The Death's Head Chess Club

THE DEATH'S HEAD CHESS CLUB

C
ONTENTS

THE DEATH'S HEAD CHESS CLUB

1.

T
HE
L
ATVIAN
G
AMBIT

1944
Konzentrationslager Auschwitz-III, Monowitz

It is late afternoon and the camp is quiet. The biting February wind blows from the east and prowls along the alleys between the wooden barracks, waiting for the return of the inmates, an enemy in a long list of enemies. Everyone knows that the wind in Auschwitz speaks its own strange language. It does not speak of the outside world, of the sun on distant mountains, or snow falling lightly on city streets. It speaks only of what it witnesses within the electrified wire that surrounds the camp, of hunger and privation, of solitude among the multitudes that live there, and of death. Arc lights cut through the gloom to flood the parade ground with an unnatural brightness, creating sharp shadows between the fence posts that surround the camp. The camp is hungry. Hunger is another enemy, ever-present, heavy and gnawing, a ravening emptiness in the pit of every stomach that neither the bread ration in the morning nor the thin soup at noon can remedy.

Weariness is another enemy, but the camp cannot rest. Constant vigilance is needed to guard against possible infractions of the rules – rules that are unwritten, unknowable, unfathomable; rules which can be made up on the spot; rules where the only purpose is to increase the opportunities for misery. Each and every rule, whether written or unwritten,
known or unknown, is another enemy: the camp is at war, and for each inmate the only measure of victory is that somehow they have managed to survive another day.

In his warm office in the
Kommandantur
building overlooking the camp, SS-Obersturmführer
¹
Paul Meissner gazes out of the window, a cup of coffee in hand. The coffee is good quality, not the ersatz that the soldiers at the front get, for duty in the camps is arduous and essential to the wellbeing of the Reich. Meissner raises the cup to his lips and savours the richness of its aroma. It is a moment of quiet. His gaze lifts to the sky: iron-grey clouds fill his horizon. His leg aches: a sure sign – it will undoubtedly snow before morning.

Meissner is tall, even for a German. His hair is dark, but his eyes are a shimmering blue, disconcertingly so. He is a rarity in the camp – Waffen-SS; his collar bears the double lightning rune in silver on black, not the death's head emblem of the camp SS, the Totenkopfverbände.
²
He walks with a pronounced limp – a parting gift from a Russian tank. It is a badge of honour: few others in the camp have seen service at the front. Now he spends his days in Abteilung I, responsible to the camp Kommandant. His duties are concerned with overseeing the many satellite labour camps that fall under the umbrella of Auschwitz, mainly the old
Zwangsarbeitslager für Juden
, Fürstengrube and Blechhammer and others even further afield. He is responsible for the SS personnel, and two Scharführers and their teams work daily miracles for him with rosters of men and transport.

Meissner's biggest headache is the IG Farben
Werke
, the labyrinthine Buna industrial complex that the Monowitz camp was built to serve. Its capacity to produce synthetic oil and rubber from the surrounding coal fields is crucial to the war effort, yet construction is months behind schedule; so far not a single drop of oil or gramme of rubber has been produced.

Without warning, the quiet is broken. The camp orchestra
³
has struck up a tune, a jaunty marching song. He searches his memory for its name but it eludes him. He glances at his watch. Where has the day gone?

Minutes later, their day at the factory over, the inmates start to enter the camp. The scene is almost comic in its absurdity: ghastly wrecks of men in filthy, blue-striped uniforms marching in time to the cheery melody of the orchestra. Some of the
Kapos
⁴
have even got their men singing. They are led straight to the parade ground where they line up in columns, five abreast. The early arrivals will have to endure the cold while they wait. There are over 10,000 inmates and it will be a while before they are all assembled and the roll call can begin.

Among the inmates is a recent arrival, from France. He has not yet acquired the haunted, hollow-eyed look of the camp, and, although he has lost weight and his uniform hangs loosely on his frame, his health is still good. He used to have a name, but that was in another life, a life that made sense beyond the daily struggle merely to survive. His name was Emil Clément, and he was a watchmaker. Now he is simply
Häftling
⁵
number 163291.

In the eyes of the Reich, Emil is guilty of a crime for which there can be no pardon: he is a Jew.

A hush descends on the parade ground. Roll call begins. The inmates must stand to attention and ignore the bitter fingers of cold that pinch at their emaciated limbs. The camp waits, gripped by numb anxiety. If the numbers do not tally, roll call will have to begin all over again. But not tonight. The Rapportführer
⁶
is satisfied and they are dismissed. One might expect to hear a collective sigh of relief, but no – the inmates simply move from one ordeal to the next. They do not have the energy to waste on sighing.

Emil collapses onto his bunk. Normally he spends his day in a machine shop, crafting tiny mechanisms for the repair of the many technical instruments that measure and regulate the processes that are the lifeblood of the Buna factory, much as he would once have created them for the workings of a fine watch. But today there was no electricity and he was reassigned to a labour
Kommando
unloading sacks of cement from railway wagons and stacking them in a warehouse. In his life he has never been so tired; every muscle and sinew hurts and his feet are raw from the
ill-fitting wooden clogs that the inmates wear so that even the constant clamour of his hunger is subdued.

He shares the bunk with another Frenchman, Yves. They arrived in Auschwitz on the same transport from the internment camp at Drancy, though they did not know one another before being assigned the same bunk. At first, Emil felt disgust at the thought of sharing his bed with another man, a stranger. Now he knows he is fortunate: it is the only time he is warm. They have become firm friends and look out for each other. If one of them is lucky and is able to organize some food – the most precious commodity in the camp – they share it, not like the other inmates in their block. Emil has noticed that most of them keep to themselves; their existence is so marginal, they cannot bear the thought of sharing anything. This solitariness is the source both of their weakness and of the strength of those in charge. Auschwitz is a camp divided against itself.

Yves climbs up to the bunk. They are on the top tier. ‘Move over,' he says. Emil groans as he makes his tired limbs obey. Yves grins. ‘I had a good day today.' He pushes something towards Emil. It is a hunk of coarse black bread. ‘One of the Poles left a woollen jacket lying around. When no one was looking I organized it.'
Organize
is the camp slang for stealing. The inmates are forced to organize if they are to survive. And, in accordance with the absurd rules of Auschwitz, organizing is encouraged, but punished severely if the thief is caught. ‘I smuggled it back under my jacket.'

The garment is a great prize, but risky. It would be difficult to keep concealed for any length of time: better to trade it. In the washroom in the corner of the camp that is furthest from the barracks of the SS men there is a thriving market. Every day, as soon as the roll call is dismissed, hundreds of inmates rush there, some to sell, some to buy. It is a buyer's
market, for every stomach is empty, and the currency of the camp is bread. Those whose eyes are brittle with hunger can be persuaded to sell for the lowest prices amid the chaotic uproar of barter. Spoons and knives: each prisoner needs one, but the camp authorities do not provide them. They must be purchased. It is here that other items, that various prisoners have managed to organize, are also exchanged.

‘What did you do with it?' Emil asks.

‘I sold it to the block elder in Block 16. I got two bread rations for it.'

It is a fair price. They eat the bread in silence, savouring every morsel, even though they are painfully aware that every other inmate in their block is hungry. They will not be disturbed. It is a code among the inmates. They would all do the same if they had the chance.

Soon it is lights out and the camp settles into an uneasy slumber; in only a few hours its toil begins again.

Yves is thankful he has been paired with Emil. He is a gentle, cultured man. They talk endlessly about France before the war. Yves is also curious about Emil's passion for the game of chess.

‘Explain to me again,' he says quietly in the darkness, ‘about the Latvian Gambit.'

1
See appendix for a table of SS ranks.

2
The SS was divided into three main branches: the general or Allgemeine-SS; the military or Waffen-SS; and the concentration camp guards, the Totenkopfverbände, or Death's Head Units. Uniquely, the Totenkopfverbände wore a death's head emblem on their right collar tab.

3
An orchestra made up of inmates was established in the main Auschwitz camp as early as 1941. Others were subsequently formed in Birkenau and Monowitz. The orchestra played when the inmates left, and returned to, the camp each day. According to one account, the orchestra was required to play ‘at all official occasions – for the camp commander's speeches, for transports and for hangings. It also served as the entertainment for the SS and the inmates in the medical barracks.' The women's orchestra in Birkenau was the most famous. Its leader was Alma Rose, a well-known musician, who died in Auschwitz in 1944.

4
The SS used selected prisoners, the
Prominenten
, to run the camps for them. They were usually Germans sent to a concentration camp for a criminal or political offence. Ä
ltesten
, or elders, managed the living quarters;
Kapos
supervised the labour squads, or
Kommandos
. They were given privileges, providing they kept control of their fellow prisoners. In order to maintain their privileged status the
Prominenten
often acted with frightening brutality: there are numerous accounts of prisoners being beaten to death for some minor or imagined infraction.

5
Prisoner or detainee.

6
An SS NCO responsible for conducting the roll call.