Life Is Cheap In Times Of War
In times of war, death is always much closer than it would ordinarily be. It seems to render life cheap and meaningless. For nearly the whole of the war we had been fortunate enough to be at least physically removed from it. When we heard that one of our relatives or neighbours had been killed, it usually happened in faraway places. One of the first to die was one of my uncles, a twenty-one year old professional soldier of junior officer rank. He went straight from the school benches of his officer’s training academy, where a high-ranking officer’s career had been planned for him.
Photos show him as a dashing and handsome young fellow in a smart uniform. It took some years after the end of the war until the authorities posthumously promoted him to full officer status, so that his widow and children could get the benefit of a much better pension. One of the first to be moved to the Russian front, he went missing in combat in the battle of Stalingrad almost immediately upon arrival. No trace of him was ever found. He left behind a nineteen-year old-widow and two children. His daughter of two he saw once and he never set eyes upon his son, who had just been born at the time of his death.
And then something reminds me of a narrow-gauge railway system, which has long disappeared. At that time it was an important part of the local transport system that connected several small towns in our area. One day almost at the end of the war, it was attacked and hit in broad daylight by a low flying aircraft. This happened when the train was about the same distance away from our house as the air raid shelter, though in a different direction. The train was so slow that it made an easy target whenever it came chugging up a hill at snail’s pace. Its lack of speed must have made it unsuitable for troop movements.
My parents’ house stood on the outskirts of town from where it was a long walk to the main shopping centre. Nobody considered that to be a problem, as everybody walked everywhere in those days. Ah, but every few hours the train did stop only about half a mile away from our house. A train ride into town was a rare treat for us children. If you were lucky enough to be considered worthy of a ride, the train could take you almost into the town centre. We had a lovely time standing on the platform, getting covered in soot, waving graciously to less fortunate mortals who had to walk, and warning each other: ‘No flower picking while the train is in motion’.
In wartimes children live as dangerously as adults, in many ways even more so. They encounter hazards that could easily be avoided by adults, as the following incident illustrates. As the war finally came to its end, many of the retreating soldiers discarded what they had left of weapons and ammunition in the extensive German forests, also in those of our part of the country. Some of these things were found by children and played with, sometimes with tragic results. For example, in the next street to ours, a twelve-year-old boy killed himself with an army revolver. He had found it in the nearby woods and as many children everywhere would probably do, he and some of his pals had been having fun practising some target shooting. The price he paid for it was his life.
Who will ever know the extent of the damage monumental struggles like wars do to those taking part? They leave behind indelible marks on our souls, even if human nature has a protective device built in, to enable us to continue living. That is why most of us as adults can no longer imagine the fears severely traumatic events aroused in us during childhood. First hand experience has taught me the difficulty of shedding them. In common with everything that is in our life, this is spiritually sound, and for the wise reason that such lessons should never be forgotten by our soul, enabling us to learn from the mistakes of the past.
As the concept of spirituality appears repeatedly in this work, in case you are wondering what it means to me, let me explain. To my mind, it is not enough to merely say: ‘I am oh so spiritual!’ There is more to it than that; being spiritual means that we have woken up to the knowledge that first and foremost we are spirit and soul. To me, that is the most important lesson this life has to teach each one of us. However, merely reading that this is so in itself is not good enough; we have to act upon what we know and make an effort to live according to spiritual laws and principles; no matter how difficult that sometimes may be.
To return to the poppies for a moment, it was the memories of the events described here that long ago helped me to decide what to do when I first encountered these flowers and the slogan ‘Wear your poppy with pride!’ Yes indeed; buying one each year and wearing it as advised was good and right for me, too. The brave ones, in whose honour they were and still are sold and worn each year, to me are the truly great ones of their time. They helped to free the rest of the world – not least us, the civilian population of Germany, from the Nazi scourge.
What it means to live and grow up within the clutches of any reign of terror can only truly be appreciated by those who experience it. In the great drama of life, the horror of the Hitler regime was our Karma and our lesson. Those who came to free us from it had been allocated the role of the conquering heroes. The former was our destiny for this lifetime and the latter theirs. In this earthly existence there is no way of knowing whether we did something similar for them in previous ones, but it has to be a strong possibility.
* * *
This article is a chapter from ‘War And Peace Between Nations.
If it has whetted your appetite to read more, please follow the link below:
‘War And Peace Between Nations’
