The Hike That Killed Five Schoolboys

there were 27 of them behind that fact Liza Grim's story of tragedy and a terrible snowstorm in the mountains soon they were up to their waist in snow eventually five of them died from exposure and the others have come back to tell another tale of death on the mountain in the middle of one of the worst snowstorms they've ever seen The Villages of hofstraund a small German Town near the edge of the black forest begin hearing desperate screams from the darkness of the mountain and then suddenly a bang on the door of a local farmhouse it's two young English boys and they don't speak German say for one desperate sounding phrase boys ill on Mountain help a number of Brave Villages rally together making their way up the mountain in the middle of the blizzard in Sub-Zero temperatures scattered across the Mountainside half buried in snow it's here that they find the bodies of a number of young school boys they appear to have gotten lost something isn't right why aren't the boys dressed properly where are the adults and why were they out hiking on a Mountainside in the middle of a blizzard What followed this fateful night was a tangled web of half-truths Lies Nazi propaganda and a shameful cover-up at the highest levels there's a reason you haven't heard of this tragedy the truth about what happened here would remain hidden for 80 years but that's the thing with lies they have a way of being found out eventually don't they it was an unforeseeable tragedy an unavoidable accident it was also a lie but to understand how we got here I need to take you back to the very beginning foreign [Music] it's 9am Friday the 17th of April 1936. 27 boys aged 12 to 17 from The Strand School in Brixton London have woken up early and are now excitedly standing outside their youth hostel in Freiburg they're about to embark on a hike through the black forest with their popular and well-like German teacher the 27 year old Mr Kenneth keast the trip was sold to parents and students alike as an easy Springtime walking tour from the popular tourist town of Freiburg through the Black Forest to the town of tottenberg and Back Again in total the trip was supposed to last 10 days just before the group were due to leave however Kiest has a rather strange question for two of the hostel workers because just a few moments before they were due to set off keast asked for directions to the mountain the two workers did their best to explain but it's here that they noticed that keast doesn't have a very detailed map just look at the difference in detail between the map Keys has versus the map he should have had nonetheless the Hostile workers Mark the route out with a pen being too experienced hikers themselves they warn him about the weather and urge him to stick to the main paths only but that's not the only strange thing that the hostel workers notice the boys were dressed in summer clothes for example they weren't carrying water but both workers assume that Keith knew what he was doing and they say nothing however the group was far more unprepared than the hostel workers knew Not only was Kiest unfamiliar with the route he was also unfamiliar with the weather he hadn't checked in at the local tourist center he hadn't even read the weather reports posted at his hostel you see if he had he would have known well in advance about the storm that was about to take hold he would have known that even for a local hiking in clear weather a 21 kilometer Journey over the shanzan mountain without a specialized map it would have been a challenge and in this weather unthinkable [Music] but both the hostel workers assuming that keast knows what he's doing wave the group off and the boys giggling and laughing excited for their Adventure follow him I had no idea I was about to hit them [Music] now I want to be clear from the outset the tragedy that is about to unfold is the direct result of a number of poor decisions some big and some small they're all stacked together to create devastating consequences if just one of those decisions were made differently then the tragedy could have should have been averted just after 9am after the group have left the hostel however Mr Kenneth keast is faced with one of those choices on the bottom of the group's travel itinerary there's a note from the travel agency which clearly outlined a number of ways to shorten even half the length of the journey by using either a tram to the bottom of the mountain a newly installed cable car up the mountain or both and as you probably guessed Kiest ignores this advice instead he starts the hike off with a three kilometer walk alongside the Tramway lines to the n-terminus at the base of the mountain along the way the weather had turned from sleet to full-on snow and that snow had begun to stick it's here that the group had a brief encounter with two employees of the Freiburg bus company who were shoveling the snow to clear a path for the bus at around 9 45 AM for reasons he never shares but probably to attempt to shortcut keys decided to lead the group North contrary to the route laid out on his map and in doing so makes yet another choice that will come to have devastating consequences it was here that the group was seen by Fritz trenkel landlord of the saint Valentin Inn and his son who were on their way to town for supplies before the storm kicked in within half an hour the group became lost so lost in fact that they ended up walking in a literal Circle past the Inn back down to Freiburg and back up again at 11 30 am with some 30 centimeters of snow now on the ground the group was seen Again by Fritz and his son with snow on their heads and in his own words suffering badly from the cold Fritz had hardly got through the front door when Keith arrived and began asking his wife 28 year old Susanna trenkel for directions to the Sharon slim Peak I'm now going to read out an abbreviated version of Susanna's statement to the police my actual words to him were you want to go up the chance London this snow when in weather like this he said yes then I said to him that he had chosen the longest route by coming this way and that he would not find his way in this blizzard he then retorted by saying that there were still signposts when I replied that by the time he got to the solaka the signpost would certainly no longer be legible he declared that he would wipe them clean and with that key stormed out it was only then that Susanna realized that he was with a group of boys or little Lads in shorts as she called them as the Tranquil family watched the group making their way up this deep soap further into the mountain one family member uses a very precise word to describe how they felt incest horrified no one thought they would get very far at all they were all wrong by 2 30 PM after getting lost yet again the group has made the five kilometer or so Journey past two notable waypoints the zolaka and the Callahan at this point the snow is so deep that the party is having to kick a path through it and it's here near the kolahau that the group happens across two woodcutters who are on their way home due to the severity of the blizzard the woodcutters warned the group for a second time against continuing of course Keystone won't hear this and the two men give up and end up showing them the way forward to the couple Valley an area just before the extremely steep Ascent up to the Sharon's land mountain peak and so the group continued on it was just half an hour later at around 3 pm that two of the youngest members of the group began complaining of cold and 14 year old Roy Witham Kiest admits in a later statement was now beginning to slip quite a bit at this stage the group was wading through snow nearly two feet deep and the blizzard was worsening by the minute but the boys trust in Kiest continued to follow his orders at around 3 15 PM the group finally arrived at the base of the couple Valley and this is where they encountered local Postman ottos diet who was on his way down from a small mining area that sits at the base of that Valley Otto later recounts the conversation they had he asked me if this was the way and whether it carried on any further I replied that you could indeed get to Tottenham that way but in view of the weather alone it was not feasible I said to him that he could not continue that way in the snowstorm I told him that when the weather was better and the visibility good enough he could go to the miners change house at this point the group was just minutes away from a large minus hostel which would have been more than sufficient to house the group until the storm passed in fact I want to be totally fair to Otto here because I've read his statement in full Otto begged as best he could in the middle of a raging snowstorm he begged he begged Keith not to continue he told him that the group wouldn't get through and what was Keith's response will manage there was nothing Otto could do and so in a moment he will come to regret for the rest of his days he steps aside I stepped back and let the hiking party pass by the boys were thoroughly wet and they all had piles of snow on their heads there was a picture of misery to see how the boys were visibly suffering under the riggers they were being put through by that March some of them were exhausted she wanted the little ones at the tail end he was already hobbling and sapped of all energy if I had seen my own child in that group I would have pulled him out and taken him home with me the teacher could have gone back with me instead he drove those children to their deaths cased continued to drive the group forward along the Route and at around 4 pm the boys were seen from the hostel of the mine works where a number of people noticed a group stumbling around in the distance clearly exhausted painfully struggling up the Mountainside and down again then up and then finally into the darkness of the forest this is the last time the group is seen for some hours [Music] it's 5 PM the group of boys emerged from the forest exhausted they were now at the base of the final push to the sharonsland peak it was here that the first boy a 14 year old Jack Eaton showed signs of collapsing the storm was worsening the snow now coming up to their knees but Kiest stubborn and determined has the other boys feed him a piece of cake and an orange while supporting his weight I singing songs as they March even as one of their friends is beginning to succumb to exhaustion and exposure why was Keith doing this why didn't he turn back to seek Refuge at the miners hostel it's a question that's haunted me for weeks the only thing even resembling an explanation can be found in a later statement keast makes to the police it was just too late to turn back their best chance would be to push forward to the nearest shelter a nearby Village known as hofstraund which keast had managed to identify on his map there's just one problem getting to hofstraund requires a brutal 70 gradient Ascent of the Kappa wand in other words he'll basically be taking his group up and over the sharonsland peak just shy of the summit East would have known that had he have purchased the appropriate map but he didn't and for the next hour he leads the group upwards through snow coming up to their waists at around 6 PM the group reached the shandsland ridge and it's here that they met the Blizzard's full force at Sub-Zero temperatures this Darkness began to descend things started to go downhill very very quickly even though the group were less than a mile away from the summit station where they would have found both help and shelter the low visibility and bitter winds forced them westwards and that's where Keith struck his group in the opposite direction of hofstrand where he would later claim to have been needing them having now walked for over nine hours some of the younger boys were simply unable to go on and they collapsed into the snow now what happened next is not exactly clear but what we do know for certain is that the group quickly began to separate with 17 of the older boys splintering off to find help whether those boys abandoned the group once the younger members began to slow them down or wear the keys as he will later claim executes a well-organized rescue mission is simply unknown of course the latter does seem unlikely since Keys didn't even know the way to hofstron himself either way the group quickly became separated and lost and the situation descended into complete chaos in the midst of the blizzard with the boys separated into smaller units yet more of the younger boys began to succumb to exhaustion and exposure and as this happens some of these smaller groups have to stop to begin resuscitation Stanley few one of the older boys of the group will later go on record to say it became colder and darker every minute we had completely lost any orientation it was just a hell by 7 30 PM the group is fragmented across the mountain stumbling around in the dark unknowingly walking away from the nearest town and deeper into the forest now even some of the stronger and older members still dressed in summer clothes are beginning to suffer from the effects of exposure and Frostbite is quickly setting in I realize they have no idea where they're going it seems All Is Lost and that's when they hear it [Music] it's 8 30 p.m and 22 year old Eugene schweiser was in the front room of Bernhard Lorenzo's Farmhouse to collect his usual loaf of bread the pair were mid-conversation when all of a sudden they heard a knock followed by desperate sounding voices in a language they didn't understand it's two of the older boys from the group the sound they heard was the bells of Hof's Grand church ringing out for evening prayers slowly but surely they have made their way through the darkness of the mountains to the town after a little back and forth the boys managed to spit out a sentence in broken German jungun's clankenburg hilfa eventually the two men decide to take the boys to the local Inn as soon as they begin the journey however more boys begin to appear and it's then that Lorenz and Schweizer hears something they'll never forget blood curdling screams from those still stuck on the mountain and so it would seem of the other villagers following the unmistakable cries of their fellow man in pain with no concern for their own danger the villagers made their way separately up the mountain to attempt a rescue over the next two hours they will work together battling the brutal blizzard carrying the boys on skis sleds even their own backs anything they can find they don't stop until they find every last single person including Kiest who was with two unconscious boys some 45 minutes away from the nearest members of the group by 11 pm the rescue was over and upon hearing how desperate the situation is local doctors and I'm battling through unimaginable conditions to come to the boy's Aid one doctor having abandoned his ambulance has to lead his horses nearly three kilometers through snow coming up to his chest in spite of the heroic efforts of the doctors the scene was desperate by the time they arrived it was clear that two boys had already passed away but nonetheless locals were still attempting to keep them alive in spite of their best efforts two other boys would lose their lives Before Dawn as morning approached two serious casualties were taken to the hospital in Freiburg but only one would survive in total five boys aged 12 to 14 lost their lives I have read multiple detailed accounts of that evening there's no need to go over the details of what happens when a young boy is made to March through Sub-Zero temperatures in shorts and sandals for hours on end it's every bit as heartbreaking as you imagine it to be quote one of the doctors directly we did everything we possibly could to save them but the riggers those boys were exposed to were too great total exhaustion was inevitable this is not the end of the story though not even close the very next day Saturday the 18th of April Kiest had very quickly found himself at the center of a media storm he was hounded non-stop by newspaper editors from all over Europe This is where the lies start they're small at first vague even perhaps best described as Lies by Omission then after being pushed for specifics keast perhaps beginning to panic crafts are much more specific and much more favorable version of events Keith didn't just paint himself the victim of a completely unforeseeable tragedy oh no he was a hero who selflessly stayed on the Mountainside to resuscitate the Fallen all while orchestrating a careful and calculated rescue confidently directing the group to hofstrand though in reality he was leading the group in the opposite direction but let's not let the facts get in the way of a good story shall we case continued the last thing that anyone expected was a storm he would say Mr Case did everything in his power to avert the tragedy which descended on the children the media would report at certain points the story descends into Pure Fantasy with keast being quoted as saying that the group couldn't make it down on the mountain even though they had seven foot skis to do so and British papers such as the Observer the times and the guardian would go on to Parrot the story without any hint of verification the locals of course could hardly believe what they were reading as one witness puts it when I read the newspaper I said to myself straight away that it was not the truth but Kiest was not the only one who had an interest in hiding the truth remember a place in Germany in 1936 even as early as the very next day of the disaster nationalist socialist powers in Germany caught wind of the tragedy or accident as they deliberately referred to it and quickly realizing the political Capital to be made from such an event began a highly polished PR campaign under the command of the national Hitler Youth leader Round the Clock honor guards were posted to watch over the coffins of the deceased with the Union Jack and swastika flags hanging over the coffins this photo sent a message a message that quickly made its way around Europe's leading news outlets by Sunday afternoon a local memorial service attended by the British Consul General members of the Nazi party and keast himself was underway just listen to how Germany's socialist publication de alaman describes the memorial service in the name of the Hitler Youth the district leader spoke of the desire for Mutual understanding and peace which is strongest among the youth his words resonated greatly with those present all raise their hands in the German salute in honor of the Fallen English comrades the surviving English school boys were not even given an opportunity to say their goodbyes to their friends that Sunday afternoon instead just hours after learning of the passing of their fellow schoolmates for the very first time they were whisked away to play a heavily publicized game of football with the local Hitler Youth a merciful distraction from their ordeal and also a calculated PR stunt but wait what use would this tragedy be in swaying a more favorable opinion of Germany and why would Germany even want to do such a thing all very valid questions [Music] if you already know what was going on in Germany in 1936 feel free to skip this part but if you don't allow me to very briefly fill you in you see by 1936 Hitler had been in power for three years and in this time Britain and Germany's relationship had become increasingly let's say tense and here in the UK as well as the rest of Europe we were getting very nervous but not wanting to risk war and hoping it was still possible to negotiate a peaceful outcome instead opted for what would become known as a policy of appeasement basically we accommodated acts of aggression this don't poke the bear policy suited Hitler's peace extolling rhetoric just fine from a foreign policy Viewpoint the UK was one of the most essential sources of support for Hitler's New Germany furthermore just days before the tragedy Britain had held a ceremonial funeral procession for the German ambassador to Britain who had been viewed as one of the best hopes of maintaining peaceful anglo-german relations and the British government had pulled out all the stops for his funeral sending him back home to Germany on the HMS Scout with the swastika Banner at half-mast it was the first British warship to enter a German port since the end of the first world war and it was a big deal okay so what does this have to do with the death of five boys on a mountain well everything you see Germany was not about to reward such appeasements by throwing around accusations of manslaughter to their fellow English comrades no that would be an extremely bad PR move and so it would seem the question being asked was not how can we get Justice for this tragedy but how can we use this tragedy to our advantage it's in this fraught and uneasy political context that the truth of what happened on that mountain becomes trapped on Tuesday the 21st of April at 8 30 a.m the bodies of the deceased were sent home in coffins decorated with both the Union Jack and the swastika as well as wreaths inscribed with the words to our English comrades from Hitler himself throughout the journey at each station the Hitler Youth would stand as honor guards the sheer ostentatiousness of this ceremony quickly turned the return journey home into a European media event amassing hundreds of Articles within the European branch of Reuters news agency alone meanwhile on Monday the 20th of April keast was being interviewed by Chief public prosecutor Eugene Vice his entire statement can basically be summarized in its first line in my opinion the misadventure is attributable solely to the fact that I completely unexpectedly encountered a snowstorm that I could not have foreseen it's not just what he says though that's what he doesn't say he's meeting with the postman the Tranquil family the men shoveling snow before he even started the journey the fact that they got lost for almost two hours none of it featured in kiest's version of events and so seeing no criminal activity Vice files away the statement and keast heads back home a hero then on Friday the 24th of April almost a week after the tragedy Vice receives a number of witness statements and it's here upon hearing the full statements of the Hostile workers the Tranquil family the postman and many more but the public prosecutor realizes that he's made a terrible mistake by the end of April Vice has written a damning 25-page report where he ruthlessly picks apart the holes in Keith's statement every single minute is accounted for every mistake highlighted this report is so methodical so precise so well organized so German that there is only one conclusion that any reasonable person can draw keast is a liar and he needs to be investigated for manslaughter and that is exactly what Eugene wise recommends to the Imperial Ministry of Justice in Berlin but Vice isn't the only one who notices the discrepancies in keast's story the father of one of the boys who lost their lives Jack Eaton began traveling to Freiburg a number of times to retrace the group's steps even speaking to a few locals what he found outraged him and he was about to make sure that everyone else knew it back in London under the watch of the London County Council a subcommittee was formed and an inquiry entitled The Black Forest accident was underway on the 15th and 16th of May the subcommittee which included Kiest himself were to deliberate for full eight hours not on whether or not keast was criminally negligent but whether or not the parents had consented to and were satisfied with the arrangements made for the trip the subcommittee at least as far as the records show was unanimous in their decision Keith did everything he could and he did so with courage and bravery Eaton was vocal from start to finish in a statement Eaton submitted just before the meeting he is scathing not just at Kiest but at the group of older boys who he claims did not go on an expedition to find help but abandoned the group when it began to get dark in the final sentence of this statement his Fury can be felt damn you I say and a thousand times damn the pair of you and the cowards you are Sheltering what was going on how was Keith getting away with this hadn't the parents in the committee seen the report written by public prosecutor Vice back in Germany yeah that disappeared so the report the 25-page report that contains all of the witness statements archive records show it was sent to the general Consul of Frankfurt well ahead of the subcommittee meeting but it didn't quite find its way there in the official subcommittee documentation that report doesn't exist it's not even mentioned in passing meanwhile in Germany the propaganda campaign continued and it wasn't long before the story mutated even further now it was the Hitler Youth who had helped the villagers rescue the boys that night and then on the 8th of June 1936 less than two months after the tragedy public prosecutive eyes quietly suspended proceedings against keast but Vice knew that that 25-page report that he'd written never found its way to that inquiry and so on the 12th of June he does something radical physically hands the full report to the editor of the Daily Express in Berlin and does anything come of that absolutely not over the coming months Jack Eaton tried everything in his power to seek Justice he relentlessly hassled anyone with a connection to the case printing posters and pamphlets which brought to light yet more evidence that he dug up and one keast attempted to arrange another school trip which would require him to cross over German soil Eaton begged anyone who would listen including Vice to resume proceedings but the powers that be did not want to seek yeast prosecuted and to be absolutely sure of that the foreign office simply banned keys from taking any out of country trips if Keys couldn't enter Germany then he couldn't be prosecuted even if the Germans wanted to which as historical records clearly indicate they did not in a letter from the ministry of Justice in Berlin to achieve public prosecutive eyes Germany's position is made abundantly clear yes technically we should prosecute Kiest if he steps on German soil but we're not going to because something something procedural difficulties I I'm paraphrasing but this is basically how it reads I think Justice for these boys is a problem that nobody wants to deal with and in spite of all of his efforts even Vice gives up towards the end just listen to how defeated he sounds in a letter to his superiors it's evident that public opinion in ignorance of the facts in my view does not hold him responsible for the deaths of the schoolboys even the prime minister of the United Kingdom who had read vice's report in full wanted this problem to go away getting absolutely nowhere Eaton would mercilessly stalk in hassle cast in one instance on the 16th of June 1937 what would have been his son's 16th birthday Eaton would be arrested for laying a wreath outside of Keith's house while screaming my son has been murdered I want to tell you that this story has a happy ending [Music] I want to tell you that eventually Vice and Eaton were able to get Justice isn't a movie it's real life and life isn't always Fair the month dragged on and aside from some fighting over who would get the final say over the boys memorials by September 1939 the forces that had shaped the story of that day on the mountain were at work elsewhere even after the war was over after everything they'd been through the families of those boys who had lost their lives had no appetite to drag up the past any expectation of Justice had now vanished Jack Alexander passed away in a psychiatric hospital his marriage in Ruins and the fight for Justice having all but destroyed him a year after the tragedy even the freedom to write the truth on his boy's memorial stone which he had erected on the site of his son's passing was taken from him the last sentence on the memorial should have said their teacher failed them in their hour of trial now there is a blank space on that Memorial where the words were chiseled off by the local authorities foreign went on to have a fairly successful teaching career though perhaps unsurprisingly damning information would later come to light about East including terrible claims of abuse as the years passed and the memories faded as they inevitably do the tragedy sometimes referred to as the England the bad luck of the English was all but forgotten outside of the local area Local Schools would sometimes take trips to the imposing Stone Memorial that still stands on the side of the Sharon's Mountain but very few people really knew the truth about what happened that day in ignorance of the facts as Vice once put it most people only remembered the myth of the unavoidable tragedy if they remembered it at all but like I said in the beginning lies especially Lies by Omission tend to have a way of being found out so how exactly did we uncover the truth then for that we have a retired local teacher by the name of bandheimer to thank a longtime resident of Freiburg he always had a feeling that something wasn't quite right with the version of events that the locals knew out of sheer curiosity he began to do his own research nothing could prepare him for the complex story he would uncover in the Freiburg State archives under a pile of Dusty old newspapers he found the report that Vice wrote All 25 pages of it and this sent him down a rabbit hole and before long he was contacting the boy's descendants and pulling up more archive records until he came to realize that this accident was not down to bad luck at all it was a grotesque mix of recklessness and arrogance burn wrote something in his book that always stuck with me most boys looked up to Kiest they trusted him they trusted him even when dressed in shorts and sandals with little food and no equipment they would come to find themselves waist deep in the snow in the darkness separated from their group they trusted the young well-liked and he betrayed them marching them onwards and onwards in arrogance until they literally dropped dead and imagine the Betrayal the parents would have felt if they had seen that report if they had known the truth that Jack's father and vice had known my boy was everything to me Jack's father would write in April 1936 and he was left alone on the mountain to die after having spent his strength helping others I am determined to fight on until The Bitter End he would say because as the old saying goes the truth will out [Music] agree more Jack foreign [Music] [Music] foreign

Channel: Real Horror

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Id: ZjjgpiDmVCw

Length: 35min 47sec (2147 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 24 2022