Fifteen years in a childhood paradise

Günter remarked quietly: "They must be from the SS." "Now he is beating her," I heard Bernd whispering, as the screaming continued. More people were dragged from the house next door, most of them had only the barest of personal belongings with them.

"Look, they are even taking children into that truck," I found out to my horror. Meanwhile, Bernd and I opened another window so that we could see better. The SS were dragging people from the house next door, and from further on. These were all large blocks of flats, about 7 storeys high. The trucks were slowly filled with people. Suddenly one of the SS men shouted at us: "Hey, you, shut those windows at once!"

We were rather scared about having witnessed this whole episode, and shut the windows immediately.

"Next thing they will be after us," I said. "No, don't worry. They are after the Poles," Günter said somewhat reassuringly.

"But where are they taking them? And why in the middle of the night?" There was no answer to that question. Bewildered we stood behind the curtains, our eyes still fixed on the ugly scene before us. Could this possibly also happen to us, or were we safe from such violence? After the trucks were filled they left and all was quiet again, but it was hard to go back to sleep after seeing such cruelty and violence. We were really scared.

A few days later the house next door was taken over by the SS and one floor became the Headquarters of the Hitler Youth in Posen.

*

Until that time, life in Posen had been pretty peaceful, especially compared with other parts of Germany, where they had constant air raids and destruction and many deaths; particularly in places like Hamburg and Berlin. It seemed the war was passing us by. But it was not to be.

One night in May 1941 we were all fast asleep, when a tremendous explosion shattered the peace. Bernd was so fast asleep that he said in his sleep: "pick it up again", before he was fully awake. Glass was shattering and falling on to the pavements, and in a few minutes there was utter chaos on the street outside. Ambulance and fire engine sirens went, and people were coming out of their homes to see what had happened. Tante Else came into each room to calm us down and said: "It was probably a bomb. Now go back to bed, all of you, there is nothing we can do."

It was hard to go back to sleep after that crash, particularly as we didn't really know what it was. But sleep came eventually.

Next morning the explanation came over the radio: There had been a single mega bomb, which fell just a few streets from our block of flats, destroying three large blocks of flats. It was assumed that it was a single American plane that had tried to destroy the very important railway

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