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I returned to Pyatigorsk after eating and drinking heartily. Hohenegg, during the di
The next morning I presented myself at the appointed time at Voroshilovsk. Turek had come separately. We stood at attention in front of Bierkamp’s desk, side by side, without any other witness. Bierkamp came straight to the point: “Meine Herren. Word has reached me that you have spoken words unworthy of SS officers to each other in public, and that, to resolve your quarrel, you were pla
Leaving his office, still very upset, I headed toward Dr. Leetsch’s office. Von Gilsa had informed me that a reco
Hohenegg, whom I met again that night, didn’t look too disappointed. “It’s the reality principle, my dear friend,” he declared. “That will teach you to try to play the romantic hero. So let’s go have a drink.” But the business was worrying me. Who could have denounced us to Bierkamp? It was certainly one of Turek’s comrades, who was afraid of the scandal. Or maybe one of them, aware of the trap being prepared, wanted to prevent it? It was hardly conceivable that Turek himself had had second thoughts. I wondered what he was plotting with Prill: nothing good, certainly.
A new burst of activity made this affair fade into the background. Von Mackensen’s Third Panzer Corps, supported by the Luftwaffe, was launching its offensive on Ordzhonikidze; the Soviet defenses around Nalchik collapsed in two days, and at the end of October our forces took the city while the tanks continued their push to the east. I asked for a car and went first to Prokhladny, where I met Persterer, then on to Nalchik. It was raining but that didn’t hinder traffic too much; after Prokhaldny, columns of the Rollbahn were bringing up food supplies. Persterer was getting ready to transfer his Kommandostab to Nalchik and had already dispatched a Vorkommando there to prepare quarters. The city had fallen so quickly that they had been able to arrest a lot of Bolshevik officials and other suspects; there were also many Jews, both bureaucrats from Russia and a large native community. I reminded Persterer of the orders from the Wehrmacht concerning the attitude toward the local populations: they were pla