Interviewed by Kamila ... and Svetlana ...
My mother was a housekeeper, my father worked in a factory supplying plywood. There were 4 of us in the family: 3 brothers and one sister.
We are particularly interested in the 1930s – 1940s
I have very poor memories of that. You see I was only 6 years old. 6 years old – so I have a few childhood memories. But I remember something from my mother's stories. We didn't live badly: my father worked, we had our own smallholding, and my older brother went to school. We were still very young, we weren't at school by that time.
As far as collectivisation was concerned, or de-kulakisation, that was all fairly well organised. It was all set up after the war. Dubin was the Chairman of our kolhoz. Mama worked there, but my father died just before the Great Fatherland War. He was with the partisans and then after Belarus was liberated they transferred them all, gave them new uniforms – soldiers' uniforms – and they went off to the front. If they were healthy enough people went to the front, and the others, if they weren't healthy enough, they didn't get to go. They went back to organising the kolhoz, getting the industry back to work that had existed before the war. De-kulakisation, collectivisation – they didn't affect our family at all. No-one forced us, noone ordered us to join. Mama joined the kolkhoz straight after the war because she had 4 children to feed, to bring up and educate.
How were you told about collectivisation? How was it explained to you?
Well we had studied it at school, from books.
And how did they teach it?
They taught it like a subject... a subject. In school we were taught history and geography. There were 7 classes – there were only 4 to begin with. In the village we went to school for 4 years, then there was the 'semiletka' (7 years) and we had to study for 7 years. Some people went on to the technical college, others went on to the 8th, 9th or 10th classes. I went off to Kiev to try to study there after school, but there was very tough competition – 35 people for one place! So we didn't even bother to take the exam. We went back home and I joined the 8th class at school. I completed 10 classes, then when I was 19 I was called on to join the army. I was just 19 at that time.
As far as the period after the war goes – I remember well the years just after the war. But what happened with religion – I can't tell you anything about that. Mama went to church. They used to gather together in one village and a priest would arrive from somewhere else – that was for religious holidays. So they would come for Easter, at Christmas, and they would give a service. But the church we had in the village – that was burned down. The partisans burned it down, together with the Germans that came here. They burned the neighbouring village... burned it down. Then it was looted. Half the things were taken, they shot up the village and burned the villagers.
How did that all affect my life? Well I should say that we lived in great poverty, we were much poorer than now – but we lived more happily, it was more fun and more friendly. After the war, everything was destroyed and we all built it up again, helped one another. We helped dig the allotments and helped each other with the building work, putting everything back. It was all very friendly.
Anton Stepanovich – I remember how we visited you when I was a small child, and there were the barracks and we came and ate your food.
Was that at the station?
Yes, yes
That was the barracks from the factory. They were built before the war and the Germans didn't take them down, didn't burn them, because they were used as army barracks by them. And before the war they were used as communal living spaces for families, for bachelors – for the workers at the plywood factory. And by the way – before the war they planned to build another factory, but they didn't manage to do it in time. There were plans, preliminary investigations – but it didn't happen. I don't know what factory was planned, but there was certainly preparatory work done.
The barracks were big, large enough for the factory workers. Then in one of the quarters – they even lived there after the war. One of them they used for a school. They had 7 classes – 5th, 6th and 7th years – and we studied there. Behind the railway there was a training college, but that was shut later on and turned into the regional centre. And in the buildings where the college had been, they made a secondary school.
But that's still there, the secondary school
No – the wooden building. There was a wooden, a lovely building, semi-circular, and there was a school hall and classrooms. We studied there for 10 years, and in the barracks which had been freed up by that time. Then when they built the vegetable preserving factory, they started to put people in the empty barracks. They handed them over to people, and they built up around them, fenced them off.
Yes, yes... they did the same thing in the town. And the brick one – they wanted to do something else with that. (someone in the background)
Can you tell us, please, about Stalin himself? I mean they show mostly bad things about him on television
I understand what you are asking. The thing is, Kamilla, that we were living right after the war. Everyone had been terrified by that war, they had come back from living in the forests. And every year during Stalin's reign we used to wait for prices to be lowered – it was either for the first of April, or for the first of March. No – I think it was for the first of March; we used to wait until they brought the prices down on basic goods. First of all, straight after the war, they brought in a system for the potato harvest. Why? Because there was nothing to plough the land with – they ploughed the crops using women. I believe – I saw it myself – I used to stand behind the plough, and women pulled the plough behind them, and in turns, eight at a time, they would pull the plough. And they taught me too when I was very young, and I used to pull the plough every day, taking turns. The thing is – there weren't those...
tractors?
No – what do you call them? Machinery which could help – and anyway the war was still going on. The war was going on and we had to hold the front at the same time. So we used to receive food, and we handed it all over to those at the front. Then they changed the potato system: people worked on the kolkhozes in 'working days' (trudodni), that's how it was. Then later on they changed that too. That was a bit later on: they changed it and started to pay people wages.
And about the repression – well it didn't affect us. In our village there was no-one who was repressed by the regime – not like the KGB arriving and taking someone away. We didn't have any of that. Those people who had gone off to the front – they didn't return. Not those who had disappeared without trace, nor those who were buried out there. So you see – that didn't affect us, not in our village, at least. Then later on they began to organise the kolkhoz, and the kolkhoz received horses which were for the army. They took them off to the army to drag the cannons, and then the dud horses were given to the kolkhoz. Later on they got tractors, machinery, and things got easier. The shops started to work and all four of us were able to study.
And why did you decide to study at the institute?
At the insitute? Well after I finished school – that was in '54, I finished the 10th class and... the drivers arrived – you know, the workers – to put the forest back, to prepare it. They had machines, tractors – all sorts of machinery – and I liked what they did. They had everything they needed, and they were well equipped. In the shops they could take things on credit if they didn't have the money, then later on they would settle up when their salary was paid. They had their own DWS – Department of Working Supplies – and they lived very well. They worked at lots of different things – unloading the wagons, and lots more besides at the station – and as schoolchildren we could earn a bit in the holidays. You could get about 3 roubles for a day's work.
Yes, that was good then (in the background)
It was. I used to go there with Stepa. We always earned enough to buy books – for school books that was all settled. My Mama was completely illiterate – she couldn't even sign next to her surname. When they used to get products for a day's work – rye, potatoes – of course we grew everything ourselves. She couldn't sign next to her name, but she taught all four of us.
I finished 10 classes and wanted to go to study at the Technical Institute in Minsk, but I missed it by one point. I didn't get in, and then they took me straight into the army in 1954 – in autumn. The entrance exams were in August, I served for 3 years, and then I tried again for the Institute. Again I didn't get in. My fault I didn't get in. They sent me off to the technical college, to Irkutsk, to a military academy. I didn't get past the Commission, but that was because of my heart. My heart began to play up. So I was demobilised, and I was invited to work for the regional committee of the komsomol. Well – I decided that I needed a higher education, so I went off again to that same institute. That was in 1957, and in 1958 I was admitted, and I finished in 1963.
My older brother finished his military service, and he stayed on in the army. He served all his life in the army: he served in Nikolaev, then in Moldova, then on the Northern Float. My youngest brother, Stepka, he graduated from Makarova – that was the Makarova Institute. Then of course he died, that was a great tragedy, a huge loss for us. Then Raya and Valya, after she had finished the 10th grade at school, she went on to graduate from business college, as a part-time student, then she worked in commerce. So that's our family.
And – I mean – they ask now, what do you think: whose fault was it that... what happened in those years... I mean in Stalin's time, after Stalin?
God knows... maybe you could look at it this way, knowing what was happening at the time, in Stalin's time. The thing is that the people around Stalin weren't exactly squeaky clean, and they forced him to be on the wrong side – to keep his guard up all the time, because there were kulaks and rich landowners, and there were traitors, you see, among the people. And it was like that all the time. And he was, you know, all that... and then Beria, Yagoda, and the others... Vishinsky... they were right next to him... and they were obviously... but he kept them in his sight and was anxious to keep everything in its right place.
Yes – to keep discipline. And they were giving him the wrong information, in order to 'decapitate' the government, and the ministry of defence – and the whole country. They used to come and report to him all sorts of rubbish – and he was ambitious, sure of himself, he thought he was infallible – and because of that, he would just give the command to remove someone, once and for all.
So that they didn't get in his way?
Yes, that's right, so that they didn't interfere. That was true, you know, for Kalinin's wife, for Molotov's, and the wives of other leaders. Just as soon as ... you know: 'something from the west – aha! Need to get rid of that, that's an enemy of the people!'
They didn't bother to sort things out
That's right. No sorting things out.
But what do you think – could it all have been avoided, or was it just the way things went historically, and we shouldn't bother to question it?
It's hard to say, Sveta. I mean imagine if your neighbour said to another neighbour that 'well Sveta... you know... she's like that, like that, and such-and-such, and this and that... how are you going to look at her?
Yes, of course
//You meet up, you ask her 'what's all this about?' Right?
Well, yes
'What did I do wrong to you?'. And the person was influential, and they were egging him on ... 'aha! that load of rubbish! Remove it!'. That's what they did.
Anton Stepanovich – tell us what you think: what are your impressions if you compare what it was like then, with now. Which was better, when was it better, in your opinion?
In my view, it was better before – up until the beginning of the 21st century. Life was easier, although of course there were lots of things we didn't have enough of, but we were never actually deprived. We could buy things in installments from the shops – furniture, crockery, clothing – because people didn't have the full amount, so we were able to pay in installments. And now you go to the shops – even telephone prices on their own price tags! Telephone prices. Of course if you compare the two, we lived much more happily then. We used to go and visit each other, there were national holidays, birthdays, and we used to go to places, we lived more happily. And now everyone has shut themselves into their own little shoe box, and lives like a mole. I'll repeat myself, but we lived more happily then. Now if you want to go and visit someone, you have to auction off your smallholding, because a bottle of vodka costs 90 roubles. And that's not something we've just dreamed up, that's a tradition which goes back to the beginning of time.
Wow
Man can't live alone – he just can't.
Can you tell us – when you were between the ages of 10 and 15, where did you live, and where did you start work?
I started to work from the age of 13.
Which year was that?
That was in '54. Even from 10 years' old, that was.
That was after the war, was it?
Yes. I used to drag the hay to the 3rd sector. So there were 3 haystacks for the kolkhoz, and the fourth one was for you. I used to scythe. When my grandfather was alive, he taught me how to use the scythe. I was in front and he was behind.
A back-up?
That's right. So I learned, and I scythed. We had a cow and a horse, and Mama used to feed two pigs – but we had to live somehow.
Of course
You see. Then when I left and was accepted at the Institute – I arrived, and then straight after the entrance exams, I was accepted and I went back home. And I said 'Mama, I've got into the Institute'. And she said 'well done, well done – for getting into the institute. But what are you going to do?' And I said 'I'm going to be an engineer, Mama'. 'Wonderful, my son – but how long do you have to study for?' I said 5 years, and she said nothing at all.
That's because you were going to study, rather than work? (laughing)
Yes. She was silent, and I said 'why don't you say anything Mama?', and she said 'well you know, my boy, I thought it was less time. What sort of help is it to me... but never mind. It's all right'.
There was no money, but Stepka helped me a lot. When he went off to sea, he used to go for about 6 months – for several months he was away. He would leave a statement with his accountant in Riga, and then they transferred the money to me in Minsk, from his salary, and I got an allowance. It was his money, but I managed to top it up: I used to help unload the goods trains, but I had to live somehow.
You know that now they say it was a harsh, cruel time, and that there was terrible violence against people.
Oh – I don't know. I felt no violence at all, not a thing. At least in our family, no-one was forced to do anything. We worked modestly, got on with things, we studied, and modestly, sincerely carried out our duties – just as every soviet person was meant to do. It's now that they say that it was forced, that it was violent, that people were subjected to violence, made to do things, humiliated, insulted. But now people are insulted and humiliated .twice as much. If there was something I wasn't able to receive, or I had some sort of difficulty, or something else – I could go and complain to someone. And they would pick up the phone right away and ask 'why did one of your workers come and see us? Why can't you resolve this issue yourself?' And now you go off – of course you can go off – but no-one is going to talk to with you, you won't get through to anyone. Try to get hold of the local governor and he's either busy, some meeting or other, a round table, something else. God knows.
So you think that your life has changed for the worse, do you?
No – I wouldn't say for the worse. Why not? Because I taught my two children, I told them both – the first and the second – I set them right, and now I don't need anything or anyone. I get my pension, I still work for the time being – and if they say 'clear off' then I'll clear off. It's that sort of time. So.
//We'll live!
We will. Whatever happens, we want to live.
What about the Iron Curtain – that there was such isolation?
The Iron Curtain was there in what sense, Kamila: counterespionage, the KGB, special sections... They were engaged in those sort of questions, so that the secrets of the Soviet Union didn't leave the country, because even those who came over here, they were interested in, and they were divided into left and right, so as to clarify things. And our lot checked them for loyalty, for their attitude to the Soviet Union. They were checked for loyalty. You had to know which ones you could let out of the country, clean or not, otherwise someone could go off and yap about the Soviet Union. The bread you ate; the bread that taught you, brought you up, educated you – maybe you would go abroad and someone would tempt you with something, and you betray it all. Of course that was interesting to them – at any rate it made the Soviet authorities nervous, but I'm saying to you that all of that was happening from the very beginning of the formation of the Soviet Union, and right up until the end, up till the 'restructuring' (perestroika). But what could they rebuild, restructure, when nothing had been done. They had done nothing in order to rebuild it.
Smashed it down, not build it up
Yes – they went on 'rebuilding', and in the meantime the airoplanes are breaking up and the ships are sinking, and the steamers – and everything that was done 15–20 years ago. Now they are sinking everything, killing it off.
And even in the family – I mean did you talk about the negative aspects at all?
(laughing) Those questions, Kamila, that's only for when we get together, some time or another. But now it's just a question of work – it's not our business. Let them solve those questions there, at the top, as they think best.
Do you think that people have become closer to politics?
That's all far away – now, Kamila, the only thing people are concerned about it is themselves. Everyone for himself, even in the government, where there is everything. Over there it's like the forest – noises, noises, and down below it's all quite quiet. The noise is only at the top.
It's just for show, really
That's right. They shout at each other, and that's how it's meant to be. Why shouldn't everyone know that we are fighting for the good of the people. Now – which other questions are you interested in?
//That's probably it, thank you so much. (Laughing). We have been at the home of Kozlov, Anton Stepanovich today.