Chapter One: GOAT STEW

"They smell even worse when they burn," mumbling with a mouthful of goat's meat from the hot stew they were having for lunch.

"Suggest the fuehrer a better way to dispose of them if it bothers you that much." His wife said in a calming voice pouring a bottle of wine into his cup. 

Hannele couldn't stand it anymore. It made her sick in the stomach. Almost vomiting on the dining table, the girl excused herself and rushed to her room.

"I'm not fond of this attitude of hers, tomorrow she'll accompany me to the camp, tomorrow her training begins," Aldous added.

"Take it easy on the child, Aldous, you know she misses the city, she had never stepped foot out of this house for a month now!" Her mother Editha was always so protective of her little girl, their one and only child.

Aldous and Editha were both assigned by the nazi government to run the Jasenovac concentration camp notorious for its barbaric practices to a large number of victims. Jasenovac specialized in one-on-one violence of particularly brutal kind and prisoners were primarily murdered manually with the use of blunt objects such as knives, hammers, and axes.

This afternoon was different. Women who were terribly sick, infants who were seen as additional mouths to feed were burnt alive. The Fuehrer ordered a total cutback on their resources. Written on the mail was "verbrenne sie lebendig." (burn them alive)

Prisoners were taken to the crematorium that morning. First, they undressed either in the yard; surrounded by a wall, or in the antechamber. Before being gassed and burned.

Two hours later it still smelled of burning flesh all over the place.

Aldous went straight to the camp after finishing lunch, awaiting the arrival of 122 Jews from Nazi Germany; teachers, doctors, and politicians filled this train, and for some reason, this excited Aldous.

After waiting for nearly an hour, the train had finally arrived. Jews were greeted by soldiers shouting, "Woman to the left!"

"If you are carrying an infant, hand them to the nuns! They will be taken to the hospital for treatment."

"Boys ages 5-12 form a line here!"

"Men to the right"

"If you disobey you will be shot!"

Women formed a line of their own as they were told and so did the men Since they had no choice but to obey.

"HALT!" Aldous commanded.

Suddenly there was a complete silence that could hurt your ears with a tingling sound.

"Please, not my baby."

"Not my baby girl! She's only 5 months old." A woman pleaded a nun took her baby away from her.

"She's not sick! You can't take her to the hospital. What are you going to cure her for? For being a jew?!"

"You pigs!" The woman screamed.

Aldous grabbed the woman by the hair. Shots her 7 times as if he had a grudge against her.

"Who else wishes to disobey the fuehrer's orders?!" Aldous shouted

He then sat on the desk the soldiers had prepared for him and shouted, "Ladies first! Form a line. Money, jewelry, tobacco, anything of value, surrender it to me, it will be returned to you in due time. Here in front of me you half-wit!" Aldous called the lady who was in front of him.

Hesitant, the woman about the age of sixty approached him and the line followed.

"Any of value?" Aldous asked.

"No, sir." The lady replied

"Search this old cow," Aldous ordered the soldier to his right.

"Nothing, Chief," The soldier reported.

"Remove her scarf, you fool!" Aldous commanded with a chuckle.

As the soldier untied her scarf. A Golden locket fell from the lady's head.

"Here, sir." The soldier presented the locket to Aldous, he then opened the locket and saw two pictures of a couple the woman resembles the one in front of him.

"Who do we have here?" Aldous asked sarcastically

"T-those are my parents they died in the first war, that's the only thing I have left of them," the lady cried.

Aldous fired his pistol at the old lady hitting her in the chest.

"Next".

"Jewelry and any of value take it off and put it on the table." Aldous continued to shout.

Children were taken to the hospital, or so as they called it. It's in no way near a description of a modern-day hospital, run by Nazi German Nuns. Would you think a 3-year-old Jew boy was fed three times a day? Bathe? No. Instead, they were placed on their deathbeds, waiting to be gassed down and burned.

Night crept in Jasenovac. Women were placed in their chambers with hay as their beds, mothers longing for their child's warmth. But nothing could be done; they knew there was no escaping.

Jasenovac was a complex of five subcamps spread 120km on the Sava and Una rivers banks. They were at the largest camp called "Brickworks".

"Hannele!"

"Hannale!"

A voice came to her head while she was sleeping. It was the voice of her father, Aldous.

"Hannale, you have to wake up, it's your training day today!" Her father shouted with excitement.

She knew that this day would come, she knew her father would train her to be his right hand on the camp.

Aldous seemed to have everything that a Nazi Chief could ask for, complete control of his family. Control and power over the Jasenovac camp, what more could a Nazi soldier asked for? A son. A son to carry the family name, become a soldier and make history just like him.

"Don't be too rough on your daughter, Aldous, you know she hasn't been out for a month now." Her wife told him kindly while they were having breakfast.

"Ah, yes! She's here! All ready for training, after this war, you will mary a man of nobility and you will join the army to continue my legacy." Aldous praised her daughter as she walked down the stairs.

Hannele nodded her head avoiding a conversation, but deep inside she knew what she wanted to be.

She had always dreamed of becoming a painter, she wanted to paint Mother Nature, and capture the world's true beauty, to travel to Germany's countryside and paint to her heart's desire.

"AIM!"

"Pull the trigger!"

"Pull it now!" Aldous shouted at her

The poor girl never even handled a pistol. Now his father was asking her to shoot a deer.

Aldous took the gun from Hannele and shot near her left shoulder, purposely missing the shot.

"That's how you shoot!"

"The first day of training and all you do is mess up!"

"I never wanted to be a soldier anyway," she mumbled.

"What? Say that again?!"

"I don't wanna be a soldier, father!" Hannele shouted.

"You will because I said so!"

"You will bring honor to our family."

Frustrated by her father's words, the girl ran away, far away from her father deep into the forest inside the Jasenovac camp

Intensely running for three minutes straight she stopped by the river.

She was surprised at what she saw, blinded by the sun, Hannale stopped and squinted her eyes.

"I never thought I'd see this here! What a beauty!"

It was a chrysanthemum plantation right beside the riverbank.

The plantation was as yellow as the sun, she wished she had her paint and canvas with her to capture the untouched beauty.

"Is that a person taking a bath in the river?" she thought to herself.

The boy instantly got dressed and ran away when he saw her.

" Wait!"

"Hey, you! Wait" Hannele shouts at the boy who was running away from her.

Hannele was never a fan of the dictatorship that was happening. She had Jew friends at her school, jew tutors that she bonded with within Germany, all of a sudden they were gone. Captured, tortured, some of them killed.

She decided to camp for the rest of the day near the river to gather her thoughts. Finally, after a month of chaos, she felt peace.

At around 5 PM, she went to her father's quarters hoping to speak to him and ask if she could go home, however, according to the soldiers her father was in a meeting that will end in an hour.

She decided to kill time and went for a walk near the quarters.

"It's him!" She said to herself. "It's the boy from the river."

"Hi!" Hannele greeted the boy.

She didn't receive any response. It's as if he saw a ghost.

"How often do you go there?" Hannele asked.

The boy continued staring at her in shock. His lips wanted to speak but he couldn't seem to open them.

"Hey, jew!" the boy turned around to the soldier that called him.

"That's the chief's daughter, do you wanna be hanged tonight boy?! Get back to your chamber this instance!"

The boy ran away as fast as he could avoiding getting caught.

"Tomorrow, same time" Hannale mouthed the words.

"HALT!" Aldous commanded the soldiers.

"Where is she?!" Aldous was furious.

Hannele ran in her father's direction.

"Father! I'm here, I was just killing time. They said you were in a meeting. No need to cause a commotion.