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Hello dear brother,

It's nice to get a good letter from Moscow. You've embarked on a large undertaking, with the duodenum, watch that you don't miss. I have frightfully many news, can't possibly describe everything, and there's no time besides, I'll tell when I come back.

With each passing day we are moving deeper into Germany. I don't know exactly where I'm located, but it's somewhere near the Baltic coast, Stettin (Szczecin) is on our way and some other city closer to here.

There's almost no population left in the local towns and cities, but lots of goods. Chickens and geese, rabbits and goats, pigs and sheep, cows and horses amble around without owners. Cows moo, they have to be milked, but who needs them? And how many foods we eat - everything, starting with potatoes and ending with chocolate, coffee, and piglets. And how much stuff there is around. It can't be counted. Yes. The Germans were well off. Well, and those who remained get some, the German girls, and all the fraus, and men. We don't act considerately. Can't write everything. You've probably heard. *

But all that is rubbish. The main thing is work. Man, how much work there is. I haven't slept for 4 days already, and don't expect to. It's hard, Sashka, no time for trophies. All you do is take care of them until you arrive at the new destination and deploy, and are ordered to establish a connection. How many times I've fallen from roofs while putting up the antenna, ** severely hurt elbow and side, haven't shaved for one and a half weeks, don't wash - basically, I've come to the limit. Believe me, even if it's hard, - no time to answer a call of nature, because you can't leave the radio station while exchanging messages. Did I manage to get stuck, I've never lived this way in all respects - although my mood isn't bad, it's interesting after all, and I do like my job.

Recently we drove past an alcohol plant, so the whole column stopped, there was some guards around, but we "removed" them (why, would they grudge us) and enjoyed life. It's good that I didn't drink a lot, I knew that I would have to work, otherwise I would've been screwed. Just try to operate a radio when there are devils running in your eyes. Well, honey, I'll wrap up. No time. Don't know when I'll write the next letter. Write to me. I'm waiting. Your brother. Yu.K. 3.3.45 (March 3, 1945)

Comments by Yuri Koriakin

*On a train on the road to Poland we were instructed on how to conduct ourselves with the local population. They said that the Poles were a friendly Slavic people that fought against the fascists. Asked that we hold up the honor of the Red Army. Promised to punish in cases of discipline violations. Although, this story happened to me. I'm sitting in my truck, messing with my radio. Suddenly there is a knock in the door. I open it, and there is an old Pole on the threshold, and he speaks something quickly in Polish, grabs my sleeve and pulls me after him. I only understood that something happened with his daughter. We come to his house which was nearby and I see that some tanker is trying to rape a girl, apparently the daughter of this Pole. I dragged him away, but he's completely drunk. A captain, with decorations all over his chest. Thank God, he came to. He says: "Sergeant Major, let's go to your place and have a drink." We went. He took out a flask. We poured. I drank and my eyes popped out - gasoline! I tell him: "What did you pour?!" He says: "Drink it, this is alcohol. You see, we drove by an alcohol plant, but didn't have anything to put the alcohol in. We had an almost empty tank, only a little diesel at the bottom, so we poured it there."

Before crossing the German border in the region of Bromberg (Bydgoszcz) the company politruk (political officer - trans.) came to a meeting and announced the following: "We are entering German territory. We know that Germans brought uncounted evils to our land, that is why we are entering their territory, to punish the Germans. I ask you not to make contact with the local population, so that you wouldn't have any troubles, and not to walk alone. Well, and concerning the woman question, you can treat the German women rather freely, but so it wouldn't look organized. 1-2 men can go, do what they need (that's exactly what he said: "what they need"), return, and that's all. Any kind of pointless damage to German men and women is inadmissible and will be punished." This conversation made us feel that he himself didn't know exactly what norms of behavior should've been followed. Of course, we were all under the influence of propaganda, which didn't differentiate Germans and Hitlerites in those times. That's why I know of a ton of cases when German women were raped, but not killed. Treatment of German women (we almost never saw men) was free, even vengeful. In our regiment the Sergeant Major of the supply company set up practically an entire harem. He had the capabilities in terms of food. So the German women lived with him, he used them, and also gave to others. A couple of times, when entering houses, I saw killed old people. Once, having entered a house, we saw that someone was lying on the bed. I pulled the blanket off and saw a woman with a bayonet in her chest. What happened? I don't know. We left without asking. But the picture completely changed after the Victory, when on May 12-14, an article by Academician Aleksandrov called "Ilya Erenburg Oversimplifies" was published in the Pravda newspaper. That's where it was declared that there are Germans, and then there are Hitlerites. That was the time of change, when peaceful reconstruction started. Then they started tightening the screws, punish practically every misdemeanor. Already at the Bornholm Island one sergeant took a watch off a Dane - just took it by force - and stripped the leather off sports equipment in a school for his boots. So he was sentenced to be shot, but Rokossovskiy (the front commander - trans.) didn't ratify the sentence.

There was another case when a soldier or a sergeant kissed or hugged a Danish woman, and some Dane saw it, called the commandant's office, and this soldier was immediately arrested and they wanted to court martial him for supposed rape. But when this girl found out that they want to try the guy, she herself ran to the commandant and said that the guy hadn't tried to rape her at all. Although, when in '95 the Danish government invited us to Bornholm to celebrate the 50 year anniversary of the Victory, they said that after our troops left in '46 about 100 children born out of wedlock remained. Apparently, this concerned our officers who, unlike the soldiers, lived freely in private apartments.

** I had many radio sets which were used depending on the task at hand. For example, we had a small radio set "Sever" for communicating with the partisans. We also had V-100 and RP-6, the oldest and least used. And then we had our domestic RSB (Fast Bomber Radio) in several crates. According to the TO&E we had aluminum tubes in the set, for elongating the antenna, but until we settled in one spot, we just stuck the antenna higher, and that's all. "To trek" - understand, speak. The word that is not used anymore at all. Already in Germany, it was replaced by "fershtey" (from German "verstehen" - trans.)

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