Chemnitz contemporary witnesses: Eberhard Preuß

Bombs fell on Chemnitz at midday on 5 March, destroying our house at Kreherstraße 114. We, my parents, my brother and I, survived the attack in the air-raid shelter of the Diesterweg School. We picked a few relatively undamaged belongings out of the rubble, put them on two handcarts and took them through the burning streets of Gablenz to our grandmother's house at Sonnenstraße 78, where we were able to find temporary accommodation.

Grandma's cosy, warm kitchen was a hive of activity. In addition to the energetic Uncle Willy, Aunt Ella and Uncle Alfred, who was nicknamed Zietenhusar because he had once served as a hussar in the Zieten regiment, lived with her at the time. Next to my mum and my brother, a few curious members of the household stood around chatting eagerly about the day's events.

Tired and exhausted, we sat down at the table. I was just about to start when the pre-alarm sounded. We hurriedly wolfed down a few bites and hurried out into the courtyard to quickly unload the handcarts. Even as we were untying the ropes, the sirens began to wail. From bitter experience, we knew only too well what to expect in the next few minutes. And we could already hear the distant rumble of aeroplanes.

We hurried into the cellar and looked for a safe place under the mighty barrel vault in the dark corridor.

We had barely settled in when the humming sound began to swell dangerously. We waited cautiously for the bombs, but nothing happened. Instead, it became noticeably brighter outside. We looked through a basement window and stared in horror at a huge "Christmas tree" hovering diagonally above us.

Its bright magnesium light almost made daylight. During night attacks, it was customary to mark and illuminate the target area with several of these giant flares. Seconds later, all hell broke loose. It was to last for fifty minutes, the bursting and crashing without pause, punctuated by the eerie howling of the falling bombs, sometimes very close, then more distant again.

At first you sit silently and wait for the direct hit and the imminent end, almost surrendering. But as the minutes tick by restlessly, fear and hope alternate, almost driving you mad.

The longer the attack lasts, the louder the prayers and moans of the tormented people sound. "Dear God, let us get away once more! I'd rather starve for years!" The whole house shakes when the bomb hits close by. I look up at the ceiling every time, shyly. Would it hold? Will we get out of here or will we be buried alive by the falling rubble or crushed in seconds? My whole body is shaking as if I'm in a fever. This is not how we had imagined the war would be.

After about half an hour had passed, a strange transformation took place in me, as I had often felt before, although not under such gruesome circumstances. I became completely calm and indifferent, I literally challenged my fate. I didn't want it to hit me cowering in fear, but bravely and with my head held high. I stood up, stretched myself and became an interested spectator. I didn't want to play the hero. That would have been downright ridiculous in this situation. I simply endured the noise and now looked around almost curiously. Sitting opposite me was a young girl who often whispered to her mum sitting next to her, or did it just seem that way with the constant noise? Was she even talking loudly? She bumped her tongue a little.

As the noise of the planes attacking in waves rose and fell almost regularly, there was constant movement in our rows. Hopeful looking up alternated with convulsive crouching. Only the Meischner couple behaved differently. When the detonations came closer, they both disappeared under the vault of their cellar entrance, only to reappear just as regularly, like weathermen, when the noise subsided. Next to both of them, separated only by a wall, was the slurry pit, filled to the brim with our fully loaded handcarts. I often peered through a nearby cellar window. The sky was a bright red colour, flickering with the flashes of bursting bombs. The younger men in the house were standing by the cellar stairs, ready to intervene at a moment's notice. Our two Willys, the energetic one and the Czech, hurried upstairs between the waves of attacks and checked the chambers for any incendiary bombs that might have hit them.

Suddenly Mrs Kleeberg missed our Uncle Alfred, the Zietenhusar. Where had he gone? Nobody had noticed yet. They started looking for him and finally found him in his bed. He couldn't be brought out with the best will in the world, defending himself with the plausible argument that he could die much more comfortably in his bed than in the cold cellar. The Kleeberg woman shouted in vain and the bombs continued to fall, non-stop. The moaning and wailing grew louder and louder. Better hunger and hardship, but no more bombs! How often it came out of the trembling lips and how quickly it was forgotten when hunger and hardship really arrived later.

Suddenly it was quiet. We looked at each other and listened intently. Was it supposed to be over? Hope arose in us again. The younger men entered the courtyard first. We heard them talking loudly outside. As nothing was happening, we followed with the utmost caution. I looked up at the sky and was startled. Was this supposed to be true? Bright as day and pale pink, it arched over the burning city.

Only one house in our neighbourhood was on fire, initially only in the roof trusses. From the outskirts, a few figures bravely tried to approach the source of the fire. They used grappling hooks to knock down the burning beams. After a short time, only a few flames flickered out. Cries rang out from courtyard to courtyard: "Everything into the cellars! Now they're coming with explosive bombs, just like in Dresden!" Terrified, we forced our way back into the shelters, but we remained quiet. We waited in silent surrender for the all-clear, but no siren would release us. We listened in vain in the semi-darkness of the cellar. Who was talking at the back? Or was it coming from outside? We looked at each other questioningly. And in the middle of the tense silence, the Zietenhusar called down from the stairs: "Come out, come on, quick!"

So he had crawled out of his bed after all.

Hesitantly at first, then more and more urgently, we all stepped outside the front door and stared in horror at a seemingly endless mass of people hurrying past us, fleeing from the burning city centre, gesticulating, talking, shouting, often only scantily clad or wearing blankets.They were often only scantily clad or wrapped in blankets, gas masks in their hands, bags thrown over their backs, carrying small children in their arms or pulling them in handcarts. So it rushed past us like an evil haunting, well into the morning hours. An old man with a goat collapsed exhausted at the entrance to the neighbouring house. We heard the bleating of the frightened animal for hours afterwards.

The Sonnenstrasse at the front was ablaze. I stared spellbound at the huge flames leaping out of the broken windows and meeting in the middle of the street. Thousands fled past us through this tunnel of fire, desperate, bewildered, turned into beggars in just one hour.

Uncle Alfred took us boys upstairs through the dark stairwell and opened a darkened window. Silent and spellbound, we gazed out at the huge sea of flames in Gablenz. The town centre was obscured by neighbouring houses. Right to the south, eerily illuminated from all sides, stood the Luther Church intact, a fortress of God in the glistening surf. A pious shiver ran through me. Was that his sign? Downstairs, in my grandmother's flat, half the house was gathered again, but there was no real conversation to be had. What else was actually going to happen? Was there anything worse than what had happened in the last few hours? Who knew?

We stared silently into the twinkling candle. The sounds of the dying city only faintly penetrated our room. Tired and exhausted, one by one we slipped away. A few fearful ones stayed in the cellar until dawn. But we decided to lie down on the makeshift beds made of hastily pushed together mattresses.

The sounds of the road and the bleating of the goat kept waking us up. There was no peace and quiet in the house either. As soon as I fell asleep, I was gently shaken. I recognised my father in the semi-darkness of the room. Quietly and briefly, as was his way, he said goodbye to us boys. He had to go back to his unit in Dresden. The energetic Uncle Willy accompanied him through the burning city to the main railway station.

I could still hear the front door slam and the sound of both footsteps crunching away in the thin blanket of snow. Then I fell asleep.

Memories of a childhood during the war

When the old Chemnitz died in a hail of bombs