The Russians fired into our packed ranks as we stumbled forward without regard for our dead and wounded. My group was now in the lead. Then we came under fire from tanks in Johannisstrasse on our right, and the effect of high explosive shells bursting in our ranks was simply terrible. The advance came to a halt and thousands of people started streaming back. I had never seen such a fiasco.
However, we did not go with them. It was obvious that there would be another attempt, so we vanished like lightning into the buildings on our left, where we were safe. As we had been out in front, no one could prevent us stepping aside as we did. We were in front because in an attack that is the safest place to be, as experienced front line soldiers know.
So far my own men had suffered no casualties and were still sticking together. We waited for the inevitable second attempt, which was preceded by an armoured personnel carrier firing on all sides as it raced toward us, but it was only hastening to its fate, for it stopped and burst into flames, blocking the street for the other armoured vehicles following.
As those on foot reached us, we jumped out to resume the lead. The street now lay full of dead and wounded, the armoured vehicles racing over them. While under cover in the buildings, we had met up with some experienced men from the ‘Nordland’ and even some parachutists. Enemy tanks appeared in front of us again and we tried to creep up under their fire to knock them out in order to get past, but fresh tanks appeared behind them from the right and sprayed those in front with machine gun fire, the ricochets causing heavy casualties among us. Practically the whole of my platoon was hit by this fire, which broke up the attack, sending the masses streaming back again.
We pulled our wounded into the cover of the buildings and bandaged them up as best we could. I used my bottle of schnapps to pour courage into them. I realised that the whole business was hopeless. The Russians had been reinforced and when another crowd moved up they were slaughtered before my eyes.
We did not take any further part in this massacre. I worked out that the leadership had driven off, abandoning us, so I owed them no further allegiance and must save my own life and those of my few remaining unwounded men. We had to leave our wounded behind, which made my heart bleed, for it was for the first time in this war. So I said farewell to them, encouraging them by saying that the opposing Russians were also front line troops and would not do anything to them. I told them to remove their SS runes and make themselves unidentifiable as Waffen-SS, to get rid of all their documents and paybooks, and then they would be taken to hospital and treated as normal Wehrmacht soldiers.
Only two unwounded men remained, Alfred, my HQ Section leader, and a runner. During a pause in the firing we crept back to the Weidendammer Bridge together. I cannot describe the horror that lay on the street and increased with every attack.
With my remaining men I found the Schlutersteg and crossed the Spree without coming under fire, for the Russians were concentrating their efforts on Friedrichstrasse. We eventually reached the Lehrter Station, where one could see signs of the fighting that had taken place there, but no Russians. Once we got beyond the Nordhafen we headed north. My HQ Section leader knew his Berlin well and gave me good directions, but I still think that I could have found my way without his local knowledge. Wherever possible we went through cellars by means of the holes in the walls that had been knocked through as an air raid precaution, so that people could escape if their house was hit. This way we could go the whole length of some streets.
Eventually we came to a police building, possibly the police hospital, as there were policemen on guard at the windows. So we gradually made progress. It was now daylight and at any moment a Russian patrol could emerge from a doorway or yard entrance, so I removed my medals and insignia, as did my comrades, making ourselves unrecognisable as Waffen-SS. We met up with some German soldiers, making their way one by one in the same direction as ourselves.
Then we came across SS-Captain Mundt, who was alone. He was our divisional quartermaster with an office in the Lichterfelde barracks. It was a post he had held since 1934 and so he had never been in combat. Having once helped him with a job, he had always stopped to talk to me ever since. It was he who now told me what had happened to the Mohnke group, of which he had been a member. After they had crossed the Schlutersteg, firing had broken out in Friedrichstrasse after our first break-out attempt, whereupon Mohnke had commented: ‘Now they have caught it!’
This comment had caused Mundt to leave the group and make his own way out. I told him that the senseless break-out attempt on Friedrichstrasse had cost my men their lives and that I felt responsible. I told him: ‘The Fuhrer is dead and my oath to him over. In future I will pick my own superiors, whether they wear generals’ uniforms or not.’
Mundt did not respond, but went on his own way while we carried on to the north. We did not encounter any enemy and it must have been about 1600 hours when we arrived at the Patzenhofer Brewery premises in Prinzenstrasse, where thousands of men were standing around in groups talking and clearly waiting for something. I thought that they were waiting for orders for the next break-out attempt to the north. I mixed in among them looking for anyone I knew, but found no one and the individual groups were distrustful of outsiders and stopped talking whenever an outsider approached. This made me suspicious in turn and I continued my search with my two comrades. I then noticed a large bunker in the middle of the brewery yard with concrete steps leading down below. I handed my sub-machine gun to my men and went down the steps to a curtain, behind which I could hear voices, including Russian ones. I brushed back the curtain and went into a dimly lit large room full of officers, mainly Waffen-SS.
Mohnke was standing in the middle of the room talking to two Russian officers, one apparently a general and the other acting as an interpreter translating all that was being said. I heard Mohnke say: ‘Let us sum up. At 1800 hours we hand over the city; the men go into honourable captivity and have to work; the officers will only have to work voluntarily; the staff officers retain their decorations and sidearms and of course their orderlies.’
The interpreter nodded eagerly, whereupon I stepped forward and said: ‘And you believe that, Brigadier?’
Mohnke came up to me and said: ‘Don’t speak unless asked when generals are talking!’
We then had a strong exchange of words in front of the Russians that I will not go into. I stormed out of the room in a rage, threatening to warn the comrades above, as we did not want to end up in the Siberian lead mines. I heard Mohnke call out to two of his officers: ‘Bring him back or he will spoil everything!’
But they were unable to stop me and my comrades helped me send them back down the steps into the bunker. Then another officer came after me, it was SS-Captain Mundt, and I said to him angrily: ‘What do you want, then?’
He had been present but I had not noticed him. ‘Oh, Rogmann,’ he said, ‘what a fool I have been thinking there was going to be another break-out. You don’t know how right you are!’
‘Oh yes I do!’ I said.
Mundt went on: “No one dared say anything against it and then you burst in and stirred things up. I do not want to surrender and go into captivity either. Please take me with you on another route that will hopefully bring us to freedom!”
When I agreed, my two comrades put their heads together and started whispering to one another. Then they pulled me aside and said: ‘Willi, just look at him! He can dress in anything he likes but he will still look like a Prussian officer, even at a distance!’
They were right, of course, but how could I leave him behind? I decided to take him, even if his presence might endanger us. Mundt understood what was happening and said: ‘Rogmann, I would rather die than go to Siberia!’
‘Of course I will take you with me,’ was my reply, ‘but I am in charge and you will have to do what you are told without any argument.’
He agreed, but now had to do things our way. I took his officers’ hat from his head and flung it away, for it was easily recognisable at a distance, and then his shoulder straps and cut off his runes and stars with my knife. Of course his boots and tailor-made uniform still showed what he was, but we could not do anything about that for the moment. He removed his officers’ belt and stuffed his pistol into his hip pocket.
In direct contrast, I was filthy, unkempt and unshaven, with a thick stubble on my face and my pockets bulging. I was wearing my trousers outside my boots and looked an absolute tramp, but in these circumstances, where the Russians were equally dirty, this was perfectly acceptable.
