My parents were ordinary people, father worked on the squashed-presscake station (zhomootkormochnom). There were seven children in our family: three brothers and four sisters. I was the fourth and was born in 1912. I came to Kyiv in 1933, I studied on the workers' faculty and soon got married. We lived in a 13-meter room on the Chkalova street, 25. On the first day of the war I went to my mother, who lived on Tverskaja street. There was also my sister with her deaf child. The Nazis entered the city. One day without ringing and knocking our neighbors got in our flat: Zhora Verevko and others. When took everything they liked and they did it, when I was looking at them. Zhora came to the couch on which lay my mother , pushed her, and took the sofa. After the war I saw this man.
My elder sister Gita had a Russian husband Ageev, a very decent man. They had got one son - Igor. He is alive today. When the war began, Gita with a child were sent by her husband to his parents. His parents lived on the Konstantinovskaja street, 22. His sisters’ husbands were Jews, and his brother’s wife was a Jew. It was a very big family. They hid Gita. One day I went to get the water on the corner of Zolotovorotskaja and Vladimirskaja street, there was a bath stove. Then I saw : there was a column of people on Volodimirskaja street . They were led by the Germans, on the sides were going dogs. All people were with shovels . Suddenly I recognized my father, he held under his arm tallith. Had I to run to him? But I have children at home. They said , they were taken to Goloseevskij forest and killed there.
There was an announcement: “All Jews must gather near Luk'janovskoe cemetery. My sister's husband Shura came. He conducted us to Artem street to a little public garden (now there is a bust of Kosior). We sat on a bench - Mom, my sister and I and children. Guys were silenced. Shura went to Babyn Yar and quickly returned: "There must go there no more." He took our children, we were back on Tverskaja street. That night we did not sleep, just were lying on the floor in the hallway. In the morning we must go. I exchange my sealskin coat to the old jersey with my neighbor. They also gave us shoes - some valenki. It was the first of October. And the weather was good. Three of us went to Stalinka, but then my mother returned to Tverskaja street.
Shura took children to his home on Podol. My sister’s deaf boy immediately was taken to the street: they did not want to hide him. Probably, he was taken and killed. But they hid my children. We were told that they were led on Tverskaja street. Mom was there too. The Germans came with the car and took them all. But I know something else: all these years, that the Germans were in Kyiv, my children hid at Podol. When the Germans left Kyiv, all they were driven from Podol to Karavaevy dachi. My sister left children for some time, because she came out for something. At that time, came our neighbors and told , that my children are the Yid soldier children. They were taken and …there is all… Igor, son of my elder sister Gita and Shura, remembers when my children were taken away. I lost my children. I do not know, where are they and I do not know anything about their fate… But all this later.
I and Rosa went from Kyiv, but we were not allowed. They said that it is possible to cross the Dnieper. Bridges were blown up. People thought, that we are Russian. Some fisherman ferried on his boat to the other side of the Dnieper, to Darnitsa. Rose gave him her watch.
We spent one night in one woman house. She told us about Jews, said that they are very bad, that all bad events are because of them, because of the Jews. She did not guess, that we are Jewish. Early in the morning we moved on. We walked through Poltava to Kursk along the rails of the railway. That was very horrible . Along the railroad rose broken structures. Ones I saw from a distance , that not far away from us were two Germans. I said to my companion, "Rose, this is our end. Let’s go. We must not turn around. We have to make show, that we do not see them”. We passed the Germans and they even did not call us out. But behind us we heard a sound of shots.
In Ukraine everything was all right with us. Many people allowed us to spend few nights in their houses. People knew what war is. There were places where we were hid by different people, who knew, that we are Jews. Also there were a lot of villages on our road, where one part was occupied by the Germans, and the other was not . We walked 50 kilometers per day. I envied the poor people - poor can ask for a handout, but I could not. Only near Kursk we could catch a troop train.
I do not know anything about my husband. I got from him only one letter. I had been looking for him for 30 years, but I did not find his grave.