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A month or so after the start of the [Great Patriotic] war, I was summoned to the conscription office. The commission sat at a table, and they didn’t ask any questions about anyone’s health or anything, just declared us ‘fit to serve, fit to serve, fit to serve’. There were several of us there, and they took us all. After two weeks of training we were sent off to the front. We wound up outside Leningrad – I don’t remember the name of the town anymore. Later an order came through to remove all non-Russians from the front lines. There were lots of us – Poles and other nationalities. They pulled us from the front lines, and they sent us to the big food warehouses on Lake Ladoga – but we were sent there as soldiers, not as civilians. Maybe they didn’t trust us – thought we’d join the Germans or something. They pulled us all out and we went to work, loading food supplies for Leningrad onto barges: different kinds of flour, groats, and rusks – I never saw any bread.
I remember I was working there in 1941 – they were gigantic warehouses, just endless. Train tracks ran through them, and they brought in supplies every day, and it was unloaded and we loaded it onto the barges. Later a new order came through, and everyone who’d been pulled from the front was sent back. And I wound up at Leningrad. The 185th independent infantry regiment – I remember exactly how I was assigned to that unit. And the liberation of Leningrad began. I remember how harsh the winter was – it must have been January or February when they broke the siege. I remember it was bitterly cold, and the snow was so deep. It was very tough going. If we’d been in the woods, we could have hidden behind trees, but this was out in the open, not even a bush – nothing grows on the water.
I remember I was working there in 1941 – they were gigantic warehouses, just endless. Train tracks ran through them, and they brought in supplies every day, and it was unloaded and we loaded it onto the barges. Later a new order came through, and everyone who’d been pulled from the front was sent back. And I wound up at Leningrad. The 185th independent infantry regiment – I remember exactly how I was assigned to that unit. And the liberation of Leningrad began. I remember how harsh the winter was – it must have been January or February when they broke the siege. I remember it was bitterly cold, and the snow was so deep. It was very tough going. If we’d been in the woods, we could have hidden behind trees, but this was out in the open, not even a bush – nothing grows on the water.
Period
Location
St. Petersburg
Russia
Interview
Michal Warzager