I Heard My People Cry by Elizabeth Lenci-Downs

Author:Elizabeth Lenci-Downs
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781412253895
Publisher: Author Solutions Inc.
Published: 2003-04-21T16:00:00+00:00

Ten

The Will To Survive

August 1941

Tchongraw, Crimea

With a bang! the big door slid shut. We were closed out from the world into a black void that was absolute. Adults and children cried out in alarm.

Mom’s voice surrounded me, said, “Don’t be frightened. We’re together and the Lord is here. He’s right with us and He will care for us, Lise.”

I reached out through the blackness to her voice and she clasped my hand with her firm, strong fingers. As the dark train with its muffled headlights moved through the night I tried to sleep, but was startled awake many times by the sway of the car or a clatter of wheels and wondered where I was. Each time, Mom was there. When I finally fell asleep, so did she.

The morning light was strong enough to find its way between the sides of our cattle car and some of my cousins began to stir and woke us even though I knew my people were exhausted. Mother balanced herself and stood up to get our food bundle that swung above us on a nail. I was relieved to see it was still there. We had a little space and she took out some food for each of us.

“Eat only enough to satisfy yourselves because our food must last. It’s a very long journey and this is all we have,” she reminded us.

I wasn’t hungry. I was more curious about where we were going. All I knew of Siberia was what Opapa Heinrich had told me. A barren land with few trees and bitter cold winters awaited me. I knew Dad had been taken there far to the east—north of a country called Japan. That was all I knew and suddenly I didn’t want to think anymore. Bodies pressed around me and the big car began to smell of sweat as well as the smoke and those goat smells which seemed never to go away. I wanted a bath, but of course that was impossible. There was nothing to do but sleep and rock with that car—back and forth, back and forth—in the gloom.

Late that morning we stopped. I rolled over to watch my uncle Heinrich push open the big door. Whoosh! Fresh air swirled in—hit me in the face. How wonderful! Most of the adults couldn’t stand without bumping the low roof, but I could. Someone saw a sign and called out,

“We’re near a place called Dyurmeny.”

“It must be a small village.”

“It is, we’re still in the Crimea.”

“At this rate our food won’t hold out.”

Then it was quiet again down below me. Eagerly I looked toward the open door for daylight and sunshine. I saw grass and small trees, only open country. All that day we waited, sometimes sitting, sometimes standing. There was no room to move around and no one told us why our train was stopped. Finally, a few of my people climbed out to stand beside the tracks.

After I fell asleep that night our train began to move again. We

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