A BAVARIAN BRIDGE BATTLE BASED ON A BOOK DEFENDING DIE BRÜCKE

As the Allies made their way into the heart of Germany, there were many last-minute attempts to stop or at least de- lay their advance. Wehrmacht engineers could not blow up every bridge fast enough, and there were many attempts to hold out at several bridge crossings with improvised forces. The story of one such battle was told in the book Die Brücke.

By Guy Bowers

Die Brücke was based on the autobiographical novel by Gregor Dorfmeister, where he recollects his own experiences being drafted into the Volkssturm militia and the chaos in Germany at that time. It has been made into two films, in 1957 and 2008. The story unfolds with seven sixteen-year-old German school friends at the end of 1945. Having never witnessed war firsthand, they are still jingoistic and eager to play their part to defend their country. They are all drafted into a local army unit and given weapons with minimal training. Their company commander knows the war is lost and does not wish to see their young lives wasted, so he assigns them to an Unteroffizier with orders for them to guard a strategically unimportant bridge and retreat at the first sign…

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Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy (Digital) - 1 Issue, WSS 130

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