Fifteen years in a childhood paradise

was a large central building, with smaller barracks scattered around. We were allocated quarters in an individual barrack, which had room for 12 FLAK helpers.

One day we were sitting at our evening meal around the table, spooning in a thin, watery cabbage soup.

"Gee, the cook has been rather mean again," said Karl, "I can't see any meat floating around".

"I've got something," said Herbert, and with that he pulled out a medium sized rat.

We all gasped, but not Herbert. He just put the dead rat beside his plate and continued to eat. His appetite was stronger than our revulsion.

"Don't show off, Herbert, that's disgusting." Karl just put down his spoon. He couldn't finish his soup.

"Come on," Herbert challenged us, after he had finished, "Who can finish their soup?"

Some of us could, others suddenly didn't feel hungry any more. After lights out we would often listen to Albert, who had a special gift for story telling. Stories about strange places and strange people, which I had never heard before. One of those stories was about an Australian bush ranger, called Ned Kelly. I had learnt in Geography roughly where Australia was on the map, but I knew hardly any more than that. Through Albert's stories, Australia and other parts of the world obtained a new meaning, and brightened the monotony of our existence. Often I had to ask the next morning though, how the story had finished, as I had dropped off to sleep before hearing the end.

Night air raids became more frequent, and school lessons became more peripheral. I have a school report, dated 13 July 1944, which reads:

As a result of the achievements and behaviour during classes, and of his duties in the service Éthe pupil Dieter Tieman goes up to year 6 of high school.

The following Subjects were studied and results were listed as follows:

German: fair Maths: satisfactory History: satisfactory Latin: fair Geography: fair Biology: satisfactory Chemistry: fair Physics: satisfactory

It is signed by the class teacher, the Principal, and the commander of our battery, countersigned by Vater. It is noteworthy that English as a subject was absent. It was considered that only 'necessary' subjects were to be included in the curriculum.

On 2 November, all of us who were born in 1928 had to register for military service in Posen. Everyone had to strip naked before the doctors

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