Author's Note: This is one scene from BOB that has always captivated me. No disrespect intended, I have only the highest regard for the 101st airborne, and especially for Sarg. Bull.
Innocence Lost
I was young, only sixteen and the German army had rolled into Nuenen only three days ago. The war was on the doorstep of our little town for so long, and now finally, it had made itself at home.
We had found the young-bullish soldier in our barn the night after the German Army had surprised and obliterated British and American forces on their way presumably to Eindhoven.
My mother and brother's, all died during the first months of the war from sickness or injury – although my oldest brother, Peter, just went missing- and now the German's had invaded our home.
They would not kill us if we stayed out of their way, so we decided to hide out in the barn until morning and avoid as much of the gunfire and as many soldiers as we could, praying to God that a tank would not destroy us.
After the day of slaughter, we could do nothing but pray and remain hidden. My father would not let me out of his sight, for he was sure the German troops would take me and I'd be subjected to all sorts of unclean things, after all, I was just a common Dutch girl, although my bright blue eyes and nearly white hair would save me from being sent away with the Jews, I was still the enemy.
It was winter, and the nights were dark with very little moonlight at this time of year. I entered the barn to join my father, only to find him in the grasp of a powerfully built man who held a dagger to my father's throat.
I didn't cry out. I didn't make a sound. I only stared in fear, like a deer caught in the headlights of a car.
There was a noise outside, and the man pushed my father towards the stall of our only work horse, Ida; but she wasn't there, the Germans had taken her for their own use of occupied Holland, months ago.
He then grasped me by the hand and yanked me towards my father before gently closing the barn door.
I fell to the old, smelly straw and clung to my father in terror, trying to push myself into the planks of wood and out of the soldier's way as he quickly joined us.
He ushered us to be quiet and for some strange reason, I felt calm, it appeared he was not here to hurt us. It was then that I first noticed his American badges.
We were in some trouble.
If the Germans found us hiding an American, we would all be dead.
I noticed blood seeping out from the man's shoulder, and pointed it out to my father.
Hesitantly, he gestured to the soldier, and then pulled his whiskey flask from his jacket pocket and offered it to him.
The soldier shook his head, but turned his back to us, and allowed my father to peel away at his jacket that was sticking to the wound.
I instinctively gathered my skirt and began to tear a strip off of my petticoat while my father washed the shrapnel wound with his whiskey.
The soldier didn't make a sound as my father then proceeded to shove his fingers into the wound and dig for the piece of metal embedded in his flesh, but I saw his face grimace in pain. I watched him, and he watched me, his eyes not losing contact, until my father produced the scrap of a tank shell for him to see. He then poured a little more whiskey on the wound and then stuffed it with the bandages made from my petticoat.
This American soldier was a tall, but well built man. He reminded me of my family's old Bullock in stature, and I'm sure he was very brave, but his eyes were soft when he looked at me. His eyes studied me, as if I was something he had not seen for a very long time.
I offered him a small, shy smile.
I could see the dimples in his cheek as he contemplated asking a question.
But there was no time for a reply, for a jeep door closed loudly outside and footsteps headed our way.
The American soldier ushered us up from the straw and quickly towards the back of the barn towards the back entrance. We hid there, right by the door and pressed ourselves to the floor, staying as still as possible.
I heard the soldier scramble back to the stall and fix his bayonet to his weapon, just as the barn doors were pushed open and a company of German soldiers entered, laughing and talking casually as they checked the place out.
Pretty soon, there was all but one soldier left in the barn, and he too was about to leave when something stopped him. I could hear his breathing change and the tension in the air was electric.
It was then, just as he went to cry out, that we heard the American soldier tackle the German from behind. There was a scuffle, so loud, that I am surprised to this day that it did not attract the attention of the other soldiers outside. I heard punches thrown and much to my father's disapproval, I stole a peek of the fight from behind a stall wall.
And that's when I saw it:
I watched in horror as before my eyes, the American soldier thrust his bayonet into the German soldier who had disturbed our hiding place. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion and I could not contain my shock as the tall American man's eyes came to meet mine and the blood of the German soldier came rolling out of his mouth in small bubbles.
He was dead.
I have never since seen a man look at me in utter torment, the way that soldier did. His blue eyes looked both guilty and defiant, it was only when he looked away from me, I knew he felt like he had just robbed me of something… my innocence perhaps.
The soldier quickly and quietly closed the barn doors once again and then urged my father to help him drag the dead man to Ida's stall and cover him with straw.
Once the task was complete, we all made a swift exit through the back door and towards one of the large drains that lined the dyke.
My father decided that it was best if we continued our journey out of Nuenen and so he shook the soldiers hand and bade me to follow.
I could not explain how I felt. But I felt connected to this soldier in some way. He had saved our lives, as well as his own and I knew that regardless of his power as a killing machine, he was still a good man.
I hastily removed my headscarf that contained a small parcel of biscuits and chocolate I had stashed in my vest and pressed them into the soldiers' hands.
It was not much, but it was something.
The American did not look me in the eyes again, but I felt him watch me as I turned and followed my father.
Now, nearly seventy years on; I do not know if that soldier survived his cold night in the drains of Nuenen, or even survived the rest of the long and bloody war, but I know, that he was one of the best men, I have ever met.
I look back on that night in the barn, as my loss of innocence and my induction into the world of honour and duty, and most of all; it opened my eyes to the reality of war and the preciousness of life.
That soldier was a constant inspiration throughout my life.
Not long after hiding out in a small woodcutter's cottage in the forests of Nuenen, we returned home to find our village destroyed and it was there I left my father.
I was no longer the innocent daughter of a Dutch blacksmith, I was a young woman, who wanted to contribute to the efforts of the Allies in the war and maybe, save the life of a soldier, just like the American man who had so bravely saved my own.
I spent the remainder of the war, as a nurse and medical aid. I served in hospitals and tents that were made out to be hospitals. I wrapped legless limbs with torn bed sheets and had felt the beating heart of a living soldier before his blood spewed out from his stomach wound and died in my arms.
I'm an old woman now. Faces and names from those days I have forgotten, although many of dying soldiers and children still haunt me in my sleep. However, there is one man's face I shall never forget, and to this day, I still pray for him. I pray he has found the peace that god gives all of us, who survive the war. I pray that he was able to know, that somehow, someway, he made a difference for the better of the future.
This is how my story closes. I pray you continue to thank God, as I do, that there are still some good men in this world, men that would continue to fight for the common and poor, who would fight to maintain what little innocence that remains. I knew a man like that once, and so he shall be remembered as such, until the end of my life.