Tag #154453 - Interview #97841 (Hertz Rogovoy )

My parents and I settled in a village not far from Voronezh, 650 km to the east from Kiev. I decided to finish the 10th grade, but did manage since I received the notice to appear in the military enlistment office in 1942. It was drafting of my age. I turned 18. The draftees were brought together on the collecting point, and from there were supposed to go Lipetsk [about 640 km from Kiev] mostly on foot, at times in carts. There was a training regiment in Lipetsk, where we were trained to march in a squadron before being dispatched to the front. We were inquired about our education. Since I finished 9 grades, it was decided to send to the military school. Again, I headed on the road - by trains, steam boat and car. We were brought to the military school in Balakhna [Russia, 1100 km from Kiev], a town about 50 km away from Nizhniy Novgorod. It was Simferopol gun and mortar military school, evacuated in Balakhna. My recollections about that military school are even more hideous than war. We had such a skimpy food, that we were running amuck from famine. We begged on the streets, trying not to be nabbed by the commanders. Once I went to the shanty to ask for food, where our commander was with his lover. He saw me and recognized me. I was lucky not to get into trouble. We found ingenuities to get some food. At school we were given a tiny bar of soap. We collected that soap. Then we took wooden bars, soaked them in water and coated in soap.