Armageddon - Max Hastings [194]
Graf Hans von Lehndorff, the doctor who composed one of the most moving narratives of his Heimat’s experience in 1945, wrote of its “mysterious splendour. Whoever lived through those last months with receptive senses must have felt that never before had the light been so intense, the sky so lofty, the distances so vast.” Since 1939, East Prussia had been a backwater, largely sheltered from the impact of world conflict. “It was incredibly quiet,” said Ursula Salzer, daughter of a Königsberg railway manager. “We had no sense of the war going on, and plenty to eat.”
Matters began to change in the late summer of 1944. Königsberg, which had been desultorily bombed by the Russians, was attacked by the RAF’s Bomber Command. Its aircraft came first on the night of 26 August, when most failed to find the city. Three nights later however, on 29 August, 189 Lancasters of 5 Group struck with devastating effect. Bomber Command estimated that 41 per cent of all housing and 20 per cent of local industry were destroyed. Unexpectedly heavy fighter activity over the target accounted for fifteen Lancasters shot down, 7.9 per cent of the attacking force. Yet the people of Königsberg cared only about the destruction which the RAF’s aircraft left behind. When a bailed-out Lancaster crewman was being led through the ruined streets by his escort, a young woman shouted bitterly at him in English: “I hope you’re satisfied!”
Her name was Elfride Kowitz. Her family’s dairy business and their corner house in Neuer-Graben had been utterly destroyed in the attack. When she emerged from a shelter after the raid was over, she stood gazing in horror at the ruins of her family home. She saw a man in a helmet. It was her father. They fell into each other’s arms, and sobbed in despair. “Both my parents were completely destroyed,” she said. “They had lost everything they had worked all their lives for.” Her father saved only the family’s radio set. Everything else was gone. Her bitterness never faded: “That raid was so futile—it did nothing to shorten the war.” Never again before May 1945 did Elfi fully undress at night. She began to shake as soon as she heard sirens.
A few special people beneath the Allied air attacks shared the common fear, but also found the bombers symbols of hope. Michael Wieck, a sixteen-year-old Königsberger, could not enter the city’s air-raid shelters, because he was a Jew. Instead, when attacks came, he resorted to a coal bunker. He listened to the distant buzz of aircraft as it grew to a roar, then heard the angry bark of the flak. He was still above ground when the RAF’s “Christmas tree” pyrotechnic markers drifted down through the night sky. “I was not so critical of bombing then as I became after the war,” said Wieck. “We knew that the only thing that could save our lives was the victory of the Allies, and this seemed a necessary part of it.” Yet even for Wieck and his parents the RAF’s second raid on Königsberg seemed a catastrophe. “Schoolbooks, curtains, debris of all kinds rained half-burned from the sky. The heat was so enormous that many people could not leave their cellars. Everything was burning. Some people took refuge from the flames by jumping into the river. When it was over, the scene was like the aftermath of an atomic explosion.” Local Hitler Youth leader Hans Siwik, a former member of the Führer’s bodyguard, was as appalled as Wieck, from a somewhat different perspective. Siwik was disgusted by the “immorality” of the British assault: “It seemed crazy that people should destroy such a place. People in Königsberg were unaccustomed to raids. We didn’t have a lot of flak. I was horrified by the idea of such vandalism.