Bardia, November 11, 1941

I was called to the captain this morning. He said, "Otto we are running out of medical supplies and medicines. The airdrops have all drifted into the English lines, and we are helpless without further supplies. During our fast retreat two weeks ago we left valuable drugs and dressing materials in one of our last camps, the old "White House." It is about 12 to 15 miles from here. There should still be a lot of sulfonamide tablets and morphine left in the pharmacy. I want you to try to get through the lines of the enemy and see whether you can recover any of these materials." The captain continued, "I will give you my best driver, Karl, with a good truck. According to my latest information there are only English patrols in this sector of the perimeter. The encirclement of Bardia is not 100 percent yet. You are to take off at four a.m. tomorrow."

"Yes, Captain, I will try." I stood at attention in front of the commander.

"By the way you may use a Red Cross flag. This is a medical mission. You should not take any weapons along. Maybe the English will respect the Red Cross sign in case you have an encounter with them."

I was aware that this was a dangerous mission. I could not expect any military support from our units.

The British surprise attack had now moved 500 miles toward the west. Rommel had finally made a counter attack at a place of his choosing. The German communiqué claimed that they had destroyed close to 800 tanks. Several weeks ago, when Rommel had dropped by at our command post, he must have spoken to our chief and told him of his plan that a part of our unit should be set up inside of Bardia, and he would detail a small force to defend Bardia. Since the English did not know how many Germans were opposing them, they might think they have an opponent like the Germans had had in Tobruk. This order helped Rommel to disengage himself without major losses and retreat with the bulk of his troops. With his unshaken optimism he planned to be back within a few weeks. But now he was 500 miles from us with no chance of relieving us in the near future. The Desert Fox was outfoxed by the British. They had begun to surround us in the perimeter of the small harbor. We were less than 30 miles from the Egyptian border. If we could hold out long enough with our few men, Rommel might make it back to our encircled battalion by Christmas. The Tommy started to bomb our wells and hit the area where the Luftwaffe tried to drop supplies. Our supplies of food and water were becoming dangerously short.

One hour before the first daylight hit the desert, Karl and I were on our way. Three miles out of Bardia we passed our last sentry. How thin those lines were! The next post was 300 yards away !

"Where are you going?" the soldier on the last outpost asked us. "You can't go beyond this spot. I saw a Tommy patrol three hours ago not far from our lines."

"I have got orders to drive to an area 15 miles from here and pick up medical supplies. We left them there several weeks ago on our fast retreat. The doctors have almost no materials and medicines for our wounded," I told him.

"Good luck, then. I hope you will make it and won't be picked up by English patrols."

The night sky gave room to the first glimmer of daylight. At least, we could find our way. A deep wadi opened up not too far from the last outpost. Karl guided the truck into the wadi which went in the direction of our old campsite. We were slowly creeping along the bottom of the wadi to prevent any telltale dust clouds. Unless an English patrol was close by we should have been invisible to the enemy. After 20 minutes of driving the wadi took a different direction toward the ocean, which was away from our goal. So, we had to find a place to get back onto the plateau. Karl maneuvered the vehicle up a slope which gave us a way out of the wadi. Now we were only two miles from the old "White House." As we raced now over the open country through brush and small rocks, leaving a big dust cloud behind us, I looked anxiously through my binoculars. About three miles away on the Dschebel, a steep elevation which surrounds Bardia, I could make out three tanks silhouetted against the morning sky.

"Let's go faster, Karl. I don't want to be a target. In case they shoot at us, at least we will make a difficult object to hit." Very soon I saw the partially destroyed "White House" in the far distance. We parked the truck on the far side of the house and looked around. Torn tents with bent beds could be seen spread on the ground. The rest of an operating table stood out grotesquely among the rubble. One month ago the English had made a direct hit on the field hospital and had caused tremendous damage. Thirty graves, including that of two medical technicians, were close by. At that time I could not understand why the English had singled out our field hospital for a direct attack. Until now the war had always had something of a gentlemanly-like behavior among enemies. Later on, I was told that the German Air Force had by accident hit an English field hospital during an attack and this was their retaliation.

The Arabs had plundered everything that seemed valuable to them. But they had not touched the medical supplies or the drugs. Even the sulfonamides were still there. We loaded the truck in record time. I again scanned the horizon for any suspicious activity. The tanks were still in the same place. No dust cloud was approaching us. The air was clear.

"Let's go, Karl." I tapped the driver on the shoulder to get him going. We put our goggles on and took off on our old trail toward the wadi, again making plenty of dust. Now in daylight, Karl hit the accelerator with full throttle, dancing around the many obstacles of the desert. Just before we entered the wadi, I saw two jeeps making a dust cloud, two miles away. Karl took the truck down into the wadi at neck-breaking speed and almost overturned the vehicle. He kept up his speed on the bottom of the gulch, not caring about the clouds we were making. I was sure that the English patrol was watching our progress in the wadi by just noticing our dust cloud. But I did not care. Just to keep going, was the only possibility of our race. It seemed the trip would last forever. Finally, we climbed to the rim of the wadi and now had only three more miles until we would reach the sentry. The final piece of desert was smoother, but we had to get around numerous obstacles again. We were now exposed to anyone who wanted to shoot at us. Karl kept the truck under control, dancing around all the brush and rocks. The last half mile was a straight racetrack. Would we make it? I looked again at the dust cloud of the English patrol which was now less than a mile from us. Our sentry came into sight waving with both arms. "What a relief," I told Karl, "we made it."

By now we were covered with fine desert dust from head to toe. Our faces were almost unrecognizable. The truck had taken the strain of the desert race well. I shook Karl's hand and gave it a healthy squeeze. "Your driving was a masterpiece," I told him. The sentry guided us through the barbed wire. "Hey, you made it!" he shouted at the speeding truck. To the relief of the company commander we again had medication and supplies to treat the onslaught of wounded soldiers for a few more weeks.

Two years later I received a short letter from my father in Berlin. I was at that time in a camp near Alva, Oklahoma. In his military Hospital he had treated a wounded medical officer who was with us in Bardia. He was evacuated with the hospital ship and ended up in my father's hospital. With some pride he reported that I was rewarded the Iron Cross for our trip through the desert. I could not have cared less about the news. The German situation was already on the downhill course when I received the letter behind barbed wire.

Dear Irmgard,

The last days and weeks have seemed like a nightmare. The only news which keeps us going is: Rommel is again on the attack. Will he get to us in time? The situation here looks bleak. The British Air Force comes 10 to 15 times daily and hits our defense line. The only well we have left is under constant artillery bombardment. The ruins in our town have been turned over again and again and reburied. Our operating room still has a roof. I suspect that they found out that we also had operated on a few English wounded prisoners, the few we have taken. One hundred English prisoners are being guarded right behind us. So the Tommy does not want to injure his own men. That is probably the reason why we still have a roof. Sometimes between operations I walk to the prisoners and try out a few words of my English with them. They have to sleep during the cold nights without protection and have to share the little food we can give them--quite a change from their army kitchen. But they are in great spirits because they assume that in a few days or weeks they will be free. I also notice that they have no lice. The English Army had issued them clothes which was impregnated with DDT. That had kept them free from body lice as long as they did not wash their shirts.

We all are infected with these animals. Most soldiers have not been able to wash their clothes for weeks. The 20 men from our field hospital unit have to work a 24-hour day now. The injured soldiers and officers are piling up. I had to give many of them morphine injections and promised them that they will get into the operating room later on. The surgeon has not slept for 20 hours; neither have I. Yesterday the surgeon gave me an order to give soldiers who have an abdominal gunshot wound with symptoms of a ruptured bowel a double dose of morphine and let them die in peace. There is no way that he can get to them. The fractured gunshot wounds and simpler cases take all his time. An Italian submarine is scheduled to enter the harbor tonight, so I have to close.

I love you. Will I ever see you again? I hope this letter will get to you somehow.........

On the seventh of December 1941 the news of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor came through the radio. The United States had entered the war! Hitler fulfilled his commitment with Japan and declared war on the United States. Germany now had the whole world to fight.

The continuous daily bombing had prevented our supplies being delivered by air. In fact, I had not seen more than 10 German planes during the last two months. Several attempts were made to drop food by parachute during the night. A JU 52 made several low-level passes and dropped a few boxes of food. With a gnawing, empty feeling in our stomachs we were constantly on the lookout for something edible. We dug up old moldy bread and dried-up Italian crackers we called "Armor Plates." We had dumped them previously as non edible with our garbage. They made a good bread soup. Sometimes we discovered old meat cans somebody had discarded months ago. A German submarine visited our harbor a few days ago. It had left us some food and had taken our mail. This had to be done in less than 30 minutes because the Tommy flew over the harbor to look for such a visit. The last time the submarine had taken off 20 minutes before the enemy dropped their bombs. I figured the bombs must have left at least a few dead fish floating on the surface. This could make a welcome change in our bread and soup diet.

"Roderick," I ask the operating room companion, the ten-semester medical student, "do you want to come with me and look for dead fish in the harbor?" "Hey, let's go. I have never been down there." was the answer. We both took the narrow road from the plateau leading 600 feet down to a pier where the submarine had landed the previous night. Sure enough, not far from the cliffs several fish were floating belly-up. It took only a few seconds to strip our clothes off and plunge into the cold ocean. Triumphantly we came back with three good-sized fish. They made a great addition to our scanty meals. I saw a chance to exploit the situation further. With four men we built a raft which from an aerial view gave the impression of a submarine. At night, with the moon shining, we pulled the raft with a several-hundred-foot-long line from a cave into the water. A crew on the opposite side of the harbor helped manipulate the raft. It did not take long until we heard a British plane flying over the harbor looking for a submarine. While we were safely in the cave, the pilot dropped a magnesium parachute and discovered the makeshift raft. Within minutes he came in a low level flight across the rim and dropped three bombs. It was a good thing he could not hear us shouting,"hurrah!" In the first morning light we sent two men down to look for floating fish. Eight large and several small fish were our first harvest. The crew manipulated the raft for several nights until a direct hit broke up the whole contraption. There was enough material to rebuild a new raft. We continued the game for one week until the British got wise and either doubted the nightly visits of a submarine, or they had discovered our decoy. We had to go back to our old routine of digging up old cans of meat. After cooking them for several hours and mixing them with dried potatoes and moldy bread, this resulted in an edible meal. One day I saw the colonel's dog looking for food. The dog was still in a good nutritional state. I wondered who was feeding the animal. I knew the Koreans and Chinese consider dog meat a delicacy. Our own weight was shrinking fast, so I decided the day before Christmas that the eight men, who worked around the clock in the operating room, should have a decent meal. I don't know why the colonel was so careless, not to have the dog on a leash. Since I was chosen to end the dog's life, I went about this bloody business and threw the meat into our large pot. The smell of freshly cooked meat could not be hidden. At times the colonel had visited our area. He knew we were especially ingenious when it came to food. He had already missed his dog and assumed it must have been eaten by somebody. Driven by the good smell of our cooking, he looked suspiciously into our pot with lots of meat. We offered him a dish of our soup, showing him a half dozen cans of "Alter Mann." We assured him that we had discovered six cans recently and that this meal was the result. He consumed his sample with great delight.

Dear Irmgard,

Another submarine is scheduled to dock for a few minutes on the 25th. So I hope to get a few lines together. Six days ago an Italian Red Cross ship entered our harbor during the night with all the lights shining, so the English Navy let them through. 20 medics, and that is all that is left of us, had their work cut out. We had 350 wounded soldiers lying in the ruins around us. I had bandaged almost everybody at least once during the last week. Some of them had casts to immobilize their gunshot wounds, some had amputations, some were still filled with grenade splinters and some had stepped on a mine and lost parts of a limb. Quite a few had third degree burns trying to get out of a tank hit by an antitank gun grenade. Everybody had lice crawling over them, including me. The bandages were soaked with dried-up blood, and while we were dressing them pus ran out with a penetrating smell. Many dressings and casts were full of maggots. Nobody had had a chance to wash himself for weeks. I had to give morphine injections right through the clothing to keep up with all the cries for pain medications. What a relief it was that we could bring all these men down to the ship for adequate medical care. It was a heartbreaking separation. We had done our very best day and night to keep them alive. They knew when we carried them down to the ship that they were heading home to Germany. But we had to carry on into an uncertain future. The ship's crew followed strict orders not to furnish us with supplies in order to keep their neutrality. The Italian crew had barely time to stuff a few cans of meat and oranges into our pockets. I joked with one of the wounded soldiers as I rode down on a truck with him to the ship. He had lost one testicle by an antitank bullet. I had stopped his hemorrhage by putting his scrotum pieces together with a safety pin until he could, after hours of waiting, be wheeled into surgery. "Be careful with the one you have left," I told him as the ship's crew took him aboard. "Let me know if it still works." Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. I hope I can write to you once more before the next submarine comes, if it comes. Today our ruins are filling fast with newly wounded .....

Dear Irmgard,

During the last two days English artillery has been pounding us without stop. The ruins of this small city shake with every hit. Our boys in the ditches had to retreat again because fewer and fewer soldiers are available to man the perimeter. Some of us still hope that Rommel will get here soon enough to relieve us, but I can see the end coming closer with every day.

The trip to the English prisoner compound right behind us convinced me that they count on being freed within the next few days. I have no more film for my Leica. I wrapped it carefully and buried it. Some day in the far future I might come back here and retrieve it, if I get through the next few days alive. We operated all Christmas Day. I asked to be relieved for a couple of hours because I had planned to cook at least one decent meal for the 20 of us. With some cornmeal, several cans of "Alter Mann" and old dried potatoes I produced an edible meal. I pulled my still existing accordion out and started playing Christmas songs. Our emaciated group started singing with me, first timidly but then we sang with full force. We did not want the exploding artillery grenades to drown out our singing. Later on, we went to each wounded soldier. They were either lying on a stretcher or on straw. Our "Silent Night" accompanied by my accordion let a little Christmas spirit help them forget their dreadful situation. We had a few candles left and lit them next to each patient. I hope this letter and the last Leica film will find a way to you.....

I had dragged my accordion all the way to Bardia. I always found some helpful soldiers who were eager to carry the instrument from place to place and from camp to camp, so long as I would make music for them. That was quite often. I knew that I either had to destroy the instrument or leave it here, so an English soldier could give the same pleasure to his comrades. I decided to leave the accordion behind in the operating room.

The next few days were filled with continuous work in the operating room. The lineup of wounded soldiers did not let up. I had had no chance to shave for two weeks. Water got more scarce everyday because the English artillery now kept our well under steady barrage. No longer had a submarine dared to enter the harbor. Not a single German airplane had showed itself in the sky for two weeks. The sky was swarming with English planes that attacked every moving person or truck. Finally, during the night from December 31st to January 1st we surrendered. The first thing the British did was free their prisoners. Later on, an English medical officer came and assessed the situation. He noticed that we had two English soldiers among our wounded. An ambulance came and picked them up. Our surgeon, who spoke a few words of English, tried to make a suggestion. The English officer cut him short and told him bluntly to keep his mouth shut. There was no question as to who was in charge here. Soon many ambulances arrived and carried our wounded to the next field hospital. The officers were separated from us and we were herded into an area outside the city. There were only five hundred fifty of us left. Our captivity had begun.