War Girls Complete Collection Chapter 289

Chapter 8: Ursula

July 1945

U

rsula hadn’t heard from Anna and Mutter since April and had grown increasingly worried with every passing day.

“I wish I could go to Berlin and see them for myself,” Ursula complained to her aunt.

“You know that’s not possible, my dear.”

“But why won’t they send us at least a letter?”

“Maybe they have and the mail is not delivered?” Lydia looked up from her needlework and gazed at her niece. “They’ll write as soon as they can. You’ll see. There’s no use in worrying.”

Ursula wished she possessed the same stoic calm as her aunt. “Are you never worried about Peter?” Lydia’s husband had been fighting first in France and then in the East, and they hadn’t heard from him since last fall.

“I miss him, yes, but since there’s nothing my worry will accomplish, I don’t worry. I do pray for him every night and send him my love.” Lydia peered down at her needlework again. “The children are growing so fast…”

Ursula wondered whether the two youngest ones, Rosa and Maria, would even remember their father. She and Lydia sat in silence, mending worn-out clothes for another season of wear, until Lydia spoke again several minutes later.

“Have you tried the Red Cross? You could file a missing persons report. Maybe they have a way of communicating with those living inside Berlin?”

Ursula considered her aunt’s suggestion and nodded. “That’s a good idea.” A shudder racked her body, because the closest Red Cross office was in Mindelheim. She still reeled from her experience during the denazification process and preferred not to go into town.

“Jörg and Matilde can go with you. I have a full list of errands to run in town.”

She might as well get it over with. “You’re right. We’ll go tomorrow. If we go first thing in the morning, we’ll be back by lunch time and still work half a day in the fields.”

Lydia gave a tired wave. “Sometimes the fields have to take a second place to the people we love.”

“Thank you, Aunt Lydia.” Ursula felt warmth spreading through her heart. Lydia didn’t express her emotions very often, so this was a precious moment of love between the two women.

In the absence of her mother, Lydia was the closest confidante Ursula had. However, she still hadn’t told her about Evie’s father. During the war it had been too dangerous and now… Ursula sighed, afraid she might never see him again. How should she even begin searching for him?

The next morning, Ursula, Jörg and Matilde set off for Mindelheim. As promised, Aunt Lydia had given them a long list of errands to run in addition to filing a missing persons report.

Just as they were about to reach the town, Jörg recognized a girl who’d worked on Lydia’s farm as

Arbeitsmaid

the previous summer.

“Hello, Helene, how are you?” he greeted her.

Helene stopped for a moment, smiled and then said, “They found one of the Nazis’ food storage locations and are handing out oil. It’s about four miles from here.”

Ursula’s mind raced. Oil was a hard-to-come-by source of fat for cooking and they had run out of it weeks earlier.

Usually when someone

found

a storage location, they broke them open and left them to be raided by the hungry citizens. It worked strictly on a first come, first served basis, as urgency was mandatory. As soon as the Amis found out they’d stop the illegal distribution of foodstuff – if the supply hadn’t dwindled already.

“Matilde, you go with Helene and get some oil for us. Jörg and I will meet you at the town square in Mindelheim after running our errands.”

Matilde pouted. Chasing after the rumor that somewhere some food might be obtained wasn’t nearly as exciting as going to town. But she obeyed and took off with Helene, leaving Jörg and Ursula to walk into town.

“Do you think she’ll get some?” Jörg asked.

“I don’t know, but it’s worth a try.” Aunt Lydia had often scolded Helene for being a no-good who wasn’t adept at

organizing

stuff – organizing being an euphemistic expression for obtaining things that you couldn’t get a hold of through normal channels.

Jörg set off for the hardware store and Ursula paused a moment in front of the newly opened Red Cross office next to the town hall. A tremble ran through her body. She steeled her spine and stepped inside, finding an elderly woman sitting behind the only table in the room. The woman had her dark hair tied into a bun at the nape of her neck and smiled.

“How can I help you?” the woman asked, even though she must know that everyone walking through the door wanted the same thing: to know whether relatives and friends were well and alive.

“I come to inquire about my mother and sister. They live in Berlin.”

“Berlin?” The woman’s face fell. “I’m afraid we have received no lists from Berlin. Working with the Soviet administration is rather… challenging.”

“So… is there anything you can do?” Ursula asked in a feeble voice.

The woman handed her a form. “Fill this out and leave it with me. You will receive a letter as soon as we have records about them.”

Ursula did as requested and filled in the names, birthdates, and last known locations of Anna and Mutter. Then she handed the form back to the woman, who glanced it over and put it on a stack of other completed forms. Each sheet representing one person, loved and missed by someone.

“Anything else I can do for you?”

“In fact, yes, I have a friend, Alexandra Wagner. She was last deployed to Stavanger, Norway as Wehrmachtshelferin.” Alexandra was her sister Lotte’s new identity.

The woman’s face lit up. “We have much better records about Wehrmacht employees than we do about civilians. Let me check for you.”

Ursula filled out another form and the woman walked to the back of the room, where several filing cabinets stood.

“Here it is,” she murmured and returned with a list. “All Wehrmachtshelferinnen from Stavanger were evacuated via Denmark in May.” She frowned. “I wonder what took them so long.” Her finger trailed down the sheet of paper. “That’s strange.”

A lump formed in Ursula’s throat, making it difficult to breathe, and she prepared herself for the worst. “What is it?”

“All the women arrived in a transit camp except for two, who are noted as missing.”

“Missing?” Ursula’s own high-pitched voice echoed in her head.

“Yes, Alexandra Wagner and Gerlinde Weiler have gone missing somewhere in Denmark.”

Ursula slumped into the chair, all the blood draining from her face. Gerlinde was Lotte’s best friend. What did it mean that both of them had gone missing? It couldn’t be anything good.

She knew her father was a POW in Russia, had been for close to three years. So she inquired about her brother Richard, who’d gone missing a year ago somewhere in Poland.

“I’m sorry. He’s still registered as missing in action,” the Red Cross helper said and busied herself returning the lists to the filing cabinet.

Ursula stared after her, unable to get up from her chair. It would have been better had she refrained from inquiring, because she wasn’t any wiser, but only more anxious.

The older woman seemed to sense her state of despair and said, “You cannot lose hope. We get new records every day. As long as your loved ones are not confirmed dead, you’re better off than most persons who come here.”

“Thank you,” Ursula uttered and left the suddenly oppressive room. As she stepped onto the town square the blazing sunlight blinded her. On any other day, she would have enjoyed the beautiful old fountain in the center of the square.

Someone had taken the trouble of planting pansies and forget-me-nots in the stone flower boxes attached to the fountain. But even this uplifting sight couldn’t brighten Ursula’s mood. Too heavy weighed the burden of uncertainty.

With a sigh, she took out the list from her bag and began working off point after point on the list. Two hours later she was finished and found Jörg skipping stones on the water of the river lazily flowing through town.

“Hey, Jörg, did you get everything?” she called out.

“Not even half of it.” He made a concerned face. “I bargained some spare parts for the plow in exchange for part of the potato harvest, but that’s about it.”

“Let’s go to the town square, I’ll buy us a treat,” she offered.

“Ice cream?” His eyes became dreamy and he ran a dirty hand through his slightly too long blond hair.

“I’m afraid not. But I saw fruit gum in the grocer’s.” The fruit gum probably was made without sugar, but it was still a treat and Jörg eagerly agreed. As they reached the town square they saw Matilde walking up the hill, hands empty.

“You should have sent me, I’m much better at organizing stuff,” Jörg said.

“We needed the spare parts more than we need the oil, that’s why I put you onto the more important task.”

Jörg beamed at the compliment. Despite considering himself the man of the house, he still was a boy – although a boy who’d had to mature much too early.

Matilde trudged into the square and washed her sweaty face at the fountain. “I’m sorry, but we arrived too late and none of the oil was left.”

“Don’t worry about it. It was worth a try,” Ursula said.

They walked back to Kleindorf and as Ursula had predicted, Aunt Lydia cherished the spare parts more than she mourned the lack of cooking oil. The tractor had long stopped working because there was no fuel to be had, but at least they still had the ox and the cows to yoke to the equipment.

The Americans, in contrast to the French and Russians in their sectors, hadn’t requisitioned any and all machinery the civilian population still possessed. Apparently, they were wise enough to realize that the farmers relied on equipment if they were to produce enough food to feed the population come winter.

But the farmers still lacked manpower and all around Aunt Lydia’s farm lay fields ready for harvest, but there weren’t enough people to do the work. Wheat, barley, oats, all were rotting on the ground. Potatoes had to be harvested and vegetables picked. Only the cherries and plums on the trees had found their way straight into the mouths of climbing children.

Lower Bavaria might have been spared from the devastating destruction the bigger cities all across German had endured. But its men had been drafted into the Wehrmacht years ago and were yet to return. With only women and children left – and devoid of powered machinery – there was only so much they could do. The lack of manpower had become even direr after the capitulation, because the foreign prisoners of war and forced laborers had been released. They were dearly missed in the farms.

“It looks like rain. We urgently need to bring in the crops. Maybe we could ask for extra workers in Mindelheim…” Lydia started to suggest and then she stopped herself. “Never mind.”

The next few days Aunt Lydia’s family, including Ursula and Frau Hansen, harvested from sunup to sundown. The only persons exempt were the three youngest children Evie, Rosa and Maria.

In the evening they got word that the entire town of Mindelheim was puking their souls out. Soon someone had found out that the cooking oil had indeed been diesel oil.

Lydia remarked dryly, “We sure could have used the oil for our tractor.”