Sverre Bergh

Sverre Bergh's last months in Germany in 1945. Surviving Dresden and escape from Berlin April 20th. (copy from Norwegian Wikipedia)

In early February 1945, Bergh was on his way to Berlin, but on 7 February he was stuck in Copenhagen because the railway line to Berlin was closed. In order to make it to an important meeting with Rosbaud in Berlin on 9 February, he bluffed the Luftwaffe that he was the courier for a package of important medical material from the Serum Institute in Copenhagen to Berlin. The package consisted of regular salt that was well wrapped and stamped. This is how he arrived with the daily courier plane to Tempelhof. Rosbaud reported that there was no progress in the German nuclear program. At the police station in Dresden, Bergh received a tip that the Gestapo was interested in his papers. On Tuesday 13 February, he had invited his girlfriend Gaby to a good restaurant. At half-past ten the air-raid alarm went off, but few people cared about the air-raid alarm because Dresden had no military-strategic importance. During his four years in the city, Bergh had not been able to report on current bomb targets. Bergh and Gaby went to the basement of an apartment building, but Bergh did not dare to use the intended shelter, which he believed would not withstand the weight of a collapsed apartment building. Instead, they sought refuge in a corridor with a vaulted brick ceiling. Hardly anyone else survived in the tenement. Dresden burned intensely after the bombing and the heat created such a strong draft that people and cars were dragged into the flames. Most died from lack of oxygen, but Bergh also saw people killed by the air pressure from air mines (blockbusters) - they were often naked because the air pressure had torn off their clothes. Bergh saw people reduced to coal and ash by the intense heat. After the bombing, Bergh and Gaby walked many hours to get away. The stream of fleeing residents Bergh was among was attacked on 14 February by Allied planes with machine guns. Bergh took cover in the road ditch and his shoes were soaked by all the blood that flowed into the ditch. Bergh believed that the bombing of Dresden was a disgrace.