Tag #149795 - Interview #96998 (Irina Doroshkova )

I had finished the 4th form successfully when my mother told me about the beginning of the great Patriotic War on 22 June 1941 [10], announced on our black plate radio in our room. But the previous morning I was woken by a roar over my head. My mother said ‘Go back to sleep – it is just another military training’. But no – those were German planes flying in the direction of Zhytomir and Kiev. In a day my mother ran home from work and told my father that Party dignitaries and their families were leaving the tom the following night, but my mother wasn’t on that list. My parents packed a suitcase, grabbed me by my hand and we ran to the center of the town where my mother’s friend Bertha lived. She worked at the Party town committee and was on the list.