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The Last Train

The third train – the one we were on – was the last to leave Belsen, on 10 April 1945, composed of passenger coaches and cattle trucks. It travelled in a northerly direction, taking the remnants of the so-called privileged prisoners from the Star Camp: some 2,500 people out of the original 4,000; the others had died. Another 500 unfortunate “Exchange Jews” would not survive the train journey and the Liberation.

On the day we left, the British army was just 20 miles from Belsen. We missed being liberated by this short distance. Five days later, on 15 April 1945, the British army liberated the camp, but our train had travelled some 25 miles north towards a town called Lüneburg. And this became the pattern of our train journey; we slowly moved forward ahead of the British army. We had SS guards on the train, but no food at all.

Our train was attacked by Allied planes on several occasions because the Germans had attached military equipment to the back of our train. Whenever we had an air attack, the train would stop and we were allowed off. We would lie in the fields and watch the Allied planes swoop down and attack the train. It was very exciting, but we did not feel in danger. On the contrary, whilst experiencing the air attacks, we would look for food because we had absolutely nothing to eat on the train.

Food

We collected anything that looked edible, such as grass, leaves and raw potatoes. After the air attacks, we carried our “food” onto the train. We lit fires on the train platforms and cooked our grass, leaves and potatoes for our meals. That is how we lived on the train as we slowly moved across Germany in an easterly direction.

We passed through Berlin on 19 April 1945, just before the Russian army got there and just before Hitler committed suicide in his bunker. We remembered that we used to live in Berlin ten years before, but it was not a happy home-coming. We saw Berlin in ruins, bombed, flattened, destroyed, and in flames, but we felt no pity for the German population. We saw schoolboys dressed in military uniforms, ready to defend the German capital. We fancied our chances of survival better than theirs.

As the Russian army approached from the east, our train turned in a southerly direction, and we continued our nomadic life: whenever the train stopped, we collected food.

Unfortunately, the typhus epidemic never left us and many dear colleagues died during the journey. There were regular burial ceremonies every day by the side of the railway track.

Eventually, on 23 April 1945, after we had been on the train for two weeks – but travelled only about 500 miles – we woke up in the morning and noticed that the SS guards had disappeared. And when we looked out into the distance, we could see soldiers on horses. They were Russian Cossacks from the Red Army and we were liberated; we were free...

Liberation

Liberation was a massive anti-climax. There was no hugging, no kissing, no laughing or singing, not even hand-shaking or dancing. Most of us had not been “free” for five years, since the German occupation of Holland in May 1940. We were in no mood and in no condition to celebrate. Perhaps surprise, relief and excitement best describe our feelings when we realized that we had finally been liberated.

The Russians wanted to know who we were. This was quite difficult to explain because we could not speak Russian and the Russians could not speak Dutch, the language we spoke on the train. And we did not dare to speak German in case they thought we were Germans and might shoot us. Eventually the Russians understood that we were on their side and against the Germans, and they let us loose.

Not surprisingly, we were obsessed with food – or rather the lack of food – after more than a year in Belsen. We all went hunting for food. Paul collected loads of grass, leaves and potatoes, as usual, for everyone on the train, because many people were ill and could not forage for themselves. But Rudi and his friends were much more enterprising: they went into a nearby German village called Tröbitz, entered the shops and helped themselves. If they encountered any trouble, they got a Russian soldier to sort it out.

They came back to the train with bread, butter, milk and honey. They were not impressed with Paul’s grass and told him to do better next day!

'Organising'

On the next morning, we all went off hunting for food again and Paul found an abandoned factory where they made tubes of cheese paste, and he also found a wheelbarrow. He came back to the train with this great, big wheelbarrow, full of tubes of cheese paste for everyone on the train.

He thought he had done well this time. But Rudi and his friends went back to the German village and this time they went into the German homes, into their cellars where they kept their goodies, and they came back with preserves of meat, vegetables, fruit and gateaux. They were not impressed with Paul’s cheese paste! They had also acquired watches and radios and Rudi had a motorbike; “organising” we called it.

Rudi and his friends had appreciated the new situation much quicker than Paul, who blames his poor performance on his poor state of health. His body, and especially his legs, were very bloated and swollen and he had some difficulty moving around. Apparently this condition, called oedema, is caused by an excess of fluids in the tissues, in his case due to severe malnutrition. It often precedes death…. Paul’s condition actually got worse because the next day he and Rudi had spots all over their bodies.

It was typhus and we were both taken to a Russian army hospital in a nearby town called Riesa with high temperatures, fever, delirium and all the other symptoms of typhus. But we must have received very good treatment from the Russian doctors and nurses because we both survived, and a few weeks later were ready to leave the Russian army hospital.

The war was over

We then found out that the war was over: Germany had been divided up into four parts: British, French, American and Russian, and we were in the Russian zone. We explained to the Russians that we wanted to return to Holland, and as a first step we were transported to Leipzig, which was in the American zone. We had to explain to the Americans who we were, where we came from and where we wanted to go. It was all quite difficult; we did not have much paperwork or documentation, but eventually the Americans agreed to repatriate us back to Holland.

We were put onto an open truck which would take us to a railway station, and from there a train would take us to Holland (and Belgium and France for other survivors). Just as we went out of this camp in Leipzig, another open truck came into the camp with lots of little children on board, including our sister Eve.

Read part three of The Last Train from Belsen: