ROSALIA DORFMAN
Please tell us about your family.
My grandparents on both sides were deeply religious people. My mother's parents lived in Belarus, in the small town of Rechitsa. They had a house and rural property where ten children grew up. My grandfather was a builder, and his sons helped him. They had their own farm: they kept a cow, goats, chickens, and geese. The house stood by the river, and my mother remembered how they did laundry there even in late autumn, before the first frosts. Maybe that's why she never suffered from arthritis. In terms of Jewish traditions and holidays, the family was strictly observant. At the holiday table, my grandfather sat in a place of honor. My mother especially remembered one touching ritual: when dessert was served, my grandfather broke off a branch of grapes and gave one to each of those present. I want to tell you about my childhood memories of the war.
When the war began, I was only four years old. My grandfather had already passed away by that time, and my grandmother gathered her three daughters and three grandchildren and went to be evacuated to distant Kazakhstan. My father was a historian: he lectured on the history of the party and international issues, and also taught history at the Chemical-Bacteriological Institute. This institute played a vital role during the war, producing vaccines and serums for blood. During the fighting, there was an acute shortage of blood, and the institute kept horses from which blood was taken to create serum. This blood, mixed with serum, was sent straight to the front. My mother worked in the laboratory of the same institute. When the institute was evacuated to the North Caucasus, to the city of Voroshilovsk, my parents and I followed it. There, our family settled in a tiny room not far from the institute. From there, my father was drafted into the army. He served as a senior political instructor of the division. Before leaving for the front, my father told my mother that we should come and say goodbye. My mother and I set off. We managed to see him only once, and then we returned home. This was the last meeting. We never saw him again. Two years after the end of the war, a message arrived: my father was missing in action. This news ended the years of agonizing anticipation and hope, leaving a deep pain that time could not heal.
When the Germans began their offensive, everyone expected that further evacuation would be organized at any moment. But the director of the institute announced that it would not be possible to quickly take out the horses and equipment, so everyone would have to leave on their own. We were loaded into a roofless carriage for cattle. It was impossible to get out - the door was locked from the outside. Along the way, in the middle of the open fields, German planes swooped down on our train and began bombing. Everyone was seized by panic. People, saving themselves, climbed up, climbing out through the open roof. My mother managed to get out, but I remained in the carriage. She screamed: "Help, my child is left in the carriage!" - but no one listened to her, everyone was saving themselves as best they could. But then, as if by the will of the Almighty, a man in a leather jacket appeared out of nowhere. He silently pulled me out of the carriage, put me on the ground and disappeared. Everything happened so quickly, as if it were a vision. There was open plains all around, there was nowhere to hide. People ran in all directions, and my mother stood in place, as if rooted to the ground. I screamed at her: "Why aren't you running?" She answered: "There is nowhere to run." Then I said: "Then I will run alone!" And I rushed after the crowd. This impulse of mine made her come to her senses: she rushed after me. And it so happened that this is what saved her. We ran towards a small grove. The planes continued to dive, dropping bombs. When we reached the grove, we crawled like mice through the tall grass, trying to hide from the planes that continued to bomb us from above. When everything calmed down, people began to crawl out of their hiding places, huddling together in one big crowd. Exhausted, they moved across the field towards the small town of Mineralnye Vody. Before leaving, my mother quietly said to me: "If they ask you your name, don't say Rosa, say Raya." I nodded, understanding that these were not just words, but a matter of life and death.
The crowd moved slowly, when suddenly an alarming rumor spread among the people: German tanks were coming toward us. And indeed, before long tanks appeared on the horizon, with dust swirling around them. The closer they got, the more fear gripped us. When the cars drew level with us, it became clear that Germans with machine guns were standing in them, coldly looking at our crowd. Everyone held their breath, afraid to move. But, to our surprise, the Germans did not touch us. They drove past us as if we were just part of the landscape. And we continued on our way. In Mineralnye Vody, they were recruiting workers for the Ural military factories. They reluctantly accepted my mother – they were hesitant to take someone with children, but we still managed to get on the list. The road to the Urals turned out to be much easier: we were provided with both food and a place on the train. This was the first time in a long time that we felt at least some kind of protection.
In the Urals, I was sent to a 24-hour children's boarding school, where I stayed until the end of the war, while my mother worked at the factory, making her contribution to the victory.
