“Generals discussing our outfit say we are the best Cavalry unit in the Third Army.”
Colonel Charles Reed, Nepomuk, Czechoslovakia, May 12, 1945
The sounds of accelerating tank engines grew louder and louder, mingled with the clatter of metal tracks on the road surface. Then the first armored beast appeared around the forested corner a few hundred yards in front of Colonel Reed’s position. Blue smoke belched from the tank’s two rear exhausts as its big diesel engine powered it forward. Then another tank appeared behind the leader, followed by yet another.
“T-34s!” exclaimed Captain Stewart as the green-painted tanks, their tall turrets placed forward on their chassis, ground on down the road towards the American position, hardly slowing.1
“What in the hell are Russians doing this far behind our lines?” exclaimed an astonished Reed. He had hardly finished speaking when the column of T-34s clattered to a halt. Standing in the open hatch of the first tank was a young Soviet lieutenant, wearing a padded cloth helmet. He started to wave his right arm in a sideways direction, and to shout.
“Raschishchat’ dorogu!” yelled the Soviet officer several times.
“Tell the men not to open fire without my express order, Captain. I’ll investigate,” said Colonel Reed, standing up and walking out into the roadway. Stewart passed Reed’s order around his men before joining the colonel.
“Raschishchat’ dorogu!” shouted the Soviet officer, still waving his arm furiously.
“We got anyone who speaks Russian?” demanded Reed, standing with his hands on his hips in the middle of the road a few yards from the first halted tank. Fortunately, a trooper of Russian heritage was found and ordered up to assist the colonel a few minutes later. In the meantime, several Soviet soldiers had clambered out on to the turrets of their tanks and were watching the unfolding drama with interest.
“Ask him what he wants,” said Reed, jerking his thumb towards the Soviet officer, still standing high up in his turret.
“He says you must clear the road, Colonel,” replied the trooper. Reed raised his eyebrows.
“Ask him on whose authority,” said Reed.
“Raschistit’ put’ dyla Krasnoy Armii,” shouted the Soviet officer.
“He says you must clear the way for the Red Army, sir,” translated the trooper.
“Tell him to get his CO up here,” demanded Reed. The Soviet officer disappeared back into his turret, presumably to radio someone in higher authority. Ominously, the tank engines remained switched on and idling noisily.
Reed could see exactly what the Soviets were up to. They intended to push straight through into Hostau, probably to snatch the horses before the Americans could send them out to Germany. All those illicit visits by Czechoslovak partisans and Soviet spies had led to some kind of flying column from the 1st Ukrainian Front, which was then pushing out into the countryside beyond Prague, being sent to try to intimidate the Americans into leaving. With the front line so porous, this small column of tanks and vehicles had been able to slip through unnoticed and race west.
Reed had first been made aware of Soviet incursions into the American line on the evening of May 9, when patrols from the 42nd Squadron had reported Red Army columns moving at speed through Nepomuk towards Pilsen.2 It had required half of the 42nd Squadron to induce the Soviets to stop. The 42nd’s executive officer and an interpreter had eventually chased them down two miles northeast of Nepomuk. The Americans had halted four SU-76 self-propelled guns from the 25th Tank Corps, some with female crews.3 It had appeared from reports that the 42nd had the situation in hand and that no further Soviet penetrations into US territory had succeeded.
The impasse outside Hostau continued for some time, and worsened with the arrival of a senior officer and his staff to try to force the issue.
“You must clear way for Red Army,” said a young Soviet captain who was translating in halting English for the column’s commander, Brigadier General Fomenich. The Soviet general had been driven up to the head of the column in an armored car, with a couple of jeeploads of officers and NCOs following, and launched immediately into a heated argument with Colonel Reed.
Though ostensibly Allies, the Soviets didn’t look all that friendly, and there were none of the staged photocalls of GIs shaking hands with smiling Red Army soldiers on busted bridges that had already started appearing in Stars and Stripes and the newspapers as the Eastern and Western Fronts finally merged into one in Germany. These particular Soviets looked hard-bitten and tough, their uniforms dirty and oil-stained, many in possession of PPsH machine guns, with drum magazines slung across their chests.
General Fomenich, wearing a heavy gray greatcoat with tsarist-style shoulder boards and a Sam Browne belt and revolver, didn’t appear to be in the mood to negotiate, his ice-blue eyes and wind-burnt face giving the impression of a seasoned campaigner.
“You have no jurisdiction here, General,” said Reed, locking eyes with the Russian officer. “You are behind the American lines.”
Fomenich shook his head and reeled off a barrage of Russian at his aide, who translated again.
“My general, he say that you Amerikantsy are behind our lines. You must move your men aside. This all belong Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.”
Reed knew that he was on shaky ground diplomatically, for it was true that at the Yalta Conference it had been agreed with Stalin to turn over all of Czechoslovakia to Soviet control once the Germans were defeated. Though General Patton had managed to push forward some forty to fifty miles to just beyond the city of Pilsen, American forces would probably be ordered to return to Germany in the near future to avoid an escalation with the USSR.4 But for the time being, Reed knew that he had to bluff it out in front of the Soviets in order to buy some time to get the horses out. They were almost finished constructing the horse loading ramps and modifying the American and German trucks.
“Tell him I am not moving from this place as I have received no orders to that effect.”
The captain relayed Reed’s words to Fomenich, but it only brought on another tirade of Russian.
The argument flowed back and forth for some minutes as Fomenich continued to demand the road, while Reed refused to budge. Reed was able to quote an order that he had received on May 9 from XII Corps delineating the forward American line in Czechoslovakia as running Budejovice–Pilsen–Karlsbad–Chemnitz. XII Corps had stated explicitly: “In order to avoid any possible incidents with Soviet forces U.S. forces will not advance beyond the line…”5 It was clear to Reed that Hostau was well within the authorized boundary and the Soviets had no jurisdiction or rights in regards to the town of Hostau.
But regardless of his strong position based upon XII Corps’ instructions, Reed was growing increasingly nervous. If General Fomenich decided to force the issue and order his tanks forward into Hostau, how should the Americans respond? They were outnumbered and outgunned. If shots were exchanged between American and Soviet troops only days after the German capitulation heads would roll on both sides, particularly as Patton had made it clear that Reed was on his own in Czechoslovakia should anything go wrong with the mission to save the horses. But Reed also knew that if he allowed the Red Army to occupy Hostau, he could forget about saving the horses. The Soviets would never allow the Americans to take them out. He would also be sealing the fates of Colonel Rudofsky, Captains Lessing and Kroll, and the other German staff at the stud, who along with their families might not be permitted to leave. And Reed was using Prince Amassov’s Cossacks to help look after the horses—Soviet citizens who had, in the eyes of the USSR, betrayed the Motherland. Such men and their families, including Amassov’s fourteen-year-old daughter and their other women and children, could expect no mercy from the Red Army. All of this flashed through Reed’s mind in seconds as he stood facing the Soviet general. Then his face took on a harder look and he pointed at Fomenich’s chest with his index finger.
“If you go forward,” said Reed in a low but menacing tone, “remember, our guns are still loaded.”6 After receiving the translation, Fomenich visibly blanched. His bluff was being called. He looked into Reed’s eyes and knew that the American was not faking.
For several minutes the Soviet officers discussed the situation out of earshot of the Americans before Fomenich abruptly left. Then, almost in unison, the Soviet tank engines were all shut off, a deep and unsettling silence falling over the scene. Hatches were opened and tankers jumped down into the road and lit up cigarettes or stood staring at the Americans. The Red Army was clearly not going forward, at least for the time being, but equally perturbing for the Americans, it was also not withdrawing. Instead, like a large and hungry cat staring into a small bird’s cage, the Soviets would wait patiently until fresh orders arrived. The unseasonable chill in the air seemed to presage a much colder war to come.
The sudden and unexpected arrival of the Russians galvanized the Americans into moving the horses out as fast as possible. The operations to prepare the transport vehicles swung into high gear. A strong barrier of US armored vehicles and men was placed across the roads leading into Hostau from the east to hopefully forestall any sudden forward movement by General Fomenich’s men. The plan was for the American perimeter to collapse like a bag as the horses and vehicles left under escort from the western side of the town, a rearguard from Troop A being the last American forces to leave, covering the tail of the convoy back to Germany.
“We leave tomorrow morning, at dawn,” said Captain Stewart to the assembled task force officers and senior NCOs on the night of May 14. At 11pm, Colonel Reed had received the final order to move the horses and personnel the forty miles to a safe area in Germany the following day, and immediately transmitted the thrilling news to Stewart. The codename for the operation: “Cowboy.”
First Lieutenant Quinlivan’s team had completed the vehicle conversions and built sufficient ramps for the loading of the pregnant mares and those with new foals in tow. All equipment and supplies had been mustered and inventoried, and all personnel made ready for the move. Those GIs who had been detailed to ride with the herds had selected their mounts from among the stallions at the stables.
Captain Stewart would lead the first group, riding not a Lipizzaner but a jeep. Behind would come the trucks containing the very young horses with their mothers and the mares heavy in foal.7 More jeeps and armored cars would provide flank protection during the drive to the German frontier. Military police or Colonel Long’s infantrymen of the 387th Regiment would be in position at each crossroads to keep them clear for the evacuation convoy, some using scout cars to cover them. The other groups of horses would be on foot, with armed jeeps with each herd, along with outriders and guides.
In total, there would be four distinct groups. First, the thirty-truck convoy, then three horse herds with vehicles and outriders, moving along at intervals of twenty to thirty minutes to prevent bunching and snarl-ups. Resting points had also been marked on the officers’ maps, where a midday break could be taken and the horses and men fed and watered.
The loading continued all night. German, Polish and Cossack women and children, together with their scanty possessions and as much food as they could carry, piled onto overloaded German trucks. Horse-drawn wagons were also utilized to bring out yet more equipment and supplies, pulled by animals already broken to harness by Colonel Rudofsky.8 The German stud commander was everywhere during the night of May 14/15, overseeing the loading, checking items and horses off his lists held on a clipboard while the veterinarians Lessing and Kroll supervised the animals.
The movement of so many people, animals, and possessions was impressive, and the caravans resembled the refugee columns that had been passing by the stud for weeks. Was there any real difference between them? Both the refugees, and now the American soldiers with their ragtag collection of “willing helpers,” the former enemies and former POWs, were all intent on placing as much space as possible between themselves and the Red Army. The horses, both a great prize and a thorny political hot potato, were the focus of this multinational collection of men, women, and children who all sought freedom in the West.
Though now technically civilians, but still in German uniform, Rudofsky’s officers and men continued with their jobs with discipline and dedication, not knowing what might happen to them once they arrived in their occupied homeland.
Rudofsky, however, would be the only one not to go to Germany. He had confronted Colonel Reed on this subject again during one of his frequent visits to the stud, and this time Reed had not pressed the matter.
“Well, if you do not want to go,” said Reed, without apparent rancor, “stay here. Dr. Lessing will take over in the convoy.” Reed’s opinion of Rudofsky was fairly low. “Because of Rudofsky’s ‘treachery,’” wrote Captain Stewart, “Col. Reed considered making him a prisoner, but we decided that justice could be served by leaving him to the Russians. When you are predisposed to dislike someone, it is easy to fuel your antipathy.”9
Refugees continued to be a problem at Hostau. When word got out that the Americans were going to take the horses and German staff and their families to their own lines, many refugees approached Dr. Lessing asking to come along as well. The refugees’ carts and carriages mixed in with the official transport that was going to leave the stud, and many tried to get seats on the vehicles that were transporting out food and other supplies. They pleaded with Lessing. “For God’s sake, take us with you,” one of the refugee leaders said, “It’s our only chance to get out of this hell.” Colonel Reed had already made clear to Lessing that this was not a problem.
“You know I can’t organize a general escape here,” said Reed when Lessing first informed him of the refugees’ demands. “But if you and your people manage to get a corresponding number of horses and wagons, these people are simply counted as stud staff, and in this way they can be taken away.” Lessing was taken aback by Reed’s humanity. “I have nothing against them,”10 said Reed, before changing the subject back to the horses and trucks.
Colonel Rudofsky looked up at the dawn sky and smiled. It was a beautiful spring morning, with hardly a cloud in sight. The sun shone down upon Hostau, warming the backs of the men who were still laboring to load the last horses and equipment for the move. After so many weeks of cold, wet and snowy weather, the morning of May 15, 1945, was glorious. Rudofsky walked into one of the empty stable blocks at the stud. It was dead quiet. “No neighing, no stamping, no snorting,” he wrote. “The thrushes are singing, the turtle doves calling, buzzards wheeling.”11
After carefully inspecting each of the empty stables and storerooms, Rudofsky walked out into the yard, where preparations were still under way, and down the line of German and American trucks. In the backs of the trucks the mares and their young stood quietly, their big eyes staring out over the hastily constructed wooden sides, tails flicking and feet shuffling. The engines started up, and all along the convoy truck doors were slammed and drivers’ elbows poked out of open windows. The escort vehicles waited to protect the convoy, with American soldiers carrying small arms or standing in the rear of jeeps holding on to the machines guns mounted on metal posts set into the floor.
Captain Stewart nodded to Rudofsky as he walked down the line of trucks, casting a final eye over the vehicles and horses. Then Stewart climbed into his jeep at the head of the convoy. Also in the jeep was Major Rollin Steinmetz, the regimental S-4, with a copy of the order of march in his lap.12 Stewart glanced at his watch, then stood up and raised his arm above his head.
“Lets move out!” bellowed Stewart, his arm shooting forward towards the west, before he resumed his seat, the jeep pulling ahead as the trucks gunned their engines and took the strain of their precious loads. Blue exhaust smoke billowed in the clear air as the line of trucks, engines revving and gears mashing, lurched forward, the horses in the rear swaying and shuffling to maintain their balance. Here and there an M8 armored car tagged alongside the flanks of the convoy, the commanders standing in their turrets talking to each other on the radio net, while more jeeps hummed along behind. Hubert Rudofsky stood and watched until the last vehicle and last horse had passed out of sight before turning sadly away and walking back into the stud.
The convoy made good time, though the vehicles kept their speeds down so that the horse groups that were walking could stay close behind. As the convoy lumbered up and down the rolling countryside it grew warmer. At each crossroads smiling military policemen waved them on, Stewart saluting at each checkpoint. The young captain scanned his maps and maintained an eye on his watch as his jeep drove slowly ahead of the convoy, having regular brief conversations on the radio with other officers protecting the flanks and rear.
The horse parties were organized in at least three distinct groups. Prince Amassov’s Cossacks and their group, who numbered in total twenty-six riders, were proving their worth, with over a dozen acting as flank riders on their tough Panje horses, with their families also mounted and following on behind. Only seven GIs rode stallions, including First Lieutenant Bill Quinlivan, who was mounted on the famous Polish racehorse Lotnik. Contrary to stories that circulated after the war, there were no mounted Texans among the Americans. Sergeant Bill Boyer from Idaho rode the stallion Tristan, while the other six GI riders were all from North Carolina. Captain Stewart rode part of the way, occasionally swapping his jeep for a stallion and checking on the different groups.13
Some Polish grooms, some Austrians, and a few released German prisoners made up the numbers of European riders to about fifty, but there was by no means enough men to properly control the hundreds of horses moving in loose roundups towards Germany.
Some German officer prisoners were determined to ride some of the two- and three-year-old stallions, with disastrous results. Ignoring the advice of the stud’s staff, within minutes of leaving Hostau thirteen riders were unhorsed in an almost comical scene of chaos, “and there was an appalling confusion of uncontrolled, riderless stallions and mares defending themselves.” The whole sorry episode was recounted to Colonel Podhajsky a few days later by stud staff, and he recounted that: “In this whirling mass of biting, kicking horses, the attendants, some of whom were totally inexperienced, had the greatest difficulty in halting the excited animals and avoiding being trampled under the hoofs of the now frenzied herd.”14 The baker’s dozen of riderless stallions bolted back to the stables at Hostau and were abandoned by the Americans for the time being. Eventually, order was restored to this part of the column, which proceeded without further incident towards Germany.
Though the distance to Kötzting and Furth im Wald was only around forty miles from Hostau, Stewart did not push the animals too hard. The journey, including the trucks that kept their speeds low, was made over two days. When night fell at the end of the first day, the horses were placed in fields that had already been selected in advance, and the accompanying riders and drivers accommodated in requisitioned barns. Many of the horses that were walking were not accustomed to such distances, and were very footsore. Captains Lessing and Kroll were kept busy attending to these animals.
The following day dawned bright and clear—perfect weather. The horses were loaded back aboard the trucks or mustered into their marching groups. It appeared a straightforward run down to the Czechoslovak–German frontier.
Dr. Lessing, mounted on Indigo, was at the head of the column accompanied by several other German riders. They were close now to the Bavarian border. Up ahead lay the small town of Furth im Wald, its collection of solid three-storey red roofed houses clustered up against the Chamb River, an arched stone bridge connecting the Czechoslovak side of the border with Germany.
Lessing’s group of horsemen rode in advance of Captain Stewart’s jeep and the convoy of heavily laden trucks, with the rest of the horses moving along in their usual three groups strung out over several miles behind. Passing through a ravine, the road snaked up towards a crest, bright sunshine dappling through the trees. Beyond that lay the river and Furth im Wald. Lessing could see the black, onion-shaped dome of the Baroque parish church in Furth, but he also saw that the entrance to the bridge was blocked. A customs house left over from when Czechoslovakia had been an independent nation had been manned, and its red and white painted barrier was down and locked in place, firmly blocking the road. But more ominously, three men stood in the middle of the road, their leader raising his hand to stop the column. Lessing could see that the men were Czechoslovak partisans, for each was dressed in an odd assortment of civilian and cast-off military clothing, with a red communist armband, and they were carrying German rifles or Soviet machine guns.
Lessing reined in his horse, raising his right hand to halt the column.
“You can’t take these horses out of Czechoslovakia!”15 bellowed the partisan leader, pointing his machine gun at Lessing. A Ukrainian horseman who spoke some Czech was quickly brought up to translate for Lessing, who demanded that the partisans immediately clear the road. But though this was an American operation, Lessing was still in German uniform, as were his men, though all of them were unarmed and helpless. The Czechoslovak leader’s hatred for their recent occupiers was clear and undisguised. The partisan repeated his demand, adding that the horses “must remain here until we decide with the Russians as to just how they should be disposed of.”16 Dr. Lessing tried to explain that the United States Army was moving the horses into Germany, but this had little effect. As they spoke, the next group of horses on foot had started to arrive, bunching up behind the convoy of trucks. Lessing turned in his saddle as someone shouted out from behind, just in time to see three or four stallions bolt into the trees. The group was degenerating into a tangle of tired, highly strung and footsore horses jammed into an expanding bottleneck at the border.
The other two partisans suddenly stepped forward and dragged one of Lessing’s German riders from his horse, evidently preparing to beat him with their rifle butts. But a shout stopped them in their tracks and all eyes turned as an American officer galloped to the head of the caravan, his horse kicking up dust as he thundered along, reining in beside Lessing.
“What’s going on here?” shouted First Lieutenant Quinlivan, his right hand unclipping his pistol holster. Captain Stewart, who was standing in the front of his jeep some way back in the column, watching the situation carefully, had called Quinlivan forward.
Lessing quickly explained to Quinlivan about the refusal of the partisans to remove the barrier. Quinlivan stared down at the leader of the partisans and then at the obstacle. He ordered an American private who had followed him on horseback to ride back down the line and get help. Quinlivan’s eyes took in the chaos that was starting to manifest itself as a large group of horses with inadequate escorts milled about in the roadway and among the trees as riders struggled to corral them, and the convoy of trucks sat immobile with their precious loads overheating under the sun. He knew that the next group of walking horses would not be far behind, and when they arrived the crush and confusion would be complete.
“Tell him to open the goddamn barrier, right now!” growled Quinlivan at the Ukrainian interpreter. The Americans were not going to take any nonsense from the Czechoslovaks, as the US refused to countenance that they had any rights to the horses.
When the Czechoslovak partisan leader refused to remove the barrier, Lieutenant Quinlivan knew that he had to act, and act fast before the situation went totally beyond his control. There were only three partisans guarding the crossing, but there could well be many more in concealed positions close by, waiting to intervene. But Quinlivan had an ace up his sleeve. The rider that he had detached would by now have passed on the message and help would be on its way. Sure enough, within a few minutes an M8 armored car came rumbling through the trees. Quinlivan rode over and spoke briefly to its commander before returning to Captain Lessing’s side. The M8’s turret swung round and the muzzle of its 37mm gun depressed until it was pointing straight at the partisans and the tollhouse.
Quinlivan turned to the Ukrainian interpreter, his saddle creaking as he rested his hands on his reins.
“You tell him,” he said slowly and clearly, jerking a thumb at the partisan leader, “that I’m going to count to three.” The partisan leader listened, the color draining from his face as his eyes flicked backwards and forwards between Quinlivan’s angry face and the muzzle of the M8’s 37mm cannon. His bluff was being called.
“One!…” shouted Quinlivan, raising an index finger in the air.