THROUGH WURTEMBERG TO THE FRONTIER
Twelfth night.—Owing to a village in front of us, we had to make a late start. It was nearly 10.30 before we marched through without incident. Later on that night, between 1 and 2 a.m., we crossed the Iller at the large town of Illertissen, and though there were many street lamps burning, we met no one. This night's march and the next one were very weary marches for me, as my feet hurt me most abominably. Buckley was perfectly splendid, and though he must have been very tired, he was cheerful and encouraging the whole time. He allowed me to grumble, and did nearly all the dirty work, the little extra bits of exertion, which mean so much. We both of us found walking uphill rather a severe strain, even though the gradient was slight; still, we kept at it with very few rests all night. Early in the night we stole some potatoes and peeled and munched them as we marched.
About this time we took to singing as we marched. Singing is, perhaps, rather a grandiloquent term for the noise—something between a hum and a moan—which we made. However, it seemed to help us along. Buckley taught me some remarkable nursery rhymes. One was about Jonah in the whale's belly, I remember; and we sang these and a few hymn tunes which we both happened to know. There was no danger in this—the sound of our feet on the road could be heard much farther than the song, and no one could possibly have recognized the words as English.
After collecting a good supply of potatoes, we found a comfortable place to hide in some small fir trees and heather at the edge of a wood.
For some hours we were made rather miserable by a heavy shower of rain, but when the sun came out towards midday we soon dried ourselves, and then, as usual, lay gasping and panting for the rest of the day. In undergrowth it is hard to find shade from a sun which is almost directly overhead. Our day's ration of water was very small, and I am sure that lying in the sun for eight or ten hours took a lot of strength out of us. I know that we started each night's march parched with thirst. I was, at this time, able to make a fairly accurate calculation of the time it would take us to reach the frontier, and found it necessary to cut down our rations once more. We hoped to make this up by eating largely of potatoes, for it was only too obvious that both of us were becoming weaker for the want of food. Food—that is to say, sausages, eggs, beef, and hot coffee—was a barred subject between us, but I remember thinking of several distinct occasions on which I had refused second helpings in pre-war days, and wondering how I could have been such a fool. We realized now that it would be necessary to lose no time at all if we were to reach the frontier before we starved.
Thirteenth Night.—Accordingly, the next night we walked through the village ahead of us at an earlier hour than that at which we usually entered villages. We saw and were seen by several people, but we walked at a good steady pace, when necessary talking to each other in German, and were past before they had had time to consider whether we looked a queer pair. We must have looked pretty good ruffians, as we had not washed or shaved, and had been in the open for close on a fortnight. About 3.30 a.m. we came to the large town of Biberach, and in the outskirts of the town we climbed down to the embankment from a bridge over the railway, and then followed the railway in a southwest direction till nearly 5 a.m. We lay up in a small copse about 60 by 40 yards, at the side of the railway. It proved to be a damp, midgy, and unpleasant spot, but we were undisturbed all day.
Fourteenth Night.—The next night we made an early start, walking parallel with the railway, on which we considered it dangerous to walk before 10.45, across some bare cultivated land, and thereby gained half an hour. For the rest of the night we followed the railway, passing through Aulendorf and Althausen. This railway runs east and west and is some 30 miles from Lake Constance. From here, for the first time, we caught sight of the mountains of Switzerland on the far side of the lake. A great thunderstorm was going on somewhere over there, and their snowy peaks were lit up continually by summer lightning. I suggested, though I never meant it seriously, that we should cut south and try and cross or get round the east end of the lake. Buckley was all for the Swiss border, and though we argued the pros and cons for a bit, we neither had the slightest doubt that Riedheim, where we eventually crossed, was the place to go for. Along the railway at intervals of 2 or 3 kilometres were small houses, inhabited apparently by guardians of the line, and always by dogs. Sometimes we could steal by without arousing attention, but usually the dogs barked whilst we were passing and for ten minutes after we had passed. I have never really liked dogs since—the brutes.
Once a man with a dog, and what looked like a gun, came out after us and chased us for a bit, but it was all in the right direction, and he soon gave it up. Once or twice men called after us—to which we answered "Guten Abend," and marched on. One of these threw open a window as we were passing, and asked us who we were and where we were going—"Nach Pfullendorf? Gerade aus," I called back. "All right," he shouted, "there are so many escaping people (Flülingen) these days that one has to keep a lookout. Guten Abend." "Guten Abend," we shouted, and marched on.
Though, unfortunately, we were unable to find potatoes that night, we were so cheered by the sight of Switzerland, the promised land, and by our tactful methods with the watchmen, that we made wonderful progress. Unfortunately a bit of my map of that railway was missing. I thought the gap was about 10 kilometres, but it turned out to be nearer 20. We had hoped to pass Pfullendorf that night, but did not do so. When we got into our excellent hiding-place at the side of the railway, careful measurements on the map showed us that it would be quite impossible to cross the frontier on the next night, as we had at one time hoped to do. We intended to get within 10 or 15 kilometres of the frontier the next night, and cross the night following. We did not wish to lie up close to the frontier, as we knew from other prisoners that the woods close by were searched daily for escaping prisoners. During the day, which was most pleasant, we once more divided our rations to last two more days. It was a pretty small two-day ration for two men already weak from hunger.
Our eagerness to get on, and the unpopulated country in which we were, induced us to start walking at a still earlier hour the next night.