Königsberg 9 April 1945 / Kaliningrad 9 April 2020

Published: 12 April 2020

10:30pm: As tired as I am, and I am, I had to write this. In about one and a half hours from now, Otto Lasch, Commandant of Königsberg, sitting in his command bunker at the heart of Kaliningrad, will sign a document the contents of which will change the course of history here forever.

By now he must have been agonising over whether to give the surrender order or not, particularly since Herr Hitler had strictly forbidden him to do so and knowing that whilst further resistance was futile the grim alternative was to hand himself and what was left of his army over to the Soviets, from whom he could expect very little leniency and possibly even less humanity.

This haunting train of thought was set in motion by a chance comment from my wife, Olga, this morning, who happened to mention that today, 9 April, was the last day of the Königsberg Offensive (WWII).

I had other things planned for today, but, thought I, perhaps I should put something together for my blog to acknowledge the historic significance that today’s date has to Königsberg’s demise and Kaliningrad’s existence.

At first, I was not sure what form the essay would take and mulled various options, some quite elaborate, too elaborate. I could write, for example, from the perspective of a time traveller, which would allow me to write a dramatic account and, as a shadowy figure from the future, flit about at will from one location to another over the four-day period that the assault took place. Or, I could write the piece as if I was an on-the-spot reporter, using short, dramatic and punchy sentences (why, now that would be a change!). But what decided against these novelties was time and the need to gen up on the historical facts first. If I wanted the article to be posted on my blog by the end of the day, I would have to read, digest, select, condense and then write.

The form which my modest contribution to this awesome day took in the life and death of Kaliningrad and Königsberg respectively, worked itself out whilst I was taking notes from my readings. After all, I would be content, for the time being, to precis the salient points from the four-day invasion and epilogue it with a time-travelling postscript, enunciating the contrast between this warm, sunny and relaxing day of 9 April 2020 with the noise, mayhem, pandemonium, pain, suffering, horror, fear, bloodshed and death which characterised today’s date 75 years previously.

Königsberg Offensive revisited

In the course of compiling this little work, my research tripped the switch, and, short-circuited emotionally, my imagination stole off to do some unauthorised time travelling of its own.

Apart from odd air raids by the Soviet Air Force, the real terror and horror of war began for Königsbergians in the August of 1944, when two consecutive nights of heavy bombing orchestrated by the RAF blew the guts out of the city. Why it had not occurred to me before I do not know, but the occupants of Königsberg, those who had not been blown to pieces, crushed to death or incinerated in the allied air attacks, would have eight months more of waiting, watching and fearing to do before their worst fears were to be realised.

As now, with the coronavirus scare, there must have been the usual suspects who were in denial or just plain blasé, but for the realists one can only imagine how the months, weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds passed as they waited and watched for Hell to announce itself.

Königsberg 6 April 1945

Having sneaked off on its own accord, my imagination arrived in the East Prussian region on the dawn of 6 April 1945. It was sun-up and the artillery onslaught, which would last for three hours, was well underway. Then came the surge of the ground troops.

This was not something that had happened in some far flung corner of the world of which I had heard but little and to which I had never been, it had happened here, in this little corner of the world, and would have taken in and effected the district of Kaliningrad where we now lived, the streets outside these windows and the very house in which I am sitting. And now came the questions, one after the other, following in quick succession. Was there anybody living here at the time of the assault or had they perchance been fortunate enough to have fled on one of the refugee ships? If not, who were these people? What were their thoughts, their feelings, their conversations to one another? What did they hear, smell, see? How did they react? And, of course, did they survive or were they murdered?

The researching and writing part of me toiled on throughout the day, but my imagination was busy elsewhere, amongst the heavy artillery explosions, the echoing chatter of machine guns, the shouts and cries and the screams of pain, the mighty explosions, the sounds of crashing buildings. It was with the Soviet troops as they scrambled through the dust and broken masonry in a fierce endeavor to rout the enemy; it was with the German defenders, each and every one I suspect endowed with the imminence of their own cruel fate; it was here, above all, it was here ~ in this very house, within the four walls of this room, helpless in its observation of the cowering, terrified inhabitants, their own imaginations mercilessly fueled by tales of Soviet barbarity (true or false) which had been unleashed on other towns and other unfortunate victims en route to the great prize itself, Königsberg.

Historical record has it that Otto Lasch, the Commandant of Königsberg, officially surrendered to the Soviet forces in the city’s command bunker a few minutes before midnight 9 April 1945. 

For the rest of my evening the two of us, the working me in 9 April 2020 and my temporarily estranged imagination in 9 April 1945, peeped into and hovered around the bunker of Otto Lasch. I looked at the computer clock, and I wrote: In about one and a half hours from now Otto Lasch, Commandant of Königsberg, sitting in his command bunker at the heart of Kaliningrad, will sign a document the contents of which will change the course of history here forever.

I did not wait up for my imagination. Longstanding association and a comprehensive understanding of all my many dualities assured me that this would not be necessary, futile even.

Suffice it to say we would meet tomorrow, when all this would be over, back in the past where it belongs ~ or so the present would have us believe …

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