What If? ... by Irena Szirtes

What if Polish soldiers rescued a captive Syrian bear cub during WW2? What if the bear became playmate, protector, confidant and comrade in battle? Sometimes the strangest “what ifs” are true. Wojtek (pronounced Voytek) was real; you can read about him in the book “Wojtek the Bear” by  Aileen Orr. The following relates how I first heard about the soldier bear:

    My sister spied them from the landing window: great coats and helmets tramping the lane, forever seeking Dad and now his tiny daughters, for he was Polish, they were not. Boots on the stair, blanket snatched away, barrel of a sub-machine gun; and as they squeezed the trigger, I awoke.

    I didn’t tell my parents, or run to their room; I cradled myself in Yorkshire dark, let River Rawthey’s song wash fear away.  

     My sole encounters with WW2 were Dad’s army coat, spread across my blankets, and his eagle cap badge, gracing the photo frame between our bedroom doors. Yet I shared echoes of his post-traumatic stress, unseen and unnamed in the 1950s. I can’t explain how Nazi uniforms stalked my sleep, how terror at being the Hunted infiltrated my subconscious. I had no idea Dad’s own dreams were relentless circles of escape and pursuit. It was as if I shared shards of his memories.

  Shards were all I knew in the waking world, too. He hid WW2 from his smallest daughter, like the shrapnel in his knee, except the story of Wojtek.

  “We had a bear in the Polish Army,”  Dad told me, as we drank hot milk in robust firelight, “a big brown bear called Wojtek. His name means ‘Happy Warrior.’”

“A bear? How did you get him?”

“He was a little cub, and the soldiers felt sorry for him. His owners were cruel and wanted to make him dance. So they swapped some food to get  Wojtek.”

  I snuggled to Dad’s heartbeat, slid sticky fingers round our terrier Judy’s  ears, as she settled on his lap.

“What did Wojtek do? Did he grow big?”

“Oh yes, he grew very big. He loved to play. He wrestled with the men and  drank beer. Just like naughty bears in stories, he sometimes helped himself to jam and honey. One day he stole the lady-soldiers’ washing, in fact he stole the line as well.”

My mind jumped to Mum hanging out our smalls, fielding Judy’s attempts to drop her muddy ball into the basket.

“Did he steal... their knickers?”

“He stole all their knickers, wrapped the line around his head!”

“Knickers on his hea-ead, knickers on his head!”

Dad was eager party to my giggles and squeals. Our exclusive moments of naughtiness always felt special.

“But the best thing,” he went on, as we recovered ourselves, “was that if a soldier felt sad, Wojtek knew, and would go and sit beside him.”

  I pictured this, fingering the shirt cuff that often escaped Dad’s jumper, recalling Judy's interest in my grazed knees and salty tears.

“ Like our little Judy?”

“Like our little Judy and lots of dogs, like lots of animals. They are all very clever, you know. And Wojtek would have stayed in the army if...”

   The sadness that sometimes lingered behind his smile settled, and instinct shook its head at my asking more. I watched sputtering flames spit sparks as charred logs snapped, and Dad offered Judy the remaining milk from his cup. She lapped it up before turning her attention to my busy  fingers. Nightmares were far away. I felt safe in my childhood world, too young to comprehend how Dad’s had been swept away a  few short years before.

   Shrapnel hid quietly in Dad's knee until he was eighty, when it moved and he underwent surgery. Facing anaesthetic caused a shift of memory shards too. There was no doubt Dad swore the Resistance pledge with his whole heart, that love for Poland embroidered his being. But after he returned from hospital, he confessed he’d saved two enemy lives. One had been a wounded officer struggling under fire, the other, a  soldier Dad encountered during his flight to the Polish Second Corps. He was ashamed. He was afraid we too, would be ashamed of a man who'd had compassion on his enemy.

“What was in your mind on the battlefield?”  I asked.

“I didn’t see an enemy.  All I could see was another human being.”

“ And the soldier?”

“ He was young like me, said he’d been taught Poles were ugly, like pigs, sub-human. He was surprised my German was so good. I’d suggested  we stop trying to kill or capture each other, agree to let each other go.”

I told my father I felt no shame.  I was proud, far prouder than if he’d watched a man die in agony, or mown a boy down.

“How did the young soldier respond?”

 “He was afraid, and he agreed with me. And so I got to the Polish Army in the end.”

“And to Wojtek,” I added, seeking to keep him from memories so sharp, he would not permit me to follow. “Tell me about the time he stole the ladies washing! I want the full version – you know - how he ran off with the line on his head, how scared the ladies were, how they softened when the men took Wojtek to meet them afterwards.”

We laughed, raised our glasses to Wojtek, remembering how I first heard his  story over hot milk in flickering firelight.

“You never get tired of hearing that one, do you?”

“Too right, I never do! And you can bet I never will!” 

Read more about Wojtek