Page 9 - Excerpts from the diary

30.09.1942
I did not manage to finish yesterday. The platoon commander came to the observation post together with the company commander. It
appears the whole company is moving here.

During the night the new replacements dug trenches for themselves and fired the mortar. An enormous number of mines were fired: our
troops went over to the attack, and we supported them. We will probably leave here today. The company commander and political officer
think we are going to Oak Ravine. It was retaken from the Germans last night.

The political officer and company commander are suddenly speaking very gently to me. Still, the political officer did not miss the chance
to scold me because my mug had become dusty during the night firing and because Korneev’s cartridges were lying on top of the trench
this morning. They smile at me, and the company commander told the political officer: “Gelfand ought to be in the Party.”

They are greatly concerned about the arrival of new replacements, especially because there are two more Jews among them. The political
officer and company commander have mentioned this to me more than once. “One of them digs trenches well. He is one of your people
too; now you can put out a combat leaflet together,” the political officer said.

The platoon commander and the senior sergeant, however, remain rude and arrogant with me. They have sent me to the observation post
again. I asked permission to put my things in order and prepare for the move, but the platoon commander said: “Go to the observation
post immediately! That is an order! And you will stay there late!”

Gorshkov did not stand watch at all today. He has invented a new fashion of putting soldiers in his place, saying: “I trained a man
specially for this. Train him the way I did and then you will be able to put him in for yourself. He will be my sergeant!” And he gets away
with it. That is what is so offensive.

Kukailo is still here and is now a squad leader. “They have started tormenting me the way they used to torment you,” he told me today.

It turns out the books and other things are somewhere in the company. Kukailo’s kettle and underwear were handed over to someone—he
does not remember whom.
The compass apparently “fell out” in the political officer’s presence, and the political officer picked it up. The ink remained at our former
positions. No one saw the soap, and the political officer saw three boxes of matches in my bag.

Apparently the political officer knows nothing about the international situation either, because we are not receiving newspapers. He told
me the issue number. I did not write any letters today; our address has changed again and I do not know the new one yet.

Today I was ordered to make sure that everyone carried a slip of paper bearing his address and surname.

29.12.1942
What bastards there are, what rabid antisemites. It is hard for us to live here in the disgusting conditions of this hospital. Breakfast, for
example, is served at six or seven in the evening—I am not exaggerating. Lunch comes at five in the morning. We receive no supper at
all. The food is almost entirely liquid: water with semolina, half a plate, three ladles. A spoonful of potatoes. No meat. Just thin semolina
and a spoonful of potatoes. Bread: 600 grams; butter: 20 grams; sugar: 40 grams.

There are many other appalling hardships, but people—not everyone, it is true—blame the Jews for everything and openly call all of us
kikes. I get the worst of it, although of course I am guilty of nothing. They vent their rage on me, shout “kike” in my face, swear at me,
and never let me say a word or even make a remark when they litter and foul my bunk.

A political officer came just now; he too is Jewish. They speak to him quite seriously when he is close to them and agree with everything
he says, but the moment he walks away they pour out dreadful abuse against him and against all Jews. I am choking with anger. It is dark
now, though, and I cannot write much, especially because one of these bastards lying above me keeps dropping rubbish onto my head. I
have had to move to the very edge of the plank bed.

At the dressing station a nurse told me that I will probably be here for a month and a half, but I do not believe her.

The day before yesterday I wrote to Mother. Yesterday I wrote to Mother, Father, and Olya in Magnitogorsk. I told them I would stay
here no more than ten days, but I do not know how things will actually turn out.

27.02.1943
Today I quarreled with the landlady because I told her frankly everything I thought of her. She swore more obscenely than ever, railed
against “the Jews sitting on our necks,” cursed Soviet power, and then brutally beat her grandson Kolka, calling him “Soviet spawn,”
“Soviet whore,” and shouting all the while, “Swine, the kikes taught you that in a month,” and so on.

He calls her “a German fascist bitch” and other things of the sort, and in some of his epithets he is not far wrong. I will describe our
quarrel in more detail when I have time.

In the end, after cursing me with the foulest language, she told me exactly where I could go—censorship prevents me from repeating all
of it, or even part of it. She also promised to lock the door and refuse to let me back in. But I will not leave, as the comrade whom she
falsely accused of theft did. I will stay until I am discharged, which will apparently be tomorrow.