Hospital and Home
Diary of a Stosstrupp Leader (Part 58)
This post continues the translation of the diary of a German soldier who fought in the First World War. Readers can find links to other installments in this series in the following guide.
I later learned that, after I was bandaged, the Americans shot at the two medics who were taking me to the rear, hitting one of them and so causing me to fall to the ground. After a long wait, another medic arrived and so I resumed my journey to (the battalion aid station run by my old friend) Dr. Kanzow.
On 9 August 1918, after the replacement of my fully blood-soaked bandage, an automobile took me, through Péronne, to the field hospital in Incourt.
There I lay, unconscious and in a high fever, until 21 August 1918. Soon thereafter, I underwent the operation that saved my life. At that time, the head wound, which cut a tangential path through my head, measured twelve centimeters in length, three centimeters in breadth, and one centimeter in depth.
On 27 August 1918, I was loaded, along with many other wounded men, onto a hospital train. On 30 August 1918, I was taken off the train at the hospital at Antoinettenruh, near Wolfenbüttel (in Lower Saxony).
There I spent the whole month of September confined to my bed. Each time my bandage was changed, I had to be chloroformed. I could not get up for more than a few minutes until the early days of October.
My head wound healed nicely.
On 9 November 1918, my father and my sister took me home to Osterode, where, on 10 November 1918, I celebrated my twenty-first birthday.
The End
Sources
The text comes from Alwin Lyding Meine Kriegstagbuch (My War Diary), an unpublished manuscript that I found at the Bundesarchiv (German Federal Archive) (Folder N 382/1).
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It is good he made it home alive, but otherwise a sad end to sad and disastrous war.
This whole Diary was fascinating! Wonderful find!