What spoiled the atmosphere most were the pirates who began turning up everywhere, and the more we talked about how much we didn’t fear them, the more we really did. There were the Roving Dudes from Essen, the Navajos from Cologne and the Kettelbach Pirates, gangs our age proclaiming eternal war on the Hitler Youth. It was unsettling as they moved about the Reich at will and even infiltrated the war zones.
