Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Four Years Less a Day: A Wwii Refugee Story

Four Years Less a Day: A Wwii Refugee Story

Bergen, Henry

Paperback

Biographies GeneralGeneral Military History

ISBN10: 1412099315
ISBN13: 9781412099318
Publisher: Trafford Pub
Published: Apr 3 2007
Pages: 338
Weight: 1.09
Height: 0.76 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English

The author tells the story of the first part of his own life as best he remembers it. The setting is a small village north-east of Krivoy Rog, on the rolling plains of the Ukraine. Born in 1931, the boy entered this world during a period of stress: economic depression, collectivization of farm lands, establishing communist power, being Mennonite in a predominantly Russo-Ukrainian society. Beyond the initial setting, the story is centred on major events in the life of the family. The first such event is the arrest of the father by the NKVD (KGB). This causes problems as the family struggles to survive on the earnings of one wage earner, the mother, who now has to support five children under the age of twelve. The next major event is WWII and the arrival of the German army. For a brief period, three years, this is a time of prosperity and hope. But that soon fades as the Germans are slowly forced out of the USSR. The German retreat leads to the exodus of the German/Mennonite people from the occupied lands. Whole villages assemble in great treks of horse and wagon and take to the road at the onset of winter with its rain, mud, snow and cold. The refugees first settle in Poland, but soon have to flee again. In the more hectic flight in the confusion of the last days of the war, the family looses track of each other. After the war the family is reunited with each other and later with family in Canada. After four years of traipsing around war-torn Europe the family is able to immigrate to Canada and settles in Manitoba.

Also in

Biographies General

View All