Some time ago we were given several German magazines to read. Among them was one which had the title, “In Seiner Hand” (In His Hand). I found this magazine very interesting because it was about Brother Otto Welker’s experiences during the Second World War. I knew Brother Welker personally because he was my teacher at the missionary school in Jagsthausen, Germany in 1965 and 1966. This magazine also gives us the reason why we, as a church, are in existence and why we believe that we should not be involved in military service of any kind.
Brother Otto Welker’s parents, Heinrich and Anna, learned about the Seventh-day Adventist message and became Adventists. When Otto was young, he also decided to follow the Lord and was baptized. The verse that was given him at his baptism was Isaiah 43:1, “ . . . . Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou are Mine.” Then verses 2, 3, and 5 in the same chapter, “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; nor shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, The Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west.” These verses were so dear to him throughout his life.
Brother Welker’s father saw the danger that Germany, with Hitler as leader, may end up in another war. He could not imagine that his sons would go and kill other people, which is what the military is all about. Therefore, his father Heinrich suggested that his son, Otto, should get involved with the Red Cross and hope that, in the case of war, he would be able to serve as a medic and avoid being a soldier, being forced to take the lives of others. So, as a teenager, Otto Welker became part of the local Red Cross organization where he was trained to help injured individuals; he often volunteered at the bicycle races in Ludwigshafen.
In 1937 he was called to serve in the military. He asked to serve as a medic and that was accepted; so from 1937 until 1939 he was in training as a medic. Otto Welker and his fiancée Martha were married on March 30, 1939. The Bible text given them at their wedding was Romans 12:12, ”Rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation; continuing instant in prayer.” This text was like a prophecy of what would happen. After their wedding, they opened a health food store. This was the fourth health food store in their family. Their parents had one and there were two more stores, which belonged to the Welker’s relatives. In August 1939 Otto Welker was called to active service. First, his division was fighting against France. After France was conquered, the army stayed there just to keep an eye on things. In 1941 his division went to Austria. The plan was for them to go to Yugoslavia, but the war in the Balkans was already over. The whole army waited for their next mission. The soldiers had tours in the mountains. They helped the farmers with their harvest and, as there was not much for a medic to do, he was mainly doing paperwork in the office. In June the soldiers were transported by train, close to the border of Russia, about 240 km east of Warsaw which is the capital of Poland. On June 22nd, 1941 at 3:15 in the morning, the good time was over. With an army of 3,050,000 soldiers and 2,000,000 horses, Germany attacked Russia without any warning and now they began the march towards Kiev, an industrial city which the Germans wanted to occupy in order to destroy the industry in Russia. As they were getting close to the city, the doctor in charge of the medics said to Brother Otto Welker, “You have not had a vacation yet; it is your turn to have some time off.” So, Brother Welker went home for his vacation. In the meantime, while he was off duty, there was a terrible fight for five weeks before the Germans conquered the city Kiev.
When Otto Welker came back from his vacation, the division that he had belonged to did not exist anymore; there were maybe two or three men left. 260,000 soldiers died in this battle. 665,000 Russian soldiers were taken captive and starved to death. If Brother Welker had not been on vacation at that time, it would have been very unlikely that he would have survived.
After joining the troops in Russia again, he was there until the spring of 1942, when the Doctor in charge gave him another vacation. The trip by railroad from Russia to Ludwigshafen, Germany was long and difficult. At that time, Brother Welker was able to hold his ten-month-old daughter Heidi in his arms for the first time. While he was away from the army, the Russian troops attacked the Germans in Charkow and the Germans retaliated. From May 12th to the 28th, 1942 there was a terrible battle. 200,000 young men lost their lives and 240,000 were captured by the Germans as prisoners of war; hardly any of them survived.
When Brother Welker came back to the troops, he realized that his division had been wiped out; he could count the survivors on one hand. He survived the battle at Charkow because he again was on vacation at that time.
After he returned to the army from his vacation, the terrible things that he witnessed were hard to imagine, and he would hardly ever talk about it; dead and wounded people every day, including children and women. The soldiers became more and more heartless and cruel as time went on. Dying people everywhere; it was just part of the day. As a medic he had to deal with those that were wounded. Once he was attending to someone who had been shot in the stomach; the patient asked, “What chance do I have?” Brother Welker was honest and said, “Not much.” Together they said the Lord’s Prayer and as they said, “Amen,” the man died. In those days, he was happy if he could have a prayer together with someone, regardless of which denomination they belonged to.
At a certain time when there was no fighting going on for a short time, Brother Welker was asked to take a Russian prisoner to another place behind the front. On the way he met a brother from the church where he grew up. They were so happy to see each other and the prisoner saw the opportunity to run away. As an accompaniment to a prisoner of war, Brother Welker was forced to be armed. He knew that if the prisoner would escape, he would be condemned to death, but he could not get himself to shoot, so he let the prisoner escape. Brother Welker had to stand trial and was condemned to death. The Doctor in charge of the medics said to him, “Try to appeal and see if you can get the death sentence postponed to the end of the war,” and so he did, and he won the appeal. Of course, at the end of the war, nobody thought about that anymore.
The war in Russia went from bad to worse. Stalingrad was the city where Russia was producing its tanks and cannons, and it was the next main target for the German army. It was an impossible goal. They were 2,000 km away from Germany where supplies had to come from and the railroads were constantly being bombed by the Russians. The winter in Russia was unbearable; temperatures were down to –30C. The soldiers had to survive in snowdrifts. They were cold and they were hungry and did not have enough ammunition to defend themselves; however, they did not give in and the battles were relentless. Not only the soldiers suffered, but people living in the area died by the thousands; they got in the crossfire, starved, or froze to death. Out of the 284,000 German soldiers in the sixth army, 226,000 died, not counting those that were wounded. Here Brother Welker was serving as a medic.
Brother Welker’s wife Martha was looking after their health food store in Ludwigshafen in Germany. One evening there was a clear sky; she was looking up at the stars in the sky and she read the Bible text from Genesis 18:23, “And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt Thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked?” In Stalingrad one night Brother Welker was looking up into the stars and saw Orion and read Psalm 23:4, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.” Later they found out that it must have been on the same evening that they were looking at the stars and read these Bible verses.
Terrible were the conditions in Stalingrad for the German soldiers. The food rations got less and less. It went down to one slice of bread per man and finally down to a half slice of bread for each man. Brother Welker concluded, “Either I will freeze to death, I will starve to death or I will get killed by a bullet.” But, he could not give up hope when he read Psalm 23. In the meantime there was an outbreak of yellow fever in the area and Brother Welker got infected by this disease. The doctor in command of the medics released him from his duties and said, “Try to see if you can make it to the airport and get a flight back to Germany.” That was easy to say, but not so easy to accomplish. There were seven airports in the Stalingrad area which the Germans occupied, but as the Russian troops were winning, only one was still available for the German army. The German army in Stalingrad was surrounded by the Russian troops and the only way out of there was by plane. Half the planes that tried to fly into the occupied area did not make it to their destination. They were either shot down or got lost in bad weather. They only dared to fly at night; otherwise the risk for being shot down was too great. Brother Welker made it to Pitomnik airport by December 25th 1942, but he had to wait until January 3rd 1943 to get a flight out of the area, surrounded by the Russians, because no plane arrived on account of a heavy snowstorm. It was just too cold and there was too much snow for the plane to land. Finally, the weather changed and the plane arrived. Thousands of wounded and sick soldiers were waiting. The only reason Brother Welker was able to get on that plane was that the army was afraid that he would contaminate others and therefore he was put on one of the first planes. The flight went well and they made it out of the danger zone. He then boarded another plane and flew to Krakow, Poland. From there he was transported to Austria, where there was a reserve hospital for sick and wounded soldiers. Here Brother Welker got the medication that he needed, a warm bed to sleep in, and friendly people to take care of him.
As mentioned before, while he had his first and second vacation, almost all the others in his division lost their lives. This time, only because he contracted the dreaded disease, yellow fever, did he get out of Stalingrad on one of the last flights; almost all the others died there.
In 1943 Martha Welker had a visit from the Pastor who was in charge of that area, Richard Lange from the Seventh-day Adventist Church. After a short greeting he came to the reason for his visit. He mentioned that the German people at the present time were in a very difficult situation and everyone had to sacrifice. It was not good that she closed her health food store on Sabbath, so please keep it open. Also, she should try to persuade her husband, who was a medic in the German army, to be a real soldier and help the German army win the war. He should take up weapons and fight like a real soldier. Later Pastor Richard Lange was bragging about how his visit to members in the area had convinced many S.D.A. medics to join the fighting troops and take part in the war with weapons.
Although Martha was asked by the Pastor and threatened by the Police to keep the store open on Sabbath, she faithfully closed every Friday evening and never opened on Sabbath. The store was located in Ludwigshafen, a city where there was a lot of industry, so this city became a target for British bombers. The British wanted to demolish the industry because the Germans manufactured the engines for their airplanes here. Martha’s father suggested that she sell the store and move to a small city where he lived. She sold the store and packed all the furniture. She and her daughter Heidi travelled to the little town Muhlacker where her parents lived. All they had with them was one suitcase. All the rest of their belongings and their furniture had been loaded on a truck and was to arrive later. The truck was parked by the freight train at the railroad station overnight. The British bombers attacked that night and hit the truck and everything burned. A little later, back in Ludwigshafen where the store that Martha had sold was located, the whole street was demolished by the British bombers, but Martha and Heidi were safe in Muhlacker.
In April 1943 when Brother Welker was healthy enough to serve, he was sent back to the German army in Southern Russia (the area of Caucasus). At that time the German army was in bad shape; they were basically trying to salvage as much as possible, as they had to give in to the Russian troops. It was a matter of
going back and at the same time fighting the Russians so that they would not take everything.
One day in the fall of 1943, Brother Welker, together with some others from the German army suddenly were in front of a Russian tank. All they could do was run for their lives. When they were completely exhausted, they hid behind some sheaves of grain, but the tank was still pursuing them and the only thing left for them to do was to lay flat on the ground. All Brother Welker could say was, “Dear Lord, my wife and my child.” Then the tank rolled over him and two others. The one on the right and the one on the left were crushed by the tank’s chains and died instantly. Brother Welker was lying right under the centre and did not get hurt. When the danger was over, he opened his Bible: the text in front of his eyes was Psalm 91:7. “A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.” This was exactly what he had experienced, and he continued to read from verse 8 to 16, “Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked. Because thou hast made the LORD, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation; There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone. Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet. Because he hath set his love upon Me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known My name. He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honour him. With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him My salvation.” God’s protection at this time made a deep impression upon Brother Welker and he decided right there and then: “If I survive this war, I will serve the Lord as long as I live.”
The Russian troops were pushing hard, and for a certain time, Brother Welker was not able to keep up with the troops. Constantly there was not enough food, and not enough sleep. His body could not take it anymore. So, he was left in a shed, close to a small Russian farm. It was in the southern area of Russia, not too far from the Black Sea. Here he was left all by himself, without any food or water, as the others had very little for themselves. Here he fell asleep, and an elderly lady from the farm found him. She was Russian and he was German. Considering what the Germans had done to the Russians, taken their land, and killed millions of their people, both soldiers and others including women and children, if she would have told the authorities, it would have been either prison or death. Instead, she acted like the Good Samaritan and shared the little she had with him. For several days she fed him, until he was strong enough to continue with the next group of German soldiers. Brother Welker could never forget how well she treated him and sometimes he asked himself, “Was this merciful lady really a Russian farmer?”
The Germans were still losing territory in the spring of 1944. The German troops were pushed back to Odessa by the Black Sea. Here Brother Welker got sick again, this time from malaria. He was put on a train to Germany together with other wounded and sick soldiers. The train ride took a long time. Everything was more important than getting the sick and wounded home. When the train stopped, those that had died were simply pushed off the train onto the ground before the train continued. Finally on May 2nd 1944 the train arrived in a town—Schreiberhau (today in Poland)—where there was a military hospital. The train stopped and the sick and wounded had to walk the last distance. When they got off the train, Brother Welker asked someone, “How far is it to this place?” The man answered, “It is about one kilometre.” After a while, Brother Welker asked again, “How far is it?” and the answer was, “Just a little further.” This continued many times and always the same answer, “Just a little more, we are soon there.” When they finally got to the place, Brother Welker said, “How come you were not honest with me and told me how far it was?” and the man answered, “When I saw the condition you were in when you came off the train, if I would have told you it is 20 km, you would have sat down and died.”
Shortly after this train left Odessa, the German army was totally destroyed. If Brother Welker had not gotten sick and left at that time, he would have died with the other 135,000 German soldiers who lost their lives in that place—in three days.
Brother Welker’s wife Martha found out that he was at the military hospital in Ober-Schreiberhau in Poland, and she and her daughter Heidi came to visit him. Now they saw each other for the first time after twenty months. His health improved very slowly and the news about the loss of their livelihood did not contribute to his recovery. Brother Welker stayed there all summer, until October 1944 when he was moved to another military hospital at Bad Kreuznach, 700 km away, for subsequent treatment. On the way, just before Dresden, the train suddenly stopped and people were asking why it had stopped. The conductor said that he did not know why, but he was not allowed to go any further. The next day when they were allowed to continue, they went through Dresden where they saw that the railway station had been bombed and the ruins were still burning. Now Brother Welker knew why the train had stopped.
Before the end of World War II, Brother Welker again had to go back to the troops, this time to North-West Germany. This was in the spring of 1945. The morale among the soldiers was very low. Everyone knew that Germany had no chance of winning the war; it was only a question of time. Brother Welker was, like many others at that time, taken captive by the British as a prisoner of war, three days before the end of the war. But, three months later he was released and travelled back through Germany and could look at all the devastation the war had caused. He finally arrived back home with his family and they could now all again enjoy each other’s company.
“But now, thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and He that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art Mine. When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; nor shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, The Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west.” Isaiah 43:1–3, 5
These words written by the Prophet Isaiah were truly experienced by Brother Welker during the Second World War:
If Brother Welker would not have had his first vacation when the battle was happening about the city of Kiev, he would most likely have died when his whole division perished.
If Brother Welker would not have had his second vacation when the battle was happening about the city of Chrakow he would most likely have died when his whole regiment perished.
If he would not have contracted yellow fever in Stalingrad, he would not have gotten out on one of the last flights that left the city where the rest of the troops lost their lives.
It was a miracle that he did not get hurt when the Russian tank ran over him.
If the farmer’s wife would not have acted like a Good Samaritan and instead would have called the authorities, he would have ended up in prison or lost his life.
If he would not have gotten sick with malaria in Odessa, by the Black Sea, he would not have been able to get onto one of the last trains which left that area with sick and wounded soldiers.
Brother Welker lived up to his promise that he would serve the Lord. Not long after he came home and had seen all the terrible devastation that the war brought with it, he joined the Reform Movement. Shortly after that, he became the church leader of Muhlacker. In 1948 he was ordained as an elder and four years later he was ordained as a minister in our church. For many years he worked as a teacher in our missionary school in Germany. As a student in his class 1965 and 1966, I can testify that he was a very talented man and very organized. He taught us music, knew how to conduct a choir, most of all, he had a strong faith in God and what God can do in our lives.
Until a ripe old age the Lord always brought him safely home from his worldwide mission trips. The work for his Lord and Saviour, who so often saved him, was his greatest passion. Brother Welker fell asleep October 12, 2007, at the age of 93.
This is a condensed translation from the German Publication called “In Seiner Hand” (In His Hand), written by Brother Otto Welker’s son, Br. Helmut Welker.
On the back cover of the magazine is the German Hymn “In Seiner Hand” which in English is “Under His Wings,” Hymn #108, in the International Hymnal. (See Inside Back Page)
Condensed and translated with a few comments by Evald Pedersen.