The Decision: "Please send a car to get us out", One Brother to another, Feb 1945
"Please send a car to get us out".In early February 1945, this note was sent to the residence of my grandfather Hans Kolbe.His brother Viktor Kolbe had sent it from Pritzlow, the family estate a few miles west of Stettin (Szczecin), today about 2 miles into Poland right across the border, 100 miles northeast of Berlin.
I remember well how my father showed me this postcard or maybe it was a telegram. But I cannot find it now in the hundreds of documents I have scanned to "Immemories" in the "Cloud". Or maybe it is still in one of the unscanned cardboard boxes upstairs. Or my sister has it, back in Lüdenscheid, Germany.
My grandfather was the County Commissioner of Schleswig-County in the Northwest of Germany. He had been installed by the Nazi party in 1934. In February 1945 the war was coming to an end.Germany was losing and would be occupied.That was quite clear to everybody, except the most gullible Nazi fanatics. In the meantime, the Schleswig area was quite safe.The countryside was rarely bombed (in contrast to the submarine shipyards in Kiel, 20 miles south) and the advancing Russian troops were far away.This area would be occupied by the British, if at all.
Stettin, where Viktor wants to be picked up, is in the East of Germany. Viktor did not have to explain why he needed to get out. His and his family's situation was very precarious in February 1945. It was absolutely desperate. He had waited too long for the escape. The Soviet forces had broken through the Eastern defenses and were quickly advancing through Pomerania and toward Stettin.
I have heard the stories a hundred, a thousand times - at nauseum. From uncles, aunts, cousins,teachers, and in books and newspapers: In the worst part of winter, hundreds of thousands of refugees clogged the snow-covered roads, low flying airplanes attacked frequently, food and supplies were very hard to come by, people got on ships that were torpedoed, went over the ice that gave it, fell in the snow and could not get up, and on and on and on.
That is not my story here.
Had Viktor believed the Nazi propaganda, is that why he waited so long? I doubt it.He was working in the General Staff of the Army – he knew. He may not have dared to leave – westward tracks were often held back by Nazi commandos, searching for "deserters", any male over 15 or under 70 could be drafted or shot immediately.Or maybe he had a transport ready, and it was taken away, stolen, or requisitioned.I think this last variation is the most likely. It was a dangerous time.
That is also not my story.
The two brothers were not friends. That is my story.
Viktor was the youngest of the four brothers, and always their mother's favorite.Their parents had made Viktor the sole heir of the estates the family still owned in Pomerania and Mecklenburg. They used to own a bunch more but lost them into Poland after WWI. Viktor was considered the "smarter one". Hans, my grandfather, became his inheritance paid out in cash, which he immediately invested in German war bonds.The money was gone when WWI was lost and the government collapsed. Viktor often commented on the poor financial instincts of his older brother.He made snide remarks about it in public, in front of the family.
I, the grandson, remember Onkel Viktor from the time when I was little.He was … "debonair", my mother would say, stylish – still as a 60-year-old when he came to visit my parents.And extremely self-assured. It might be better to say he was full of himself.
Upstairs in our "treasure cabinet" of trinkets in our San Francisco living room we have a small silver bell engraved "Viktor Kolbe" given to me by Great-Onkel Viktor when I was born.My name is Hans, not Viktor. He had it engraved, being sure I would be named after him, not his brother or my uncle.
But now, Viktor was desperate for help!
For the first time he was begging from his brother.
I can see my grandfather, the brother, brooding for a few hours. Is he asking his wife Irmela? She is upstairs, on the second floor of the residence. Probably not.Irmela is painfully ruminating the fate of her younger son Ulrich, my father. The oldest brother, also called Hans Kolbe, had been killed early in the war.Ulrich is still fighting, probably on his way back, in retreat from the Mediterranean to the Baltic Sea. A few days ago, he had called. He wants to get married to his fiancée Johanna Anschuetz, once he is back home in Schleswig.Johanna in Segeberg, only 30 miles south. Getting married now! And her parents don't agree to the marriage! What a thing to worry about now!
My grandfather is not thinking about that.He is thinking about how Viktor was always smart, smooth, and knew to be on the winning side.
Hans remembers that barely 15 years ago Viktor had called Irmela, Hans' wife to rat him out. "Your husband is committing treason with his battalion in Berlin", so Viktor on the telephone in March 1920. He reported Hans' paramilitary supported a military coup (the "Kapp Putsch") against the government."We were trying to save Germany from the socialists who signed the shameful Versailles Treaty", that was Hans' side of the "Brigade Loewenfeld" militia story. The coup lost.
And later, Viktor always was critical and making fun of the National Socialists and warned of their warmongering and other plans. He will be on the winning side again, now.
But, Hans also has to admit, "Viktor did help out quite a few times."His brother had sent food and silver (to barter) from his estate when Hans did not get paid by the Navy of the new Weimar Republic.Those were the months in 1923 when the hyper-inflation hit, and his weekly pay was not worth even a loaf of bread.
After some more rumination, he makes up his mind, "Now it is my turn to take care of my brother", he has decided.
My grandfather calls out to his adjutant to get a small truck off to the estate to get Viktor's family out. The car makes it through the nearly 300 miles, manages to pick up its precious cargo, and successfully gets back to the future British Zone.Lots of stories about that trip. That's for later. For now, this decision of my grandfather is why we have those documents from Pomerania in San Francisco, going back to 1800, and many other family treasures.