Seeking Arnolds (eBook)

CHAPTER 1
FINDING ARNOLDS

“Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous”

- Albert Einstein

I have no memories at all of my father, Arnolds Pommers. Growing up, he sort of didn’t exist for me, since I was 1 year and 11 months old when he passed on November 7, 1948. This empty hole was actually reinforced by having, starting at age 7, a father-figure, my stepfather Aleks Siraks. My mother Anna spoke little to me of her past life with Arnolds. Some of this was to avoid memories and reminders of difficult times, and some was to keep herself and me forward-looking and appreciative of Aleks. After all, he was taking on financial and other fatherly responsibilities for a child not his own, with the natural lessening of the biological imperative. But as I matured, married Sue, and had a family of my own, the role of my biological father became more important and my need to understand Arnolds a bit more began, and then grew.

1.1 FIRST CHAT

That first moment of insight remains very vivid. It was January in the mid-1980s when I flew to San Diego, California to attend a Simulation Society conference. My distributor in the area had arranged for a room in Rancho Santa Fe, a beautiful inland suburb. I was sitting on the small patio, eating a sandwich, when I felt Arnolds’ presence. He was hovering just overhead, although I couldn’t see him…and said that I should visit him, although I heard no voice. It was disquieting, yet not scary at all, but a sensation I had never had before, and would have not believed in, had I not felt it. After those few seconds had passed, I resolved to find Arnolds.

Several photos exist of Dad’s funeral. A key one was of his gravestone, a large vertical monument, 3 or 4 feet high, engraved with the name, birth and death dates and places. The Latvian inscription “Milestiba Nekad Nebeidzas” (“Love Never Ends”) was carved into the large stone burial slab set in the ground directly in front of this headstone. Other slabs and their associated headstones were next to his. After returning from the San Diego trip, I asked my mother Anna where the cemetery was located. She said it was in Soltau, Germany, near the main road from Soltau to Hamburg, on a small side road, in the Wolterdingen area, with a train track next to it. Armed with this minimal description and photo of the gravestone, I began my search for Dad a few years later.

1.2 GUIDES ARE SENT!

It was in the spring of 1990 when I flew from London, where I had been on a business trip, to Hamburg, Germany. The next morning, on Thursday, March 22, I drove south toward Soltau. I kept my eyes peeled as I neared the target area some 50 miles south of Hamburg, and soon saw a small sign for Wolterdingen. Almost immediately, on my right, visible through a leafless spring forest, was a small cemetery. I slowed down, wondered if this could be it, but then resumed driving straight down the road, based on the disqualifiers of not yet being in Soltau, plus the visibility of the cemetery from the main road, versus it supposedly being on a side road. About a half-mile further there was a road sign - “Entering Soltau” - and I pulled off on the shoulder. Perhaps that small cemetery was worth checking out? So I waited for traffic to pass, did a U turn, and went back, taking a left onto the side road, Soltauer Str., and 2 quick right turns into the cemetery parking lot. A railroad track crossing then became visible just ahead; this immediately raised my hopes that I had found the right spot.

The parking lot was tiny, with room for maybe 10 cars. The cemetery itself was also small, perhaps 200 X 200 yards. Only one car was parked in the lot. I got out of my car and walked to the single cemetery entrance, a small gate between fencing. As I walked up to the gate, an elderly couple was approaching from inside the cemetery. We met - exactly - at the gate. Five seconds earlier or later, they would have been strangers that you might wave to, or not even acknowledge due to distance. But the timing was absolutely precise.

We had to talk. I held the gate open as the couple stepped through, and they said, in German,“Guten Tag” (good day) to me. I responded “Guten Tag” to them. They stepped through the gate, looked at me, thanked me for holding the gate open, and then said, “Sie ist nicht Deutsche” (you’re not German), and “Vas volen Sie heir”? (what are you doing here?). Since this area is well out of normal tourist haunts, their curiosity was reasonable. I replied in broken German that I was looking for my father who was buried somewhere around here. They asked, who was your father? I replied “Ein Lettish DP” (a Latvian Displaced Person), whereupon the man asked “Sprechen Sie Lettish?” (do you speak Latvian?), and I replied “Ja”. He then said, and this is an exact quote seared into my memory, “Tad runasim Latviski!” (then let’s speak Latvian!), in Latvian, which is shocking. There are perhaps 2 million Latvian speakers in our world of 7.5 billion people - and what are the odds of running into one at that exact time, at that exact place, a thousand miles from Latvia?? Mere circumstance? Strange, but at the moment, it seemed perfectly normal. Only later that night did the incident strike me for the statistical oddity that it was, or for the sheer supernaturalness of it.

But there’s much more. Further conversation revealed that the gentleman, Gabrielle, had known my father and knew exactly where he was buried - I was at the right Cemetery! Gabrielle had also been a Latvian DP at that same Wolterdingen Camp where we had lived in 1948, and had married a local German girl, Hildegard, and stayed in the area (Note: it’s possible that my guide’s names were Vilis and Erica; my personal documentation has become sketchy over time and I apologize and feel horrible about this possible inaccuracy. My later local acquaintance, Waldemar, who you will soon meet, said with great certainty that the guides were Gabrielle and Hildegard). Gabrielle then said “You would not have found the grave”, and walked me a hundred feet to Dad’s grave…and it was easily apparent why I would not have found it alone. The huge 4 foot monument that I was looking for, as portrayed in the photo, had been replaced by a 1’ x 1’ stone plaque flat in the ground, with Dad’s name on it, but covered by low evergreen bushes that had crept up and almost obliterated the gravesite. The explanation was that the large upright gravestone was simply a cheap concrete marker (which explained a mystery to me - how could my penniless Mother have afforded a huge granite monument?) - which had crumbled over time. For years after World War II no one had paid attention to foreigners’ graves. Cemeteries were crammed with local casualties, and Germany was more concerned with food, medicine and shelter. Many years later, after Germany had minimally recovered, the nation began replacing these crumbling concrete monuments with flat stone plaques wherever possible. I salute them for this.

To be finally standing next to Arnolds was a highly emotional moment. Tears flowed. The grief for a life cut short at 40 years, of a father unknown, of a son unknown to the father, all gushed out. My hosts waited respectfully by, and then invited me to view the remnants of the Wolterdingen Camp - a bit down this side road, just past the Soltau-Hamburg road, on the left. After cleaning up Dad’s site, laying down some wildflowers, and “touring” the graveyard, we left to see the old Wolterdingen Camp.

(Note: As an important aside, this Cemetery also has monuments to commemorate the massacre of 269 prisoners - mostly Jewish - on April 12, 1945. They were being transported by rail from the nearby Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in an effort to hide Nazi atrocities as the War was winding down. The Allies were bombing German trains, and one raid hit such a train in Wolterdingen, with many inmates escaped in the tumult. They were hunted down and murdered by a combination of locals and German troops, and the monuments in the Cemetery are in remembrance of these victims. So, very sadly, this was the site of many tragedies besides our personal one.)

To continue - after a short ride we arrived at the old Wolterdingen Camp. There were still the remains of buildings, cellar holes, foundations, and paths where my family and I had lived in 1948. We actually stood on the road where Arnolds’ funeral procession passed from the Camp to the Cemetery - I have a photo - so this was also breathtaking. My hosts then kindly invited me to their home, which was just a few miles toward Hamburg on the main road, on the right side - where we chatted, ate, and parted company. Upon leaving, they gifted me with two souvenirs, decorative plates of Soltau. Gabrielle and Hildegard were wonderful people, and primary players in this most amazing, miraculous happening.

1.3 SECOND CHAT

On the same trip, but later in the day, I took a short detour to Bergen-Belsen, the notorious concentration camp liberated by the Allies in 1945. The grey spring weather and the total lack of other visitors added to the melancholy of the place. I paid my respects by walking around the burial mounds and their body counts and contemplated man’s horrors visited on man. My memories remain vivid: I observed closely the trees surrounding the main camp, which were either witnesses or their offspring to the suffering and carnage. On the...