They smelled the camp before they saw it. They were a 6 man recon patrol in a woods in rural Southern Germany, part of the leading edge of American forces in that region. It was an warmish spring morning, some trees were leafing out and the birds were singing. The patrol had been uneventful until they began to smell something and the sergeant raised his hand for everyone to halt. They listened and scanned in front of them for a bit and he motioned for them to move on. They saw a break in the trees and as they approached they began to see an encampment surrounded by tall barbed wire fencing with wooden guard towers. They dropped down onto a knee and took it all in, looking for Germans but saw none. What the hell is this? whispered a private. They could see people inside but not a guard in sight. Let’s take a closer look said the Sarge and they quietly stood up, spread out and began walking towards the camp. They noticed that the main gate was chained shut which they cut open with a bolt cutter. As they opened the gate, some people inside began to take notice while others wandered around. The odor was overwhelming and the patrol soon saw piles of rotting corpses on the grounds. On either side of a main path were makeshift wooden huts. At one point, they just stood, dazed by the sight. Finally the Sarge said to one of the privates run back to camp as fast as you can, find the captain and get him up here. As the kid left, the rest of the patrol walked in. They noticed that the people were made up entirely of women and girls. They appeared to be inmates of some kind, wearing striped clothing, with numbers and yellow stars of David sewn on their tops They were hollow-eyed, emaciated and filthy. One woman approached one of the squad and upon seeing their uniforms were not German, took his hand and fell to her knees breaking into tears. The patrol continued to walk further into the camp and at one point a corporal looked inside one of the huts. There were wood bunks with women and girls on them, all starving, all filthy. It appeared some bunks contained dead women. Outside, more inmates were coming over to the squad, crying, making gestures begging for food waving metal cups in their hands. The Sarge ordered the patrol to back off towards the gate and wait for reinforcements. He had no idea what to do-there was nothing in his training for this.
The Captain soon arrived with most of the company-about 150 men with more on the way. He had talked with Division about how to proceed and announced to his men: give the people water but no food as their systems could not handle it due to starvation. Squads were organized to go hut to hut and try and help people out if they could. Many of the men were hardened paratroopers who had fought their way across France into Germany and had seen the horrors of combat. This was something different: these were civilians, women and children.
In one of the huts lying on a bunk, a private found a young girl, head shaved, emaciated but with beautiful blue eyes. She reached out to him and he helped her off the bunk. She could not walk so he carried her. She is as light as a feather he thought. They worked their way through the camp, which by now was bustling with activity. As they walked, she lifted her head towards the sun and pointed at it, smiling. He thought that he needed to get her out of there, away from this place of death. They quietly moved out of the camp to the woods where it was quieter. He found a nice big tree on an edge of a clearing and sat down, with his back to the trunk. The day had warmed and the sun was streaming down through the canopy of branches. He propped her up and offered her a sip of water from his canteen which she took. He was careful not to give her too much. She finished, wiped her mouth with a dirty hand, smiled at him and sighed. She moved her arm around him and snuggled close. The birds were quite active and the private noticed squirrels busily moving up and down the surrounding trees. It reminded him of back home in upstate New York and thoughts of his life there streamed through his mind. His attention returned to the girl as she had gone limp. He gently moved her hand and then her head but she did not respond. He quietly wept. After all he had seen and done since Normandy, witnessing close friends blown apart, killing men in close combat-this young girl’s death had broken him.
After a bit, he slid her gently to the ground and sat for a while, gathering himself. Time had stood still and he had no idea how long he had been away from his unit. Never mind, he thought, there was something that had to be done. He rose, picked up his shovel from his pack and began to dig a hole. He was about halfway done when he heard someone calling his name. It was a couple of guys from his recon group. When they walked up, their annoyance turned to silence. The private didn’t stop digging. Give me a hand here fellas he said and without a word they did and finished quickly. He gently moved the girl into the hole, crossing her tiny arms across her chest. He walked over to a patch of blooming wild violets nearby, picked out several stems and placed them in her hands. He looked up. I want the sun to be on her face, always he said to his buddies and they began to shovel dirt on top of her. When they finished, one placed a large rock they had unearthed on the head of the grave. I heard Jewish people put stones on their graves he said and they stood for a moment. They noticed that the woods had gone quiet followed by a soft, single breeze. Thanks, fellas finally said the private. She deserved more than to be buried in a unmarked mass grave. Now, we have the living to tend to. He grabbed his pack and the three men walked back to the camp.
The private survived the war and returned to his family and home in upstate New York. He went to school on the GI Bill and earned a degree in accounting. He found a job, fell in love, married and raised a family. He never talked about the war although every Spring, his wife noticed there would be a period where he would be quieter than normal. On a nice weekend day, he would be gone for hours in the woods on their property, never explaining his absence. He wasn’t a hunter, in fact, he had never touched a gun since the war. She would tell her girlfriends that her husband was on one of his “walkabouts” but in her heart she knew it had something to do with his time in Europe.
One late Winter day, 55 years after the liberation of the camp, he announced to his family that he was going to take a trip to Germany. They were quite surprised as he had never been much of a traveler unlike his wife and children who loved to go on vacations and explore new places. He simply told them there was something he needed to do. His family protested about him going alone but he pointed out that despite being in his early 70’s, he was pretty healthy, mobile and stubborn.
Recently, thanks to the new Internet, he had been researching about the camp. He discovered its name, precise location and history but little more. The experience with the girl had always stayed with him and he wanted to return to the camp and visit her before he died. He timed his arrival to around the date he and his buddies had discovered the camp. The journey was simple and fairly direct. He rented a car and drove to the site on a beautiful Spring day much like the one years before. The camp was a minor one in the industrial killing system the Nazis had installed. There was a parking lot and a plaque outside of the main gate. He was the only one there.
He got his bearings, hitched up his knapsack over one shoulder and walked to the woods which seemed unchanged since he was last there. The trees had begun to leaf, the birds and squirrels were busy at their work of finding food. Twenty minutes later, he began to worry about his memory of the place. He stopped and at looked up at the cloudless, azure sky and closed his eyes. The woodland creatures all went quiet and a slight wind picked up. As he opened his eyes again and moved his gaze down, he saw The Tree about 30 yards away. As he approached, a sight stopped him in his tracks: at the base of the tree was a large colony of blooming violets with a large rock in the middle. Those few sprigs he had put into her hands had managed to propagate and spread over the years. His eyes welled up and he sat beside the flowers and began to talk. It poured out of him-his life since the war, how her memory had always remained with him, how sad he has been to never had known her name or family. No one to tell that she was here and that in the final moments of her life, she had known freedom.
Finally he was done, all that he had kept inside all these years, expelled. He stood up and reached into his knapsack. He pulled out a rock, one of the first he had come across digging his garden back home and had saved. He placed it next to hers. A part of myself, he thought, and murmured so you won’t ever be alone. He sighed, blew a kiss at the grave, turned and headed back home.
