Tag #129558 - Interview #94180 (Maria Yakovlevna Komarovskaya)

On June 22, 1941, Kiev was bombed at night. For some reason I did not sleep well that night and heard everything. But I thought it was military training. In those years all men were called up to the army for 2-3 months for training. In the morning, when we had our breakfast, our neighbor breakfasted with us because my mother invited him after his family had gone to the village for the summer. This neighbor was a Communist Party member. So, over breakfast some man came to this neighbor, whispered something into his ear – and the neighbor left immediately. We became anxious but did not link his leaving with the bombing. And a few hours later Molotov addressed the nation on the radio and said that the war had begun. Then we listened to the famous speech of Stalin, “Dear brothers and sisters, I turn to you, my friends…”.