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Authors: Laurence Rees
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she didn't utter a single word. She didn't even move. She was very old’. It was obvious, of course, that this sick old lady could not have collaborated with the Germans. ‘That old woman wasn't guilty of anything’, confirms Perevalov ‘Most people were not guilty of anything – I have to be frank about it’.
Kebire Ametova 55 was still a young girl when the NKVD came to take her and the rest of her family away. Her father, ironically, was away fighting for the Soviet Union in the Red Army. But that meant nothing to Stalin or the NKVD. Nor did it matter that she had previously witnessed her mother helping the local partisans: ‘We prepared some food for some partisans who were passing by – I used to give them pies. At that time we weren't expecting anyone to come, so my mother invited them to sit at our table’. But then they saw Germans in the street outside, about to enter their house. Quickly, the partisans opened the window and climbed into the well in the garden. Kebire's mother hid them until the Germans had gone. If the partisans had been found, she would have been shot.
But on 18 May all that concerned the NKVD was that the family – Kebire, her mother, three sisters and brother – were on their list as Crimean Tatars. ‘Two middle-aged soldiers arrived’, says Kebire. ‘They told us that we were being thrown out of our house and had fifteen minutes to get ready’. Her mother ‘started to rush about and weep’ and tried to gather together whatever belongings she could: ‘Of course there was a lot of shouting and noise, that's for sure. There was shouting, noise and pain. And bitter tears…. We had some boiled milk on a three-legged stand on the floor. My mother asked them to wait so that she could give the children some milk to drink. But he [one of the soldiers] kicked it over with his foot and spilt it all. He wouldn't allow us to drink any milk’.
The NKVD soldiers then searched for gold – Tatars traditionally kept any wealth they possessed in the form of gold jewellery and concealed it somewhere in their house or garden. The Ametov family kept theirs hidden under the stove in the kitchen. TheNKVD failed to find it, so, no doubt disappointed, the soldiers carried away the Ametovs' sewing machine instead.
The family were taken to a nearby Muslim cemetery, which was used as an assembly area for all the families from the surrounding villages. The scenes were heartbreaking. ‘The noise and the shouting were indescribable’, says Kebire. ‘All you could hear throughout the village was crying. People lost their daughters, their sons, their husbands. The chaos was deafening and very frightening’. The families were confined in the cemetery for most of the day, and of course the children needed to go to the toilet – but their faith forbade them to desecrate the cemetery by using it in this way. Nonetheless, the NKVD refused to let anyone out to relieve themselves in the field next door. And so, adding to the humiliation of the day and much to their shame, ‘We children could not bear it. We did it all in our knickers, in whatever way we could’.
In the late afternoon the NKVD moved into the cemetery and started dragging people on to trucks to take them to the nearby station, where they were herded into freight wagons. The whole process was conducted swiftly and brutally. No care was taken to ensure that families were deported together: ‘They [the NKVD] threw [people's] things in one vehicle and the people themselves into another. They scattered everything around. They put children in one vehicle and the adults in another…. So when we were taken to the station, lots of people were running around like mad, trying to find their children…. As for us, our mother did not allow us to move away from her – she did everything herself and we just stayed in one place. And when they were loading us, they just took us by the scruff of the neck and threw us in a carriage… they flung us like
Kebire Ametova 55 was still a young girl when the NKVD came to take her and the rest of her family away. Her father, ironically, was away fighting for the Soviet Union in the Red Army. But that meant nothing to Stalin or the NKVD. Nor did it matter that she had previously witnessed her mother helping the local partisans: ‘We prepared some food for some partisans who were passing by – I used to give them pies. At that time we weren't expecting anyone to come, so my mother invited them to sit at our table’. But then they saw Germans in the street outside, about to enter their house. Quickly, the partisans opened the window and climbed into the well in the garden. Kebire's mother hid them until the Germans had gone. If the partisans had been found, she would have been shot.
But on 18 May all that concerned the NKVD was that the family – Kebire, her mother, three sisters and brother – were on their list as Crimean Tatars. ‘Two middle-aged soldiers arrived’, says Kebire. ‘They told us that we were being thrown out of our house and had fifteen minutes to get ready’. Her mother ‘started to rush about and weep’ and tried to gather together whatever belongings she could: ‘Of course there was a lot of shouting and noise, that's for sure. There was shouting, noise and pain. And bitter tears…. We had some boiled milk on a three-legged stand on the floor. My mother asked them to wait so that she could give the children some milk to drink. But he [one of the soldiers] kicked it over with his foot and spilt it all. He wouldn't allow us to drink any milk’.
The NKVD soldiers then searched for gold – Tatars traditionally kept any wealth they possessed in the form of gold jewellery and concealed it somewhere in their house or garden. The Ametov family kept theirs hidden under the stove in the kitchen. TheNKVD failed to find it, so, no doubt disappointed, the soldiers carried away the Ametovs' sewing machine instead.
The family were taken to a nearby Muslim cemetery, which was used as an assembly area for all the families from the surrounding villages. The scenes were heartbreaking. ‘The noise and the shouting were indescribable’, says Kebire. ‘All you could hear throughout the village was crying. People lost their daughters, their sons, their husbands. The chaos was deafening and very frightening’. The families were confined in the cemetery for most of the day, and of course the children needed to go to the toilet – but their faith forbade them to desecrate the cemetery by using it in this way. Nonetheless, the NKVD refused to let anyone out to relieve themselves in the field next door. And so, adding to the humiliation of the day and much to their shame, ‘We children could not bear it. We did it all in our knickers, in whatever way we could’.
In the late afternoon the NKVD moved into the cemetery and started dragging people on to trucks to take them to the nearby station, where they were herded into freight wagons. The whole process was conducted swiftly and brutally. No care was taken to ensure that families were deported together: ‘They [the NKVD] threw [people's] things in one vehicle and the people themselves into another. They scattered everything around. They put children in one vehicle and the adults in another…. So when we were taken to the station, lots of people were running around like mad, trying to find their children…. As for us, our mother did not allow us to move away from her – she did everything herself and we just stayed in one place. And when they were loading us, they just took us by the scruff of the neck and threw us in a carriage… they flung us like
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