Darkest Hour

For two whole days the division had remained at Ludwigsburg, vehicles and kit at the ready, waiting for the signal to move. The order had finally come the previous Tuesday, 12 May, but having sped north of Cologne, then west through Aachen to the Belgian border, they had gone no further. In the meantime, Timpke and his colleagues had had to listen to wireless bulletins proclaiming the sweeping successes of the Wehrmacht and the Luftwaffe. In the north, crucial forts had been captured in Belgium; Rotterdam had been bombed and after four days the Dutch had capitulated. As if that was not galling enough, Army Group A had made even more dramatic and far-reaching progress. It seemed General Guderian's panzers had achieved total surprise as they had attacked through the thick forests of the Belgian Ardennes. The gutless French had crumbled, so that the tanks had managed to cross the river Meuse - a crucial obstacle to have overcome - and had swept all before them.

They had not been idle - Eicke had made sure of that, insisting that his commanders keep the men busy, something with which Timpke agreed entirely. None of his men had seen front-line action: most had been former camp guards and SS reservists, and although they had trained continually since the end of the Polish campaign, Timpke was determined that until they were in a position to draw on combat experience, they should fall back on rigid discipline instead. For four days, as they had waited in the rolling border country, Timpke had drilled them, sent them on long marches and given them rifle practice, as well as despatching them on manoeuvres and making them practise their codework and radio telegraphy. He had also made them clean, re-clean, then clean again their vehicles, weapons and uniforms. On two separate evenings, he had sat the men on the banks of a shallow hill overlooking the camp and had lectured them on one of his favourite subjects, National Socialist and SS ideology, reminding them that the German Reich was rising, phoenix-like, from the ashes of despair into the greatest nation the world had ever known. It was their destiny that they, the chosen ones, should be the elite of this new Aryan order.

Then had come the news that Rommel and Guderian had advanced as much as forty miles the previous day, Thursday, 16 May. Forty miles! An advance of that speed was unheard of. A strange anxiety had gripped Timpke. Surely it wouldn't all be over before the division had been thrown into the line. It couldn't be, yet as every day passed, with reports of outrageous gains made, Timpke became increasingly concerned that the Waffen-SS would be ignored once again by the Wehrmacht, left to idle out the campaign in their makeshift camp on the Belgian border.

Although he was not a man who had ever needed much sleep, he had slept particularly badly that night; outside, it had been warm and humid, but his mind had been unable to put aside the news of the day's fighting. Major-General Rommel's 7th Panzer Division had reached Avesnes, only thirty-five kilometres south of Mons. Timpke had never heard of the place before, and had been stunned when he had discovered just how far into northern France the town was. On the map, the French coast had seemed impossibly close to the leading panzers. The huge extent of the German thrust was astonishing, and he had been struck by a wave of despair. Soon the war would be over, and the Wehrmacht would take all the credit.

Unable to clear such thoughts, he had risen, washed and shaved, then turned to his desk, keeping himself busy by writing further company training exercises. As a consequence, he had already been up for several hours when the company clerk knocked at the door shortly after seven. Entering, he had handed Timpke a note.

Timpke read it, grinned, then crunched the paper into a ball and threw it away.

'Good news, Herr Sturmbannfuhrer?' his orderly, Sturmann Reinz, asked.

'Most definitely,' Timpke replied, putting on his jacket. 'Very good news indeed.'

Downstairs, in the officers' dining room, he found his company commanders, Saalbach, Beeck and Hardieck, already there, drinking ersatz coffee.

'Look at his face,' laughed Saalbach. 'Our boss is happy at long last! I'd begun to think we'd never see you smile again, Herr Sturmbannfuhrer.'

'Part of Army Group A! It couldn't be better. With luck we'll be at the van with von Rundstedt.' Timpke slapped Hardieck's back, then smacked a fist into his open hand. 'At last!'

A little under seventy miles away as the crow flew, Sergeant Tanner had also woken early. In contrast to Sturmbannfuhrer Timpke, however, Tanner had slept well. After eight years in the Army, he had long ago become accustomed to the lack of a mattress or other home comforts; and a bed of straw in a warm barn in May was considerably more comfortable than countless other places where he had spent the night.

However, it was not long before he, too, was feeling increasingly agitated. By seven, orders had arrived for D Company to move up to the canal, on a line to the south of the village of Oisquercq, yet he had still heard nothing about his promotion and transfer to B Company. With mounting irritation, he had woken the rest of the platoon, chivvied them to their feet, made sure they had breakfast - and still there had been no word.

'An oversight, I'm sure,' said Lieutenant Peploe, as the platoon stood in the yard drinking their morning brew. 'Let me find out what's going on from Captain Barclay.'

Yet the lieutenant had been unable to speak with him before they had moved off, so twenty minutes later, when the platoon had begun the three-mile march to the canal, Tanner was still a platoon sergeant in D Company.

'I expect the appointment had to be approved by Colonel Corner,' said Sykes, as they marched through the village. 'Maybe even Brigadier Dempsey. And there are lots of troops to move and other things to do. You know 'ow it is, Sarge.'

Tanner scowled. 'Bollocks, Stan. They've changed their mind - I know they have.'

'Course they 'aven't,' said Sykes, then added, 'but if they 'ave, at least you've got some good men in your platoon here.'

Tanner glared at him.

'I'm not saying you're right, Sarge.'

'I am, though. I can feel it in my bones.'

'And you like Mr Peploe, don't you? He seems a good sort.'

'Look, just stop talking about it, will you?' snapped Tanner.

They were now almost through the village. Ahead, Tanner could hear a grinding rumble. High above, a flight of aircraft thrummed over to disappear into thick white cloud. Soon after, they crossed a railway line, then turned onto another road where they were unexpectedly confronted by a mass of British vehicles and troops heading towards them.