A Russian migrant story

Main BodyMy name is Hella Wilson.
My Russian name is Svetlana Vladimirovna Stepanova.
I have never used my Russian name because it was too dangerous.
I was born in Yeupatoria, Crimea, Russia (it is now Ukraine).

Yeupatoria is a large city.
It has always been a health resort on the shores of the Black Sea.
The climate and situation is not unlike Tauranga and it is somewhat like the Mediterranean (a long time ago it was Greek). I lived there with my father Vladimir Nikolivital Stepanov, my mother Ida, my sister Rufina and grandparents Emilia and Georg Schaubert.

When I was only 1 year old World War II broke out.
Three years later my father was called for military service.
He had no military training as he was a veterinary surgeon.
So my mother, sister, myself, grandparents and other relations had to leave our home.
We were evacuated to the Caucasus, a mountain region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.
Because we were of German descent (some of our ancestors arrived in Russia around 1750) we were suddenly treated as enemies.
The authorities were going to decide what to do with us next.
We never herd from my father again and it was assumed he had fall in the war.

My mother decided to act and get us out of Russia to Germany.
We were lucky!
We managed to flee in front of the German front.
It was a slow process; we traveled by goods train, train, any way possible.
Our other relatives were taken to Siberia and we did not hear from them for 15 years.

We stopped in several places, sometimes for a few months.
My mother was always able to get work as she was an engineer.
She worked in factories as there was a lack of men.We got to the city of Dresden, a beautiful cultural city – two hours before it was devastated by firebombs.
As soon as we arrived we were told – you have to move on quickly, the war is coming.

There was a train standing so we threw a few things through an open window and jumped on the train.
A few minutes later it left.
For several nights as we were travelling, we saw the fires of Dresden burning.
We did not have many possessions but my mother made sure we always travelled with our eiderdowns and Russian felt boots.
Just as well as we experienced heavy winters.

In Poland we officially became “German” and arrived early 1945 in the village of Heroldsbade in Germany.
My mother always said, we were quite lucky as we never experienced or witnessed anything really terrible, although it was all around us.

Certain fears you never lose all your life.
Even when my mother was eighty years old, she used to say: My suitcase is packed, just in case.

These migrant stories were collected by Tauranga Regional Multicultural Council

Usage

AcknowledgementTe Ao Mārama - Tauranga City Libraries

Relates To

EventsTauranga Memories (2011-2021) - Events

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AuthorTauranga Regional Multicultural CouncilType of ContributionCommunity storyTaxonomyStories

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A Russian migrant story