Soldiers‘ Letters

When I write, I always try to get into the minds of my characters as much as possible. In order to be able to describe plausibly how they act, I have to and want to understand why they act the way they do, how they see the world around them, what they think and feel. This is difficult when dealing with historical epochs that have been viewed and analyzed so often and in detail from today’s perspective that I have to be very careful not to let today’s perspective influence what I write. It becomes almost impossible with motivations that are diametrically opposed to my own. Young people who fell for the Nazi dictatorship back then, but whose motivation cannot simply be explained by the stupid primitiveness of many (then and today) right-wing supporters. How to explain that? This was a topic on which I read a lot, personal testimonies, diaries; where I tried to briefly ignore today’s knowledge. My readers tell me that I succeeded well in explaining the different motivations of the characters in my books who joined the Nazis. I’m happy about that, because it wasn’t easy.

Another topic that I approached quite cautiously was the Wehrmacht soldiers. It has by now been proven that the Wehrmacht was involved in brutal crimes and did not “just” fight in a war (which in that war cannot be described as “just”). There were soldiers who lived out their lowest instincts and so I didn’t want to trivialize that. On the other hand, there were also many who didn’t want to fight, who wanted to lead their normal family lives and just survive. One of my grandfathers, who leaned towards the Social Democrats politically, was drafted when he was just 19 and would have been happy to do without that. Adolescents aged sixteen and seventeen were sent from school to the Eastern Front and experienced the horrors of Stalingrad. I think it is important to take both sides into account and have deliberately described different types of Wehrmacht soldiers in “Life’s Labyrinthine Course ”:

The fanatic who joins the Waffen-SS out of conviction, finds the heinous crimes justified and doesn’t change his mind even after the war. (Excerpt from one of his letters: He made it clear to them that our work, although often unpleasant and downright unsavory, is necessary, even if it is not as publicly applauded as the Wehrmacht’s victories. It is unbelievable how mollycoddled many of the young fellows are when it comes to doing what is necessary to secure and strengthen our race.)

The father of a family who goes to war because he has to and sees it as an interruption to his actual life, who painfully misses his wife, children and work and who also becomes increasingly worried about the family as the war progresses. Who has to do things in war that go against his conscience and his understanding of decency, who refuses to do other things and knows enough about the crimes committed in the name of dictatorship to know what the end of the war will bring. (He can hardly make it understandable to those at home what is happening in the East: I’ll also put a bullet into a partisan’s skull if I’m ordered to, it’s just part of the hideous mutual slaughter of war, even if it makes me despise myself. But I draw the line when it goes completely beyond decency and honor. Some officers don’t like this and it affects the chance of promotions, but I don’t mind repeating it, I’m not interested. I don’t consider murdering women and children to be an act of duty and I will never stoop to that.)

The man who has just become an adult, grew up under the dictatorship and was seduced by propaganda from childhood. Who then wakes up after witnessing the mass shootings in the East, breaks down and realizes which murderous regime he served with naive enthusiasm. Who will ultimately be crushed by this very regime because he has a conscience. (He collapses while on leave from the front:Do you think I’m making things like that up? And how could one even come up with something like that! After that first time, I really considered putting a bullet into my head, I didn’t want to think anymore, I didn’t want to be anymore. They told me you get used to it, but you don’t. And I don’t want to! What kind of creature are you when you get used to something like that!)

Here, too, I read intensively to understand the thoughts, motivations and fears of these men. I also wanted to know what they knew, how they dealt with this knowledge, how dangerous it was to refuse some things. The last questions in particular were difficult to answer. There are few reports on this and they are sometimes contradictory. Of course, no general statement can be made about all Wehrmacht soldiers. When it came to facts, I preferred to stick to history books; when it came to thoughts and feelings, I preferred to stick to contemporary witness documents. A source that was not only informative but also interesting was the soldiers‘ letters, of which you can find many on the internet. There are numerous articles in which excerpts from soldiers‘ letters can be read, and I found plenty of soldiers‘ letter from Stalingrad especially. These letters touched me very much. There are many farewell letters from men who knew that they were being unscrupulously sacrificed and faced a cruel fate. Given the hopelessness of their situation, they were more open and no longer cared about censorship, because what else did they have to fear? Therefore these letter offer unusually honest and shocking insights. (Some of these honest letters were not even delivered by the dictatorship, so that the relatives were withheld the farewell greetings and last signs of life from their husbands, fathers, brothers and sons). I can recommend anyone interested in history to do an internet search for soldiers‘ letters from Stalingrad, but I also admit that these letters and fates in particular have weighed heavily on my heart. It was one of the most painful topics to research in my books.

There is a German website that has digitalized countless letter, an amazing source of information. I spent hours on this website. It was an interesting kaleidoscope of the thoughts of soldiers and those left at home. There were those who showed frightening cold-heartedness in the face of the crimes committed; one soldier literally “reassured” his wife that everything was being cleaned up properly in the East. There are fewer critical voices, which is understandable given the censorship. Sometimes there are hints between the lines and I would have been interested to know what these couples discussed while the husband was on leave from the front. I was surprised at how openly some couples corresponded – our grandparents‘ generation was clearly not uptight! Here the censorship does not seem to have bothered the couples in love and it is a very refreshing look into a private side that we rarely experience from previous generations.

And so these soldiers‘ letters from various wars, just like the letters between East and West Germany after the war, are better than many history books, offering exactly this view of the real, normal people who experience and have to survive the history orchestrated by those in power.

I can only express my respect to the museum foundation, which digitized and sorted these letters through such complex and lengthy work and thus created an almost unique reference value.