The incredible life stories of the brothers Alfred and Ernst Hofer E-Book

Kurt Steinegger

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 266

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

Two brothers, two fates, a turbulent time. In the 20th century, Alfred and Ernst Hofer are drawn from the tranquil Emmental to faraway places. But in the turmoil of the Russian Revolution, Alfred is forced to flee in a hurry and soon settles in France. But even there he had to fear for his life because of the horrors of the Second World War and the dangerous actions of the Resistance. The merchant Ernst ended up in Italy and Paris, but the First World War forced him to serve as an infantry corporal at the front. The Great Depression also brought setbacks, but Ernst did not give up. The two eyewitness accounts allow us to share in the extraordinary lives of two brothers in a time of upheaval, in which they courageously fought for their survival.

Leseprobe

Special thanks

The author would like to express his special thanks to his friend Karl Widmer, Münchenbuchsee, for editing and helping to shape this book.

Quote

Not what we experience, but how we

feel what we experience,

makes up our destiny.

M. v. Ebner-Eschenbach

Foreword

In 1961, at the age of twelve, I heard the life story of Alfred Hofer, who had married my father's sister.I was so fascinated by this incredible story that from then on I studied the life of Alfred Hofer and the history of the 20th century intensively. I went on many excursions to visit the focal points of contemporary history. Later, as a tour guide, I led groups to important sites of the two world wars.

Alfred Hofer gave me his manuscripts and photos shortly before his death. Without changing the statements, I have edited the texts in this book and illustrated them with photos.

In the first part of the book, we get to know Alfred Hofer, who experienced the turmoil of the 20th century at first hand. As a young Swiss cheesemaker, Alfred Hofer emigrated to Russia in order to make a living there. Surprised by the outbreak of the First World War and driven out by the Russian revolution, Alfred Hofer flees back to Switzerland. After the war, he built a new life for himself in France. Here he experiences the outbreak of the Second World War, the occupation of France by the Germans, the actions of the French Resistance and the chaos of the reconquest by the Allied troops.

I received the text on Ernst Hofer, Alfred's younger brother, in the form of a manuscript in 2010 following a book reading about Alfred Hofer from Mrs. Béatrice Kaufmann, a granddaughter of Ernst Hofer. Without changing the content, I have translated it to some extent into today's language, but have retained Ernst Hofer's rather cumbersome style wherever possible.

The second part of the book is dedicated to Ernst Hofer. Growing up in the rural Emmental valley, he describes in impressive words the extremely modest living conditions in which he and his brothers spent their childhood. Ernst Hofer learns the trade of a merchant. After his apprenticeship, Ernst Hofer also moved abroad, first to Italy and later to Paris, where he traded in leather goods. Here he is surprised by the mobilization for the First World War. Called up for active service, Ernst Hofer travels back to Switzerland. After the war, he helped to set up a leather factory in Gümligen. The business fails and the company goes bankrupt. Ernst Hofer now opens a shoe store in Thun, but this venture also fails. In 1932, after 26 eventful years, he took up a position as head accountant at Hirter & Co. AG in Bern, which he held until his retirement in 1957.

By recording the biographies of Alfred and Ernst Hofer, I would like to make a small contribution to contemporary history.

Jegenstorf, March 15, 2024

Kurt Steinegger

The four Hofer brothers

Unfortunately, I don't have any biographies of the brothers Fritz and Hermann.

My encounter with Alfred Hofer

At the end of September 1961, my father told me that he had just read in the Swiss Family Gazette that a Swiss expat named Alfred Hofer had been living in Münsingen for some time. Due to his friendly nature, he had already become very close to the locals and felt quite at home. Although he is a cheesemaker by trade, he has mainly been carrying out gardening work on orders recently. He then remarked: "I am sure that this person is the husband of my long-deceased sister Marie."

It was indeed the Alfred we suspected. A rendezvous was arranged and one fine day Alfred came from Münsingen by train, streetcar and on foot to us at Maygutstrasse 30 in Wabern.

This was followed by a warm welcome over a glass of wine and - how could it be otherwise - an intensive conversation about Alfred Hofer's life. It was clear that my father was particularly interested in his time with his sister Marie, their first encounters, their later marriage and their subsequent experiences in Russia. With Alfred Hofer's consent, his words were recorded on tape. The recording was a great help to me later when I was working through his life story.

He told how he had accepted a job at the new cheese dairy in Lyss in 1908. He soon met Marie Steinegger at Eigenacker in Lyss and they subsequently met quite often in secret. But after just one year, he was seized by wanderlust and took a new job at the castle cheese dairy in Bournelle in France. But he never forgot Marie im Eigenacker again. Letters went back and forth regularly.

In the fall of 1910, he came to Lyss again and it was on this occasion that Marie introduced him to her parents for the first time. When asked how he had been received by his parents-in-law, he replied that they had judged him to be an honest and marriageable young man. But it would be a while before he married. First he went to Finland for a year and then to Russia until the end of 1912.

On New Year's Eve 1913, he once again visited Marie at Eigenacker, this time to discuss the timing of the wedding. Marie was working at the Hotel National in Adelboden at the time. They agreed to celebrate the wedding on February 3, 1913 in Büren an der Aare, i.e. at Albert's mother's place of residence.

After this celebration, the time had come to say goodbye to all their loved ones, as they left for Russia on March 10, 1913, full of confidence and hoping to spend their future lives there. Little did they know that their happiness together would be short-lived.

Despite the heavy blows of fate that Alfred Hofer had to endure during his life in the turmoil of the 20th century, he never lost his courage to face life. Time and again, he pulled himself together to start again. His indomitable will not to give up, even in hopeless situations, may serve as a role model for us.

The story of Alfred Hofer

The Hofer family

According to the extract from the family line, my great-great-grandfather Peter Hofer lived as an oiler in Biglen in 1754. My great-grandfather Johannes later took up the same profession.My grandfather Christian was a tanner in Rohr in Biglen and my father also came to Zäziwil as a tanner, where I was born in 1887. In 1890, we moved to Mülchi in the Limpach valley to a tannery. At that time, this profession was still lucrative; the naturally tanned sole leather, my father's specialty, was bought by the farmers and the shoemaker joined them on the sturgeon. But in the 1990s, leather and shoe factories were springing up like mushrooms and tanners and shoemakers fell on hard times.

The Hofer family; Alfred Hofer on the far right.

In the spring of 1900, my parents bought a tannery and farm in Büren an der Aare. As I was always one of the best pupils at elementary school, my teacher recommended me for secondary school at. However, my father was not at all enthusiastic about this suggestion and said: "If you're only ever at school, you won't be able to work at home." So I stayed at elementary school and didn't become a teacher, as I had actually dreamed of. My destiny took its course. On November 1, 1903, I joined the cheese dairy in Büren an der Aare as an apprentice. Although the apprenticeship only lasted six months at the time, I stayed there for another year and a half as a farmhand. After another year of work in Schönbrunnen near Utzigen, I was overcome by a longing for faraway places. A longing that was intensified by the prospect of good pay abroad. At that time, Swiss cheesemakers had an excellent reputation and therefore worked in many foreign cheese dairies.

Start of the traveling years

I ventured across the border to take up a position in a cheese dairy in Haute-Savoie. Here they still worked with the hanging kettle and the cheese dairy was therefore coal-black. To my surprise, the sirte (cheese milk) was centrifuged. Almost more important than the cheese dairy was the beautiful pig fattening farm; I had 80 to 100 animals to look after in addition to the cheese dairy and the cellar.

On the evening of my arrival, my master, a man of 110 kilograms, led me into a large room above the cheese dairy, where he showed me my bed between sacks of corn and old cheese-making material. It was still the way my predecessor had slipped out of it; fresh bedding lay next to it on a box. The master held on to a crooked stick hung with two strings and explained to me: "You can hang your clothes up there!" The window was about 50 centimetres wide and 15 centimetres high and there were cracks in the wall so that you could see outside. I looked down into the cheese dairy through the cracks in the floor. Half of the smoke from the hanging cheese dairy rose up through them. Fortunately, the ceiling was also permeable and the smoke was able to escape outside.

I would have preferred to sleep in the straw under the roof of the pigsty, but the rats were at home there.

For breakfast, the master boiled a large pan of milk and put it on the table. The three boys, aged four, six and eight, slipped out of their beds, usually relieved themselves in their shirts in the garden and then set the table without thinking of washing. The milk was ladled into soup bowls and some cold coffee was poured in; then bread was cut and eaten with a spoon. Finally the master's wife, a lazy Savoy woman weighing 98 kilograms, appeared and, yawning terribly, put on her stockings next to us. For lunch we usually had stew with meat, potatoes, whole tomatoes, onions and other things. Before lunch, the boys had to wash the dishes from the whole day. "Oh, how I'd love to turn back!" I could have sung. But I was too proud to do so, as I had celebrated my farewell with my friends. I lasted a year in this job because the master was good and always happy with me.

In 1908, I worked as the first cheese dairyman in the new cheese dairy in Lyss. Then I had wanderlust again and found a job at the Bournelle castle cheese dairy (Doubs, France). Here I was often able to make cheese on my own and I really enjoyed it. The milk, about 2,500 liters, was brought together with four horses from six villages. But I only stayed here for a year because I was called to the City-Milchhalle in Mühlhausen by friends. There I had to accept, check and pasteurize 5,000 liters a day. I was the first of four workers, even though I was the youngest of them all. Later, I thought back to this job a lot, because it would have been a nice existence for me. But after a year, my wanderlust took hold of me even more than before and I found a dairy worker position in Finland with five other lads.

On October 28, 1910, four of us met in Basel. Each of us had a fir branch in our hat as a sign of recognition. Trummer, Rüegsegger and Guggisberg were the names of our colleagues.

After crossing the border at 11 p.m., we traveled via Freiburg im Breisgau, Frankfurt, Kassel and Hanover to Lüneburg, where we arrived at 4 p.m. the next day and had a one-hour stopover. Greetings were sent to Switzerland, then we continued on to the old port city of Lübeck. It was a pity that it soon got dark on this route, as the D-train raced through the well-known lowlands, the Lüneburg Heath, which was overgrown with heather almost everywhere. The next day in Lübeck we had time to admire the palaces and churches, most of which were built of red sandstone. In the afternoon, it was a Saturday, we went to the harbor and soon spotted two Finnish steamers.

The Linea, as our ship was called, was not very big. Like her sister ship Primula, she sailed once a week from Lübeck via Helsingfors (Helsinki) to Reval and back. She had about 50 passenger seats and could carry quite a lot of cargo. As it was late fall, the latter consisted of a huge amount of cabbage, onions and other vegetables. The goods were loaded with powerful cranes. Among the passengers we found two colleagues, Hess and Zehnder, whom we had been looking for in Basel in vain. They had arrived in Lübeck a day earlier. Now we were six lads, 20 to 25 years old, a cheerful bunch!

On the journey to Helsingfors.

At last the cabbage was loaded and the departure signal sounded. We stood at the bow, Rüegsegger played his Schwyzerörgeli and we sang to our hearts' content.

It wasn't until nightfall that we reached the open sea through a canal. When the shore disappeared from our view and all we could see was water and sky, we landlubbers were overcome by a strange feeling. We retreated to the tween deck, where music, singing and cards were played halfway through the night. There were also three German comedians who provided amusing entertainment.

After a few hours' sleep on hard benches, we didn't want to miss the sunrise and were back on deck early. Under a cloudless sky, the sun rose out of the water, dazzling the eye. It was a wonderful moment that I will never forget! It was Sunday and we were probably all thinking of home, of the cozy herd ringing, while the people streamed towards the church in their Sunday best. After breakfast, the happy crowd was back in action on deck. The captain said: "You Swiss are a strange people."

In the afternoon we saw land on both sides. We were between the island of Öland and the Swedish coast, which is almost entirely forested. Grain farming must be important on Öland, as many mighty windmills were visible from the ship. There were many smaller ones in between, which were probably used to supply water. Before night fell, we were back on the open sea and a ship came straight towards us. It was the Primula. The two ships slowly crossed each other and the mailbags were thrown back and forth, secured by ropes. Greetings cards were sent back home from us via Lübeck. Then it was full steam ahead again and the Linea was soon alone again.

The second night was to be different for us than the first. At around 9 p.m., an icy wind blew in from the front, it started to snow and the ship began to sway. We enjoyed it at first and went right to the front so that we were rocked quite high and then low. But the fun was soon over. In a quarter of an hour there were 20 centimetres of snow on deck and then the wind grew into a terrible storm, whipping up the waves so that they crashed over the ship and swept down the snow. We rushed back to the tween deck, quite wet. Luckily we hadn't eaten yet, because the first and second class passengers ran from the dining room to the railing and fed the fish. They also got a cold shower from the incoming waves. The ship was completely askew, constantly rising over house-high wave crests and sliding down. We lay down on the hard benches and had to hold on to them. It was also cold in the tween deck, because every two hours the door had to be left open for a quarter of an hour: The ashes were lifted out of the engine room in large buckets, carried on deck by two sailors and emptied overboard.

None of us could call a coat our own, because back then it was considered a luxury. People weren't as spoiled as they are today. Only our colleague Trummer, who had spent a few years in Russia, owned a fur coat. He let us use it for half an hour at a time; otherwise we would probably have almost frozen to death. Only Guggisberg was always in a good mood: "If only this nutshell would sink soon," he said. The storm raged ever stronger and more ferociously, now from the side. The ship was so lopsided that it was impossible to walk without holding on to something or leaning against the wall. The unfortunate sailors also had their work cut out for them with the huge ash buckets. The whole crew was very excited and we watched them with a mixture of respect and fear. We were also sick to death. Incidentally, the Linea went down with all hands in a storm the following September.

At around five o'clock in the morning, the storm finally subsided and we went on deck, where the fresh air did us good. The morning only dawned around nine o'clock. The sky was gray with heavy hanging clouds and the mood of the otherwise cheerful lads was also gray.

Apart from a ship on its way from Helsingfors to Stockholm, all we saw all day was water and sky. When a kitchen maid brought us the news at 7 p.m. that we would be ashore in two hours, we became livelier again. We quickly put our luggage in order and soon saw a lighthouse rising out of the water from the deck. After half an hour we had the beautiful sea of lights of Helsingfors in front of us. The plane was blowing more smoothly and soon we had reached the landing site.

Passport control and customs inspection were written in four languages: Finnish, Swedish, German and Russian. We went ashore. Instead of a passport, Rüegsegger only had his home country certificate and it was only after a lot of back and forth that he was able to come with us. In the horse-drawn carriage that drove us through the strange-looking city to the train station, Guggisberg sang "Bern - oh you beautiful federal city - Bern". Two Swiss milk buyers, Mr. Fritz and Mr. Jakob Eggen, welcomed us at the station. As our luggage was placed in storage, we made our first amusing acquaintance with the Finnish language. "Uks, kaks, kolme, nelia, vis, kus, seiteme, karekse, ürekse, kümmene ...", the railroad officials counted our luggage. But what was that? The floor kept swaying under our feet, causing us to make missteps, to the amusement of everyone involved and onlookers. It was from the swaying on the Linea.

The gentlemen took us to a hotel and we were delighted to finally get something warm to fill our empty stomachs, but unfortunately we were only served large sandwiches. At last we got something warm, a mixture of equal parts coffee and cognac, but this was not good for our growling digestive system, which soon became apparent during the night - the "Hüsli" was constantly occupied.

The following morning, we had the opportunity to visit the fish market. For us landlubbers, it was a special experience to see the numerous fishing boats filled to the brim with more or less fragrant fish. Women and men in high boots stood on these piles. They touted their wares in loud voices and seemed to outdo each other not only with their offers, but also with their voices. Live fish were also waiting in large cement troughs for a buyer. At the cheese market, we saw many local dairy products that we were not familiar with. We also discovered some magnificent examples of Emmental cheese. A Swiss man called Wenger was busy cutting out square pieces. He measured the weight on a bar scale on which the pieces of cheese were hung. His business was obviously going extremely well and he barely had time to exchange a few words with us.

Then we took the train on towards Turku. Steep hills overgrown with moss and stunted fir trees rose up again and again from the fertile plain. An accompanying band of musicians provided the entertainment, although the foreign-sounding Finnish tunes didn't quite fit our ears. We also noticed the pretty red houses with whitewashed window and door frames.

When we had to get off at a small terminus, some farmers stood ready with their two-wheeled carts to lead us on. "Brrr, brrr", they shouted from time to time and at first we attributed this to the cold, but it was a sign for the horses to stop. Our comrade Guggisberg had to travel two more stations. He later told us that he was supposed to sweep the Emmentaler cheese on the cheese press when he arrived, but this was difficult for him because he was a hotel porter and not a hut servant.

Trummer and I arrived in Lupaia, a new, large dairy. Until our arrival, all the milk here had been processed into butter. On the recommendation of the milk buyer, a Simmentaler named Stauffer who had grown up in Finland, the cooperative had set up two 1,500-liter churns and the two of us now had to churn three Emmentaler cheese weighing up to 130 kilograms a day. A stoker kept the steam boiler and the machines running. A dairymaid was responsible for the butter factory and a pig farmer was on hand to look after the 300 or so pigs. Stauffer himself, aged 26, did not work as head of the farm; with his arms crossed behind his back, he kept a close eye on everyone. His father had come to Finland at the age of 30 as a forager; he now owned a large estate himself and was so rich that his son no longer needed to work. When a cheese merchant from Petersburg came by, our boss was not satisfied with the offer and explained that he would keep the cheese until there was no more money, which could be a long time. In fact, the cooperative had a storage cellar built for 600 Emmentaler cheeses and two salters were employed to look after the cheeses.

As a result, the November cheeses were not sold until May of the following year. The dairy equipment was exemplary by the standards of the time and could still be seen today; it was a real pleasure to work in this factory. Everything was pasteurized, even the sirte. The butter produced from the surplus milk was salted in the butter churn, then immediately evaporated in barrels and transported twice a week to the port city of Hangö (Hanko), from where it was shipped to England by special ship.

But not every Finnish dairy was so modern. Rüegsegger and Zehnder, our travel companions, were only two kilometers away from us, but encountered very primitive conditions. Each kettle of water had to be pulled out of a five-meter deep hole by a rope. The butter churn had to be driven by two large dogs, which ran in a wooden wheel and turned it by their own weight. The churns were only primitively walled in and the fire had to be removed with a shovel after heating. Three to four Emmentaler cheeses weighing around 70 kilograms were produced every day. The cheese cellar was located about 200 meters from the cheese dairy at the end of a bumpy path. Both the entire cheese cellar and around 100 pigs had to be looked after by our colleagues, so they had to work almost day and night. The master himself never lifted a finger. When we went there once in the evening, they were still salting. "The devil take it," said Zehnder, "I won't grow old here."

The winter nights were very long; you could only work with daylight from ten to two o'clock. The opposite was the case in summer. The climate is not as cold as in central Russia, as I was to find out later. A lot of snow falls, which then begins to melt in the sun. If there is a setback in the weather, the whole layer freezes so hard that horses can gallop over it.

Instead of a bicycle, a peculiar sledge is used in winter. Two steel, narrow runners are connected to a wooden frame and bent sharply upwards at the front. They have a handle about one meter above the ground. The rider holds on to it and stands with one foot on a runner. On the other foot, he straps on toe irons and pushes himself off. They often travel for miles without effort - a kind of scooter.

Agriculture, especially dairy farming, was already at a high level back then. The land was mostly farmed from large estates. In Lupaia, for example, we only had 35 suppliers with a daily milk supply of 6,000 kilograms. The cattle kept were mostly red and white Simmental cattle. The barns were very spacious, clean and had lots of windows. I also saw stalls that were 2.5 meters above the ground. The manure fell through special openings directly into carts, which were then driven onto the manure heap. Milking was carried out by snow-white clad milkers. Thanks to the high level of cleanliness, first-class butter and very good Emmental cheese could be produced. After 24 hours in winter, barely half of the jars were gelatinous, the rest were unchanged. But we also noticed similar results in summer. The milk was brought once in winter and twice in summer. However, as evening cheesemaking was unknown, the milk delivered in the evening was set aside. For this purpose, a supply of ice was procured during the winter. On a nearby lake, as soon as the layer of ice had reached a thickness of around 50 centimetres, pieces of two by one meter were sawn out and piled up in the form of a pyramid near the cheese dairy. A layer of 50 centimeters of sawdust was placed on top. In summer, the daily ice requirement was then broken out of this mountain of ice, finely crushed and distributed into the cement troughs filled with water. The milk was then placed in shallow containers.

In June of the following year - it was now 1911 - my comrade Trummer received a job offer from the Stucki cheese trading company in Moscow and immediately decided to accept the position. So he moved to Palujewo in the Smolensk Governorate, on the Riga-Orel railroad line. Our master, Stauffer, soon received a replacement through the mediation of Mr. Winkler in Konolfingen. But his character did not suit my friend Trummer, and so I also left. In Kankara near Salo, I took up a position as a second cheesemaker, alongside Ernst Gerber, who later became a cheesemaker in Luterbach near Solothurn.

Ernst Gerber was having bad luck with his production. A disruption in cheese production caused him a lot of trouble. Unfortunately, at that time there were no cheese inspectors and testing laboratories as there are in Switzerland today, or at least they were not in contact with the practice. A friend from Italy gave Gerber some good advice. From that day on, production went better and these secrets also came in handy later in Russia.

From 1 November 1911, I found a job as a self-employed cheesemaker with Johann Gerber in Lyakhovo (formerly Lächova), about 50 kilometers from Trummer's place of work. Four of the former six-person traveling party remained in Finland. They also later returned to Switzerland via various detours.

Dressed in new clothes, boots and a fur coat, we set off on our journey again. The pig herder from Kankara also left his job and traveled with me to his home town. In Helsingfors he wanted to buy a bottle of cognac, but they wouldn't give it to him, because in Finland they only sell alcohol to well-dressed people of legal age. In his distress, he fetched me and in my company he received the delicious drink; he was so looking forward to celebrating a reunion at home. In the railroad carriage we met Russian soldiers who were on leave from the garrison. They were a lively bunch! There was music, singing and proper Russian dancing all night long. At three o'clock in the morning, my Finnish companion said goodbye to me at a small station; he was glad to be able to get off, because even then the Russians were not particularly friendly towards the Finns. I was probably the only civilian left in the car and didn't understand a word of Russian.

There was a customs inspection in Viborg. After passing the guard - about a dozen soldiers with bayonets fixed - I had to enter the customs building, where I was thoroughly examined, i.e. patted down. Fortunately, I had not bought the Browning pistol offered to me by Ernst Gerber.

At nine o'clock in the morning I arrived at the Finnish Railway Station in St. Petersburg. I hired an Iswostschick, a racy single carriage, and drove over the long Neva bridge through a large part of the city to the Tsarsky Selski station. It probably won't be called that today! The next train to Vitebsk didn't leave until 8pm, so I had time to buy a warm fur hat and see the Imperial Palace and the Cossack Riding School, albeit from a respectful distance. You couldn't get too close anyway, as there were sentries on every corner.

When I wanted to check in my basket that evening, the railroad officials told me that my luggage had to be tied down with a rope. A distinguished, German-speaking Jewish woman showed me a store where I could buy rope. As Trummer had advised me, I now traveled second class, and I was really glad to finally be able to sleep that night. The Russian railroad carriages are excellently equipped for this. They are wider and higher than those in the rest of Europe and at night the backrest is folded out; there are now four berths in each compartment, which are very well padded. As the sleepers usually rest on sand due to a lack of stone, larger trains can only travel at a speed of around 50 kilometers per hour. This means you are shaken less and have a smoother ride. In my compartment, a young lady was also getting ready to sleep; she spoke a little French so that we could talk.

On the train I was told by a Jew in broken German that I would have to wait an hour and a half in Vitebsk for the Riga-Oral train. We arrived at half past ten and I went to the market, which was very interesting for me as a newcomer. There were whole flocks of sheep, geese and black-spotted pigs for sale by farmers' wives. An hour later I was back at the station, but my train had already left. The railroad officials wrote the number 10 on a piece of paper, which meant that I had to stay here until ten o'clock in the evening. I had the Jew to thank for that, who had said "one and a half" instead of "half and a half". So I took another Iswostschick and pointed towards the town. "Franzuski?" the coachman asked and I said yes. He led me to a French-speaking gentleman. He sent me to a hotel where they also spoke German so that I could finally satisfy my growling stomach.

Now came the third night on the train. This time, too, I slept relatively well. Only the next morning did I realize that my only neighbor in the compartment was once again a Jew who spoke some German. "I'm also going to Stodolice," he remarked when I mentioned the destination of my journey. By midday we were in Smolensk, an important city with huge ramparts.