����ý

We knew two quite well, and neither of them wanted to be in the war. One was Austrian. He’d been the village postman, his rifle was practically as big as him, and he didn’t want to be in the war.The other one was a farmer, he had children, and I remember him coming back from leave, I didn’t know why at the time, but my mother told me later. He came to us and he was crying his eyes out, and my mother asked what was wrong, you know, as much as she could understand what was wrong. His boy was in the Hitler Youth, and he had been saying that the war was over, and things against the war, and his son turned up and said he would report him if he didn’t stop talking like that, and it broke his heart.
They used to bring us little things, well, what they could, they used to try and get sweets for me and things like that.
Another time he was going back for Christmas leave and I had a little double jointed doll, and he happened to say, or make my mother to understand he had nothing to give his little girl. My mother spoke to me and said would I let him have it. I said “All right then” and he came back with a leg of ham, a big leg of ham, he brought us back when he came back from the farm. As I say they did not want to be in the war, these two in particular.

Although it was rather funny, because the Austrian did not trust the German, well, when I say didn’t trust him, they were friends, but we used to get leaflets dropped that were supposed to be for the Germans to read. By rights you weren’t allowed to pick them up, but they used to fall on the ….. I don’t know, at the time when we lived at the bank they hadn’t built it up like its built up now. We had the top two floors and then as I say there was the accountant’s office underneath our flat, which had a view out onto what we used to call the ‘Leads’. It was a lead roof and you could go out and stand there. That was the only place I had to play, it was like a big balcony. Of course they dropped there, and we used to pick them up and the little Austrian used to translate them, but my mother had to keep the other one occupied while he translated them for my father. He used to say, “You are as far as this…., you’re winning. You’re winning the war, you’re not where they say you are”. He would show us our position on the map, but he always used to make sure that Hans, who was the German, was occupied by my mother chatting to him, then he would go with my father and tell the true story.
JEAN BUDDEN
LIVING WITH THE GERMANS - The good……

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.