«The best day»: Lidiya's story — a child of war

Editorial note. This story is a composite portrait based on the recollections of children of war. The name is conditional, but the events described — siege, hunger, evacuation, the joy of Victory Day — reflect the typical experience of millions of children of that generation.

Children's memories of war are among the most powerful and unguarded testimonies of World War II. Through personal stories you can sense not only the fear and hunger of the war years, but also the enormous value of peace, family, and human life. This is the story of a childhood that took place amid war, and of a Victory Day remembered for a lifetime.

A childhood amid war

When the war began, Lidiya was still a child. Instead of an ordinary childhood, she encountered hunger, fear, and constant danger far too early.

Her most frightening memories would always remain the war years in Leningrad. People survived as best they could, and a trip to fetch bread became a real ordeal.

"What saved us was being shut indoors all the time," she would recall many years later. "It kept us from the worst scenes, when going out for a piece of bread meant stepping over the dead, gnawed by rats."

For children of war, bread was not just food — it was a symbol of life and rescue. That is why, decades later, white bread remained her favourite food.

Father at the front, and the family's rescue

During the war, Lidiya's father served at the front and was severely wounded. He ended up in a Moscow hospital.

From there he sent his orderly to Leningrad — a man whom Lidiya remembered all her life as "Uncle Misha". It was he who managed to find the family and help them get out of the city.

After her father was discharged, the family travelled to Uzbekistan, where they were able to wait out the hardest war years far from the front line. In 1945 they were sent to Minsk, which became Lidiya's new home.

"I never saw such joy again"

What stayed with her most vividly was 9 May 1945.

"What a celebration it was, how people rejoiced — never again in my life did I see so much joy, so many tears of happiness. The best day of all!"

For people who had lived through the war, Victory meant far more than the end of fighting. It meant the hope of a life without fear, hunger, and loss.

Life after the war

After the war Lidiya never became a baker, as she had dreamed of as a child, though bread remained her favourite food for the rest of her life. Before retirement she worked as a goods clerk in a shop, raised a son, two granddaughters, and became a great-grandmother to four great-grandchildren.

Lidiya spoke with gratitude about Belarus, which became her second home after the war.

Her main wish, throughout her life, was a simple one: that future generations should never know what war is.

Why preserving such stories matters

Children's stories of the war let us see World War II through the eyes of ordinary people. They remind us of the price at which peace was bought, and of how deeply war changes human lives.

Each year, fewer witnesses of those events remain. That is why it is especially important to preserve their recollections today — for children, grandchildren, and generations yet to come.

How to preserve memory today

On moypolk.uk you can preserve the story of your own relatives who lived through the war, add photographs and recollections to the registry of memory, and explore the stories of other families.

Users can search for veterans and war participants by known information, study archival profiles, and light online candles in memory of the heroes.

Projects like this help keep the living memory of the wartime generation alive and pass it on to future generations.

No one is forgotten, nothing is forgotten

As long as we preserve the personal stories of those who lived through the war, the memory of them continues to live.

These recollections help us understand the cost of peace and remember the generation that had to live through one of the hardest trials in human history.