Escape:

I do not know if they made it home. At the time I hoped they would, and settled back into the loneliness of my watch with only the moon and my thoughts for companions. One thought came to me that perhaps this canceled the account of that poor rag doll, which had died near this very place. If God, I mused, had wanted these two souls to leave this orb of pain just like He did the mosquito pilot, He would have let my trigger finger keep contracting. But He did not.

From the continuous ominous news at the home front we out here on the periphery could only surmise that the end was near. When the announcement of Hitler’s’ death on May 2nd came through, also naming Admiral Doenitz as the successor, we knew it was over.

Since I had not the slightest wish to become an involuntary guest of the French government, for who knows how long, it was now time to seriously plan to extricate myself from this untenable situation. I knew that all of us occupying this island and the coastal areas surrounding the three submarine bases were all trapped and destined to become prisoners of war by a very unsympathetic and unforgiving, sometimes cruel enemy. I no longer saw any reason to wait for the trap to spring. I wanted to go home. After all I was on an island in the Atlantic and all I had to do was to take a ship and sail it west and home. Wasn’t it that easy? I confided my fears and unripe plans to Lieutenant 1st class Poellinger, a young officer a year younger than I, who came from a very catholic, staunchly anti-nazi Bavarian family, and to Heinz Grintjes, my closest buddy. Only recently had I left Poellinger’s command and transferred to the communications unit above Le Palais. But whenever I could I would visit my buddies at the gun emplacements.

The three of us had grown close due to late night philosophical conversations we had over the past several months. These ranged over a wide variety of subjects such as religion under the Third Reich, duty, honor, the oath of allegiance every individual soldier had sworn to Adolph Hitler. Where does loyalty begin and end, what would become of Germany and the Germans? What would become of us? After this devastating conflict how would we personally end up, indeed, was there a future for any of us? The Lieutenant knew my background and was very sympathetic. It was only during these last conversations that I realized how much Franz, that was the lieutenant’s first name, which he permitted both Heinz and me to use in private conversation and out of ear shot of others, was on my side. But he did not permit us the ultimate "Du", consequently keeping an ever so slight arms distance between us.

There is a formal and familiar way of addressing a person in German. Strangers are always addressed by the formal "Sie", while friends and persons one has known for a very long time, address each other with the familiar "Du". In order to call someone "Du", that individual has to "offer or grant" you the right to do so, which does not come easily. However, before you are offered the "Du", there can be a familiarity one grade distant, by getting permission to call one by a first name, but still be addressing each other with the polite form of "Sie". This subtle difference indicates a wall which may not be breached. So while Heinz and I addressed each other with the familiar "Du", when addressing Franz and he us, the term "Sie" was always used.

Heinz had been promoted to sergeant, and I never again reached that exulted position after having been demoted when I was transferred to the navy. So Franz told me why. He said he had always considered me an individualist and leader, and consequently had put my name up for promotion on several occasions, once even recommending me for officer candidate school. Each time he was advised that although I might be a good soldier, but the fact that I had grown up in America, a matter of record, was against me. Why had I never joined the party, nor been a member of the Hitler Youth? Then too, I had made utterances indicating a love of Americans, and so never could be trusted politically. Consequently all recommendations of promotion were automatically denied. So, where was this loyalty to country and country to the individual soldier? It seems it had been on a one way track for me all this time.

Franz now said that once there was capitulation his command over body and soul of his men, and in theory he still considered me one, would end. He also said he would not impede my plans to escape, nor those of any of his other men, sic. Heinz Grintjes. But he suggested we formalize them carefully and rationally. Heinz, on the other hand was his usual enthusiastic self and hoped that I would include him in any escape plans. Since I had come to the conclusion that it was not prudent to simply grab a boat and blissfully sail westward, I felt a safer route was necessary. Say, via Spain, which, although not an ally, was sympathetic to Germany. If I could get this far, I would surely find a way to get home. There were many boats, both powered and sail in the harbor which could get me to Spain, a distance of some 300 miles due south through the Bay of Biscay. All that was needed was a seaworthy craft and a compass, head south and land somewhere on the north coast of the Spanish peninsula and freedom. I did not wish to think of what I would do once in Spain. That bridge I would cross once I got there. My goal now was simply to get to Spain.