Letter 257

Thursday Aug 17 1944

Dear All at Home !

At this moment I am laying behind a Rail Road embankment with a Machine gun and try to write and I have to keep watch on several hundred Romanians who are felling trees. But I am not on my own, several men with carbines are here as well. Here is our place, 30 Kilometers from Varna and 75 meters on either side of the rail Road, the trees will be cut down. This is to get a better field of fire against Partisans trying to disrupt the rail connections. There are not as many here as there were in Russia but the Russian drop some by parachute at times. I wished I could stay with a unit like this until the end of the war, just to secure a rail link. That would be a good job for me. I was going to apply as a forest ranger here if we stayed for a longer time. I can only hope that my Company is not coming back to soon but I don’t get any mail from you here, but I don’t mind, I can write to you whenever I like. I am what you can call a self employed, instead marching in a big group to some unknown destination. I wish the German People had a chance to see this Romanian Folks and think they can classify the Romanians as better people, not so, they live worst than the Russians and there is us, we have to defend Nations like these. If it was not for us standing behind them with a Machine Gun and a dozen Rifles, they would have thrown their weapons away long ago and fled. They learned from the Italians it seemed. Well for now Greetings Your Heinrich.

From: Heinrich Bredemeier FP # 56972 = Grenadier Battalion 320

To: Family Heinrich Bredemeier, Rehren A.O. # 12, near Rinten, Weser.

This was the last letter I have found from Heinrich to home.