The Lithuanian Genocide and Resistance Research Center received news that O. Pasenau, chairman of the German community “Edelweiss,” passed away at the age of 92.
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O. Pasenau was born on October 16, 1934, in Allenstein, East Prussia, to Bruno and Martha Pasenau. Besides Olaf, the family had a daughter Ingeborg, born around 1928.
Olaf’s father Bruno Pasenau was an officer with the rank of senior lieutenant, and his mother Martha was a housewife. When the children grew up, the family moved to Königsberg. They lived in a barracks district, in a service apartment.
When World War II began, Bruno Pasenau was taken to the front.
Martha Pasenau stayed alone with the children. During the evacuation of the population, she decided to send only her daughter Ingeborg to her parents in Osterode. Later, Ingeborg reached Germany and settled in Frankfurt am Main. Martha Pasenau and her son Olaf stayed in Königsberg, waiting for news about her husband. Olaf recalls: “We kept waiting for dad. We received a letter from him saying he was surrounded near Stalingrad (now Volgograd). Mom cried a lot then. Mom and I kept going to read the names of the dead, but dad’s name was not among them.” At the end of 1944, news arrived that Bruno Pasenau was missing in action.
In January 1945, the Red Army surrounded Königsberg. It was too late to retreat. Olaf and his mother had to endure terrible Soviet soldiers’ atrocities and the first winter of hunger. They, along with others, were driven into a wire-fenced camp area and held there. Olaf remembers: “People died en masse. They were buried in bomb craters, without coffins, prayers, or tears. There was no strength for that. People were given half-rotten bread, from which they contracted typhus and died, died.”
In 1946, Olaf’s mother Martha died of starvation in that camp. An old man who collected corpses took her body out of the camp barrack on a cart. Olaf was very ill at that time. However, the next day he managed to reach the place where his mother was “buried.” “I will never forget that terrible sight. A pit, and in it – children, women, and old people. Skeletons. Tortured.”
After what he saw, he decided to save himself. He reached the train station where his mother had worked for some time (cleaning wagons). “It was the Moscow–Königsberg train, the ninth wagon. The attendants were elderly Belarusians.” These people took the exhausted Olaf with them and took him to Belarusian territory. Olaf spent about three months with them and returned back: “I returned to Königsberg. A twelve-year-old boy nobody needed. I slept in ruins. Later I settled in the Ponarth camp.”
Once, children were rounded up and loaded into wagons. Olaf also ended up in a wagon. On the way, he jumped out of the wagon and found himself in Lithuania, near Vilkaviškis. It was spring 1947. “Wet, cold, foreign land, incomprehensible language.” Some people gave food, others drove him away.
For a longer time, Olaf was taken in by the Paplauskas family, living in Mačiūnai village (now Prienai district). Olaf recalls: “In four years I learned Lithuanian, in six years to write and read Lithuanian. No one thought I wanted to study.” He always had to do very hard work. In 1950, Olaf started working in the Ežerėlis peat bog (now Kaunas district), in 1953 worked in the forest (pulling stumps), 1954–1955 – in the Prienai brick factory. In 1956, he acquired the specialty of tractor-combine operator and worked for twenty years at the Prienai auto transport company.
In 1956, Olaf Pasenau managed to obtain documents under the false name of Jonas Balsys.
After Lithuania regained independence, in 1991, children who had come from East Prussia after the war and lived in Lithuania formed the “Edelweiss” community (in 1993 renamed “Edelweiss–Wolfskinder”). The first meeting took place on September 14, 1991, in Klaipėda. Olaf Pasenau was elected chairman of this community. In 1991, 58 children who experienced the fate of “wolf children” from East Prussia were registered in the community. During this meeting, three resolutions and a statement were prepared explaining who the children who came from East Prussia to Lithuania are and why the community is called “Edelweiss.” After the meeting, appeals were made to regional, national, and German press. Short memoirs of persons who experienced the fate of “wolf children” were written, asking for help in finding relatives.
The community’s activities expanded. More and more people from various parts of Lithuania responded. Regional community branches were established in Kaunas, Šiauliai, Tauragė, Marijampolė, Jurbarkas, Klaipėda, Vilnius. Many “wolf children” moved to live in Germany. They managed to reclaim their real names, surnames, true birth years, and citizenship.
Olaf Pasenau also began searching for his relatives. He found his sister Ingeborg Pasenau. However, after a few meetings, she refused to acknowledge Olaf as her brother. This was a painful experience for Olaf. “It hurts not for myself, but for the memory of our mother. If my sister refuses me, it means she refuses our mother, who died of starvation in Königsberg. The mother who gave birth to her, raised her, loved her…”
Olaf Pasenau’s father Bruno Pasenau returned from a Soviet prisoner of war camp to Germany. He searched for his son Olaf all the time but was told that his wife and son died in Königsberg. He remarried, raised two daughters, and died in 1983 without ever seeing his son. In 1994, Olaf Pasenau received German citizenship and a German travel passport.
In 1998, he moved to Germany. After some time, he settled in the town of Gransee, which reminds him of East Prussia.
“The war left terrible wounds in the land of East Prussia. Slavery and daily humiliation are terrible. It would be good if no one ever had to experience that…”
On behalf of the Lithuanian Genocide and Resistance Research Center, we express our sincere condolences to Olaf Pasenau’s relatives.
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