"Something was way wrong."
Yeah, the putrid smell tipped me off...
Judging by what you're saying, I'm thinking you made refrigerator pickles, where you use a vinegar, sugar, salt solution to "pickle" the cukes?
That's not what I was doing. I was making naturally fermented pickles.
Making fermented dill pickles isn't rocket science, but you are battling against every other natural critter that's out there, hoping that the salt will keep the nasties at bay until the lactobacillus turns everything into an acidic soup in which nothing bad can live.
I lost that battle. And my pickles.
I lost a batch of sauerkraut the same way once.
But when it turns out right, there's nothing better on the face of the earth.