The Bloody Red Baron's Uncle and I...

I suppose I should start out by laying out a couple of facts - the truth is, I never met Baron Walter Von Richthofen. Considering he was born in 1848, this is really no wonder - and though I am not a child, I am not that old. Nor, do I think, did his nephew, the Bloody Red Baron ever visit him - at least not at his castle.

                            Baron Walter Von Richthoven

                                          Manfred Von Richthoven

                                          ('The Bloody Red Baron')

But speaking of his castle, I did, as a child, spend a number of years, if in not in its direct shadow, then within the very large aura it cast over the neighbourhood. By the time we moved to the area, the Baron had long since died and the castle itself had passed through many hands, though at the time of which I write, there were still living within its walls some minor Hungarian aristocracy - and this added a certain air of Old World mystery to the place - and for a child with a vivid imagination, a certain sense of excitement/terror as well.

I remember Halloweens at the Castle being quite scary - though no one ever went inside but stood at the door waiting for the treats- and we were always disappointed with them - little packages of candy cigarettes, dusted in confectioner’s sugar and wrapped in paper; you could ‘puff’ on the cigarettes and blow the sugar out, making it look like ‘real’ smoke - so Kool at the age of five… - but that’s another story.

                               The castle just after completion

As happens when you move into a new neighbourhood with lots of children, you eventually meet them all and some of them even become your friends - one of mine was the son of the gate-keeper at the Castle. Actually, I don’t really even know if he was the gate-keeper or whether he just lived in the house - I haven’t a clue what the man really did - but his son and I were friends and I would occasionally, not too often, be invited onto the grounds of the Castle to play.

There must have been some construction of some sort going on at the time of this particular incident, because I remember a large pile of broken concrete all along one section of the drive and a truck parked next to it. How or why we ended up playing in the back of the truck is not to be known (it was a long time ago) - but we did - and it didn’t take long before an accident occurred. Now, who do you think the accident befell? That’s correct - me.

I don’t know what we were doing but somehow I got pushed (fell? Nah.) out of the back and directly onto a jagged piece of concrete. If my hands had been quicker or the tumble more graceful, the fall would not have resulted in a gash at the top of my forehead - but unfortunately, I fell headfirst.

Yes, there was some screaming and yes, there were some tears, but mostly - there was blood. Lots of blood. There was blood everywhere in fact because it seemed to be flowing quite profusely from my head and down my face. You see, even a small head wound will bleed like crazy - this I know from experience...

From the gatehouse, came the mother of my (suddenly less than best) friend and she quickly pressed a cloth against the wound and bundled me into their car (I think) and back to my own home - that’s one way to solve a problem - drop it off at the neighbour’s!

When my mother came to the door, I thought she would likely faint, for the cloth which had been pressed against my head was quite red as the bleeding was still an ongoing event.

I was taken inside and after the loving ministrations of my mother, the bleeding subsided and it was decided a hospital visit (stitches! Yikes!) would not be necessary.

Whether it was through my own volition or something decided by my mother - I would not be returning to Richthofen Castle for any more play dates. I had been cast out. Just as well - I’d had my own bloody Richthofen experience - and one was definitely enough.