Chukhinina Maria Nikolaevna

On 11 August 2010 in her living room

Interviewers : Konstantin […],Antonida Novoselova, Katrin Schubert, Ina Alexandra Reshetilovki

I, Maria Nikolaevna Chukhinina, was born on 1 January 1924 in the village of Elisabetovka, in the Kharkov region. In 1940, I moved with my parents and my sister to Konstantinovka. I finished 7 years at school.

In 1941 German soldiers captured me on the street and took me away to work in Germany. On the troop train they sent me to Berlin. In the carriage I slept on straw; they did not give us anything to eat and seldom let us go to the toilet.

For one year I worked for a German family. The woman of the house had a grocery shop. First they checked me out to see if I was honest, but then they loved me. They gave me enough food, and also clothes and some money. In the beginning of 1942 doctors discovered that I had problems with my lungs and sent me to work in a labour camp. Sometimes the woman of the house came to the camp and gave me food and clothing.

In the labour camp we worked for 12 hours a day. I prepared parts for cars. When the Russian forces approached Berlin they sent us to some village. But when they ‘liberated’ us it did not get any better. The Russian soldiers considered us to be traitors and sent us to work on a farm and then in a sausage factory. In 1945 they sent me to Brest, and then they let me go home to Konstantinovka. At home many despised me and I could not find work. I married in 1946 and had two daughters. I did manage to get an education and worked as an accountant in the glass factory. I worked there for 35 years.