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

All the schools were turned into hospitals. Our school No. 70 housed the field army hospital for the lightly wounded. Mama was assigned there. She was allowed to take me along, so that I didn’t stay at home alone. And when there was a retreat, we went wherever the hospital went.

After one bombing I remember a pile of books among the rubble. I picked one up that was called The Life of Animals, a big book with beautiful pictures. I didn’t sleep all night, reading it, unable to tear myself away…I remember I didn’t take any war books, I didn’t want to read about war. But about animals, about birds…

In November 1942…The head of the hospital ordered that I be issued a uniform, but to tell the truth, it had to be urgently made over to fit. And they spent a whole month looking for boots for me. So I became the foster child of the hospital. A soldier. What did I do? The bandages alone could drive you crazy. There was never enough of them. I had to launder, dry, and roll them up. Try rolling up a thousand a day! I got the hang of it and did it quicker than the adults. My first rolled up cigarette also came out well…On my twelfth birthday the first sergeant, smiling, handed me a package of shag, as if I was a full-grown soldier. I did smoke it…On the sly from mama. I showed off, of course. Well…it was also scary…I had a hard time getting used to blood. Was afraid of burned men. With black faces…

After a train transporting salt and paraffin was bombed, the one and the other proved useful. The salt went to the cooks, the paraffin to me. I had to master a skill unspecified in any lists of military professions—making candles. That was worse than the bandages. My task was to make sure the candles burned for a long time, because they were used whenever there was no electricity. Doctors didn’t stop surgery either under the bombs or under shelling. During the night the windows were curtained with sheets or blankets.

Mama wept, but all the same I dreamed of escaping to the front. I didn’t believe I could be killed. Once I was sent to get bread…We had just set out when artillery shelling began. It was mortar fire. The sergeant was killed, the coachman was killed, and I got a concussion. I lost speech, and when after a while I began to speak again, I stuttered. I still stutter. Everybody was surprised that I was still alive, but I had a different feeling—how could I be killed? I went with the hospital through the whole of Belarus, through Poland…I learned some Polish words…

In Warsaw…A Czech turned up among the wounded—a trombonist from the Prague Opera. The head of the hospital was glad of him, and when the man began to recover, he asked him to go around the wards and look for musicians. He came to us with an excellent orchestra. He taught me to play the viola, and I taught myself to play the guitar. We played and the soldiers wept. We played merry songs…

So we reached Germany…

In the ruins of a German village I saw a child’s bicycle lying about. I was happy. I got on it and rode. It rode so well! During the war I hadn’t seen a single child’s thing. I forgot they existed. Children’s toys…

“IN THE CEMETERY THE DEAD LAY ABOVE GROUND…AS IF THEY’D BEEN KILLED AGAIN…”

Vania Titov FIVE YEARS OLD. NOW A SPECIALIST IN LAND RECLAMATION.

Black sky…

Fat black airplanes…They roar down very low. Just over the earth. That’s war. As I remember it…I remember separate glimpses…

There was a bombardment, and we hid in the garden behind the old apple trees. All five of us. I had four brothers, the oldest one was ten. He taught us how to hide from the planes—behind the big apple trees, where there were lots of leaves. Mama rounded us up and led us to the cellar. It was frightening in the cellar. Rats with small piercing eyes that glowed in the dark lived there. They glowed with an unnatural brightness. And the rats kept squeaking all night. They frolicked.

When the German soldiers came to our cottage, we hid on the stove.^*1 Under some old rags. We lay with our eyes closed. From fear.

They burned our village. Bombed the village cemetery. People went running there: the dead lay above ground…They lay there as if they’d been killed again…Our grandfather, who had died recently, lay there. They were reburied…

During the war we played “war.” When we were tired of playing “Whites and Reds” or “Chapaev,”^*2 we played “Russians and Germans.” We fought. Took prisoners. Shot them. Put on soldiers’ helmets, our own and German ones. Helmets lay about everywhere—in the woods, in the fields. Nobody wanted to be a German, we even squabbled over it. We played in real dugouts and trenches. We fought with sticks, or hand-to-hand. Our mothers scolded us…

That surprised us, because earlier…before the war…they didn’t scold us for that…

*1 The traditional Russian tile stove was a large and complex structure that served for heating, cooking, and washing, and even included shelves for sleeping.