Flakhelfer to Grenadier

Karl H. Schlesier. Flakhelfer to Grenadier. Memoir of a Boy Soldier, 1943-1945. (100+ pages; a Foreword by John M. Janzen; one map; four photographs)On January 7, 1943, the German Government, in order to free adult soldiers for frontline duties, ordered that all male students of elite secondary schools (Gymnasium, Oberrealschule) born in 1926 and 1927 were to be drafted into anti-aircraft service in the homeland. The day the students were ordered to arrive in the designated batteries was February 15. The official term for them was Luftwaffenhelfer (Air Force Auxiliary), although they were usually, and more accurately, called Flakhelfer (Anti-Aircraft Auxiliary).After serving from one year (those born in 1926) to eighteen months (those born in 1927), the boys were transferred into the Reichsarbeitsdienst (Reich Labor Service) and from there into the Armed Forces. They were replaced by boys born in 1928. A total of about 200,000 boys served as Flakhelfer. Their average age when they were called up was sixteen, but due to the birth date quite a few were still fifteen (as was the author). The boys served in batteries of Light Flak (2 cm and 3,7 cm guns) and Heavy Flak (8,8 cm, 10,5 cm and 12,8 cm guns).The author served as Flakhelfer in the regions that suffered the most numerous and heaviest air raids of the war, in the Rhineland (D?sseldorf) and the Ruhr (Recklinghausen). After fifteen months as Flakhelfer he was transferred first into the Reichsarbeitsdienst, then into the Army. The memoir covers the time period from June 10, 1943, to September 23, 1945.The memoir was written based on the author?s diary notes of that period. Little, if anything included here, is made use of from post-war sources. Views, opinions and interpretations of events expressed in the memoir are those from inside Germany at the time. They may be inconvenient today but mirror the chaos of the time and place. Then, to live or not to live was accidental.The author, with a long professional career in the U.S. and Germany, has published seven books and numerous articles in scholarly journals. He wrote this book as an old man, giving a voice to the silent generation of those born in Germany in 1926 and 1927. This generation has been silent because the horror it went though pales compared to the horror of the Holocaust.