STERNBERG, CZECHOSLOVAKIA (October, 1942 - April, 1945)
In October 1942 Mutti moves into Lisbeth’s house in Sternberg to take care
of Lisbeth’s four children. She takes Heiner with her and later in the year
returns to Neisse to get Marianne. As is the custom there is a teenage girl living
with them to help out.
For the next two and a half years Heiner and Marianne have fun playing with
their four cousins. Occasionally Marianne is sent back to visit her grandparents
in Neisse. When she is in Neisse, Grusla gathers herbs for evening tea and tells
Marianne fairy tales. In Sternberg Mutti meets and starts dating a soldier, Ernst
Landsiedel, from Oberursel, Germany. Marianne picks some flowers and takes them
to Mutti and Ernst, and tells them that she wants to be the flower girl at their
wedding. Marianne feels crushed when Ernst replies that they are already married.
Lisbeth is released from prison and returns to Sternberg. Ernst is assigned a
house near the train station and he, Mutti and the two children move there. The
house had previously been occupied by a German officer. When he was killed his
widow had returned home to Germany but left many of her belongings locked in
one bedroom. Marianne and Heiner wonder what is in the mysterious locked room.
Mutti loses her furniture. She has it shipped from Neisse but it never arrives
in Sternberg. Ernst takes Heiner with him on a visit to his family in Oberursel,
Germany near Oberstedten. In Sternberg, Marianne and Heiner are allowed to feed
the stove. They throw in sawdust and nothing happens, so they are afraid they have
smothered the fire. As they lean forward looking into the stove, the sawdust suddenly
ignites and burns both of their faces.
Ernst is sent to the front and loses a leg. He returns to Sternberg to recover,
and learn to walk with an artificial leg. Jürgen is born in 1944. Mutti is
now 22 years old. She has lost one husband, and is taking care of three children
and a crippled second husband.
In February 1945 the Russians have advanced into Selesia so Mutti’s father,
mother and grandmother make their way from Neisse to Sternberg. They hike and
hitch rides bringing what possessions they can carry. They have to cross, what
is essentially, a no-man’s land, and along the way Paul catches a pig, that is
running free, and kills it. He carries the pig in a hand pulled wagon. It is
cold enough that the pig carcass partially freezes. When they arrive in Sternberg
they butcher the pig and get the local horse butcher to smoke it. Someone reports
them to the police. Ernst explains to the police that the pig was running free.
Still, they are fined 21 marks and must give up their ration cards.
By April, 1945 it is clear that the war is lost and that soon Sternberg will
be overrun by the Russians. All the German soldiers have left the Sternberg
garrison except for Ernst and another wounded soldier named Putzig. Putzig
had lost an arm. They have stayed because they continued to believe the propaganda
that Hitler would unleash a secret weapon that would turn back the Russian advance.
Mutti has two wooden boxes constructed to hold the family’s silver, dishes, linens
and clothes. The local silk and tobacco company’s doors are thrown open to the town
residents ahead of the Russian advance. Paul, along with Marianne, takes a
wheelbarrow and they get a large box of cigarettes, a large box of loose tobacco
and a long roll of silk, thinking these things may be useful for bartering.
Ernst and Putzig have confiscated the only remaining half-track from the army
base and driven it to the house. The garrison’s money and ration cards have
been left as all the other soldiers evacuated the post. Mutti thinks they should
take the money and the cards and is very upset when Ernst and Putzig refuse,
out of soldier’s honor. Mutti has some money that she received as widow compensation
for the death of her first husband.
In the news they hear that the Russians have taken Troppau, a town about 30 kilometers
to the northeast, and they decide to leave. But before they have managed to
leave, on the morning of the May 5th, the Russians start firing at the train
yards that is two blocks beyond the house. They had advanced their tanks and
artillery to the hills overlooking the town. Mutti is cooking goat meat on the
stove. The goat meat is forgotten as they rush to leave in near panic.
As shells are flying over their head and exploding in the train yards, the
half-track is hurriedly loaded with Mutti’s boxes, a basket of Anna’s filled
with the pig meat, tobacco, cigarettes, silk, a baby buggy for Jürgen and other
belongings. Mutti has a woman’s handgun given to her by Ernst. Ernst has their
money and what little jewelry they own stashed in his artificial leg.
Another woman and her two children will be going with them. Also Grusla’s
sister and her husband, who have arrived from Neisse, will accompany them.
There will be 14 in all; Putzig, Ernst, Mutti, Marianne, Heiner, Jürgen, Paul,
Anna, Grusla, Grusla’s sister, her husband, the other woman and her two children.
Lisbeth decides to stay in Sternberg in case her husband returns.
Putzig with his one arm drives and Ernst shifts gears. As they drive away
during the pandemonium Mutti and the kids see 88 year old Grusla sitting on the
front steps of the house. They yell at Ernst and Putzig to stop. Mutti wants
to jump off to get Grusla. Ernst says they can’t go back and that Lisbeth will
look after Grusla. They leave without her.