Rat King (part 1/2)

A child’s recollection of the Warsaw Uprising 1944

© Andrzej Olas (andrzej.olas@gmail.com)

Translated by Krystyna Olas

On the first of August, 1944, I was eight years old. It was during the World War II. I lived in German-occupied Warsaw, till 1939 Poland’s capital. It was a sunny afternoon. Crouching, I played in a puddle left by a brief rain. I heard a sound not unlike that of nails being hammered and got up. I saw an elegant man fire his rifle. The end of the barrel was odd looking, like a funnel, and from it, flames shot out. He stood next to the neighboring house fence, slender and tall. He wore khaki plus fours, and on his arm, his right one I think, was a white and red armband. I didn’t have a chance to see anything more, for right there my mother ran up and took me into the cellar of the condominium in which we lived. In the basement stood primitive benches saved by the janitor from the siege of Warsaw at the beginning of the war in 1939, upon which our neighbors already sat. They were saying that the Uprising was beginning, that Warsaw would be freed by the resistance fighters, that the Germans would flee, and that then the Bolsheviks would come, bringing the Red Army.

About the Red Army I had heard half a year earlier, in the winter, while I was playing with my lead soldiers. Andy, who was two year older, told me then, that it was thus called because all the soldiers wore red uniforms. I didn’t believe him: the lead soldiers I had wore green uniforms and brown boots. The SS men in nearby barracks wore black. Soldiers in red had to also have red boots, and no respecting soldier would wear such boots. Therefore, Andy was trying to trick me. When I told him so, he pinched my nose painfully. But now, adults were talking of the Red Army. They said that when it came, “what’s yours will be mine.” What’s more, they reasoned that the Red Army marched without shoes. This solved my problem. In red uniforms, but barefoot - that was believable.

My mother was very upset: she murmured to herself under her breath. At that time, this wasn’t common for her. I heard, “ It’s crazy, they are stupid; they’ll destroy the city, everyone will die...”

I wasn’t sure just what was “stupid,” but I didn’t feel it safe to ask. I had imprinted in my memory the vision of the tall man, and I was sure I’d never forget him. I knew that every shot from his rifle was purposeful, and I wanted to go see him triumphant, but with my mother I wasn’t going to have that chance. She was in a bad mood, and one could easily get it.

I never saw that elegant man again. The next day, another man, also a resistance fighter, came to the basement, wearing the tell-tale white-red band on his arm. He was shorter, and not as stately.He brought two carrots per each child and told us that Warsaw was almost free, and that walking on the streets was unsafe, for the time being. He said that because of this, we should dig a passage from our basement to the basement of our neighbors. I thought this was a great idea.

A day or two later, my mother decided that since she felt there was less shooting, we could move back into our house, but only into the kitchen, since it was hidden from view. Once, when we were sitting in the kitchen , an old friend, Romek Hartman, came by, and it turned out that he, too, was a resistance fighter. He wore a thick, wide belt, and pinned to that belt was a grenade. My mother was very puzzled by the fact that Romek was a resistance fighter, because he was barely three years older than my elder brother Maciek, and he was only twelve. I asked him if he had a revolver, because I wanted him to show it to me, but he told me that the only way to get a gun was off a dead enemy. He added that in a matter of days he was to get a second grenade, but that he couldn’t let me hold the one he had , because regulations forbid it. My mother got upset again. At that point, it was very easy to upset my mother, so it was worthwhile to watch out.

Now I knew what the elegant man had been doing the first day of the uprising. Not more than 50 meters from our home there were SS barracks. The elegant man and other resistance fighters were trying to overrun the barracks. The barracks were not captured, and many of the fighters were killed. I could not imagine that the man had died.

Those barracks had interested me long before. I had seen the SS men, (we never called them soldiers), while they were practicing throwing grenades in front of the building. The entrance to the barracks was blocked off by a crossbar. A guard sat in a booth painted with black and white chevrons. I avoided walking on the sidewalk in front of the barracks; I was afraid of the SS men on the streets as well. However, shortly before the uprising, curiosity had became stronger than fear. In each corner of the barracks there had been bunkers being built. I had picked the corner farthest from the gate, and for hours I had watched the masons. The constructing of a bunker is easy, as long as the building has a basement. One moves the bricks in the corner of the building - one meter up and one meter over from each edge. A new, extended corner is built, under which there is room for the soldiers to stand while they shoot from the slits cut in the sides of the fortification. This was the type of bunkers built for the SS men. After the masons had finished, I no longer went near the barracks - I was afraid that SS men were watching me from the bunkers.

At some time during the uprising, we moved permanently into the basement, or until the Germans fled, at any rate. It seemed to me that all the residents of our building had moved into the cellar - at least all of our acquaintance’s children were down there. My brother, mother and I had a place in the middle of the basement’s hallway. Sitting on our cot, I could see the large gas pipe coming out of a hole in the wall on my left, going along the basement’s ceiling, and entering the wall through another hole on my right. Almost every evening, a giant gray rat would come out of the hole on the left, slink along the entire length of pipe and disappear in the hole on the right. The way he moved was very stern and determined. The rat quiclky became a big attraction for us, one for which we waited every evening. Moreover, the rat was a challenge: we wanted to stop him. For this, Jacek Patycki thought to set soldiers in the rat’s way. We started with a lone infantryman in a green uniform and brown boots. The rat didn’t even notice. Without breaking stride, he knocked our soldier to the ground and marched onward.

Every day in the evening a Mass was held. The manager’s office, which was on the first floor, only a few feet from the basement entrance, served as the chapel. We sang pious hymns, mostly sad ones. Evenings were therefore full: first the rat, and then the sermon. Occasionally, though, the rat would be late, and we’d have to go to mass without seeing him.

One day the SS men herded us onto a neighboring courtyard, where, already, on the dead grass, the people from the building between us and the barracks sat. From a speaker hung on a pole boomed Hitler’s orders, in German, and after that some man spoke Polish with an odd accent. The edict stated that Warsaw was to be destroyed, so that not one stone remained on top of another.During the speech the neighboring apartment house, the one between us and the barracks, started to burn People started to cry and shout. My mother said that soon they would ignite our home.Mr. Grusza said no, because the Germans had forced us out without anything, while the neighbors had been allowed to gather up their things and take all that they could carry into the courtyard.He was sure they would not burn our house. He was right, and in a little while we were allowed to return to our home.

The rat still won over our army. Even three officers could not overcome him. One became missing in action during a battle - he fell from the pipe into the hole in the wall. A few days later a second soldier was killed in a skirmish - his base stand broke off.

The adults said that there would be starvation, and continuously spoke only of food and sustenance. One day Mr. Winter came upon the idea to gather the tomatoes in the main courtyard, which had been planted before the uprising. The problem with this was that the courtyard was within range of SS fire from the barracks. Mr. Grusza said that even Germans would not fire on children. I don’t know why it turned out to be me, but in any case Mr. Winter gave me a white flag and told me to go gather tomatoes on that little plot of land. I didn’t argue then, but as I readied to go out, I began to be afraid. Some said it was best that I crawl, others that I should go out waving the white flag. I don’t remember what was decided, but it didn’t really matter, because I got about three steps out the door and immediately escaped back inside. I told Mr. Winter that there were no tomatoes there anymore. Mr. Winter looked at me, and then at the plot, and said,

“You’re right, there really aren’t any.”

To this Mrs. Niczman cried, “What are you talking about? It is completely red over there with tomatoes!”

Mr. Winter repeated, “There are no tomatoes on that p;ot,” louder this time.

Mrs. Niczman backed off quickly, saying, “You’re right, there aren’t any.”

I was surprised that the adults agreed with me so readily.

The rat continued winning the war. Our flank of grenadiers was decimated. The commanding officer was crushed after falling from the pipe under the heel of one of the adults.

The basement was lighted by carbide lamps. Before the uprising, the Germans had turned on the electricity for a few hours a day. Now the electric lighting had stopped completely, ever since the beginning of the uprising. Normally, for thrift, only one lamp was burning, flickering and hissing, and the height of the fire was dependent on the current production of gas. That night two lamps were burning, and, also, Mr. Winter had put in more carbide than normally, so they would light the basement longer. The reason for this was Mr. Zurman, who having recently sneaked over to our building from the downtown district of Warsaw, had tidings from that other part of city to tell, and everyone wanted to hear everything without interruption. The streets of that area were covered with barricades, so as to hinder the attacks of German tanks. The barricades consisted of overturned trams, cars, pieces of walls, street curbs, bricks, and even furniture. I couldn’t imagine knocking over a tram, but I was sure the resistance fighters knew how to do it.

A barricade: exactly what we needed to beat the rat. If our army was behind a barricade, the rat would have no chance whatsoever. My attention got divided: with one ear hearing Jacek telling me that for the rat barricade he would give me his wooden toy tram, with the other ear listening to Mr. Zurman saying that German bombs went right through the roofs and floors of buildings and exploded in the basement. At that very moment a carbide lamp on my left side exploded. In an enclosed space like that basement an actually small explosion gave the impression of a huge detonation. The top half of the lamp had leaped up into the air, turned upside-down and imbedded itself in the ceiling so that it looked like a duck’s bill pecking through to the basement. Then things started happening fast and semingly simultaneously. Mrs. Dobiecka, pointing with her right hand at the duck’s bill, shrieked,

“A bomb, ahhhhhh!”

At the same time her left hand tried to plug both her ears in preparation for the bomb’s explosion. Mr. Zurman straightened up and commanded,

“Don’t panic, just everyone get down!”

With his head held high and his mind concentrated, Mr. Zurman gave the impression that he could control every situation. Mrs. Smolinska didn’t notice this impression, because she had covered her head with a blanket that before now had always laid in her lap. From under the blanket a muffled,

“Hail Mary, full of grace...” could be heard.

The shadow of Mr. Zurman on the basement wall told me, “Trust and obey your leader.”

I yelled, “Yes Sir!” and dropped to the floor, never taking my eyes of the bomb. Piotrek said,

“Sir! Sir! I’m not allowed to drop to the floor in these clothes!”

Jacek, still holding the wooden tram in his hand, started to make his way toward the lamp saying,

“I have to see the bomb!”

By chance, Mr. Kowal, who had, on Mr. Zurman’s word dived beneath a bunk, was in his path. Jacek tripped over Mr. Kowal outstretched leg, and dropped the wooden tram. The tram arched through the air and landed in the small of Mrs. Smolinska’s back. Mrs. Smolinska threw the blanket back and stood up screamed,

“I’m hurt! The shrapnel got me!”

Mr. Zurman shouted,

“Medics! The injured must go to the infirmary!”

“Sir, we don’t have an infirmary,” I volunteered.

Mr. Kowal rose from under the bunk and, shaking off the dust, said coldly,

“Mr. Zurman, not only is there no infirmary, there is also no bomb. Perhaps you’re hallucinating.”

Mrs. Smolinska, rubbing her offended back, glared at Mr. Zurman and said,

“This place is crawling with subversives waiting for a chance to hit someone in the back.” After a moments thought, she added, “Some of them are easy to spot: they are always instigating panic.”

From then on the kids thought carbide lamps were better than electricity any way.

The next day we built an anti-rat barricade. The main body of Jacek’s tram construed the center of the barricade, while the undercarriage and the wheels blocked the rest of the pipe. The rat came up to the barricade, climbed up onto it, and found only the ceiling. Without hurrying, he turned around, climbed down, and returned to the hole from which he had appeared. We had won.

The next morning we saw that the barricade was destroyed. The rat had returned during the night and chewed through the tram’s side by widening its windows.

Continued next week.