Last Witnesses : An Oral History of the Children of World War II

“BUT, LIKE RUBBER BALLS, THEY DIDN’T SINK…”

Valya Yurkevich SEVEN YEARS OLD. NOW RETIRED.

Mama was hoping for a boy…And my father wanted a boy. But a girl was born…

Yet they all wanted a boy so much…So I grew up more like a boy than a girl. My parents dressed me in boys’ clothing and cut my hair like a boy’s. I liked boys’ games: “Cops and Robbers,” “War,” “Mumblety-peg.” I especially liked to play “War.” I believed I was brave.

Near Smolensk our train carriage with the evacuated was completely destroyed by bombing. We somehow survived, and we were pulled out from under the rubble. We reached a village, and there a battle had started. We sat in someone’s basement. The house collapsed, and we were buried under it. The battle subsided, and we somehow crawled out of the basement, and the first thing I remember is the cars. Passenger cars drove by, and in them sat smiling people wearing shiny black raincoats. I can’t express that feeling—there was fear, and some kind of morbid curiosity. They drove through the village and disappeared. We children went to see what was happening outside the village. When we went out to the fields, it was something terrible. The entire rye field was strewn with dead bodies. I guess I didn’t have a girlish character, because I wasn’t afraid to look at all this, though I was seeing it for the first time. They lay in black soot. There were so many it was hard to believe these were people lying there. That was my first impression of the war…our blackened soldiers…

We went back to Vitebsk with my mother. Our house was destroyed, but our grandmother was waiting for us…A Jewish family sheltered us, a very sick and very kind old couple. We always worried about them, because all across the city hung announcements saying that Jews had to register at the ghetto; we asked them not to leave the house. One day we were away…My sister and I were playing somewhere. My mother was out, and my grandmother…When we returned, we found a note saying that the owners had left for the ghetto, because they were afraid for us; we had to live, but they were old. Orders were posted across the city: Russians must hand over the Jews to the ghetto, if they knew where they were hiding. Otherwise they, too, would be shot.

We read the note, and my sister and I ran to the Dvina. There was no bridge at that spot, people were transported to the ghetto by boat. The bank was encircled by Germans. Before our eyes, they loaded the boats with old people, children, towed them to the middle of the river, and overturned them. We searched for our old ones; they weren’t there. We saw a family sitting in a boat—a man, his wife, and two children. When the boat was overturned, the adults immediately sank to the bottom, but the children kept resurfacing. The fascists hit them with their paddles, laughing. They hit them here, they would resurface somewhere else; they would catch up with them and hit them again. But, like rubber balls, they didn’t sink…

There was such silence, or maybe my ears got blocked and it seemed to me that it was quiet, that everything died down. Suddenly, amid this silence, laughter rang out. Such young belly laughter…Young Germans were standing nearby, watching it all and laughing. I don’t remember how I got home with my sister, how I dragged her back. Children obviously grew up quickly then. She was three years old, but I could see that she understood everything, kept quiet and didn’t cry.

I was afraid to walk in the street, and for some reason I felt calmer when I walked through the ruins. One night, Germans broke into the house and began shaking us. Get up. I slept with my sister, mama with my grandmother. They led us all outside, didn’t allow us to take anything (and it was the beginning of winter), loaded us into trucks, and drove us to the train.

Alytus was the name of the Lithuanian town where we wound up a few weeks later. At the station they arranged us in ranks and led us away. On the road we met some Lithuanians. They most likely knew where we were being taken. One woman came up to mama and said, “They’re taking you to the death camp. Give me your girl, I’ll save her. If you survive, you’ll find her.” My sister was pretty, everyone pitied her. But what mother would give up her child?

At the camp, they immediately took our grandmother from us. They said that the elderly were transferred to another barrack. We waited for our grandmother to give us a sign of life, but she disappeared. Later it somehow became known that, in the first days, all the old people had been taken to the gas chamber. After my grandmother, one morning they took away my sister. Before that, a few Germans went through the barracks and listed the children. They chose the pretty ones, especially those who were blond. My sister had blond curly hair and blue eyes. They didn’t list all of them, but specifically those. They didn’t take me, I was dark haired. The Germans patted my sister on the head, they really liked her.

They would take my sister away in the morning and bring her back in the evening. She faded more with each passing day. My mother questioned her, but she didn’t say anything. Either they were scared, or they were given something, some pills, but she didn’t remember anything. Later we learned that they were taking their blood. Apparently they took a lot of their blood, because after a few months my sister died. She died in the morning. When they came again for the children, she was already dead.

I was very fond of my grandmother, because I always stayed with her when papa and mama went to work. We hadn’t seen her die and we all hoped she was alive. But my sister died right beside us…She lay there as if alive…Beautiful…

In the barrack next to ours lived women from Orel. They wore fur coats, bell-shaped fur coats; each of them had many children. They drove them out of the barracks, lined them up by six, and forced them to march with their children. The children clung to them. They even played some music…If one woman didn’t keep pace with the rest, they beat her with a whip. They beat her, and yet she went on, because she knew if she fell, she would be shot and her children would be shot. Something rose in my chest when I saw how they got up and walked. In their heavy fur coats…

The adults were sent off to labor. They had to take logs from the Neman River and drag them to the bank. Many died there in the water. Once the commandant grabbed me and put me in the group that was supposed to go to labor. Then an old man ran out of the crowd, pushed me away, and took my place. In the evening, when my mother and I wanted to thank him, we didn’t find him. They told us he died in the river.

My mother was a teacher. She said repeatedly, “We must remain human.” Even in hell she was trying to keep some habits from home. I don’t know where or when she washed them, but I always wore clean, laundered clothes. In winter she washed them with snow. She would take all my clothes off, and I would sit on the bunk under a blanket while she did the laundry. We only had what we were wearing.

Still, we celebrated our holidays…We saved something to eat for that day. A piece of boiled beet. Or a carrot. My mother tried to smile on that day. She had faith that our soldiers would come. Thanks to that faith, we survived.

After the war, I went straight into fifth grade, not first grade. I had grown. But I was very reserved, I avoided people for a long time. All my life I’ve liked solitude. People were a burden to me, I had trouble being with them. I kept something inside that I couldn’t share with anyone.

Mama, of course, noticed how I had changed. She tried to distract me. She invented holidays, and never forgot my birthday. We always had guests, her friends. She herself invited my friends. It was hard for me to understand. She was drawn to people. And I didn’t realize how much mama loved me.

She still saves me with her love…