assembly members managed to break through the cordon around the building and escape. Others holed up in their offices. Markgraf’s police did nothing.
The Communists roamed the town hall, discovering forty-six plainclothes West sector (‘Stumm’) police that assembly members had brought for their protection. Other Westerners fled, or found refuge in the offices of the Allied liaison officers attached to the Magistrat . Things went quiet. Then, at around eleven p.m., Markgraf police demanded that Dr. Friedensburg unlock his office. He refused. They marauded through the building, trying doors until they managed to break into the American liaison officer’s room. They found a number of German civilians in there and carted them off in handcuffs.
From now on, all Magistrat members and employees, as well as the Western liaison officers, were hostages. A break-out attempt in the early evening foundered on the tightness of the ring around the town hall, now reinforced by Soviet troops. The British liaison officer had his answer: he sent out urgently for tea, milk and sugar. His French colleague, Captain Ziegelmeyer, also reacted admirably in accordance with his national stereotype. On returning at around nine p.m. from a visit to the theatre, he found his way blocked. Ziegelmeyer, not to be foiled by a handful of Germans, pushed past and sprang through the shattered glass doors, crying out, ‘This is the French way in!’ Other French colleagues, bearing champagne, followed him.
Finally, the Soviet commandant responded to Ganéval’s plea to allow the remaining inmates of the Red Town Hall to leave in safety. At five a.m., Western-sector police officers who had spent the night in hiding inside were loaded into one French truck, and exhausted German and American journalists into another.
The hostages set off for the sector border, just ten minutes’ drive away. They had scarcely gone a kilometre when a Russian jeep, full of armed soldiers, blocked their way. Some of the Stumm police were kept in custody and ended up spending months in the former Nazi concentration camp at Sachsenhausen.
When the American representative on the Kommandatura entered Kotikov’s office to deliver a protest, he was told that ‘peaceful workers’ petitioning the city assembly had been assaulted by Western soldiers and ‘black guards’ from West Berlin (equating the Stumm police with the Nazi SS). It was he, Kotikov, who should be protesting, was it not?
It became clear that anything like a democratic government in the Eastern part of the city was impossible. The SMA moved into city halls in the Eastern districts and began to dismiss employees who were not SED members. Western city councillors, meeting at the Free University, agreed to hold new elections in November.
On 9 September, 250,000 Berliners thronged the Platz der Republik (Republic Square) in front of the Reichstag to hear their leaders urge them to hold out against the blockade and oppose attempts to topple their elected representatives.
Ensuing demonstrations began in the British sector, but spilled over into the Soviet sector just by the Brandenburg Gate. The reaction of the Eastern police was prompt. A dozen demonstrators ended up in hospital, ten with bullet wounds. A sixteen-year-old boy was shot in the stomach and bled to death. Five demonstrators were arrested by the East sector police and condemned to twenty-five years’ hard labour by a Soviet military court. After international protests, the Soviets were forced to cut the sentences. In explanation for this unaccustomed clemency, they said that the impressionable young men had been fired up by ‘Fascistic, provocative’ speeches.
The Soviet blockade of Berlin still had eight months to run. However, from now until 1990, Berlin was divided, both politically and administratively. For three years the Allied Control Commission, based there, was supposed to have been the ruling body for the whole country, pending a peace
The Communists roamed the town hall, discovering forty-six plainclothes West sector (‘Stumm’) police that assembly members had brought for their protection. Other Westerners fled, or found refuge in the offices of the Allied liaison officers attached to the Magistrat . Things went quiet. Then, at around eleven p.m., Markgraf police demanded that Dr. Friedensburg unlock his office. He refused. They marauded through the building, trying doors until they managed to break into the American liaison officer’s room. They found a number of German civilians in there and carted them off in handcuffs.
From now on, all Magistrat members and employees, as well as the Western liaison officers, were hostages. A break-out attempt in the early evening foundered on the tightness of the ring around the town hall, now reinforced by Soviet troops. The British liaison officer had his answer: he sent out urgently for tea, milk and sugar. His French colleague, Captain Ziegelmeyer, also reacted admirably in accordance with his national stereotype. On returning at around nine p.m. from a visit to the theatre, he found his way blocked. Ziegelmeyer, not to be foiled by a handful of Germans, pushed past and sprang through the shattered glass doors, crying out, ‘This is the French way in!’ Other French colleagues, bearing champagne, followed him.
Finally, the Soviet commandant responded to Ganéval’s plea to allow the remaining inmates of the Red Town Hall to leave in safety. At five a.m., Western-sector police officers who had spent the night in hiding inside were loaded into one French truck, and exhausted German and American journalists into another.
The hostages set off for the sector border, just ten minutes’ drive away. They had scarcely gone a kilometre when a Russian jeep, full of armed soldiers, blocked their way. Some of the Stumm police were kept in custody and ended up spending months in the former Nazi concentration camp at Sachsenhausen.
When the American representative on the Kommandatura entered Kotikov’s office to deliver a protest, he was told that ‘peaceful workers’ petitioning the city assembly had been assaulted by Western soldiers and ‘black guards’ from West Berlin (equating the Stumm police with the Nazi SS). It was he, Kotikov, who should be protesting, was it not?
It became clear that anything like a democratic government in the Eastern part of the city was impossible. The SMA moved into city halls in the Eastern districts and began to dismiss employees who were not SED members. Western city councillors, meeting at the Free University, agreed to hold new elections in November.
On 9 September, 250,000 Berliners thronged the Platz der Republik (Republic Square) in front of the Reichstag to hear their leaders urge them to hold out against the blockade and oppose attempts to topple their elected representatives.
Ensuing demonstrations began in the British sector, but spilled over into the Soviet sector just by the Brandenburg Gate. The reaction of the Eastern police was prompt. A dozen demonstrators ended up in hospital, ten with bullet wounds. A sixteen-year-old boy was shot in the stomach and bled to death. Five demonstrators were arrested by the East sector police and condemned to twenty-five years’ hard labour by a Soviet military court. After international protests, the Soviets were forced to cut the sentences. In explanation for this unaccustomed clemency, they said that the impressionable young men had been fired up by ‘Fascistic, provocative’ speeches.
The Soviet blockade of Berlin still had eight months to run. However, from now until 1990, Berlin was divided, both politically and administratively. For three years the Allied Control Commission, based there, was supposed to have been the ruling body for the whole country, pending a peace
Similar Books
