Krystyna her reflections

“an excerpt from Kystyna Brooks (Wojciechowska) diary - Reflections”

“It was an idyllic family life farming in Polesia, growing Zyto and Prenica (wheat), fruit trees everywhere, surrounded by large vegetable and flower gardens.   My favourite time of year was wheat harvesting, I vividly recall the season of Dozynki cutting the wheat with the villagers and the celebration parties that followed.

A few kilometres away we attended school in Huta, it was a mixture of White Russians, Belarussians and us Poles.  Saturday was spent in preparation for Mass on Sunday in Popina, a journey made by horse and cart. Following Mass we joined with the Meczynski’s for lunch, there were always quite a few of us, grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles it was a happy time. Another great pleasure for me was to visit my aunt, my mother’s sister Jadwiga, who lived in Drochiczyn in a beautiful two story home. It was here that we first enjoyed the “miracle” of electricity.  My sister would be upstairs switching the power on, while I was downstairs switching it off and vice versa.  My mother and my Cocia (aunt) Jadwiga were extremely close, much as my twin sister, Marysia and I are today. 

Life continued to be wonderful until on the 10 February 1940 in the early hours of the morning, in the midst of a severe winter, my mother and five of us children were to be deported into the depths of the Soviet Union, with the exception of Stanislaw my elder brother, who was visiting grandparents in Poznan.   Still not knowing the whereabouts of our father, the Russians soldiers came that morning, and we were given very little time to pack the necessities we would need. They took us to the school in Huta to wait for our transfer to the Drohicyzn train station.  From here commenced the horrifying journey of six weeks in a cattle wagon.  In atrocious conditions, no seating, no toilet facilities and with very little ventilation, and in sub-zero winter conditions we watched as fellow family members died and were thrown from the train like animals. People were squeezed into this small space it was unbearable. Our ultimate destination was when the train tracks ended. Taken from the train we were put onto snow sled’s and headed for our final destination, the gulag labour camp on the freezing edge of the Arctic Circle, the most desolate place on earth, the Archangelsk in the Soviet Union.

Accommodation at the camp was dormitory style, bunk beds with little room to sit up in, mum and five of us children all shared one room.  Spartan and extremely depressing, survival for us was by virtue of the fact mum who spoke fluent Russian was chosen to work in the camp bakery, she smuggled bread to supplement our pitiful meagre rations.  Our Cioca Jadwiga often sent us food parcels from Poland, a huge treat, but sadly we would never see her again. Winter months were hard and we stayed indoors with little to do, but the summer months offered us an escape from our prison and for awhile we enjoyed being children again running in the forest foraging for mushrooms. For awhile we could forget the death, starvation and disease that haunted the camp. We longed to be back in our beds in Ostrowski with our father. We learnt to accept death but we would never forget it.

In 1941, news of the amnesty to all Polish citizens held in gulags would finally reach us, this brought great joy, freedom was finally in sight.  Later that year a train arrived at the camp to transport us to an unknown destination, this time it transpired to be Bukhara in Uzbekistan.  On this journey, Amelia my elder sister became separated from us and Bolek my brother left the train to scavenge for food when it stopped but he too would be lost to us when the train started up unexpectedly and left him.  In Bukhara there was a newly formed Polish army camp, an orphanage, the Red Cross and facilities to assist displaced people.  Our shelter in Bukhara was one of the village’s mud huts, we slept on the floor, our cousin Irena was with us, all of us were always dirty, tired and hungry and we often slept huddled together to keep each other warm during the cold desert nights.  By now our mother had become seriously ill with typhoid.   As mums health worsened, Marysia and I needed to make a decision, who should stay with her and who should take Janek our younger brother to the orphanage.  It was agreed I would remain with mum, who by then had to be moved to the hospital Dom-Bolngo Rybionka, and I was left in that hut scared and alone.   It wasn’t long before our mother died, buried in an unmarked grave, coffinless and no headstone to mark her life. My father also lies buried somewhere in Polesia in an unmarked grave, they should have been buried together.

By this time Marysia and Janek had joined the exodus to Persia and I was very much alone in Bukhara wondering my fate, but fortune would have it when I was found by mums’ brother my uncle, Wojciek Henryk who was by then serving in the Polish army. I joined the group heading for Persia, this meant a 1000 kilometres overland journey to the Caspian Sea followed by a terrifying 48-hour sea voyage to the shores of Persia, to the seaport of Pahlevi and then overland to Teheran, where I would be reunited with my beloved twin sister Marysia”.

Krystyna died January 2022 a happy life and a sad life, but most of all a full life, 94 years young.