A Sad Note

Route: Attendorn to Schmallenberg via Lennestadt, Graftshaft, Oberkirchen, Obringhausen back to Attendorn

Distance: about 65 km

Today was completely overshadowed by thoughts of grandma. I felt her presence with me, waking up, as I biked through the cold forest, and all throughout the day. Since talking with dad last night, I got the sense that things are really not good; that she will most likely be “checking out” as we like to say in our family. We don’t like to talk about death.
Since finding out that it would cost more than I can mortgage myself for at the moment to get home now, I decided to go to Schmallenberg, the scene of one of grandpa’s battles during the Ruhr Envelopment. This decision was based on the fact that my map said there was a train station there. I figured, I could ride over, see the place, and catch a train as planned to Hamburg. Once in Hamburg, I would await word from home and figure out my next move.
Well, when I got there, no station; of course. Apparently there hadn’t been a station there for some time because people acted like I was asking for fresh squeezed orange juice, an internet connection and a manicure.
Riding out of Attedorn, a blue collar town tucked between the high forested hills in this part of Germany, I found a nice little bike path following the rail line. Interchanging between pockmarked asphalt and red rocky gravel, it led through the little valley over tiny mirrored ponds and stands of young firs. Soon, the pointed spires of a castle jutted from the trees unobtrusively. It’s as if the architecture of this place blends into the forest.
I was making a run to one of the places where grandpa had fought during the last months of the war. In March 1945, the 48th had crossed the Rhine, and assisted with the breakout from the Remagen Bridgehead. As part of this action, they were called on to take numerous small but strategically important towns in this part Germany. This was all part of a larger effort to encircle the remainder of the German Army in what became called the Ruhr Pocket.
Basically, after the failed offensive during the Battle of Bulge, the remainder of the German Army gathered in the major industrial area of the Ruhr Valley. This was where most of Germany’s weaponry, fuel and general supplied were manufactured. Hitler knew that if they lost the Ruhr, the war was over, so he reinforced it with fresh divisions from Norway and Denmark, in addition to the so called Volks-Grenediers, the “peoples army”; a force mainly consisting of boys, old men and culls from the navy and Luftwaffe.
These men could, none the less, still pull a trigger, and thus were a force to be reckoned with. In every little town, every little valley or hill, the men of the 48th encountered some resistance. While it wasn’t nearly a major obstacle to overall victory, it still bled the unit. Men still got killed and wounded taking these small areas trying to build a wall of Americans around the Ruhr. It must have been extremely hard to know that the war was all but over, we would win, but you could still be killed.
As previously mentioned, to visit every specific location where Grandpa fought during this rapidly developing phase of the war would be out of the scope of this trip. Because of this I chose one particular area around Schmallenberg to represent this stage of the fighting. It was characterized my many small units like the 48th AIB driving up highways until fired on, dismounting from their vehicles and figuring out the best way to move forward.
By the time the 48th got to Schmallenberg, the Germans had been surrounded in the Ruhr. Little towns like these, when taken, would open up a road for the attack into the center of the trapped German Army. The final stage of the war was about to begin and grandpa and his men were among those leading the way.
Riding up the narrow river valley of rugged forest coated hills, I could picture the line of artillery, olive drab tanks dug in just behind the tree line, and men in steel helmets crouching in foxholes. They were just up there, at the edges of the trees above me to either side, waiting for the order the move out.
Upon reaching Schmallenburg, I realized that it wasn’t simply one town, but a series of towns centered around one area. Once, this place had been a nation of its own, a little kingdom up in the hilly forestlands of Germany. Now, it was just another little state.
Each town, Grafshaft, Oberkirchen, Schmallenburg, was a arranged in a road loop surrounded a large hill. This hill dominates the territory in the valley, and thus would have been the focus of any attack or defense. Each little town was situated around this high ground at strategic points where roads or streams intersected, sort of like towers in a medieval castle. If you captured one of these towns, the whole area defense was threatened.
One of the “minor” actions was at a town called Grafshaft, then a small hamlet still surrounded in its medieval walls, but controlling access to the road net and the hill beyond. Company C was sent attack and hold the hill while Company B was sent to attack and take Grafshaft. The Germans weren’t about to let this little key to the ring defenses go without a fight, so once pushed off the hill by Co. C, they counterattacked.
Co. C was pulled back about 1000 yards down the hill. Meanwhile, because of this, Co. B was stalled in the attack on the town. The Germans had the initiative for the moment, and were bleeding B and C companies. Grandpa, along with Co. A was ordered to move into the dense woods on the high ground the south of Grafshaft without being noticed by the Germans.
Riding up this little valley, I was breathing hard, and seeing a lot of hills. It was plain to see that any well organized defense here would have been very hard to break. This was probably why the town had been founded where it had, I thought as I passed a sign which read “Grafshaft 1072-1972”. A light rain was falling from a grey sky.
Grandpa and his men hiked on foot north along a ridge overlooking the town at night, making no sound, and probably carrying nothing but their rifles, extra ammo and grenades. A 20 minute artillery preparation fired into Grafshaft, and then they were off, running down the hill out of the trees trying to cover the 200 yards to the town before the Germans had a chance to pull their heads out.
As I rode past the stone walls, filled with building from the 17th century I thought that this must have been the center of resistance. Other houses were built to the left of highway, downhill, but they looked generally modern. Then, I noticed a peculiar custom of this part of Germany; the builder of a house carves his name and date into the main crossbeam over the front door. In the case of most, the dates on these stucco and wood frame houses are no earlier than 1700 and no later than 1830. Some of these houses where here in 1944.
It must have been something to run headlong down these grass fields toward the town below, loaded gun in hand, knowing that Germans were waiting for you; bullets whipping the ground, mortars exploding around your feet, and men getting hit and falling. How difficult it must have been for these guys to push into this type of frontal attack this late in the game, knowing that the end of the war was but months away.
Grafshaft fell to A Co. that morning. Afterwards, Co. B came through to “mop up” stragglers and snipers. Co. C took the high ground because the Germans had lost their base of supply and the stage was set for a later, and larger, attack on Schmallenburg itself. Once these towns had been taken, the way was open for the attack to continue north and west all the way to Dortmond, Dusseldorf and Essen, three large industrial centers and home to the remainder of German military resistance in the west.
Riding back to Schmallenberg via the little highway to Oberskirchen, I was winded. The entire route today had taken me up a river valley into the hills. In short coming here was a ride 40km uphill with me thinking that I would get on a train to Hamburg at the end.
The real fun began when I had trouble locating the train station in Schmallenberg. The map I had just bought a few days before said there was one here. But where? After riding around the perimeter a few times, I asked a youngish looking woman and her boyfriend who were waiting for a table at a café in this mostly tourist oriented town of grey stone houses and tall hills.
“Ya, the next station is in Neuestaadt” The guy said, “it’s about 18km back, enjoy your ride.”
An 18 km backtrack is not the best outcome in any days ride. I mean, 18km is probably 10 minutes in the car. On a bike with gear, that more like 25-30 minutes. And it was getting dark. Does that seem to be happening sooner every day?
Luckily, turning back and riding the entire route had its advantages. For one thing, I wouldn’t be getting lost. For another, it was pretty much all downhill. However, I never like to backtrack. Whenever possible, I would rather take an unknown road and risk getting lost then have to go back the way I came. Something about it always feels like I lost.
But, in this case, I really had no choice. I was between camping areas by about 45km, according to my now suspect map. This meant that if I continued east to the camping, I would just have to ride back down west the next day to get to the train station. Given this, I elected to go back. Luckily, it only took me 15 minutes of getting lost in Schmallenburg to figure out how to go back down the road I’d come in on. By this time it was gloomy, raining, and around 6 pm.
I put on some Dethklok and hauled as much as possible back down the 18km to Neustaadt. Once there, I found no train station. Asking the locals provided me with a host of different German to try and decipher. Eventually I gleaned that I had to go further back toward where I had camped the night before.
I finally found a station at Alundrumen. I walked by bike past a group of drunk teens out for a Saturday night. Sometimes I forget the day of the week here. This, of course, was very special Oktoberfest weekend for many Germans, which I think explained the plethora of drunken teens hanging out by the local train station, which was so far from open that it made riding back to Attendorn seem like a good idea.
So, backtracking all the way to the place where I had just camped became my plan. If I had only known this would happen, I would obviously not have hauled my gear which today made my rear wheel bearing howl with protest. I later found out that it had come loose about 1/8th of an inch. That’s big in bearing world!
The sun set behind a veil of low hanging clouds as I pedaled as fast as possible back to Attendorn. I knew that a massive hill climb up to the camping area awaited me at the very end of the run. It was dark, raining and cold.
After cresting the hill at the campsite with The Roots nudging me up the last 200 Meters to the camp area, I called Becky. She listened to me rant about not being able to figure out the trains and how everything is shut down because of Oktoberfest. When I was done, she suggested that if I was stuck here anyway, I may as well try to go have some fun. Maybe go to a bar or something? I was skeptical as I don’t speak a word of German, I was camped in a forest surrounded by trailer homes, and everyone seems to know everyone else here. Frankly, I was just tired and cold and I planned on getting in the tent and drifting off.
No sooner had I hung up the phone, when a girl from the camp across the way came over, cigarette in hand, and asked if she could help me set up my tent. She, and her entire family in the RV, had been watching me stand around the flattened tent on the ground talking on the phone and probably thought I was in need of help in more ways than one.
This quickly turned into a beer and full introductions with her family back at the set of RV’s parked in there space. As the night progressed, and it got very cold and windy, we sat in one of the RV’s drinking wine and talking along with her little sister and tiny poodle.
Farina was from Deusburg originally, but was currently working as an event planner in Berlin. Her sister, Mariana, was a student hoping to come to New York for a year of student exchange. Neither of the sisters was too thrilled about being stuck in an RV with their entire extended families for the weekend. It was their grandfather’s birthday and he had wanted to go camping. I sensed that they weren’t as bored as they let on, although they did gravitate toward the strange American in there midst.
While we talked about the differences between Germans and Americans in one trailer, the parent and grandparents were getting stomping drunk in the other.
“She doesn’t do this that often, so when she does, she really let’s loose.” Farina said about her mother by way of explanation.
Eventually, the conversation got to down to stereotypes.
“What do Americans think of Germans?” asked Farina’s little sister, “it seems like all they think about is Hitler, like he’s still in charge of us or something!”
I asked where she got that idea, and she said something about an encounter in Italy before Farina chimed in with, “I think Americans are stupid.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Most of them don’t know where Canada is on the map.” She dryly replied.
“Yes, that’s true a lot of Americans are dumb. It’s not necessarily their fault, but it partly is. I mean, “ I tried to explain to these middle class college girls who come from a culture of where achievement is prized above all else, “In America, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, like no one is holding an axe to your head saying you will finish school and become a doctor you know?”
They looked at me funny, and I could tell that they had absolutely no idea what an axe had to do with it.
“What I mean is”, I continued, “if you want to be dumb, and live your life that way, we say that’s ok you know?. But we also say, you’ll be dumb and treated like you are.”
It’s hard to explain away something that is plainly true. We are a nation becoming dumber. Our country really is, in some ways, filled with people who choose to be ignorant. Our educational system rewards blind obedience and strict adherence to mediocre performance. Our government is clearly interested in maintaining that status quo through the reforms of the past decade.
Once people are not taught how to think for themselves, they become easier to fit into the broad fabric of C+ performance that our country is becoming. Let’s face it, our life expectancy is declining, we are not teaching our children how to think, we are working harder and more than ever before (more hours than Japan now), and we are simply becoming more and more unhappy as people. We are clearly not the same country that came here and won this war.
Faced with all of this, I had to acknowledge that yes, there are some really dumb people in America, but there are also dumb people everywhere. In addition, there are some very smart people in America as well.
“Do you like Obama?” Farina asked.
“Yes, I really like him. I voted for him.”
“What do you think of him?”
“Well, I really wanted him to change things, like really change things. No more war on terror, nor more war on drugs, you know; Real change.”
“Why do Americans say “you know” all the time? You do say it all the time.” Mariana asked.
“ummm, I don’t know, ya know?”

Throughout the blustery night, the mother, father, and grandmother made silly appearances at the door of the RV with flasks, cigarettes and beer. I’m pretty sure it was a way of checking in on this weird guy with their daughters at first, but soon it became a little party between the trailers.
We laughed, and sang “Hey Baby” over and over again because I think it was the only song in English that Farina’s mother knew. I felt accepted for a time by good people just when I needed it. I managed to forget about the things I can’t change like where I am right now in relation to home, and how much money (that I don’t have) it would take to affect that.
Soon, the parents, being the drunkest of the bunch, needed to go to bed, and it was out with the American and in with the pass outs who owned the place. Farina and I said a quick goodbye, and I went off to my tent with the sounds of a happy family echoing through the night beyond.
Tomorrow I think I will attempt to get to Berlin for at least one night. Grandpa spent nearly a year there after the war. He describes the devastation, hunger and malice of the city at that pivotal moment in time when we stopped hugging the Soviets and started staring across the invisible barrier between east and west.
From there, I will go as planned to Hamburg and visit Badow, a little town to the northeast where Grandpa spent VE day. In his letters, he talks about how the 48th took over a landed estate complete with golf links, hunting grounds and a mansion that made his chateau on the Rhine look like a “shack”.
He also talks about how the landed gentry who owned the place were “die hard Nazis”, and they weren’t allowed back into their home by the men of the 48th, not even to collect bed sheets and clothing. When they protested that they owned the estate grandpa said, “This place is now owned by Uncle Sam.” He had to explain what that meant to them. He said he felt “very proud”.

After going to bed that night, watching the clouds roll over the deepening gloom of the tree coated hills, I couldn’t escape the irony of my situation. I was here, where he had been 65 years ago, overshadowed by thoughts of the same person. Grandma Vernice. Vernice Munsey. Vernice Wells. Vernice Brown. She was dying in Seattle. Just as he was here at the beginning of their lives together, I was here at the end of hers. Like him, I wanted nothing more than to return home and be with the family.