One day, I was watching an S.S. column moving towards the far corner of the fence. Suddenly, a lone Allied plane approached us as if from nowhere - probably looking for something worthwhile to hit! He must have come from the coastal area and been scanning these wild parts. He now quickly dropped a couple of bombs damaging the fence. At this point, the S.S. were nowhere to be seen - it was as if they had disappeared into thin air!
No prisoner had ever been seen in that corner of the camp. At this point, the temptation to make an escape was great as it appeared to be a good spot from which to make a quick getaway. However, I decided not to do anything and after this incident, the two criminals or "greens", found me coming out of the block hut, a bit higher up than when they had last seen me and now covered in fodder - they found this very amusing!
The time of arrival of prisoners at Buchenwald obviously had a big impact on their rate of survival. In the month of August, a couple of new arrivals from my home town of Ostend had just been caught in the bombings. Both were members of the White Brigade in Belgium. One of them was a well known goalkeeper and the other one his mate.
The former goalkeeper had been wounded by shrapnel during the bombings. He had also risked the run towards the S.S. barricade, located in the bushes and in the process had been shot. His situation was very similar to when I had been shot by the S.S., the bullet had passed his hip bone and luckily was just a flesh wound.
In comparison to me, he had been a relative newcomer to the camp. Consequently, his wound had healed much more quickly than mine, very likely because I had been in camps for a much longer time and was therefore very much more under-nourished and so it took longer for my wound to heal.
It was at this time that we laid our hands on special hostage letters or "shultzhaffling".....
To be continued ....
No prisoner had ever been seen in that corner of the camp. At this point, the temptation to make an escape was great as it appeared to be a good spot from which to make a quick getaway. However, I decided not to do anything and after this incident, the two criminals or "greens", found me coming out of the block hut, a bit higher up than when they had last seen me and now covered in fodder - they found this very amusing!
The time of arrival of prisoners at Buchenwald obviously had a big impact on their rate of survival. In the month of August, a couple of new arrivals from my home town of Ostend had just been caught in the bombings. Both were members of the White Brigade in Belgium. One of them was a well known goalkeeper and the other one his mate.
The former goalkeeper had been wounded by shrapnel during the bombings. He had also risked the run towards the S.S. barricade, located in the bushes and in the process had been shot. His situation was very similar to when I had been shot by the S.S., the bullet had passed his hip bone and luckily was just a flesh wound.
In comparison to me, he had been a relative newcomer to the camp. Consequently, his wound had healed much more quickly than mine, very likely because I had been in camps for a much longer time and was therefore very much more under-nourished and so it took longer for my wound to heal.
It was at this time that we laid our hands on special hostage letters or "shultzhaffling".....
To be continued ....
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