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FRANCES KING Outside Stalingrad one day
OUTSIDE STALINGRAD ONE DAY | |
I had slipped out of the ruin once
called the city of Stalingrad shortly
before dawn flitting over the snow on my cross country skis with little
Ivana
trotting along behind me. With horses, cats and rats and even humans
going into
the pot of a population facing starvation, a plump brindled West
Highland
terrier bitch was not safe alone in the town. There was a little clump
of trees
surrounding a pond I had seen through my binoculars which attracted a
skein or
two of ducks each evening, which was my goal. I had stuffed a few
essentials
into my pouches, hefted both my sniper's rifle ( a customised version
of the
French Chassepot) and my own Purdey shotgun, told
my Sergeant where I
was going and we were off. To tell you the truth, getting out of the
City with
its stench of burning, shit and rotting bodies was as much the motive
as
bagging some food for the platoon. Well, both objectives were quickly
and
smoothly achieved. The snow was firm and crisp as it was well below minus twenty and had been for a
month. With
my hood pulled down to my eyes and my white scarf over my mouth and
nose. It was
only our shadows which might give us away and as the sun was yet not
over the
horizon, as yet I needn't worry. On reaching the copse, I unclipped my
skis and
tiptoed noiselessly into it, in my own non regulation sealskin boots.
My
Purdey, a lovely English fowling piece given to me by my Grandfather
made short
work of a couple of widgeon, Ivana, oblivious of the cold plunged in
and
retrieved them and soon we were off again, skirting German positions
dug in
alongside their airstrip. They were easy enough to avoid as I could
smell their
fires a kilometer away in this crisp clear autumn weather, and their
grey
uniforms stood out against the snow. German kit was smart, well
designed and
cut but no one had told their designers about snow, frost or indeed
about
battle field conditions. The Red Army on the other hand has learned
from bitter
experience, mainly against the Finns, and we snipers as elite troops
are
allowed considerable latitude in our choice and
adaptation of kit. For example, I have sewn extra horsehair padding
into my jacket. Not
just for extra
warmth, but to absorb recoil from my stripped down rifle and to
disguise the
fact that I am a woman. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the attentions of
men, but
there is a time and place. On the dance floor, or in the barracks later
are good
places, to celebrate gender differences, on the front line fighting for
the
Motherland is not. There was much activity on the
airstrip, planes were taking off in an
almost constant stream. At the end of the runway about one hundred
meters
outside the boundary I came across a large hump in the snow which I
knew
contained a wrecked German tiger tank. The sun was now up and beginning
to warm
me. I swept the snow off the track guards on the side away from the
airstrip,
let the sun dry the metal and then I sat on it, enjoying the warmth
through my
seat from the tank
and the sunshine on
my shoulders from above. After a bit
of
sniffing around, Ivana joined me and we watched the heavily loaded
German
transport planes taking off low over our heads. I gave Ivana a twist of
smoked
horsemeat which she chewed on noisily while I took a swig of vodka and
chewed
rather more quietly on some stale bread and a lump of sausage I was
hoarding
for just this sort of occasion. I was feeling warm right through.
A very rare feeling for the defenders of
Stalingrad after a peculiarly bitter Russian winter, believe me, and I
was
pondering whether it was safe to pull off my hood and let my hair
loose. an
intoxicating thought, but at that moment one of the German air
transports, its
three motors howling incessantly, desperately trying to get clear of
the ground,
flew over so low that I instinctively ducked. I could see that the back
door
was open and I sensed rather than saw something dark plummeting to
earth from
it. By the time it
hit the two meter
deep snowdrift alongside us, I was cowering under the tank, assuming
what had
been dropped was a bomb. We stayed under the tank for at least two
minutes, but
nothing exploded and when
Ivana's natural curiosity finally got the better of her, she slipped my
protective grasp and trotted out to investigate. She licked it, so it
certainly
wasn't a bomb, maybe it was food? I cautiously joined her. It was a
man! from
his uniform a German. He was small and elderly but seemed to be still
alive
from the fall. I bent down and picked him up. I had been told that the
Germans
had suffered even worse than
we had in the
siege, but this bag of bones was a barely living proof. He was an adult
but
weighed no more than my seven year old brother. I laid him on the track
guard
of the tank and watched him slowly recover in the wamth of the
sun. However I
was cautious enough to remove the Luger pistol from his highly polished
belt
and holster. He was an officer and judging by the rest of his uniform,
a high
ranking one. His eyes fluttered and I splashed
a little vodka into his open mouth.
"That'll warm him up a
bit," I
said to Ivana who was licking him furiously. He sat up slowly and cautiously,
bruised but miraculously nothing serious
broken. "Guten tag Mein Fraulein", He said. Definitely German, then!
He licked his lips and reached into his greatcoat. I raised my rifle.
He
smiled, made a gesture of submission then slowly and deliberately
produced a bottle
of brandy, which he offered to me. Hmm, very nice too," I offered him
a hunk of bread and sausage, which
he accepted with alacrity and wolfed it. He spoke again in German which
I
obviously didn't understand. He tried in French, which I did (a bit).
It turned
out his name was Otto, he was grateful for me rescuing him. I replied
that my
name was Catherine and he was welcome. Ivana was my dog, and indeed was
Scottish- West Highland Terrier. I looked at a photo of his wife and
children
and another of his daughter and grandchildren. I showed him a photo of
my
parents and brother Igor. He offered me a cigarette. "Americanski". I inhaled deeply,
Hmm, even better, "all the
nicotine and none of the tar. I wondered where he had got it, Paris
apparently,
on the black market. I gave him a
Georgian black cheroot. A poor substitute but he
accepted it gratefully. I wondered what Paris must be
like. One day after the war he said, he would
be happy to be my guide. We ran out of
vocabulary. What
should we do now? he said that as he was going back to Germany in the
Ju 52,
probably to be executed, when he was pushed out of the plane, I had
saved him
from freezing in the snow, his life was now mine. I said that I now
gave it
back to him, along with his pistol. I suggested he walk over to the
nearest
German sentry post and get home to his family, while I skiied back to
Stalingrad with my dog and two widgeon for the pot and go back to my
family in
Siberia, then on 12th of September 1947, in five year's time we would
meet
again when this was all over, in front of
the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris and thank God
for our safe
deliverance. So that is what we did. Frances King worked for the
British Council for many years around the world
but now lives with family in South Oxford UK. |
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