Disclaimer: Do I own them? Take a guess. But, to further clarify: the following story is not intended to reflect on the work of others. And heaven knows I'm not making any money on it.

Things Never Are

You've asked me what the last day was like. I have to admit, I don't know where to begin. All I can say is that it wasn't like I thought it would be. Or at least, it wasn't all like I thought it would be. I always assumed there'd be a lot of cheering and excitement, and there was, but I felt a lot more that day than I ever dreamed of.

The last few weeks had been pretty strained, I remember that. We were all tense and sniping at each other a bit. I think it's because you always get more anxious when you can see the end, when you can see you're almost home. Of course, that's when you also get the most sloppy according to the Colonel, and he was riding us pretty hard about not being complacent or rushing through things. The Germans were reaching the breaking point and, as the Colonel pointed out, they didn't have much to lose anymore. He said the last thing we needed to do was push one of them over the edge when we were so close to home. But, between doing all the things we needed to do to close down the operation, helping out our friends in the underground, tip-toeing around the Krauts and watching the gates every day to see who'd make it first, the Americans, the Russians or the Gestapo execution squads, I was walking around all the time feeling like I had drunk twenty cups of coffee or something. There were times when I felt so nervous I could hardly talk at all, and for me that's saying something!

We didn't know for sure that that day was going to be the last day, but we all felt it was getting close. The operation was pretty much closed down by then and most of papers and stuff the Colonel had wanted to get out had already been shipped to London or destroyed. All the escaping prisoners down in the tunnels (and some of our guys too - even the Kommandant knew by that point his no escape record wasn't worth a hill of beans anymore), had been taken out and gotten on their way before the situation outside the camp might have become too dangerous. Frankly, I think the Colonel was a bit angry at himself, on account of us still being there, for not shutting us down completely and getting everyone away before that happened, but we wouldn't have gone anyway, so I don't know what the point of him torturing himself was for. We all wanted to see it to the end the same as him. Sure we wanted to go home, and we were scared too, but what if someone had needed our help? Or what if the Germans had pulled some magic trick out of their hat and turned the whole mess around and it wasn't the end after all? Like Kinch said, it's not like we could just stroll back into Germany and start up again. You can't blame us for wanting to be sure, right?

By that day though, it was pretty clear. Or at least as clear as it could be in times like those. Everything was a mess outside. Not just destroyed buildings and things like that - no one knew what to do. There were no orders coming from the Krauts anymore. None people felt like following, anyway. You'd see some of'em in the streets sometimes, almost going wild. Or others who couldn't do anything but sit and stare into space because they were so tired or so…I don't know…heartbroken, I guess. Most though, just shambled along with no where to go. It was more like the end of the world than the end of the war.

But here in camp, the Colonel was keeping things as much under control as he could. The tunnels were cleared out and the charges were set. The only thing left of the operation was the radio which we had kept in case of an emergency, and the weapons the Colonel had given us in case things got bad. He had also drilled us on his plan to defend the camp, and on another plan in case we all had to escape in a hurry. (I'll tell you now: sitting at my post with Newkirk back then, watching and waiting for who knows what, I don't think I remembered a single thing about either one! I told Newkirk that a few years ago; he said he'd been the same way, but he figured we would have remembered in the end, if we'd actually needed to.)

I never had to find out though, thank goodness. The very last radio message Kinch ever got was to tell us that the American forces were only a half an hour out and were on their way. The Colonel must have talked to the Kommandant before that, because when he went to the Kommandant's office, Klink turned over control of the camp to him right away. (Officially, that is. The Colonel had been kind of calling the shots for a little while already.) It was almost like a little ceremony - Newkirk called it the changing of the guard - and it kinda of gave me a funny feeling. I always thought I'd be jumping up and down, but Klink was so sad - almost dignified in his own way - and the whole thing was so solemn and so BIG, that even though it only took a minute, it felt terrible. He didn't even seem that surprised. Klink, I mean. But I guess the Germans had been doing their own waiting.

After that, we collected the guard's guns, then we all sat around in the compound while Olsen and Garlotti climbed up into two of the goon boxes to keep a lookout. London hadn't thought to tell us from which direction the Allies were coming. It was well over an hour, and I was starting to worry that London had made a mistake, when Olsen started shouting that they were coming.

Well, the cheers that went up, you just wouldn't believe! We shouted ourselves hoarse. To this day I'm surprised I never went deaf from it all. Poor Garlotti sprained his ankle jumping off the ladder half way down from the guard tower, he was so anxious to join the celebration! I was so overwhelmed by it all I just wanted to sit right down and bawl my eyes out. Some guys actually did. I tried not to though, cause I don't think I would've been able to handle the embarrassment on top of everything else! Instead, I got so choked up I couldn't say a word. Newkirk noticed and started laughing. "Look, old Andrew's bloody speechless!" he said. And then he grabbed me in a fierce hug and, would ya believe it, when he pulled away he was crying! Crying and laughing at the same time. He'd hardly let go of me before he was hugging Lebeau, but then Kinch slapped me so hard on the back I spun round and the Colonel had to steady me. And when he did I saw that he was smiling so hard I thought he was going to split his face, and there were tears in his eyes too.

But when the American tanks finally rolled up, and the gates were opened for them, for a minute it all stopped. We all stood there, stunned. Really! I know that seems strange, but it's true. I don't think there was a single guy in camp who wasn't staring at those front gates, unable to say a word.

I don't think I'll ever really be able to explain to you how it felt. I don't think any of us could. It was shock mostly, I suppose. It was over, really over. That's when the war ended for me. It's not like I had never been through those gates before, and certainly not like I hadn't ever been out of camp before - which I guess makes the feeling even harder to understand in our case, since we were never as trapped as other POWs - but it was so final this time, you know what I mean? That's when it really hit us - no more running, no more hiding, no more cons and tricks to get out; after years of having to plan and scheme for every bit of freedom, years of those fences and barbed wire and guard towers and even our own sense of duty keeping us in, keeping us here, now we could just waltz out the front gate as easy as you'd walk from the kitchen to the front porch. We were FREE, and when we walked out this time it would be for the last time. I couldn't even say I was happy. I just didn't know what I was feeling. I was free, I could go, and yet there was this bitter kind of feeling that came crashing down all around me. I should've been happy, but all of a sudden I couldn't help thinking about how unfair it was it all was. It wasn't until I was free I think, that I realized just how much of prisoners I'd really been.

Well, there isn't a whole lot to tell after that. The cheers started again when the Americans came up to us and started introducing themselves. Their CO and the Colonel started organizing everybody and getting them onto the trucks. Those poor guys, the ones who liberated us…ha, ha, we were clambering all over them, asking about news from home - even though we had a lot more info than most POWs, or even these guys, thanks to our radio - but we were all too happy to do much thinking, let alone anything productive.

After awhile though, mostly everyone else was gone, even Klink and Schultz and the other guards. The Colonel got the last of us into the truck at the end of the line, and then told the American unit's CO to drive us down the road about 500 feet, and that's when we blew the tunnels. Boy, a lot of the guys liberating us didn't know what to make of that! After standing there for a minute, looking at each other and waiting for the dust to settle, we got back in the truck and now we were all laughing and joking, even singing. I guess we forgot what we'd been feeling just a few hours ago.

So in the end, I never even took a final look round the old place. I kind of wish I had now, though. I don't know why. But it bothers me a bit these days, that I can't remember what was the last thing I saw of Stalag 13. Maybe that whole time would feel more over with now, if only I'd paid attention and had some kind of memory of that last glimpse. If I'd just taken a second and fixed one last look of the place in my head and said, "Yep, that's it. It's over," maybe it would've closed the book.

But I don't know. It's been years and years and yet I still don't know why the world had to go through something like that. And I don't know how someone like Hitler could rise to power. I don't even know whether to call myself lucky or not. But I guess anyone who lived through it is lucky.

All I know is that it - you know, the war, being a prisoner, getting liberated - none of it was like I thought it would be. But as the Colonel himself pointed out to me, things never are.