- in retrospect!

Fate or chance?

Introduction

Time and again you are faced with events and situations that at least immediately seem incomprehensible and meaningless. On several previous occasions I have written articles that just dealt with such events and situations, which can only be described as gruesome or cruel. This is especially about articles such as 4.29. Why? - The horror of fate and 4.72, the horror of fate - again! - Fate or chance? - 4.57. Do you believe in God? - A slightly difficult dialogue (continued) and 4.74. Do you believe in God? - A slightly difficult dialogue (continuation 2)

The basic problem and issues associated with the horrific and cruel experiences, situations and events that humans may be exposed to in this context must be whether these unfortunate and tragic events express something destined or too pure and coarse. Normally, we have no difficulty in perceiving light, positive and pleasant experiences and events that we and others are exposed to as expressing the favour and wonders of destiny. It is immediately harder with the dark, negative and unpleasant experiences and events that we are also exposed to, for these we will usually judge immediately as being a result of coincidences, which we ourselves have no fault with and which we therefore usually perceive as unfair.

The concept of coincidence generally refers to something that occurs unexpectedly and without, as a rule, being able to demonstrate a logical or necessary internal causal relationship. As long as there is something positive and pleasant, we often think about incidental and surprising events, but on the contrary, we generally find that negative and possibly painful events and surprises are unpleasant and therefore very little welcome.

Contrary to coincidence, the notion of fate is about something that imposes a higher power or power - for example, a god or gods - on people, or which we ourselves basically blame for our attitudes, behaviour and actions. In the former context, this is about an interpretation of the world as, overall, strictly statutory, why one's fate depends on the extent and extent to which a group and an individual are able to adapt and obey the applicable law. In the latter context, fate is an effect or consequence of causes that we ourselves have, in the first instance, triggered or initiated. This perception and interpretation of the concept of destiny is what we find, among other things, within Martinus' cosmology. In it, the concept of fate is briefly interpreted as the experience of the effects on the causes that the individual has triggered. But as pointed out in several of my earlier articles on fate, the existence and function of the process, which in Danish is referred to as rebirth and with a foreign word as reincarnation, is assumed. Without the latter, the concept of destiny as an individual and personal matter would be totally incomprehensible.

Second World War and the Occupation of Denmark

Throughout history, it is almost abounding with a multitude of creepy and even cruel events, events, and situations, which at least immediately seem incomprehensible and meaningless to humans being subjected to. Such events also include wars and war situations that have not only affected the soldiers on the battlefields, but also the civilian population in war-torn countries. It is both World War I and WWII monstrous evidence of recent times. Here could be mentioned numerous examples of the ailments in the form of, among other things, poverty, hunger, homelessness, bloody mutilation, disability and death, which many people, children as well as adults, have had to endure, primarily because there were self-sufficient and hard-skinned politicians and financiers which, so much on human costs, wars and war situations, always automatically causes. A particularly outrageous example of deep despect for man is the attempt by Nazi Germany to suppress the Slavic race and eradicate the European part of the Jewish race, the latter of which survived only because the Nazis lost the war. The same profound despect for man was, moreover, the Communist Russian Revolution 1917-18, whose outrageous human costs have only come to the public's knowledge in recent times.

As probably well-known, the Second World War broke out on September 3, 1939, when, following strong challenges, England declared Hitler-Germany war. It was the beginning of a five-year-long and horrible war, during which, among other things, small Denmark came under German rule in the years 9 April 1940 to 4 May 1945. But even though Denmark did not experience the horror of war near as close as The case was, and was, for many of the other occupied European countries, not to mention Germany's relentless war on the Soviet Union, but events occurred and events took place at home which, in the circumstances and circumstances, were serious and cruel enough in themselves.

Among the more eerie events in Denmark during the German occupation, for example, the bombardment of the Shell House in Copenhagen, which, despite a successful attack on the Shell House itself, was given an unhappy and tragic course because one of the low-flying English bombers during the approach to Copenhagen hit a high electric mast on the railroad train at the freight train station and thereby came out of course and crashed into the French School at Frederiksberg Allé, where the plane exploded, an incident or an accident that had fatal consequences for many people, children as well as adults .

The Shell House bombed

In the following I will give a description of how I, as barely 16-year-old, experienced the Englishmen's bombardment of the Shell House in Copenhagen. At that time I worked as an animator on the first Danish long cartoon "Fyrtøjet" (“The Tinderbox”).

On Wednesday, March 21, 1945, a partially successful British air raid took place at the Gestapo headquarters of the Shell House in Copenhagen. The shell house was located at the corner of Kampmannsgade and Vester Farimagsgade, not many hundred meters from the place where we worked. But the attack itself, we who worked at the studio in Frederiksberggade, came to experience in close proximity. The attack took place in the morning around noon. 11 and at that time we became aware that something unusual was happening, as we suddenly heard a loud engine alarm over our heads and followed by a throbbing fast repetitive sound. We subsequently realised that it had to be one of the hunting machines that accompanied the bombers, who flew low over the city's rooftops and gave very strong reverberation in the narrow shaft of a courtyard that was behind the property in Frederiksberggade 28.

Over here is the Shell House, as it looked in 1945 and before it was bombed. As can be seen, the then very modern building has a ground floor and 5 floors as well as a loft floor. It was in the attic roof that the Gestapos prisoners were imprisoned. The Germans believed that when resistance people were locked in there, the building would not be bombed from above, and other forms of bombing could apparently not be imagined. The facade to the left looks out towards Kampmannsgade and the facade to the right faces Vestre Farimagsgade. - Photo borrowed from "The biggest events of the year in pictures 1943-45", volume 2. A / S Bogforlaget DANA - Fruens Bøge 1952 .

Among the many large Copenhagen properties that had been seized by the Germans during the occupation period, Dagmarhus was also at the corner of Vester Boulevard (now the Hans Christian Andersen's Boulevard) in the foreground and Jernbanegade. To the left in the picture All shops and corporate offices were closed and supposed access. Dagmar Bio - at the bottom left of the picture - served as a cinema for the armed forces. On the roof, anti-aircraft posts were placed, which are clearly seen in the picture, which was, of course, due to the fact that the house was home to, among other things. "The higher SS and Police Pancke". Normally, Dagmarhus was fully illuminated at night, but under air alarms all light was turned off. - Photo borrowed from "The biggest events of the year in pictures 1943-45", volume 2. A / S Book publisher DANA - Fruens Bøge 1952.

Probably the attack was completely behind on both the Danish emergency preparedness, because the sirens did not come into use, and also in the Germans, but the anti-aircraft shooting position on the roof of Dagmarhus just over the other side of the Town Hall Square, nevertheless reached its end, because it was probably from there the throbbing sound sounded. Shortly afterwards, the hollow drones were heard from the exploding bombs that were thrown down over the Shell House, and whose pressure waves crushed many office windows in the buildings on the Town Hall Square and sucked out glass cuttings and loose papers, such as invoices and typewritten letters, and spread them over most Town square. The traffic was stalled everywhere, probably because the running part of it was waiting for what would happen next.

We were some of the latter from the studio that witnessed as we hurried down the street and across the Town Hall Square. Our archivist Bjørn, called "Largo" and I followed up when we crossed over to Vestre Boulevard (the present H. C. Andersen’s Boulevard) and through the western part of Studiestræde at the Student Union Assembly building and over to the bridge over the railway grave at Hammerichsgade over to Kampmannsgade just opposite The burning shell house, which was located on the corner of the latter street and Vester Farimagsgade, and which was almost hidden behind a large and dense black smoke cloud, which at the same time darkened the sky. Although the bombardment was obviously over at that time, we naturally did not dare to venture closer to the ever-burning and huge 6-storey building, so we were briefly standing in the shelter of the bridge's heavy stone railings. The sight we saw was scary, not least because there was complete silence around us.

Above is an aerial photo over the railway terrain at Vesterport the fatal morning on Wednesday, March 21, 1945, when a formation English bomber, followed by protective fighters, attacked the Shell House in Copenhagen. The photo is probably taken from one of the hunters who accompanied the bombers. The shell house is seen to the far right in the lower corner of the photo, but as far as it can be judged before the thrown bomb detonated. The bombs were timed to first burst after the bombers got away from the site. One of the low-flying bombers is seen to the far left of the picture, heading away from the place. To the right of the plane is a larger building, which is located opposite the Palace Theater's then white building, the exit side of which is facing Hammerichsgade, which runs along the railway line. Opposite the two buildings mentioned, the bridge is over to Kampmannsgade and the Shell House. It was here - cf. the main text - that Largo and I crept into the back of the bridge's stone railing and saw the eerie sight of the burning and shrouded Gestapo headquarters. See the next photo below. - Photo: Source unknown.

After the eerie sight of the burning and smoking building, we rushed something shocked back to the studio where we told what we had seen. Strangely, we didn't even see any German soldiers or Hipo people on the way, but I have no explanation why this was not the case. But everything seemed as if it had stalled, so that the silence became very noticeable.

It was difficult to concentrate on the drawing work after that experience, and for the rest of the day, most talked about what it was that had happened and why. But all you knew was only that the Shell House was the headquarters of the Gestapo and that there were Danish resistance people as prisoners in the house.

It was a frosty day, and a thin layer of snow was everywhere where it had not been swept away. After the event at. 17 I cycled home and had dinner, and of course told my parents and siblings what I had heard, seen and experienced. Their reaction was for the adults concerned deep seriousness and silence. Then we at. 18.30 heard in the Radio newspaper that the Jeanne d'Arc Institute, called The French School, at Frederiksberg Allé and some surrounding residential buildings had also been bombed, and that many had been killed and wounded, an irresistible urge and desire for knowledge is guarded in me. to see the affected places, and after dinner, I went over to my companion, Jørgen, I asked if he wanted to go out and see what had happened. He wanted that, why we hurriedly headed to line 18's stop at Jagtvej just at the end of Jægersborggade and drove the tram to Frederiksberg Runddel, where we stood and walked down Frederiksberg Allé towards the place where the French School was located.

Above it is seen in its way a successful and effective result of the English air bombardment of the Shell House on Wednesday, March 21, 1945. The building is seen here from the side facing the Kampmannsgade, and with the Auto Workshop, garages and other facing, which, however, had nothing to do with. Shell house to do. It is Vestre Farimagsgade, which is seen to the right in the picture. - Photo borrowed from "The biggest events of the year in pictures 1943-45", volume 2. A / S Book publisher DANA - Fruens Bøge 1952.

It was dark and only the shielded light from the lamp posts illuminated the avenue, which was covered with a thin layer of snow and shrouded in a foggy, yellow-haired and ghostly glow. At the same time, a sweet-sweat smell rested all over, which became stronger, the closer we got to the accident site. Closer to the French School we found that alone was blocked by red-and-white bands across the street, to mark access prohibited by extraneous people. To get even closer to the scene of the accident, we had to take a detour along Kochsvej and down Henrik Steffensvej, which ended up in Frederiksberg Allé, just opposite the bombed school.

The sight that met us has never been forgotten, for what I saw was the remnants of a merged, sooty and yet ruining ruin of a building, which, apart from the remaining outer walls with gaping empty window holes, looked almost like a large heap of waste, on top of which some fire-fighters still went and extinguished the places where it tended to flare up.

The most notable and peculiar thing was that apart from Jørgen and myself and a few others, men and women, who also stood at the closed end of Henrik Steffensvej, there were almost no people on the spot, and in addition, the silence and silence rested heavily over the whole grim scene.

Over here, people are gathering in front of the burning French School, whose buildings at this time are not yet completely burned out and partly collapsed. The wall with the entrance portal in front of the school is still there, but was later probably demolished, to make room for the rescue work. - The photo is borrowed from Krigsaviserne 1940-1945, Part 49. 1999.

Above is the tragic and unfortunate result of the unfortunate side of the English bombing at the Shell House: The totally burnt out French School, whose ruins speak their distinct language about the collapse of the interiors of the buildings. Some of that contributed to so many children and adults losing their lives or being wounded and burned. It was this sad and gloomy sight, but in half-darkness that met my companion Jørgen and me, when we went to the evening on March 21, went out to Frederiksberg Allé to see what had happened. - Photo borrowed from "The biggest events of the year in pictures 1943-45", volume 2. A / S Bogforlaget DANA - Fruens Bøge 1952 .

At this time, I didn't know anything else about the bombardment of the Shell House and the French School and the surrounding residential properties than what I had seen in the places and heard in the Radio newspaper, and especially the latter was not much. The Germans immediately used the bombing as a welcome occasion to attack the Allies for brutality and ruthlessness against the civilian population. But we had gradually become accustomed to these one-sided, propagandist attacks so that they were not taken seriously. And what about the press, we knew that this was censored, so that you didn't get everything knowing that way. On the other hand, one could at best hope that the illegal press knew and could tell more about what had actually happened and how and why it had happened. But so far we had to wait for the illegal press's reactions for reasons of time.

Many years later than the events took place, and before my description of these in my autobiography, on the website Dansk Tegnefilms Historie 1919 – 2000, I have described the bombardment of the Shell House and what followed, and that report will be suitable as a good supplement to My description above, I will allow to refer to it here. It can also be read at http://www.tegnefilmhistorie.dk/ under the section "Palladium A / S enters".

Here, however, I must reproduce a few quotes from the mentioned website, which elaborate and supplement my above description of the events surrounding the bombardment of the Shell House:

(Quote) The Shell House, which was - and after later rebuilding - is located on the corner of Vester Farimagsgade and Kampmannsgade, had been seized by the Germans at the end of February 1944 and arranged as the headquarters of the Gestapo. Here, third-degree interrogation and several forms of serious torture of arrested Danish resistance people took place, and as a kind of 'protective measure' against possible air strikes, the Germans had very cleverly arranged the five-storey high-rise building roof with a number of prison cells, where particularly important prisoners placed. Therefore, it was fortunate that the English had trained the pilots to fly in from low altitude and throw the bombs to the side of the house at about the second to third floor height. This part of the action proceeded roughly according to plan, as several of the prisoners who were prominent members of the Danish resistance movement managed to escape.

The Shell House burned out almost completely and left a smoking ruin, whose smoke mixed with the smoke from the neighbouring properties that the fierce fire had spread to. Some prisoners as well as about 100 Gestapo people perished as a direct consequence of the air raid, but prominent prisoners such as. Professor Mogens Fog and editor Aage Schoch survived thanks to a courageous police assistant who found his way out through the burning building, while others managed to save themselves on the undamaged part of the façade and from there venture the risky jump down the sidewalk. Fortunately, the rescuers were quickly taken away from the place and in safety, presumably by emerging people from the Resistance. Later, the survivors could tell that shortly after the attack they had managed to make a stunned German prisoner to unlock the cell doors, so that the prisoners could escape and try to find opportunities to save themselves and their fellow prisoners in relative security.

While the actual attack on the Shell House had to be described as a successful precision work, the action got some very unfortunate and unfortunate consequences, partly because one of the English aircraft crashed into the Fælledparken, and partly - and of course especially - because another of the aircraft during the approach over the State Railways terrain hit one of the light masts at Enghavevej and was so damaged that it was not possible for the pilot to straighten the plane again. It crashed right in the middle of the French School, also called the Jeanne d’Arc Institute, at Frederiksberg Allé, where the plane's bomb burst exploded and sent flames and smoke high up. The accompanying aircraft pilots perceived in a split second that this was the bomb target, so they were most deliberately emptying their bomb loads over the place - with catastrophic consequences for both people and buildings. Partly for the children and nuns in the French School, where 86 children and 13 adults died, but also for more people in the surrounding residential area: Sønder Boulevard, Henrik Ibsen's Vej, Amicisvej and Maglekildevej, which were also hit by bombs. Some were killed while others became temporarily homeless.

The actual air strikes came so surprisingly to both the Germans and the Danish civil defence that they did not even succeed in triggering the sirens who should have warned the population. And for the Copenhagener s too, the action came as a huge surprise, because one could hardly believe that such an attack would be possible. But the joy of the extermination of the hated Gestapo headquarters mixed with the undesirable painfully with the unintended consequences of the attack.

It was an eerie and sad sight, even though we knew that the Shell House was the headquarters of the most hated and infamous part of the German occupation of Denmark, namely the Gestapo. These sadistic beasts were none of us left behind, on the contrary, we wanted them where some of them had probably ended up, namely in a burning flame hell. But we also knew, of course, that there were civilian Danes employed in the house, among other things. office ladies who involuntarily have followed their employers in death.

The unfortunate bombardment of the French School, which was purely for girls, became one of the most tragic events of the Occupation, and the deaths of students and teachers, all of women and teachers, have been reminded at a ceremony every year on the anniversary ever since. The school was not rebuilt, but a monument has been erected to commemorate the dead. The Royal Airforce pilots who participated in the air strikes of the fateful day, and who survived, have been guests many times during the memorial service, as the people at least as affected by the unfortunate events of the relatives of the dead.

But in the midst of all the grief and sadness, one should not forget that there were also many of the students and several of the adults who survived the horrible day of the liberation year 1945. Several of the girls, as adults, were able to tell what they experienced and how they in spite of confinement in the burning buildings was rescued. Among these was one of my sister-in-law, at that time 5 years old, who occasionally, when the speech fell on then, could tell of his own tragic experiences of mutilated and dead companions.

But it is understandable that in the days following the sad events was a somewhat depressed mood among the Copenhagener’s, and not least with us at the studio. An atmosphere, which, by the way, was reinforced by the fact that in the following days we could see the strange sight of horse-drawn carriages with open ladders, covered by tarpaulins, which, however, failed to completely hide the carriage's eerie load of a pile of charred human . A black arm stuck out here, an equally black leg there, so there could be no doubt that it was about the unfortunate fatalities after the bomb attack on the Shell House, especially not, as the wagons came from there and via Axeltorv, Jernbanegade, City Hall Square and Frederiksberggade continued on along Strøget over Kgs. Nytorv and Bredgade to Kastellet.

It looked peculiar with these poorly-covered horse-drawn carriages, pulled by a single horse and with a single German soldier as a coach, who sat motionless on his seat with the empty one hand and a long whip in the other. It was like a picture of the death post of death that had picked up its "harvest" of the recent deceased, and was now on its way through a heavily trafficked and humiliating stroke to get the unrecognisable dead bodies out of the way.

Incidentally, the resistance movement perceived the aircraft attack on the Shell House rightly or wrongly as a signal, partly that the Danish Freedom Council in London and its local members in Denmark had influence, and partly that the British now considered Denmark as an ally. The events of the next approximately one and a half months would then also prove to be crucial for Denmark and the Danes. No one or only few were in any doubt that the days of the occupying power were really speaking, but as you know, strong cold often occurs before the weather turns into spring. March is the month in which cold and warmth really take hold of each other, and best as it seems the worst in the weather, watching snowdrops and erantis emerging from the soil and announcing the coming of spring. (End of quote)

It is, moreover, interesting to note that the newspapers - or at least "BT" in the issue the following day, Thursday, March 22, 1945, only indirectly mention the English air bomb attack and not with as much as a hint of a word mentions that The bombardment concerned the Shell House. The newspaper only mentions and mentions the French School and the residential properties in the neighbourhood that had been hit by the bombs. To the defence of "B.T." and the newspapers, one must, moreover, say that for good reasons they could not have a full overview of the events and their progress already the day after it happened. But when the Shell House is not mentioned at all, it is probably due to the fact that the German press censorship had not yet received instructions from the higher place on how the bombardment should be described to the public. These factors must be borne in mind when reading the following quite dramatic and macabre quotes from "B.T.", which is reproduced because the bombing of the Shell House and the accident with the French School and the housing properties are important in connection with the understanding of the time then.

110 Deaths at Hospitals

Last statement of the victims' number

2 Firefighters among the fatalities

Ritzaus Bureau announces:

Until kl. 7 in the Morning, at the Municipal Hospital Command, it was calculated that 420 persons were brought in to the Copenhagen hospitals in total. Of these, 110 are dead, and 140 of the wounded are admitted. 170 is lighter.

The rescue work is continued through the Night

There, the night has been full time in the clean-up work on the various catastrophe sites in the city

In the Property Sdr. Boulevard 106, where a pair of bombs fell, had to be set at 2 times due to a timed bomb.

The residents were evacuated and bids were sent after the blast command. The rescue work in the Vesterbro Estate is, however, expected to resume until Tomorrow. You count on a total of eight killed in this property, and in the morning hours one of the bodies was pulled forward.

Kl. half reached the cellars under the French School

At 2.30 pm, the rescuers reached into the collapsed basement of the French School. It turned out that the vast majority of the children were dead. And furthermore, two fire-fighters were found from Frederiksberg Fire Station, who were killed during the collapsed rubble.

Two killed fire-fighters

It was the 52-year-old reserve fire-fighter Oscar Dalby, Dalgas Boulevard 124, and the 25-year-old fire-fighter Svend Hansen, Tryggevälletvej 133. During the rescue work, a total of seven of the fire-fighters had been shut in, but the three of them managed to reach out, og which however, all were slightly injured.

Still bodies under the ruins

About the rescue work, Deputy Chief of Fire Mygind from Frederiksberg states that it is believed that several of the affected properties lie under the ruins. Thus, it is believed that more people are burned in properties on Maglekilde Road, and one cannot ignore the fact that human life has been lost in the villas on Amicisvej.

14 bodies was found in one place

During the fire on the French school, in a door in the Northeast corner, several children and adults have been looking out shortly after the air attack and on the spot late in night 14 lying.

At the 3 o'clock in the Morning, Fire Chief Bang told the waiting parents who were assembled in the Allé Scenen’s Theater Hall that there was no hope of saving alive out of the ruins.

Many rescuers injured

To the Department of Forensic Medicine is brought the bodies of three girls and a boy from the French School. They are all unknown. From the Danish Technological Institute, the body of a man, the caretaker Carl Mørch Petersen, and the Westend the body of Glarmester Aage Aksel Nielsen, who was death of a shock, was brought in. Furthermore, the bodies of two English airmen have been brought in, who crashed with the machine at the French School.

Several of the rescuers received minor injuries during the relief work, and two fire-fighters had to be driven to the hospital. It was Fire Chief Jensen from the Copenhagen Fire Department who got broken four ribs, and Brandmand Hansen, who was driven to Bispebjerg Hospital after being heavily burnt. (R. B.)

63 killed children

It is stated this morning that there are 63 children among the 110 killed in the bombing disaster. (R. B.)

Several quarters in Frederiksberg without Gas

As a result of the disaster, the gas is interrupted in several quarters in Frederiksberg, as water has flowed in the pipes, but the lighting service people have worked to rectify the damage all night, and one hopes that the gas supply must be in order in the course of today.

The neighborhoods without Gas are: Vodroffsvej, Værnedamsvej, Jacobys Allé, Falkoner Allé and Gammel Kongevej.

[It must be added here that gas was then the only energy source used in kitchen cookers in Copenhagen. Electric cookers only became common a few years later, and preferably in new construction. My addition.]

C.B.U. Crew, Teachers, Scouts and D.K.B. Helps with the cleanup

In the clearing work at Frederiksberg, in addition to the previously mentioned Corps all Teachers and Pupils, as well as the permanent crew from the CBU School participates in Bernstorff Castle and the Zealand's CBU Column from Roskilde and a part Scout. The rescue work in Nat was led by Fire Chief Bang, Frederiksberg.

Danish Women's Preparedness provides catering for the rescue crew, and Frederiksberg Social Service established a collection station in Platan Bio in Vesterbrogade for the many people who have lost their home and provided accommodation. It is believed that over 1000 people have been taken home.

40 People who were unable to obtain another Logis lived in the night at Rahbek School.

(Quotes ended)

Some relevant additional considerations

When it was exactly the Shell House in Copenhagen that became the goal of the extensive English air strike, it was because the house was the headquarters of the German Geheime Staatspolizei, abbreviated Gestapo. This secret police, among other things, had the purpose of revamping the Danish resistance movement and was known for its inhuman, cruel and painful interrogation methods when it came to getting information from captured resistance people or saboteurs. In fact, they succeeded quite well, partly with the help of sneakers, so well that in early March 1945 the Gestapo had managed to arrest all members of the Copenhagen regional leadership of the resistance movement. The knowledge of the Resistance Movement and its members became, like everything the Germans dealt with, written down, posted and archived for future use. It was therefore only a matter of time when the Gestapo would be expected to initiate a major action against the entire Copenhagen resistance movement.

Under the impression of the serious threat faced by the Danish Resistance Movement, leading resistance people requested that an English side would initiate and carry out a bomb attack against the Gestapo headquarters in Aarhus and Copenhagen, and later in Odense. The attack on the Gestapo headquarters in Aarhus took place on October 31, 1944, and cost 18 Danish prisoners and a large number of Gestapo people their lives, the attack on the Shell House, 21 March 1945, while the attack in Odense first took place in April 1945.

However, the myth was later killed that the English bombers were aiming for the lower floors of the Shell House because they knew there was a lot of resistance people imprisoned at the top of the building. When the planes threw their bombs against the lower floors, it was solely because they were the centre of the target. That they gave the prisoners a chance to survive and escape, must be regarded as a lucky side benefit of the action. The actual reason for throwing the bombs towards the building at the above mentioned height was, from the planners' side, supposedly that it was expected that the weight of the floors above would cause the building to collapse by itself.

Later, it has come to the public's attention that a member of the Freedom Council's top management doctor, the later professor Mogens Fog, was among the prisoners up on the top floor under the roof of the Shell House, and together with several of his fellow prisoners (including editor Aage Schoch) escaped He, though not for their part, by crawling outside the building at the height of the fourth floor and jumping down the sidewalk. No, it was later confirmed that it was actually police assistant Lyst Hansen, who shortly after the bombardment had managed to escape unharmed and unhindered out of his cell, after which he liberated and led a bunch of other surviving prisoners, including Mogens Fog, down the still existing stairs and out into the open and away from the place. But other political prisoners were hardly fortunate, as the only rescue route they could find in haste was to climb out onto the cornice in front of one of the windows in - as far as I remember and know - in the height of the 3rd or 4th, and from here jump down onto the sidewalk. Here, some quickly responding people, probably people from the auto repair shop, had hurriedly thrown away some cardboard boxes and other things that were going to take off when the prisoners jumped into what they hoped would be freedom. After the information available, these prisoners were happily escaping from the jump and were quickly taken away from the site and in safety. Probably assisted by members of the Resistance, who, however, had not been informed in advance of the time of the attack, but only that it would take place.

According to later information on the bombardment of the Shell House, it turned out that 48 fighter and bombers had participated in the attack, so apart from the aircraft lost as a result of the crash in the French School and in the Fælledparken, most of the aircraft returned to their base in Norfolk in England, a flight of several hours each way plus the time spent on the action itself, so the aircraft fuel tanks must have been well-filled, which has probably also contributed to the fire becoming so violent as The case was when one of the aircraft crashed into the French School. The planes were divided into three groups with a flight distance between them in one and a half minutes. It was during the approach over Copenhagen that an aircraft in the first group accidentally hit a 30-meter-high signal mast at the freight railway train, so that the pilot lost control of the aircraft and came out of course, with the result that it partly lost a few bombs over a residential building on Søndre Boulevard and subsequently crashed into the French School at Frederiksberg Allé, with the disastrous consequences it got, not least because subsequent bombers misjudged the target and thought that this place was the target. One should keep in mind that the pilots and navigators only had seconds to respond.

Later on, it has come to the knowledge of the public that the real and primary purpose and background of the Englishmen's bombing of the Shell House was to maintain the German troops in Denmark. The situation in the relatively peaceful Denmark was such that the German army leadership was supposed to have plans to release some of the German forces in Denmark and send them to the Rhineland, where the Germans had to fight hard against the south-invading English and American troops.

They survived the nightmare

Many years later, some of the now grown women, who in 1945 attended pre-school at the French School, in a documentary program on television were able to tell about their eerie and cruel experiences, which they had suppressed the experience of, but at the request and for the sake of Historical data was willing to tell, even though it awakened visions and emotions that were deeply painful and hurt. For example, one of the women could report that she had been locked up in a rubble with one of the nuns. They both lay on the floor, but in spite of the narrow conditions, the nun managed to lay protective over her until, at some point, the water from a burst water pipe slowly rose around them. While the nun spoke soothingly and comfortingly to the crying child, it then manoeuvred the little girl on top of it, so that the child would not drown. It became the nun's own death, as she drowned, as the leaking water rose over her head and there was no way to escape.

The little girl escaped the drowning death and was later rescued by the rescuers, who had gradually come into great numbers.

Another of the surviving women, one at the time 5-year-old little girl, experienced being rescued from the burning and collapsing building and along with some other little girls being laid up on the cargo by a truck driving them to the nearest hospital, which was Frederiksberg Hospital. Along the way, the little girl held one of her peers in her hand, but when they reached the hospital it turned out that this companion was dead. This gave the little girl such a shock that she was unable to speak and tell what she was called. Therefore, it took some time before her parents, who along with many other parents of the dead and wounded children stayed at the Betty Nansen Theatre’s foyer just opposite the French School, were told that their little daughter had survived and was alive.

Consistent told the adult women who, as children, had survived the horrors of the bombardment of the French School, that their automatic response to the horrific experiences that children had suffered at the unfortunate occasion was a displacement of what had surpassed them themselves and their peers as well as the much-held nun teachers. And the reactions of their parents and others to the harsh events were silent about what happened, assuming it would be best for everyone, not least, to forget about what happened in the morning the fateful Wednesday, March 21 1945. Only many years later and as adults, some of the surviving and now adult women have dared to think back at that time and tell others about their shocking experiences.

Here it is again that one can raise the question of how far the horrific and painful experiences that a large number of smaller and larger children and their parents and a number of adult nuns may experience in connection with the bombardment of the French School , was an expression of or expression of destiny or coincidence? - Martinus will, according to his perception of the concept of destiny, believe that in this case too, there were events that were caused and triggered by the people's own fate. Although this view raises a wide range of issues, such as about coincidental collective debt, can I theoretically follow the thinking, but my feelings and own understanding - or lack of it? - tell me that after all, there must have been talk of coincidences. That it was therefore coincidence that an English bomber accidentally fell into the French School exactly that day and at that time of schooling, causing the pilots in the subsequent bombers to bomb the school because they mistakenly thought this was the bomb target .

Once again, let me leave the question of fate or chance open, in the hope that I will be able to confirm Martinus' analyzes and conclusions about the concept of destiny, or - which, however, I do not consider particularly likely, to refute these as invalid.

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