Read Online I Shall Live by Henry Orenstein - Free Book Online Page A

west andsee what developed as we approached Hrubieszów. Early the next morning we were on our way home. The skies had cleared, and we found the going a little easier, although the roads were still very muddy and we all had to help push the wagon. But we felt much better. At least we knew where we were going.
    Soon we were back in Włodzimierz, where we learned that the Russian army was not far away. We stayed overnight there, and the following morning the Russian soldiers entered the town. They were friendly; clearly they were under strict orders to behave like liberators, not conquerors, which was a pleasant surprise. The local people didn’t know what to expect, but soon they felt at ease and even began telling Russian stories and jokes.
    It was obvious from the soldiers’ behavior that the newly “liberated” territories were far more prosperous, with a much higher standard of living, than they were used to in Soviet Russia. Butter and meat were a tremendous luxury to them, and they were avidly buying things like fabrics and watches, which apparently were scarce in Russia. The soldiers were too proud to admit to any shortages of consumer goods in the Soviet Union and always asserted that everything was abundant in the Socialist paradise. The local Jews soon made a joke of it, and would ask the soldiers, “Say, soldier—you got plenty of
tsures
[troubles, in Yiddish] in Russia?” The soldiers standard reply was, as always,
“Dovolno”
(plenty).
    The day after the Russians arrived in Włodzimierz, we learned that the Soviet army was also in Hrubieszów. Immediately we set out for home, arriving there in the evening. The horse collapsed just before we reached the house, and the last couple of blocks we had to push the wagon ourselves. But here everyone knew us and helped us. It was a relief, too, to find the house undisturbed and everything in order.
    We unpacked, bathed, and rested. Mother was just as tired aseveryone else, but she immediately started cooking dinner, and soon we were all sitting around our dining room table enjoying one of her delicious meals.
    For the next few days the town buzzed with conflicting rumors. The Russians were in Hrubieszów, but the Germans were not far away. No one could predict what would happen.
    To our surprise and disappointment, the Western front was strangely silent. Our hopes and expectations of a quick Allied victory had proven groundless. The “phony war” was on between the Allies and the Germans, and Poland was once again occupied by both Germans and Russians, just as it had been for more than a hundred twenty years before World War I.
    Near the end of September, a new set of rumors swept through Hrubieszów: The Russians would be withdrawing behind the Bug River after all, and Hrubieszów would soon be taken over by the Germans. This unhappy news was soon confirmed by the Russian troops in Hrubieszów as they began preparing to depart.
    Once more we were faced with hard choices and the tortuous process of analyzing the pros and cons. Should we leave our home again and start a new life in a Communist country? We knew it would be very risky to stay in Hrubieszów and face the dangers of Nazi occupation, but the other choice was scarcely preferable. Father was known to be a rich man, and sooner or later would be singled out by the Soviets as a capitalist enemy. He and perhaps his family too might well be deported to the Siberian labor camps. The prospect of undertaking to make a new life for ourselves under the oppressive Soviet regime was almost as difficult to face as was the grim possibility of life under the Germans.
    Should the Allies finally launch their long-awaited offensive and defeat the Germans, then Poland, and Hrubieszów, would be liberated from them—but what would happen in that event to easternPoland, recently occupied by the Russians? Would the Allies be in a position to force them to give it