Death of Bertinck and Leer

The deaths of Company Commander Bertinck and Leer occur in a single, concentrated action during the summer of 1918, a period the narrative calls "the most bloody and the most terrible." The event crystallizes the collapse of the German front under the weight of overwhelming Allied matériel and the erosion of the old certainties that once sustained the men. Bertinck, a front-line officer who had served for two years without a wound, falls in a desperate attempt to save his surrounded men from a flamethrower team, while Leer, a former mathematics student, dies moments later from a fragment wound. Their deaths mark the end of an era for the company, stripping it of two of its most capable and recognizable figures.

The Flamethrower Attack and Bertinck's Last Stand

The company occupies a crater and is surrounded. The stink of petroleum or oil blows across with the fumes of powder. Two enemy soldiers with a flamethrower are seen approaching: one carries the fuel tank on his back, the other holds the hose from which fire spouts. If they get close enough to reach the crater, the men inside are doomed, and retreat is impossible. The company opens fire, but the flamethrower team works nearer under the cover of sharp enemy fire that forces the defenders to keep their heads down. Bertinck, seeing that his men cannot hit the targets, takes a rifle, crawls out of the hole, and lies propped on his elbows to take aim. He fires, and at the same moment a bullet smacks into him. Despite the wound, he remains lying, shifts his position, and takes aim again. His second shot hits the hindermost of the two flamethrower operators, who falls. The hose slips away from the other man, the fire squirts about on all sides, and the second operator burns. Bertinck lets his rifle drop, says "Good," and slips back into the crater. He has a chest wound.

Leer's Death and the Fragmentation of the Company

After Bertinck is hit, a fragment smashes away his chin. The same fragment has sufficient force to tear open Leer's hip. Leer groans as he supports himself on his arm; he bleeds quickly, and no one can help him. Like an emptying tube, after a couple of minutes he collapses. The narrative notes with bitter irony that Leer had been a good mathematician at school—a skill that proves utterly useless in the face of a random piece of shrapnel. The two deaths occur within moments of each other, leaving the survivors in the crater without their commander and without one of their oldest comrades. The event underscores the theme of chance that pervades the novel: Bertinck, who had survived two years of war, is killed by a bullet while trying to save his men; Leer, who had been with the group since the beginning, is killed by a fragment that was not even aimed at him.

Thematic Significance: The End of the Old Guard

Bertinck and Leer represent two pillars of the company's identity. Bertinck is one of those "superb front-line officers who are foremost in every hot place," a leader who earned his position through competence and shared risk rather than parade-ground authority. Leer is one of the seven classmates who volunteered together, a figure from Paul Bäumer's youth and a link to the world before the war. Their deaths, coming so close together and in such a futile action, signal that the old guard is being systematically erased. The company is now led by men who are either dead or broken, and the survivors are increasingly isolated. The event also illustrates the transformation of the war into a purely mechanical slaughter: the flamethrower, a weapon that reduces human courage to ash, is the instrument of Bertinck's end, and a random fragment—not a deliberate shot—kills Leer. The summer of 1918, with its "red poppies in the meadows" and "smooth beetles on the blades of grass," stands in stark contrast to the annihilation in the craters, a juxtaposition that deepens the sense of loss and the absurdity of the conflict.