumination on that moonless night came from the thick blanket of stars that glittered in the sky. Podhajsky paced anxiously, suddenly brimming with energy. Ever since the Germans had taken the mares out of Austria, he had wondered if they would ever return. In only moments, the Lipizzaner mares would be reunited with their homeland.
SOON HE HEARD A low rumble, and the convoy of forty trucks began to roll onto the airfield, their headlight beams crisscrossing in the darkness. While waiting for the trucks to arrive, Podhajsky had prepared a ramp, set at a slant against a small rise; he had planned to ask the drivers to back their trucks up to the ramp, one by one, so the horses would not have to jump from the elevated flatbed of the truck all the way to the ground. But the field was dark, and the drivers couldn’t see well enough to back up to Podhajsky’s ramp. Instead, they all pulled up helter-skelter and turned off their ignition.
As soon as the drivers cut the engines, the horses got restless, kicking against the thin boards that enclosed them. Someone suggested waiting until dawn to unload, but Podhajsky could see that the mares were already getting panicky. They would have to improvise something and hope for the best. Unfortunately, the ramp that Lessing and Quinlivan had used to load the horses had been accidentally left behind in Kötzting, and Podhajsky’s was unsuitable unless propped against the hillside. One of the trucks was equipped with a short ramp used for loading gasoline cans, but it was not long enough to reach all the way from the truck bed to the ground. Instead of leading the mares off the trucks, they would have to push them down to the end of the short ramp, where each horse would jump to the ground in the dark. Though the setup was far from perfect, it would have to do. Two trucks pulled around to illuminate the unloading area with their headlights. The mares, some calm, some impatient, skidded down the ramp one by one, jumping and sometimes stumbling as they came off the end. When one truck was unloaded, they moved the ramp to the next one.
Then one of the broodmares panicked and bolted ahead of her groom, jumping off the ramp with a terrible twist. She landed with a thump, and then, squealing and snorting, hopped forward on three legs. In the pale headlights, the men could see her fourth leg dangling at an awkward angle. Podhajsky’s heart thudded heavily. He approached her quietly and coaxed the panicked mare to let him examine her. A quick check revealed the worst possible outcome. The mare, Trompetta, had fractured her cannon bone—a fatal injury. She had made it all the way back to Austrian soil, but she would never make it back to the barn. Podhajsky’s serious mien revealed none of the grief that seized him. With his pistol and a steady hand, he took the mare out of her misery. That night marked the last shot fired in the Lipizzaner’s war.
The rest of the mares were unloaded without mishap, and within a few hours, each was stabled in a fresh bed of straw in one of the barns that Podhajsky had managed to secure. It was near dawn when the POWs finally drove away and he was able to fall into his bed, exhausted.
The tumultuous arrival of the mares in the new Austria only served to highlight how difficult was the path that lay ahead of him. Yes, he had the horses, and yes, Reed and Patton had fulfilled their promises. But now more than three hundred mares and stallions were counting on him—a worn-out forty-seven-year-old citizen of a defeated nation—to keep them safe. The country of Austria would need to reinvent itself, and the Spanish Riding School, too, would need to find a new path to assure its future.