Hein: I never followed politics as I found it boring so I never paid attention to what the press said about Poland. I know my parents and others spoke about the trouble we had with Poland right after the first war. They attacked German border towns trying to take more than what Versailles gave them. This sparked the wars on the frontiers with the Freikorps, they fought both the reds and Poles. My father fought in the Baltic region against the reds. When the Führer came to power it had been quiet for awhile but when talk started about reclaiming the lost lands the Poles started agitating against the German minority, hurting many. That was all I knew back then, I did not know anything about Jews or anyone else. It came as a surprise when I heard on the radio that we had attacked Poland. I had a teacher who was a party member and he told us all that Germany will need our prayers as our enemies are bigger than us.

He said the Führer will see us through this and to not fear. We would listen to the daily war reports on the radio and were quite pleased to hear the Wehrmacht was advancing. I heard the remark that it was interesting that the Allies declared war on us but not Russia for attacking Poland. I will say that our lives were not really impacted very much, I saw the air raid men doing drills and taping windows. We were placed under rationing to save food for the front, and to beat the Allied blockade. I also saw some of the ethnic Germans who escaped from Poland march to demand that they be allowed to take back land the Poles seized from them. Overall the mood was cautious but optimistic in victory. It was a happy time when victory over Poland was announced. It made us proud that we beat a very large and well equipped military.

You were part of the last ditch Waffen-SS division 'Nibelungen', can you tell me about your time there and the fighting?

Hein: Yes, Nibelungen was formed from several SS units including students and instructors from Bad Tölz, men from border units, broken up SS units, and wounded who were released to fight. There were French and also HJ [Hitler Youth] boys fresh from Panzerfaust training. We were nowhere close to being a division, like most divisions at this time we were only about five thousand men, vastly under strength. We were placed on the western front in March of '45 and attempts to organize us were made. There was much infighting I remember at this stage. We all knew the war was lost; it was evident after the Allies crossed the Rhine. Therefore many took it upon themselves to try to give orders and their forceful opinions about orders. This caused some charges of insubordination to be brought, but due to wartime stresses these were largely dismissed or the offender transferred. I did not hear any defeatist talk however; we somehow believed a miracle would happen. At the least we were told even resisting for just one more day meant the escape of those fleeing the reds.

We had heard it was very bad in the east with many civilians suffering from the winter cold while escaping the red army. In the west it was bad also, most all German cities had been badly bombed and the civilians had crowded the small towns. We were placed in a blocking position to face the advancing Americans and slow them down. This was in April, if I remember right. We had a warm-up but that only meant the Jabos [American planes] were out often. Those devils shot at anything that moved, military or civilian. We had to help bury civilians caught on a road that were killed. It helped us that we were in wooded areas and often had cover. Civilians were warned to not be on the roads during the day but many foreigners did not understand. We engaged Americans towards the very end of it all and gave them a good beating. Our leader was Gruppenführer Martin Stange who did all he could to make sure we had what we needed, like all SS commanders, he was a frontline leader and often among the men. I was in the 95th and we were put in position around Kelheim.

The Americans had tank reserves to punch through our lines and this caused us to retreat often, but we bled them as we went. We became very good at knocking out the Sherman with mines or Panzerfausts. Many men would qualify for the tank destruction badge, but never received it. I remember this time was a blur, it was as if it was a dream, and not real. The smell of smoke and death, the looks on the faces showed despair. We had to keep falling back as our flanks were threatened. I met an American prisoner from Madison, Wisconsin, he was German as well. He said he was sorry to see what was happening to Germany, and we talked about how futile the war was, he surprised me.

We thought the same things, and we had good conversations with him while we waited for someone to move him to a rear camp. He shared cigarettes with us, and we shared what little we had. It was a nice respite to forget about the war. We talked about the girls back home and showed pictures. He was taken by the home guard to be moved to a collection point, but the war was over before he even made it. We were forced to surrender on May 5th and for us the war was done. Even though our time was short-lived we took pride in holding up the vaunted American army with limitless tanks, men, and planes.