After I moved into the attic of the chimney sweep's house, a million things needed to be done. Before I could do anything else, I had to get into Munich to see whether and when I could restart my medical training. Several clinics had remained operational and the outlook to start with the fall semester looked good. Two weeks after my arrival Irmgard and I went on a trip to Karlshafen, where my sisters and my younger brother had survived the turmoil of the first postwar year. My sister Gisela was willing to come to our wedding in June. On the way back to Munich we made a detour to Bad Pyrmont to find the grave of my father. A simple cross on a neglected grave marked the spot were he was buried a few days before the death of my mother. The next goal was to try to make my way into Berlin and see what was left of our belongings. My sisters had told me that my mother had, at the beginning of the war, packed all valuables into large trunks and boxes and stored them in the cellar of the house. If the Russian soldiers had found the place, there would not be much left.

I had no clothes to wear except what I had brought from the U.S.A. Irmgard, in painstaking work, had taken two army pants apart, turned them over and sewed them back together so the stenciled "PW" would not show. My third army pants still showed the PW and I wanted these for my trip. I bought two bottles of schnapps and a railroad ticket to Helmstedt.

In the middle of May I arrived at the border town between the American and Russian zones. I had taken my old German Army coat along to keep me warm during the cold nights, and in case I would find no place to sleep in Berlin.

"You have to walk by night ten kilometers south of town to an area where there is a dense forest separating the two zones. There is seldom a Russian patrol in the area. Should you meet a patrol give them one bottle of schnapps and they will let you go."

With that information I walked during a clear night towards the forest and found a narrow footpath which took me to a small village on the other side of the border. There I asked a farmer, who had just gotten up with the chickens, where the next railroad station was. It was another ten kilometers to walk. I took the first train to Berlin. As I came to the outskirts of the city, I could see the vast destruction of the war years. Whole blocks of apartment houses were destroyed. The incendiary bombs had often burned the houses but the facades were still standing. The streetcars were already running. So, I could take the familiar line #75 from the railroad station. It brought me to the corner of the Kirchhofstraße-Neuendorferstraße. Two lonely windows on the front facade was all that was left standing of our house. I found the old entrance to the cellar. At least that was still intact. With a flashlight I walked through the storage room which had served for five years as a bomb shelter. I saw four overseas trunks and several boxes which could have been placed there by my mother. The lids were all broken and I could see the effect of a bayonet. Everything must have been ransacked by the Russians. All the silver and winter clothes were gone, but other valuable things and boxes full of old letters were still there. As I looked through the correspondence, I saw several envelopes with an American stamp. They were addressed to my mother and had been mailed in 1936 from Frau Sieg in Buffalo. I put these letters into my pocket with the idea that it would not hurt to write a letter to her. Maybe she could sponsor us. At least she might send us a Care package.

I went past my old school. Only ruins were left of the building. Searching through the telephone book I found the address of an old patient of my father, who used to be in the moving business. I called the number. He was still alive and still in business. He remembered my father well, for he had made house calls at the family home. The shipping of the few belongings was negotiated. I slept for one night in our old cellar. The sad story of the last days of my parents were forever before me. Nothing remained to keep me any longer, so I left the next morning going back the same way. I felt the bundle of letters from Frau Sieg in my pocket. I planned to write her the minute I got back to Diessen.

Without delay I wrote her a long letter and addressed it to her home in Buffalo.