Report about a heavy air raid over Hamburg,

Preface:
In this year 2003 WHO and UNICEF pointed out traumatic sufferings to the public once more. UNICEF put the focus especially on the children in Irak and other war zones. Various effects of traumatic war experiences are recognizable now, other will appear someday later. It is thanks to scientists that resulting illness can today often be alleviated and sometimes even cured, but many children and adults cannot get help because of several reasons. The following report about such suffering is based on a true story from Worldwar II. In this case the cure was possible by belief and trust. The story is autobiographical.

Title:
Report about a heavy air raid over Hamburg,
a following traumatic suffering and the curing by belief

Report:
A man told me about the problems he had for 20 years whenever many people came together and there were cramped conditions. Sometimes it was unbearable for him to stay in a waiting room, church, theatre, or building for business meetings. His attacks of phobias would cause him make a getaway. The situation also occurred in fast moving cars. He did not drive a car by himself on expressways so he would not cause dangerous situations for other persons and himself.

The man — I call him William Brunert, but this ist not his real name — joked that his doctors and specialists could make a large pile with his medical reports. He mostly got psychiatric drugs and other medicines, but that was no help really, only for a day or so. Nobody could find out the reason of his illness over the years. But William did not lose his hope, because there was a silent voice in his soul saying: "one day you will be healthy."

At the age of 39 his case was solved suddenly. It happened after William and his family took part in a week- long retreat of their parish. You know, some Christian congregations offer such courses for families, where they sing, pray, and discuss and have holiday activities together.

At an evening discussion their Pastor suggested that the adults should think about their life: "Have you had unusual luck in your past? " he asked and added "perhaps we will hear some reports and we can say together "What a piece of luck " .

William thought about this task a minute, and when it was his turn he said:

"In 1943 my mother lived with my elder brother and me in a city in the north of Germany. When the siren gave air raid warning all families left their flats and came together in a small air raid shelter, down in the cellar. This happened over several weeks. I cannot remember all details by myself because of my age, — I was five years old. But my mother told me that the situation was unpleasant, awkward, and confined. Everybody was afraid when they heard the bombs exploding nearby and when their bodies could feel the vibrations and tremors that were coming through the earth and the walls. To make things worse, the electrical light often broke down.

One day my mother spoke to us: "I have no trust in this air raid shelter, not a half day longer! We should give up our places quickly. There are bicycles in our cellar, we will ride to our small summer cabin at the city border." And we did so.

Some hours later the strongest air raid against this city began, the British answer of German rockets: A gigantic squadron of more than 700 airplanes brought heaviest bombardments over the district where we lived. Fire storms grew up in short time and ran raging amok down the streets. The weekly rate of dead people in the city climbed to more than 32 thousand that night. All persons in the air raid shelter that we had used for weeks died, also my playfellow. My mother heard that a rescue team found the dead bodies in form of small black packets.

But we survived in the cabin in our garden at the city border. Even my father survived. He returned from French captivity some years later. We were homeless and poor now, but I think, the whole family could say: "What a good fortune!" — When William ended his report, there was silence only for a while. William did not know at this moment that his story and the Christian friends were the key of his new life.

The situation was sterile in the past: William did not have any religious advisers in his youth, not in the family, not at school, not really in any church later. But he found trust in these Christian people more and more and he had the impression, they all have something that he missed: The Hand of the Creator.

Especially to a friendly, religious man in William's age, Fred Simon, he developed a trust, for example, when they made a long walk together, although or because their religious states were different. Fred had the habit of doing missionary work without any particle of dust and refuse on his vocal chords. And he could listen, too. And certainly he would be sitting with the tax collectors together, as Jesus did in former time.

The calendar showed Saturday before the Easter week of the year 1976. All families at the retreat went home by car in the morning, William drove his road vehicle himself — against his habit. The plan was that his wife should carry on when they reached the expressway. But William did not stop there because of Fred's beige car, which overtook him at this moment. William felt when Fred — in William's eyes a holy man — would drive in front of him, something terrible could not happen. And indeed, William drove his car without any trouble and any attacks of phobias or other illness, although he lost sight of the beige car soon. William and his family arrived at their home after almost 100 miles, and when he got out from his car, he was calm and relaxed like never before. And he had not needed any pharmaceutical crutches. William was very astonished about these occurrences and at the next day, Sunday, when they worshipped together, he informed Fred about what had happened. But Fred answered: "I have prayed for you indeed, but I chose another route with my car. You must be wrong, perhaps you saw another beige car." —

William was lost in wonder more then ever. The information, how it happened was a new experience. Obviously Fred was not in front of him, as William had believed when he drove his car on the expressway. But the reality of Fred`s nearness and Williams trust was evident and William thought if he should use generally the word
"trust" instead of "belief".

This was a new start of religious recognition, understanding, and development in the life of William Brunert. He took some days off and from Sunday until Wednesday he read hour after hour in the Bible, in haste and with passion. When he made a pause, so mainly because of reading a paperback, "Denker des Glaubens 1" by Ulrich Neuenschwander. The author, a theologian from Switzerland, gave William`s wife a copy some months earlier.

William read in a great hurry. And he looked again and again at the reports about curing illness by Jesus (for example Matthew 15,28 "...your trust is great..." and all the other sources), also the experience of King David in psalm 31,9 (in German: "DU hast mich nicht preisgegeben der Übermacht meiner Gegner, hast meinen Füssen freien Raum geschenkt") and many other parts of the Bible.

After reading this William recognized that his illness all the years, the background of his surviving, and his ingratitude were connected. By Thursday his humility grew considerable. William felt that his ingratitude was so big that he was unworthy to pray or to ask, to call H I S N A M E or even to approach H I M., GOD.
And William felt that he was "less than the dirt under H I S nails". —

William went in this situation of grief, sorrow, and unhappiness into his garden. When he touched a rose un- intentional, the wonder happened: He had an Epiphany, an appearance of C H R I S T. —

William never had more traumatic attacks of phobia, not for the passed 27 years. His last medical specialist congratulated him in 1976, but some members of his parish doubted that the story can be true. They missed the sin. William answered, perhaps "sin" was the distance in this case and that he did not search enough for a long time. —

E p i l o g u e
Historical particulars:
The mentioned air raid took place in the night of July 29/30 1943, principally against the district of Barmbek, City of Hamburg. The heavy raid was part of a military operation in Worldwar II by the British Air Force, called "Operation Gomorrah", described in several history books. There is also some information in "Destined to Witness" (Morrow, New York 1999) by Hans J.Massaquoi.

What about the persons?
The theologian Prof. Dr. Ulrich Neuenschwander, Rector designatus of the University of Bern, died unexpected at the age of 55 in June 1977. That was in the time of troublemaking at European Universities.

Fred Simon, the holy man, who had made an impression on William Brunert, worked honorary more than 20 years in the social welfare work of the parish. He suffered from cancer and passed away before he reached the age of 60.

William Brunert, the man without fear of life since he had an Epiphany, works for many years in the administration of the German government in the former German capital. He is retired, lives in Sankt Augustin near Bonn and recovered after two pulmonary embolisms. His doctor says, he is in a good health now. Who is William Brunert really? That's not important, but the readers can have a guess! William Brunert and the author
are identical.

(The title of the original report in German language is "Ein traumatisches Kriegserlebnis und die nachfolgende Heilung" [URL:
http://www.lebensgeschichten.org/trauma/trauma07/php^{About links}
]. There you will find a button for a message to the author, too)

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