My Mother's War by Eva Taylor

Author:Eva Taylor
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hanover Square Press
Published: 2022-01-31T16:57:59+00:00

Amstetten

Sabine said, “In our barrack the beds were arranged in units of nine, three by three with four people per bed. All night long people fell or were pushed out of bed. There was a lot of screaming and shouting. The windows were not allowed to be opened due to fear of spreading illness. We could not move due to overcrowding, and we waited and waited.” This was probably up to two weeks. Sabine could not remember, but around March 20, they were suddenly moved to a barrack just outside the camp, near the Wiener Graben, and divided into groups. Here there were no beds, just straw on the floor to sleep on. Finally they were told what their job would be: clearing bombed railway lines and junctions at Amstetten, near Linz. To get there, they had to get up at 2 a.m. and march for two hours. Amstetten had suffered a bombing raid of more than two hundred bombs by the Americans a few days before, and the women were sent to clear the resulting chaos.

It was very dangerous work, as every day brought new bombardments. Of course there were plenty of replacement prisoners waiting to take over from those who died.

Sabine said, “We were given enormous shovels and pitchforks, which we could barely lift, let alone the heavy rails and sleepers, which were the beams the tracks were laid upon.

“But on our first day, before too long, the air raid siren sounded, and panicked guards drove us over the fields up a wooded hill. The sun was shining and spring was in the air, and while the bombardment was all around us, we felt elated. We were outside the camp and in the fresh air. A small sense of freedom came over us as we watched the railway carriages flying through the air.

“‘At least we don’t have to clear those away anymore,’ the women noted. Eventually, though, the planes were flying lower and coming straight at us, and the bombs started dropping all around us. I cannot describe what it feels like to see them coming straight at you. One of the nearby trees fell on top of me, but so much stuff was raining down, I did not even notice it. Eighty women were killed on that first day. They were hanging in bits off trees, buried under earth and trees. Many had gone mad with fear. We did not know what to do. The guards who, in first instance, had run away, returned when the bombing had stopped and made us collect the dead. The women dug out a young girl, barely alive, who had gone mad.”

A nearby farmer brought some schnapps for the women while they were counted. After some time, the dead and seriously wounded, including Sabine, were put on an open horse-drawn wagon filled with straw and taken back via Linz to Mauthausen. They got stuck in a large square in Linz, where a furious shouting and threatening crowd had gathered. Sabine managed

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