Leonid Krichevskiy

This is my husband Leonid Krichevskiy. The picture was taken in Saratov in 1940. I met my future husband at work. Leonid Krichevskiy was an engineer. He worked with medical X-ray and physiotherapy apparatus. Leonid graduated from college. He was a jack-of-all-trades. He was good at mechanics. Leonid previously worked in the military hospital and was responsible for equipment repair. In 1948 Leonid came to work in our hospital because of the mass dismissal of Jews. He was much older than me. Leonid was born in 1908 in Samara. After the revolution his family moved to Saratov. Leonid had stayed there before the war. He went in the lines as soon as the war began. After demobilization he was offered a job in the Moscow military hospital. Leonid was married. His wife was twelve years older than him. They had a daughter. After the war Leonid divorced his wife, but they lived in the same apartment. Leonid wooed me for three years. First I didn't want to be with him, as I thought that he should live for his daughter. His child needed a father. Finally he broke down my resistance. His courtship was spectacular. There was a mail box with a slot on my door. Every morning when I went out, I saw a bouquet of flowers in my mailbox and the words on my fence, 'I was here,' and the date. I never saw him bringing the flowers or writing the words on my fence. Then we started seeing each other. We got married in 1952. We didn't have a wedding party. We just registered our marriage in the state registration office and had a festive dinner with our closest relatives afterwards. We didn't have a place to live, and my sister-in-law talked us into staying in her apartment. We made a partition and stayed in the room. In 1954 my daughter was born. She was named Olga after my perished sister. My husband died in 1964, when my daughter turned ten. He was buried in the city cemetery.