Vasily Bunelik

LEIBNITZ

At lunch time when the when the other prisoners came into the camp for half an hour, we who were selected for transport, were locked in our barracks and kept away from the others.  It was clear the fascists were hiding something from us or they didn’t want us to know where they were sending us.  In the evening we were put on wagons and it wasn’t until next day when we were let out again.  We were then in Leibnitz.  We were put into an open camp surrounded by barbed wire, the barracks were yet to be built.  there were 1200 of us, [Mauthausen records say over 900] we were divided into two brigades each of which had a pre-set task.  I was put into the wheelbarow group.  Our job was to continuously carry stones from the ground to a place where some sort of factory was being built.

P27 (Translated by Albert Thompson)

With the wheelbarrows loaded, the prisoners harnessed themselves just like horses, and in a hungry state pulled the load up the hill.  The fascists were obviously in a hurry to build the underground factory for the taskmaster was mercilessly beating the prisoners.  It was round the clock work, the first shift started at 6am and the night shift took over at 6pm.  One morning a Pole who had suffered on the night shift, dropped off to sleep by his barrow.  For this, the sirens were sounded.  This meant everyone had to line up outside the barracks.  The Pole was made to sit up while two task-masters beat him with sticks until he was dead.  The SS called for an interpreter and said,  “tell these lazy Slavonic worms that this will be the fate of each and everyone of them who dares to slacken in work-time.  If all of this job is not finished within one month I’ll kill the lot of you”

The following week I was put on day shift, but Sasha Morozov was on nights.  That meant we could only meet on Sundays, daytime.  Sasha told me what he planned to do when we get on the same shift.  “Night shift of course, I’ll grab hold of a hammer and kill the two SS guards, then we’ll run for it.”  

“We would not be able to get far, they’d catch us and we’d suffer for it.  Now if we could manage to kill all the guards (and there aren’t many of them here) we could organise a mass break out to the Alps,  then through the pass to Tito’s Yugoslav partisans.  

“The idea is tempting but first of all we have got to get on the same night shift.  See how the land lies with our Yugoslav friends, get to know the distance from here to the border and where the partisans are active.”

“I already know thes facts, but remember, besides Yugoslav partisans there are the ‘Chetnik’ traitors, whose hands you could fall in by mistake.

I was reminded of this by Radoslav, who guessed where I would be making for.  He also gave me directions in the mountains situated around the town of Split.

We decided to continue our escape discussions the following Sunday.

The conditions made it essential to speed up our escape plans.  The Fascists were intensifying their terror so much so that even recently arrived prisoners were showing signs of wasting away,  the catastrophic situation frightened us all.

Nos sooner had the night shift returned after 12 hours work than they were put to work again, they were not given even an hour’s rest.  After 24 hours suffering without sleep, thirty prisoners dropped to the ground.  in the morning roll call we heard the report that three prisoners could not get out of bed.  

The camp boss swiped the block boss on the head with his whip and ordered him to bring out all the lazy ones.  The block boss dashed into the barrack, demanded and even pleaded with the ‘simulants’ but they just didn’t have the strength to get up, all was in vain, so the block boss grabbed two of them under his armpits and pulled them out onto the ground and ran back for the third.  Meanwhile the camp boss was kicking at the other two “lazy ones”  while they were on the ground, demanding them to get in line, but they already had no strength.  One of these sufferers was Flore a compatriot of mine, born in Belozerski,  Zaporozhie region, a Bulgarian who worked as a soil specialist on the Belozerskii Regional land control until the outbreak of war.

Swollen with phlegm, he was a martyr, the most  tenacious of all three. When we returned after twelve hours of work in the camp, two of them were already dead, but Flyora continued to lie on the damp ground, looking bleary-eyed around him .. Having half a liter of black coffee, I brought it to his lips, trying to warm him up and quench his thirst, but Flyora could only look with grateful eyes and was unable to even to open his mouth. By nightfall, all three were taken to the Mauthausen crematorium. 

Bullying the prisoners had acquired such forms, that even a hardened German convict could not stand it, and tried to escape while he was in much better condition compared to the others. Dressed in civilian clothes, he climbed into the cab of a truck hired to take stone from the quarry, in place of the driver, who was getting out the stones from underground. But he was unable to escape. Soon he was caught and an “original” way to punish the fugitive arose. One SS shot him in the cheek with an explosive bullet in such a way that his tongue was torn out. With  his cheek pierced,  teeth and tongue knocked out, he suffered a few more 

days. Fascists delightedly mocked him, bringing him delicious SS dishes from the dining room, knowing that he could not eat and was doomed to death by

starvation. On the fourth day, being in a state of agony he could not bear, he ran to the toilet and voluntarily “drowned”, throwing his head in the pit with feces and urine. 

After this incident I formed the opinion that to flee from the camp was altogether impossible, as well as the fact that all of us here were waiting for imminent death, as the Germans intended to keep secret the location of the factory and its purpose. This was said by the prisoners openly, but we could not see a way out of the situation . Meanwhile, the terror grew stronger and stronger. The SS looked for all sorts of ways and reasons to kill as many prisoners as possible. 

The next Sunday we did not have Morozov to continue the conversation about escape. As I and several other prisoners were taken to the railway station to unload boxes of machines for the factory.The boxes were so heavy that they could not even be budged. Enraged, the Fascist beat us, but it did not help. Then he took out a pistol from his holster and began to beat each of us with the handle, at random and I got a blow in the stomach. My sight grew dark, I sat down, losing consciousness.A second blow, a kick to the temple seemed to be more stronger than the first. I groaned, but recovered from the blow and asked the beast pleadingly:

“Believe me, I want to do it, but I don’t have the strength. There’s no point in beating me, nothing will help, when there is no strength .. 

Nearby some Germans were working. One of them came up and said something 

to the SS. He nodded. We went quiet.What was  awaiting us?  Three meters away from us lay a half-rotten swede. I asked the SS permission to take it. 

“Take it!” He agreed. 

I instantly grabbed the swede and began to eat. 

Stop! / Vek Lassen! / Cried suddenly the SS.  “infection! “ He hit my hand and knocked down the swede, but in an instant it was in the hands of another famished prisoner. The SS lashed him with a whip.  A third hungry inmate swallowed the remnants of the completely rotten swede. The SS hit him hard with his whip on the head. 

 

By this time the German worker had rejoined his team, in his hands he held a little block of bread substitute.  Divided into four equal parts, the German gave us each a piece. We swallowed, afraid that the SS would take it

away. After we ate, the SS demanded from us the respective rate of unloading the wagons. In the course of which again were given curses, the whip and pistol. But convinced of the  impossibility

of getting us “stubborn donkeys” going, the SS agreed that the Germans should help us though they were reluctant to direct them to help their inferiors. 

In the area of  abdominal emptiness that was my stomach, I felt a nagging pain, though I didn’t know it then I  had received from the SS a hernia which I discovered much later. This pain did not allow me to sleep at night and this morning I was back in the dungeon, where I suffered an even greater ordeal. 

Our team was still mining stone from underground. The carts were fully loaded, the weight was clearly all we could manage .In order to facilitate the work, I 

followed the example of a Pole, and attached to the arms of the wheelbarrows some cable,  to loop round my shoulders and put a dense layer of paper, so as not to cut myself with the wire. 

Noticing this, the SS beckoned me to him with a nod. After consulting with other SS guards, he took a willow branch, about an inch thick, cut off the side shoots, tried its flexibility in his hand, then asked me to bow my head to two feet from the ground. Holding my head with one hand, the SS began to beat me with the other hand on my back. The blows were so severe that I felt  only the first five or six, then, when I fell to the ground, blows rained down on my legs, head, hands ... 

Aufshteyn! Aufshteyn, ferflyuhten! / Get up, get up, damn! / 

I do not know how I then stood up and was able to work. Having reached the wheelbarrow, I removed the wires, and quickly loaded the stone, and thought: how to warn the young Pole, that he is also in danger. However the SS paid no attention to the Pole, but  called me over a second time. 

“Well, how? “ He turned to me, “is it  easier -  to pull the wheelbarrow with cable 

or without cable? “

So as not to call down on myself a new disaster, I tried to give an answer that would satisfy the inhuman executioner: 

‘”Yes, of course, pulling the barrow as it is is much more convenient than using  a  harness. In future I will continue to do just as you tell  me ...”

So, you still get ten strokes, so that in future you will be wiser and not dare to harness yourself in a wheelbarrow, like a horse “bow your head!  Can you take ten new blows and endure it? 

At the last second I had the idea: ask for mercy,  elicit sympathy for the suffering 

“Excuse me. I give my word that mistakes will not happen again and I will try 

to work so that you are satisfied. “

The Fascist smiled. 

“OK.  I promise never to beat you again, if you can stand these ten blows and 

not once cry out. I advise you to count the strikes: that way it’s always easier to bear them. Bow your head. “

Clenching my teeth and trying not to think about myself, I recall Stepan Razin, Emelyan Pugachev and other heroes who courageously endured inhuman torture. Then a fierce blow on my spine and I forgot all about Razin and Pugachev, instinctively crying out, swayed and fell, losing consciousness. Apparently, the torture continued , the butcher shouting “Aufshteyn!” (as did all the fascists in such cases, ) but it did not help. I came to my senses after the executioner poured  a bucket of cold water on me. With some difficulty getting up, I reached the tunnel, to my team. My comrades finished loading their carts, but  I could not rely on their help: the Nazis brutally beat those who took pity. I risked being beaten again by the fascists, this time for being late, as a lazy malingerer and, therefore, appealed to the capo with a request to leave me in the tunnel on the jackhammers. The Capo came close to me and punched me in the face once,and again, and a third time bellowing; 

“Come on, curse you, faster! “ / Los, ferflyuhten, shneler! / 

 

Forgetting the danger it could  lead to, my comrades rushed to help me load a wheelbarrow, and a young Yugoslav advised: 

“hang on, brother, soon will be the end of work. Instead of us will come the night shift, and we will return to the camp, lie down to rest.”

Indeed, a few minutes later a siren wailed. Twelve hours slave labor and abuse were behind us.  It was awful, everything hurting, If it were possible to sleep I could soon forget. But I did not get to sleep. As soon as we stepped into the camp,  Sasha Morozov ran up to me. He was pale, alarmed: 

“Vasya” he said in a trembling voice , - I advise you to go with the night shift: 

stand in line in my place . . . .  I’ve been told . . . . Radoslaw found out from SS-Slovaks, he blurted out ... Take this my rations, it’s quicker for you, you don’t have time to get dinner. Here comes the night shift. Go and try to escape  tonight, tomorrow will be too late . . . .Yugoslavs will tell you what it’s all about. So, be well. Good luck! 

The team were called up, I hastened to the column, in place of Sasha Morozov. 

Entering the tunnel, they all scattered to their jobs. Only I knew not where to go and what to do. Sasha did not manage to say in what team he worked, and I could not see what to do. I was forced to turn to the capo. Aware that I had been beaton by the SS in the day and I’ve gone from the day shift to the night “at will “, the capo ordered me to follow him.

Finding the commander of the night shift, the capo removed his hat, stood to attention and said loudly: 

Darf man meldung! (Let me report!)

Vass ist Loss? (What has happened? )

This  Russian was beaten for poor performance today. He is a cunning beast, trying to cover it up, he changed to the night shift but was forced to confess all to me. 

 

The commander nodded, giving a sign for me to follow him. 

He led me to a three-ton truck and ordered me to load 

it with rocks. And then more than a strictly warned: 

“But just half an hour to load! “ He looked at his wrist watch. 

I took a stone, and straight away wanted to throw it over the high

boards of the  vehicle, but it was beyond my strength. The Komandfyurer slapped me in the face with his knuckles and ordered me to take a larger stone size and lashed at my head as I tried to get it over the boards. When he left, I began to take smaller-sized stones, mindful of the time allocated to me to load the lorry. Violation of the “Rules” could cost me my life, which was already hanging by a thread. Two or three dozen meters from me a huge tetrahedral stone sawn correctly was being loaded into a truck. When the stone was put in place, the commander ordered I stop loading my lorry and change to the truck with the huge stone. I climbed up the stone-slab, taking the entire lorry. There were  four more prisoners there-all Poles. The team’s leader was somewhere away from our car 

and in that same time, immediately leaned out of the cab the driver’s head-a Yugoslavian: 

“Russian Brother , come here I have something to tell you! “

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