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After an eventful life on November 28, 1968 our beloved, kind and revered by all March Ingeborg Hansen died. Born on 9 October 1885 in Arkhangelsk, deeply mourn those who were tied to the old Motherland
Funeral on Thursday 5th December 1968 at 12 o'clock at The tonndorf cemetery in Hamburg in Hamburg-Wandsbek.
The effort to learn Russian from my mother, according to her, was not crowned with much success. Although my mother could speak Russian and understood Russian, but not as well as her older brothers and sisters. Since it is still before the beginning of his training left Russia, and at school the study was conducted in the German language, Russian language, she taught for some time but my aunt Hansi. But not only that was the reason. The reason, mainly, was that baby and early young years were spent in Germany. Both older brother and sister, Herbert and Renata, often spoke very well with their mother in Russian. The younger kids have already experienced difficulties with the Russian language. They were ashamed of their friends and friends, if in their house talked La Russe. They feel obvious to strangers that are not really in the circle of his friends.
At the beginning of 1934, after almost a one-year waiting period after passing the matriculation examination, my mother made an important decision for her future life. Without saying anything to the parents, she secretly applied to become a nurse in the hospital of Hamburg, i.e. to obtain a medical education. Her older sister Renata shortly before it lost training in the hospital Bethesda (Bethesda Krankenhaus Bergdorf Hamburg) and was dismissed. First of all, because of this unfortunate experience, my grandfather, when he found out about my mom's statement, tried to dissuade her from this intention. But, she stayed true to her decision, was accepted and began working at the hospital Center at Easter 1934, as student nurses. The hospital was located near the house.
During a two-year training for a nurse from 1934 to 1936, my mother lived in the dormitory of the hospital for nurses and soon met a very important friend for her, Doris Hermann, later on her husband Doris Brandenburg, who remained her faithful friend for many years. However, the beginning of this friendship was, as he recalled my mother and her friend with a smile, not quite so friendly. When my mother, as a newly admitted student, poured water into the bucket on the nurse and stood at the washbasin holding her hand over the water tap, at this time diligent nurse Doris taught her, "Sister Magda, we can not hold on to the water tap when they collect water." Friendship began after the warm-up. Together with Doris and another friend, Erica Steenbock, my mother in her spare time again made long walks around the country, up to Mecklenburg. Later she realized, that these walk not quite safe. Several times they had to meet with rather Intrusive men, from whom they could hardly escape. Both her friends on such walks were much more experienced than my mom, which she will later say about himself, was naive and shy and just not interested in Dating men.

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In the hospital, she coped well with her duties and in 1936 passed the examination for the profession of nurse, and immediately received the place of nurse in the same hospital in Wandsbek. There she met with the senior nurse Gertrude Heydenreich, with whom she maintained close friendly contact throughout her life. My mother, Gertrude Heydenreich and the already mentioned Doris Brandenburg, were friends of three, and as she called it, they made up a"drawn three".
The political events of the time very little reference to them in her own memories. About the Nazis in the district of Wandsbek knew little, as they do not touch the lives of their families. She referred herself to those who are not interested in politics. She also valued her father for being outside politics, although he probably joined the German national socialist workers ' party (NSDAP). On one of the last photos, before his death, he appears with a party badge on the lapel of his jacket. Most of still extant copies of this photo icon has been retouched with a pencil so that only upon closer examination one could see him.
My grandmother Alma, his wife, was completely indifferent to politics. She was only interested in a world of their own families, the world of friends and families from Arkhangelsk. Like all economic issues, politics for her, and this was a consequence of her upbringing in Russia, her special youth, was considered a matter of men, in which she never intervened.
Renata's eldest daughter was, as my mother called it, a "non-political youth movement" and opposed against everything and everyone that somehow looked authority.
The third son Erich was a member of the storm detachment (SA). Otto's youngest son was primarily an active member of the Concordia football society in Hamburg and was more interested in football than politics. Throughout his life, he has not participated in any organization other than his favorite football club.
Born in Hamburg, the daughter of Tudi at the time was still a foolish teenager. About the other brothers and sisters my mother had nothing to provide more specific, so she lived at home and lived in a hostel for nurses at the hospital, and his family had little contact. With regard to the political events of that time, she was able to recall precisely that the Sudeten crisis of 1938 (12 September 1938, after the failure of the negotiations, a second Sudeten crisis was triggered. ... September 22, Hitler makes an ultimatum: do not interfere with Germany in the occupation of the Sudetenland) she took very seriously and felt then the first time real fear.
After three years working as a nurse in the hospital of Hamburg in 1939, in the personal life of my mother at a crucial point. My future father, Dietrich Krause, the eldest son of pastor Hugo Krause who died in Arkhangelsk in 1915, first graduated in 1939 from the textile College in Chemnitz and before returning to Estonia, where he lived with his mother, brothers and sisters since 1915, wanted to travel to Germany. His mother asked during this trip is sure to Arkhangelsk to visit her friend Marta Hansen in Hamburg, with which it has been already mentioned, for three years he taught in the Arkhangelsk Church school and served kindergarten, established at the school my grandfather Krause. When Dietrich Krause arrived in Hamburg in March at the request of his mother, he stayed for a couple of days in the house of always hospitable aunt Hansi.
March 17, the birthday of Herbert, the elder brother of my mother, Dietrich K. came to visit with aunt Hansi family Lyursa. My mom also came to my brother's birthday party for a couple hours from the hospital. She was probably all she'd known, the last child, who is the pastor Krause before his death baptized in Arkhangelsk. On this feast in honor of the birthday of my mother were fooling around together with her younger sister Tudi so that my grandmother Lyurs the next day with a rebuke said to her: "What should think of you, Mr. Krause?"My mother comforted her by saying that they had already agreed to meet with Mr. Krause the next day. From the day of birth to the hospital it was carried out: El Lindes, aunt Hansi and named Mr. Dietrich Krause. The next day, my father, the future, called her at the hospital. Although no one was allowed to do so, a sympathetic gatekeeper called her on the phone to my mother, and they agreed to meet the next day. My mother remembered this day well. It was March 19, 1939. They went to Hamburg, where just there was a Grand procession of the Nazis. But they did not think about it, and went to the cafe, where they spent a wonderful evening. My father invited my mother to visit Estonia, and they promised to correspond with each other. My father was "very interested," as my mother called it. Later that evening, he walked my mom through the woods Andbecause to the hospital. Then at night she went to her trusted friend Doris Brandenburg, who had a night shift, and told her everything.
As it was due, my parents began texting and have specifically been preparing the visit to my mom in Estonia. When everything was prepared, the sad news came, Helmut, my father's younger brother, suddenly dies in Fellina in June of spinal tuberculosis. My grandfather tried to dissuade my mother from the planned trip because of these circumstances, but my father in Estonia insisted, despite this hard blow for their family, on the planned visit of my mother. To the horror of her father, my mother really in June 1939 gathered on the road to Estonia. My father accompanied her to revel (now Tallinn) on the boat. From there they went to Fellin, where Krause's family lived since 1915. During the entire visit my mother lived not in family Krause, and have their friends nearby. 14 days later, my parents got engaged in Fellina, but the engagement was not official. All were devastated by the death of Helmut. At home then was my father's sister Irmgard, as well as the second oldest son Berend, he met with my mother only once, he at that time probably already lived in Riga. Since my father, who worked in Fellina, could not get a leave of absence, his younger brother Walter took care of my mother, as the grandmother of sister Krause, aunt Matzi, spoke out in a rather ironic form: "with one engaged, and with the other walking everywhere." My mother was very depressed and disappointed by the reaction of her future mother-in-law, who took part in the engagement, and reacted with the following phrase: "Now I have lost my second son."

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After some time mother went back to Hamburg on the steamer. But even here this engagement was not recognized as official. However, my grandfather, despite earlier excuses against this trip, made every effort to establish communication with the Krause family. He knew this family from Arkhangelsk and highly respected Mrs. pastors. She was a surprisingly strong and working woman and managed to put her husband on his feet and raise five children in Estonia after his early death. She was the only one that showed up in her reaction to the son's party with my mom, very intolerant and stubborn in their views. So, for example, she went out of the room, if in its presence of discussed religious or sexual questions and problems. Playing cards was strictly forbidden in her house, and she was terribly outraged if my mom sometimes smoked.
What was hiding behind such hypocritical (hypocritical) behavior, was determined only half a century after her death, at least partially. Was no doubt that she is in 1924, being already in a fairly advanced age, the widow of a pastor, gave birth to another child, an illegitimate son about whom nobody knew anything. He was born in a hospital in Helsinki, and she adopted him immediately after his birth. The father of the child is unknown. How she managed to hide her pregnancy from her own children, the elders were already older, and also all the relatives and friends in a small town Fallin, remains a mystery today. When her fifth son in 1999, announced he already been the doctor retired, he lived on the Finnish åland Islands, its origin can be uniquely set according to the found documents, all of his half (maternal) brothers and sisters had already died. Obviously, none of them were unaware that they had another brother. This brother, who from the day of his adoption was called Niels Eric lang, had close contacts with some of the few surviving relatives in Germany, first of all, with his niece Elzbeth Krause, daughter of his brother-in-law Berend Krause. Niels Erik Lange died in 2006 at the Aland Islands and was buried there.
This mystery of her life, hidden from the whole family and from all friends, and probably a strong sense of guilt, may help to explain at least partially some of the moments in her behavior, as well as her sharpness and rigor towards others, but still probably more to herself.
With the return of my mom from Estonia to Hamburg in the ship, already then there was great concern regarding the "corridor". Soon followed by the announcement of the Second world war on 1 September 1939, which my mom found out during the night shift. From Estonia in the weeks that followed we received new news in October, referring to Hitler's speech from October 6, it was argued that the issue of resettlement of the Baltic Germans, they were required to leave the old Homeland in Estonia, Latvia, and taking on new challenges, to move into the occupied Polish lands, so as to expand the boundaries of the German state. The basis of this resettlement lay a secret agreement between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, in the framework of the so-called "non-aggression Pact between the USSR and Germany", better known as "Molotov – Ribbentrop Pact", was signed in Moscow 23 August 1939, which at that time were not known to the General public.
My grandmother Krause in Fellina first delayed to leave Estonia. Her son Berend was out of reach in Riga at the time. Most likely, he was already evicted from there. The remaining children in Fellina, Irmgard, Dietrich and Walter finally managed to convince the mother of the need for resettlement. She left Estonia on the 20th of October 1939 with their children, Irmgard and Walter. They came out of Pernau on the ship "Orotava" in Gotenhafen (Gotenhafen). My father arrived there later on the ship" EMS " with all his Luggage. All of them, still Estonian citizens, were evicted in Gotenhafen on October 30, 1939, they were given a new place of residence and jobs in the Polish area just annexed by Germany. My grandmother and her daughter, Irmgard arrived in Svetz on Waikele. My father was sent to Neustättin. Shortly before he moved, he officially announced an engagement with my mother, back in Estonia.
When he was on the Christmas of 1939, Neustettin came to Hamburg, in the family circle, my parents once again celebrated their official engagement. While in Hamburg, the father received a telegram with the news that he was transferred to Lodz, Warthegau (Reichsgau Wartheland) and it must arrive there. At that time Lodz was a center of textile industry in Poland, and my father was an engineer for the textile industry.
As he had to live in Lodz in the first days of his stay, my mom could only tell individual excerpts. At all, the first days were awful, as mentioned my father mother. They had to go, or rather, to break in, confiscated the apartments, which are on the table, sometimes still standing dishes of half-eaten food, as the Polish residents had to leave their apartments in a hurry. After a while my father got a job at Loeser und Reimann textile factory in Lodz. Having settled down, the father sent his mother a telegram to Hamburg and asked her to leave the hospital and come to Lodz. My grandfather was against it, but my mother quit, no matter what, but it led to a serious quarrel with him. First of all, before the wedding, she shouldn't have lived with my father, by no means. In this regard, my grandfather was an exceptionally scrupulous and pedantic person. When my mother finally got permission to enter Wartegau and arrived in Lodz, which after the German invasion of 1939 was renamed Litzmannstadt, she first lived in a hotel. A few days after her arrival, on may 4, 1940 my parents were married while my father had some nasty trouble with it improperly executed documents from Neustettin. As can be seen from the letters of my grandfather, my parents told my grandma Krause in Svetz about your wedding rather late. The reason for this late message can only be guessed. This may have been a consequence of her hostility towards my mother when she commented on her son's engagement by saying, "Now I've lost a second son."
After the wedding, my parents got the first small one-bedroom apartment, but then moved to a large apartment on Emberstrike. Was near a lovely Park, where my mother often walked with us small children. A little North-East of the Park at a short distance passed the border Lodz ghetto for Jews in Poland, it was the second largest after Warsaw. After some discussion on the Jewish question in Warthegau old North part of the city of łódź was announced in February 1940 a ghetto. This area was joined two more, granchise extensive urban areas. April 30, 1940, just at the time when the mother came to Lodz, the ghetto was completely closed off from other parts of the city. People, if they were not Jews, were forbidden to appear in the ghetto; the Jews who tried to leave the ghetto, risked their lives, been shot by the guards. In General, the Lodz ghetto was considered the most closed. Although the tramway passed through the middle of the ghetto along two wide main streets, which were not part of the ghetto, the tram there passed without stopping. Jews who wanted to get from one part to another, the fenced part of the city, had to cross streets on specially constructed wooden foot bridges. These constantly used wooden bridges and a strictly guarded boardwalk fence with a wire fence around the ghetto was the only thing that the non-Jewish population of the city could see. About specific conditions of life in the ghetto my mother, as she spoke, had no idea. Like all others, she knew that there were terrible conditions, but like others, she did not seek to learn about this life. You could learn more if you wanted to, she said later with remorse. Could an individual do anything-it is a different question. In the four and a half years that she lived in Lodz, she said she was extremely busy with her difficult and sometimes difficult family problems. Her husband was at war, two small children, serious illness of the daughter, the mother, arrived from bombed-out Hamburg in her apartment, which was so crowded, unclear fate of the brothers and so on. Basically, she said she never felt at home in Lodz. But the fate of many others who lived at that time. In some respects, the situation in Lodz for a long time was much better than in the Reich: there was a blackout, but there were no air raids.
In the summer of 1940, my parents made a memorable wedding trip to Posen (Reichsgau Wartheland), where they met my father's cousins Dorrit and Trudy, as well as my father's "former love", Britta von Auer. Then from there went to the family in Wandsbek, Hamburg and Wandsbek little short trip to Niendorf on the Baltic sea (Germany).

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After their return to Lodz, they took for a while a ten-year-old boy from Berlin who had been evacuated there. My sister Ortrud was born in Lodz on 12 July 1941. As already mentioned, on April 11, 1940, Lodz was renamed the German occupation authority Litzmannstadt in honor of the General of the First world war, and later a high-ranking Nazi official Karl Litzmann. In our personal documents place of our birth is the city of Litzmannstadt. Later in the sixties of the twentieth century we had to change in our documents the place of birth to G. Lodz, otherwise our trip to Poland or the GDR would have been impossible.
Eight months after my sister's birth, in February 1942, my father, who had served for some time in the so — called Estonian "operetta army", was drafted into the Wehrmacht and left for bad Reichengall (Upper Bavaria, Germany). So my mother was left alone with her little daughter in Lodz, where she felt very lonely. Soon she received word that her cousin (cousin), Freddy (Ferdinand) Lyurs 7февраля 1942 died in Russia, which further upset her. But there was good news in April 1942, she was allowed to visit her husband in bade — Reichenhall. During these days, little Ortrud was taken care of by Edith Twers, my father's cousin. It was my mom's only friend in Lodz.
Two months later, mother went a second time in bad Reichenhall, but with a small daughter. From there she traveled across Germany to her parents, my grandfather and grandmother, Hamburg. There they celebrated the first anniversary of the granddaughter's birth, and for the joy of grandparents Ortrud made her first steps here.

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My grandfather tried to persuade my mother to stay with them in Hamburg and not to return to Lodz. But due to the constant air raids on Hamburg, she wanted to quickly return to Lodz, where in this regard she could feel calmer.
How she got confirmed in a few weeks. In the night from the 26th to the 27th of July 1942, during another bombing of Hamburg, one of the bombs fell in her parent's house on the wilhelmstraße and completely destroyed it. My grandfather, Mrs. Werle and her mother, they lived on the top floor of the house, died on the spot. Mr. verlet and 19-year-old Tudi, the younger sister of my mother, remained unharmed. My grandmother survived, but she was seriously injured. Three survivors were rescued after six hours, which they spent in a heavily destroyed basement. All who were at home looking for sanctuary. Mrs. Verla and her mother, who died during the RAID, were sitting in the places where my mother and her little daughter had just sat, she was constantly sitting in this place. That this quick recovery of three survivors of such severe damage after a major air RAID was a happy event, which often occurs in our lives. My mother's sister Elsa, whom everyone called only "a's moppy" or "Mapgen", was mobilized for the air defense of the city and that night, when reporting about the bombing on wilhelmstraße itself mobilized emergency aid to the victims of the RAID. Such quick relief and saved her family.


 

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In the air RAID of 26 to 27 July 1942года killed my beloved husband, our good father and brother, Alexander Edward Lyurs in возрасте65лет, with deep sorrow Alma Lurs, nee Meyer; Herbert; Alex; Erich; Otto, currently, in the East; Renata; Magda; Elsa; Gertrude.
Ndsb – Wandsbek (probably of a Church, or administration), wilhelmstraße, 46 – Requiem, 04.08. 14-30. Tondorf cemetery.

My mother at the funeral of his father in Hamburg did not go. Her mother, knowing that she was pregnant again, rebuked from such a trip. Besides, my mother had no one to leave Ortrud with in Lodz.

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So, at my grandfather's funeral at The tonndorf cemetery on August 4, out of eight children, only three of my mother's sisters were present, four of the brothers were in military service, they were not informed of the death of their father or could not come. Otto's youngest son was sentenced to 14 weeks ' imprisonment in a military prison on the grounds of insubordination during guard service. Using party ties older sister Renata, and later managed to arrange his trip to Hamburg. Herbert and Erich also received short-term vacations to travel to Hamburg.

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A letter Back to the fourth brother, Alex, in which she had told him all the details about night bombing, it was returned to her unopened. She wrote to him on August 12. It was the day Alex died in a military hospital in Russia.

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My grandmother after several weeks of stay in the hospital lived for some time at always ready to come to the aid of aunt Hansi Atmosphere. And in the fall of 1942, her daughter Renata moved her to Lodz to visit my mom, where she lived for the next two years. Renata at the time worked in the Lodz or near Lodz probably PE navodchica. Mom didn't know for sure.
Her younger sister Elsa, who was called "Mappi", and her life partner Wilhelm Jensh, but everyone called him for some reason only" Hare " (der Hase), who had previously worked together in the company Reichardt in Hamburg, now they worked in the civil administration in Warsaw, and occasionally visited mom and her family in Lodz. Mappi was in Lodz when I was born. She's the one who brought my mom to the hospital. The delivery was 30 January 1943, quickly and without problems. When Mappi returned from the hospital, my grandmother had just received a farewell letter from her eldest son Herbert of Stalingrad, in which he reported the desperate situation in Stalingrad and informed that he would never surrender to the Russian captive alive. When my grandmother visited my mother in the hospital after that, she did not mention this letter to Herbert in one word, so as not to worry and not to disturb her mother. Only a few days after my birth, my mother found out about the capitulation at Stalingrad and Herbert's farewell letter.
From the hospital she was brought Hazen (Bunny) as she recalled, was very proud when passers-by and passengers in the tram took him for a happy father of a little boy. Aunt Mappi and her" Hare", whom she later married, had no children.


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In mid-1943, a few months after my birth, my sister became ill with cerebral palsy. First, the doctor made the wrong diagnosis – the flu, and accordingly prescribed the wrong treatment. When, finally, disease was correctly defined, my sister was already almost fully paralyzed. In subsequent months, the paralysis in his hands completely away, the right leg is also partially paralysis passed. The left leg, despite numerous operations, forever has remained paralyzed.
In the autumn of 1943, when I was six months old, my father and his brother Walter came to Lodz from Russia for a short break, and then for the second time shortly before Christmas. From this visit, probably the last photo was preserved, where you can see my parents together. Three months later, my father died in Italy in captivity with the Americans. On his death my mother found out only a few years.

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Also Erich and Otto, my mother's brothers, came to Lodz at the same time for a short break, first of all, to see their mother, who since the fall of 1942 lived with my mother in Lodz.
In the following year 1944 began with the attack on Lodz. This city has not yet been bombed. In the autumn, when the front approached the East, the first trains with refugees from East Prussia appeared in Lodz. My mother's future brother-in-law Wilhelm Jensch, called the "hare", who until that time still worked In the civil administration in Warsaw, advised my mother to leave Lodz as soon as possible. Otto, the younger brother of my mother, in September 1944 took his mother from Lodz to Barntrup, Lippe district, where during the war a repetition of the magnitude Of b-20 (the meaning of this phrase – the war forced a second time to come to Barntrup).
After a while, my mother and I left Lodz with our children and went by train to Schwetz (Weichsel), where her mother-in-law lived and her son-in-law, Irmgard's husband, after the resettlement. Only Renata and Tudi, my mom's sisters, stayed in Lodz.

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Son-in-law Brand, grandmother and daughter-in-law Irmgard Krause with my mother and children in Schwetz (Weichsel). October 1944.

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Later my mother learned that it was madness to come now to Schwetz where vessels with refugees from East Prussia continuously came. But the mother-in-law did not want to leave, Svetz. She was, as previously reported, a brave, strict and often quite harsh woman. This behavior insulted my mother. Mother-in-law celebrated Christmas in advance, even before mother and children. She also gave the mother to feel that she is guilty, caught in an extremely difficult situation, and was unhappy that the mother smoked.
Out of fear of the approaching front, my mother wanted to leave Schwetz. She did it and dared to escape, one with two young children. As the train was no longer going, she went into town and found that there just is post. At her urgent request she went to meet him, and offered to come back later and quietly to this post. How was our escape, until finally we got to Demize on Elba, and stayed her friend Doris Brandenburg, my mother wrote to my grandmother in Hamburg.
Here is the letter:
"Of dömitz 9.2.1945 year. My favorite mommy! Hope You got my telegram, and my children from the surrounding area Neustettin, and not worried more about us. You're my sweetheart! I've been here with Doris for two days. 15 days I was on the road and everything that happened to me during this time was unreal and like in a dream! I'd love to see You and tell you everything, but will have to wait. You can to imagine, that trip with children was very difficult and very burdensome, has I its have Doris, arriving to it on the evening.
Thursday afternoon I left at your own risk from Svetta, there was incredible turmoil, all sought to flee the city, someone in the car who is on a horse-drawn cart as the railway communication stopped. The postal truck took me with the children and a small Luggage to Konitsa, the next day the Wehrmacht bus drove me and the children through Schlochau to Ratzeburg, but the constant breakdowns and lack of gasoline slowed our movement. On the road met a completely deserted area. In Switzerland I could accidentally fall on passing vehicles with women and children who managed to get us into Asherie in the village, 12km from Neustettin. If I couldn't get on this transport, I'm hardly able to get out as the bus could not continue to follow, ran out of gas. In Estrie I was accepted to wait very hospitable peasants. But when, soon Neustettin ran women with children, and the front was approaching, no institutions that could help us to move on, was not. Then I, along with another woman with 4 children decided to move on. We managed to get to Belgard, then to colberg in an incredibly crowded train for refugees, from there the next morning to Stettin. What was going on in the train and on the platforms, it is impossible to imagine; I stole a baby carriage, my suitcase I left for storage at the peasants in Eschenrige, as it was not possible to take it with you! In Szczecin after hours of waiting outside on the platform managed to get on a train for the refugees in the direction of Mecklenburg, dark, dirty carriage for the transportation of livestock, the children could not even sit at night, especially cried Wolf, suffering from crowding, and crowding. Tired and shocked by the pressure, the kids were clinging to me, and when they were both asking for me, I thought I couldn't bear it. But all people around were busy only with their own Affairs, some had the opportunity to unite, only I was all alone. Despite all the difficulties, we finally reached a small cozy apartment Doris, she made us so touching, actively assisted us. However, the room in which she now lives, quite cramped for 2 adults and 4 children. She's trying to find us an apartment. Gradually get better like a normal life! Managed to save their belongings: for children a couple of warm clothes for each set of bed linen, a little silver and two quilts and a little downy feather. When I can get my suitcase, then I have bed linen, towels, summer clothes, some material, but even if it does not work, and it's nothing. The main thing that children were healthy to overcome all the terrible. But things are moving very chaotically. Well, my mother dear, write to me everything, how's it going all of You? I'm so glad our Otto moved you in a timely manner. Where to find Renata, Mos and Tudi? Do Erich and Otto write? When will I hear anything about Dietrich? And see him? Left whether, Irmgard and mother Krause from Svetta, I don't know. Where could they be? What they learned about the Berenda and Walter? It is completely unknown how this will happen? Me in the last time reality, what is happening with us, seems normal! Say Hello to my family. Write also, please, Hansi on our behalf. Maybe she heard something about the people of Schwetz?
Did Renata hear anything about Buddha? I gave him Your address, was he supposed to stay with Volksturm? The people's tower in Schwetz! So, write immediately! Doris sends his regards, she's so touching! Heartily kiss on behalf of Your Dula and your little children who would like to return to Amalia in Barntrup.
The Buddha sends kind regards Renate".
My mother gave me some additional details when she talked about her experiences during her flight. She reported that when she left Schwetz on 23 January 1945, there was a terrible frost before — 23 degrees Celsius. In Konitsa, the first intermediate station on the westward flight, she had to leave us children at night in the market square under the protection of German soldiers, while she was looking for somewhere to stay until she got a place in the commandant's office in a temporary refugee camp. In Estrie, where we stopped at the good and the good of the peasants for a couple of days, I noted on 30 January its second year of birth, and the woman in the peasant houses made in honor of my birthday pancakes. The preliminary purpose of our flight was Demnitz on the Elbe, where he lived for Doris Brandenburg with their children. This is my mom's friend from the time when they worked together at the hospital in Wandsbek. In Demnitz she was evacuated from bombed-out Hamburg. From there, she invited my mother to come to her in Damnit if Sveta a whiff of "burnt". This invitation, the mother was forced to take, and the sixth or seventh of February, after a 15-day journey we arrived in Dömitz.

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Immediately upon arrival in Demnitz I became seriously ill, it was so hard that my mother was afraid of pneumonia. Fortunately it didn't confirm, and I recovered. However this disease for my mothers was large test of, she was exhausted too hasty flight, nights spent could not sleep, so as from high temperature I was very restless.
Soon mother, with the support of his girlfriend Doris got a new home in Delnice, which consisted of two furnished rooms, a very nice woman with two children. There was even Central heating, and the woman made mom coffee three times a day. But there was a flaw, this is a new housing was outside the city limits, and she didn't want to get into the city with us two children to go shopping or go to the administration, as Ortrud with her paralyzed leg could barely walk so far. The pram was stolen from us during the flight, and there was no way to get a new one. My mother could not, as she wrote in another letter, to leave us in the care of a fine woman, because we were scared during the flight, and clung to it "as the burs". To top it off, my sister and I got measles, which made my mom's life even more difficult. Moreover, frequently declared air alarm, when the allied bombers flew in the direction of Berlin. In Delnice directly bombing was not. The Russian Army was approaching, and my mother planned to run further West, if possible, to Barntrup (Lippe County), where my grandmother lived for five months. But on April 23 the American bombers destroyed the bridges over the Elbe, thus further way to the West over the Elbe river was cut off. Later, when American troops entered Damnit, the population breathed a sigh of relief. Soon, however, American troops left the city of Demnitz, which was located on the East Bank of the Elbe, and the city was given to the Russians.
Which then followed, my mom was able to call it one word - " terrible!". Looting and terrible harassment began. First of all, she is grateful to two circumstances, the fact that she had to go through it easier than many of the other inhabitants of Damnica. First, she spoke Russian and could communicate with Russians, both soldiers and officers. Found understanding of in this rubbing shoulders, that was invaluable in this situation. Second, she had small children, that gave her added protection, as most of the Russian in this extraordinary, special atmosphere loved children, they were treated in a condescending, spoiled and sometimes take it with him to bestow upon sweets and then again to deliver us safely home. Some of them behaved like little children and play with us, for example, while my mom kept saying "Man, don't be mad!» (with enthusiasm.) Mother very often remembered very handsome young officer, who once knocked at our door. He was the adjutant of the commander of a special cavalry regiment, he asked his mother to be an intermediary at the invitation of German girls to participate in the Colonel's holiday. It is his desire my mother could not perform, because being a refugee she practically knew nobody in Delnice, except the landlady and her friend Doris. This young man was very kind to us children, often came to us and looked after sometimes for us when my mother had to go to the city. One day my mother was invited to the Russian festival, where she had to dance. Mom told me that all behaved impeccably there; only gradually when that feast was a lot tipsy, she quickly got out of there.
In General, the situation in Delnice my mother perceived, first of all as an inevitable exceptional situation, which she wanted as soon as possible to change. Her biggest wish was to go West to join her whole family. She gave one refugee, who went to Hamburg, a letter to cousin Ingrid, in the family it was called only "Gita" or "Gitul", as the mail at this time has not yet functioned. But this attempt to establish contact with relatives from Hamburg at first did not yield any results.
Tudi, my mother's younger sister, settled in Barntrup with my grandmother. She after departure of my mother from Lodz walk out of the city and they managed to get to Sochi. From there, secretly crossed the border to Demnitz to bring my mother and us children to Barntrup. About the details of this five-day trip by rail with all the scrapes mom just could not remember. Finally, my mother, with the help of Tudi, was able to get to the scheduled rail transport, which went West through the small town of Oebisfelde (Germany, Ebisfelde, in the Berde district of Saxony-Anhalt). There they got off the train, and at your own risk and went on in Hamburg, where they were with us kids in November 1945. On 14 November 1945, my mother registered us as newly arrived refugees at the Barntrup police station.
My mother's life in Barntrup (1945-1989).)
When my mother came to Barntrup in 1945, she was 31 years old. Her life path proceeded very violently: from Russia to Holland, from Holland to Hamburg, from Hamburg to Lodz, from Lodz to Schwetz-Weichsel, from Schwetz to Demnitz on Elbe, and from there, finally, brought her to Barntrup. The remaining 44 years of her life, from here we see her life as more peaceful that she spent with my sister Ortrud in Barntrup. I myself left in 1962 from Barntrup after passing the exams for the certificate of maturity and enrolled to study in Hamburg. Since then, he has only been a frequent and regular guest in Barntrup. Whether my mother liked living in Barntrup all the time and felt at home here, or whether she wanted to move somewhere closer to the rest of the family, who mostly lived in Hamburg, is hard to say.
The circumstances specific to this time, and decisions directly relating to her little one's own family, made it difficult for her to make a fairly accurate decision to leave Sochi.
Barntrup, located in the Eastern part of Lippe County between Liego and Hameln, was a small town with a rustic lifestyle, as agriculture played a big role in the country at the time. In addition to the finally closed in 1956 cigarette factory and several small furniture companies there was no industry. Overall, Barntrup was a rather poor community in economically underdeveloped Lipperland. Existence for a long time of the Union of masons, which in contemporary urban culture played a role, reminding about the fact that many men from this area in previous years earned waste craft on large, often very remote brick factories, and therefore spent months away from home. Maybe that's why people coming here are struck by the fact that in many old families Barntrup leading were often women who set the tone in the family, as they say, run all the Affairs.
Anyway, at that time and now too, it is difficult to find a job in the specialty in Barntrup. Perhaps this was the reason that, compared to other communities in the Lippe area, the influence of the Nazi party (NSDAP) was very strong, given their promises to the residents of Barntrup. Throughout the land of Lippe in connection with the difficult economic situation should also explain why the national socialists won the elections of the Landtag (Zemstvo Parliament) from 15.01.1933, the victory is very important on the way to "seizure of power". In 1932, they lost their votes and found themselves in a serious crisis.
Residents of Barntrup, with whom we talked in the early years, lived in very cramped conditions, even if they had their own house. For example, in the house in which we rented an apartment in the early years, even for homeowners, all the amenities were in a small barn attached to the house, in which the goat watched with interest what we were doing there. Daily need products many residents of Sochi were decided in the first place, due to its carefully crafted garden plots, which were immediately behind the house. And grass for the goat they were harvested on carefully manicured street gutters in front of house.
Against this background, it becomes clear that many of the evacuees, the refugees, housed in the last war years in Moscow in rooms and small apartments, was greeted by the inhabitants of the inhospitable. It survived and my mom, when she's been with us young children, aged two and four years in November 1945 he arrived in Sochi.
We first stayed a few days in a small apartment of my grandmother on the street Alverdissen until the housing authority didn't allocate our own private room in the neighboring house, but without water and sewer. The local hosts met us without much joy. When we got there, the room was completely empty, even the only light bulb on the ceiling of the room was quickly turned out. It was probably a helpless protest against the forced and unwanted entry into this house. The most necessary pieces of furniture, which today would be considered discarded garbage, they also were not. My mother was forced to ask for any kind of furniture those residents of Sochi who were willing to come to the rescue.
What still surprises me and delights me is that my mother has never been vindictive and has never kept grudges against the owners of the house for a long time for their simply cruel treatment of the refugee woman. With no means, with two young children, a boy of two and a girl of four, who also could not walk. Mother at first very much worried, but always explained to us children that these people poor, and we refugees are forcibly settled to them. Later she, when we moved away from them for a long time, even visited them on occasion, and sent us children to them. True friendship, of course, could not occur, and the circumstances of life and life experiences were too different.
As a simple example, for my mom was her own, at that time already 70-year-old mother, who lived nearby on the second floor of the neighboring house, no toilet and no amenities. She grew up in a very wealthy family in Russia, never studied any profession, and even in the early years of living in Hamburg had a staff that freed her from most of the female chores on the farm. The more amazing was the admirable ability to adapt to disasters, when, during the Second world war and in the subsequent post-war years, it proved that it had to bear all the blows of fate as a poor refugee with some of its family members. Nobody in the family could remember to say at least one word of displeasure, a word that requires compassion and assistance. Without expressing discontent, she was walking several miles on a rural road, and it was in the early postwar years to the neighboring town to exchange a silver spoon for bread from a Baker. Only a few records in her personal diary showed that she had suffered greatly in such depressing living conditions and that she had to cope with them. The only little luxury that she was allowed was if nobody saw her, with a stick, quickly go around the corner to a little café where she could spend half an hour without interference over a Cup of coffee, and at this point, she could once in a while to relieve stress.
Her life did not become easier by the fact that her eldest daughter Renata settled in Hamburg and lived with her in her small one bedroom apartment. This extravagant and impulsive sister of my mother arrived in Barntrup from Lodz at the end of January 1945. Some residents of Sochi, which she had in a manner peculiar to her arrogance more or less often, because she never owes nothing pulled, complained in the case of my mother on her sister, which was very frustrating for my mom. But in General, aunt Renata, who was my godmother, was always ready to come to the aid of their friends and often even with a sense of humor. When my mom arrived with us in Barntrup, aunt Renate was on the third or 4th month of pregnancy. The father of the child, who was born on 26 April 1946 in Barntrup and was baptized with the name Irena (we still call her Kika), was a repeatedly married Baron von Budberg (in our family he was always called only Buddha). He appeared for some time in Sochi and disappeared again in the direction of the town of Detmold (100km from Hanover), where he remarried. My aunt, who met him during the war, was "happy", as she herself later said that she had not married him.
Kika grew up with us children until 1954, and to some extent we were Bankcrupt like brother and sister, and today it remains the closest relative.
All the problems and difficulties that my mother faced after her arrival in Barntrup, receded into the background, as all this time she was tormented by the question of the fate of my father. She saw him for the last time during his Christmas holiday in December 1943 in Lodz. She also learned that he was in the spring of 1944 was in Italy, near Naples, and was captured by American troops, and possibly sent to the United States. But what really happened to my father, she didn't know. There was no message from him, there was also no social notice of him. What details in the beginning she tried to know about his fate, we don't know for sure. Anyway 17 February 1947, she wrote, is still extant, the letter to the Red Cross of the city of Naples with a request to tell her if they know anything about staying there with her husband. On March 27, 1947, she received, it was probably independent of her request to the Naples Red Cross, a message from the military Department in Washington that her husband Dietrich Krause first April 1945 (sic!) died of leukemia in captivity. Two months later, with a date of may 8, 1947, came, this time in response to her request to Naples, a message from the red cross in Geneva that Dietrich Krause died on April 1, 1944 in a hospital in Italy from " Blutzersetzung "(decomposition in blood?). Today just installed the year of death "1944". Later it turned out that the notice of the death of my father sent to my mother in April 1946, but at her former address in Lodz. In connection with her escape from the news it was not received. And her new address in Hamburg at that time were not yet known and probably has not been reported.
When she received word of her husband's death, we saw for the first time, and perhaps for the last time, how desperately she was crying. We tried to comfort our mother as a child, as she later recalled:" don't cry, when I grow up, I will marry You", — so I said in solace. Whether this promise helped, I can't tell. Anyway, from that day on it became clear that my mother and we, the children, should now live alone without a father. About the new marriage, as far as we know, she thought, although she was only 33года.

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How could my mother maintain our livelihood for the first time after the war, I can not say for sure. We did not have any property or savings. In addition to state support, her closest relatives helped us from time to time with money, but they also did not have sufficient funds in the first post-war years. From 1949 to 1952, my mother, with the support of the Union of war victims and military personnel, invalids and social pensioners in Germany, waged a long struggle with the Land the insurance company of Westphalia for the recognition of pension, as the widow, and the orphan's pension from pension insurance of the employees of my father in Lodz. Which, after several inquiries, testimonies (certificates) and testimony, finally ended successfully, my mother and we were guaranteed a rather modest but constant source of income (income).
Another great concern of my mother was my sister's disease. As already mentioned, she became ill with cerebral palsy at the age of two. Since the paralysis of the left foot and right foot did not pass, it remained with a violation of the ability to move, and therefore could not move much and was limited in everything that is taken by children at her age. Starting at the age of six, she underwent seven operations on her feet and her left foot, while in hospital for a long time, although her health was slightly stabilized, but there was no significant improvement. It on all life remained with impaired ability to move. Because of the numerous operations she had for weeks or even months to learn in school, and could not, as I after the fourth grade of elementary school to go to school. Then we went to the same sixth class at the gymnasium in Barntrup.

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During our own studies, my mother lived exclusively for us children, but she was never bothersome and she never took care of or restricted us. Her rhythm of life was focused on our needs and interests, in which she took a live part, delving into, and sometimes restraining. If we could not solve difficult problems in mathematics, she never quarreled, but could in the evening, when we were asleep, for hours to sit on the solution of these problems, and in the morning proudly reported that she found a solution to the problem. She listened attentively to our classmates and classmates who liked to come to our house. With the release of our newspaper for school in Sochi, which were mainly created in our home, she helped us with enthusiasm. And when we used to say in the evenings when we got older, we said goodbye to her, going to home balls or class parties and birthdays, she used to tell us, "don't Come too late." And if we still came home too late, she never reproached us, but, on the contrary, friendly and with interest asked: "well, everything was fine?".
The problem is, what will my sister do after school and what profession to master her with her disability, depressed my mom all these years, and forced her to seek a way out of this situation. A social profession, such as a nurse or social worker, has itself disappeared because of its disability. Thus, after finishing school, she first enrolled in the then one-year trade school (school) in Lemgo Leugo. Then I registered on a training place of service of average qualification in regional administration in Leugo which she received after the termination of the training and to the pension she remained the employee at regional administration. However, this profession is not particularly answering her desires and inclinations. Despite this, it is quite well worked there. My sister remained unmarried and, along with her professional activities, she devoted her entire life to Church work with young people.
A significant change in my mother's life in Barntrup, and perhaps for this reason, close contact with us children, occurred when her beloved mother, with whom she had throughout her life cordial relations, in 1950 left Barntrup because of old age and ill health. Besides, she never felt at home here. She moved to Hamburg, where two of her sons lived and numerous relatives from their close family circle.
She was then 73 years old. After a nearly four-week hospital stay in Hamburg Mariinsky hospital she lived in the next three years in various apartments Hamburg, for a short time a visit from his old friend Arkhangelsk Martha Hansen. Both of her sons, Erich and Otto, as well as other relatives close to her, could not take her to themselves because of the then living conditions; besides, Erich and Otto after a relatively short stay in captivity were still working and could not take care of her.
But they took care of her, often visited her and provided other assistance. First of all, her youngest son Otto, who was a bachelor, as clearly seen from the records of her pocket calendars, was particularly close to her.
After a long stay at the hospital, my grandmother died on 26 March 1953 in Hamburg immediately after being discharged from the hospital. She was buried in the family vault of the family Lussow on Tandartsen cemetery beside her husband who died in the bombing of Hamburg in 1942. She did not wait for the return of his eldest son Herbert, as he returned home from Russian captivity in 1955.
In the spring of 1951, a year after leaving my grandmother's state of health in Hamburg, we got an apartment bigger on Obernstrasse in Sochi. But even there the conditions were very cramped from a modern point of view. Now we had a more cozy room, a small kitchen and a very small attic room with a sloping wall. We lived there with an old childless couple. They owned a house destroyed during the war. Now we lived with them on the same corridor, and the toilet was also joint. All this close proximity of families with very different life habits and interests was, first of all, for my mother a significant inconvenience. But she, like her own mother, showed great ability to adapt, the ability to adapt. The irresponsibility and complaints of the imperious and the old lady, in the first years of living together, my mother endured patiently, even helped her neighbors in the autumn in harvesting potatoes, which they grew on a small plot of land, and always tried to ensure that we children were not a burden to neighbors. For many years, first of all, since my mother and my sister moved into a large and separate apartment on the second floor of this house in 1964, my mother has always maintained, though at a distance, a predominantly friendly and even relationship. Calm and good-natured elderly gentleman, the lady's husband, a former worker of the tobacco factory, later even received permission from his wife, who could no longer walk, walk with my mother down the street.