Mail Correspondence with Soldiers at War (“Feldpostbriefe”): Letters from the German soldier Werner Pott from Russia, Christmas 1941 (Published on 22/12/2024)
(source: Bähr/Meyer/Orthbandt, Kriegsbriefe gefallener Studenten 1939 – 1945, p. 223 ff. [translation from German language]):
“Near Kalinin before Moscow, 19 December 1941
I’m sitting in a house that will go up in flames in half an hour. We have been deployed for weeks without rest or respite, a different billet every day, marches in blizzards at 25 degrees cold, frozen noses and feet that make you want to scream when you have to take off your boots, dirt, vermin and other unpleasant things: these are the sacrifices we have to make to straighten out the front line. It drove a long, thin wedge into the enemy’s lines. In addition to all the personal hardships, the civilian population, whose houses we set on fire as we retreated and who were left to starve to death, takes its toll on me. The full cruelty of war becomes apparent! Christmas! We are on the march, the snowstorm is roaring across the wide fields, rarely does a forest offer any protection. You can hardly feel your feet. The falling darkness is illuminated by the blazing flames of burning villages.
The red tongues rise up greedily up the firmament as if they wanted to devour it – world fire! Stooped old men, mothers with small children hurry past, a small bundle on their backs holds the last of their belongings. Behind us, engineers are blowing up bridges and houses. At home there is a Christmas tree somewhere, familiar decorations shining, dear and beloved people singing Christmas carols. It’s better not to think about it.
We have become infantrymen, insofar as we are expendable, and are deployed as such. We’re not quite used to man-to-man combat yet, but at the decisive moment everyone will be able to hold their own. Unfortunately, no mail has arrived for Christmas Eve yet. I was so looking forward to receiving letters from home and perhaps one from you, but now that’s probably still to come, the anticipation remains.
The only values that are everlasting, I realize more and more here, are those that took the poisoned cup from Faust’s hand on Easter night – memory! When you think of the past, everything around you sinks away and the last rays of the evening sun gild the beautiful hours of times gone by. Today you think of this and tomorrow of that. Let me have a chat. When else was it? I came back from a vacation trip and climbed the long staircase to your apartment. I remember your blue room, so nice and cozy, with the wax figures, the books on painting – especially Grünewald –, think of a walk in the churchyard or an evening in the café, think with a smile of how I used to get annoyed afterwards on the train about my clumsy behavior – – over –over –. I wonder if later on I will have the energy and impartiality to forget what I experienced here and become young again.
Now it’s time for a new battle, the village is already burning at every corner!”
First Lieutenant Werner Pott, born on 28/08/1922 in Ascheberg/Westphalia, was killed in action as a member of the 2nd Battery of Artillery Regiment 120 on 25/03/1943 in the Orel/Russia area due to an accidental mine explosion.
(Head picture: Winter scene in the Bavarian foothills of the Alps,
February 2013)
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