This is a picture of me. This photo was taken in the evacuation, in Kamyshlov in 1943. I sent this photo to my husband at the front.
I graduated from university in 1925. After university I worked as a dentist in Tartu for some time before I received a job offer in Sigulda, a resort town where I worked before getting married. I met my future husband, David Sorkin, at Tartu University. David was born in Tartu in 1903. He studied at the Medical Faculty of Tartu University. He found me in Sigulda. I was receiving my patients, when I noticed that one man in the queue was sitting there letting everybody else go before him. When he came into my office he said he was happy to find me. He came to see me over weekends. Then he proposed to me. David lived in Tyrve where he went on a job assignment upon his graduation from university. I didn't think about getting married. I had a job and earned my own living and I liked it. I had an apartment and money. I was in no hurry to get married. However, David didn't give up. He kept visiting and convincing me to become his wife until I finally gave him my consent. We got married in 1933.
On Sunday 22 June 1941 Hitler's Germany, having violated the Non-Aggression Treaty crossed the border of the USSR without declaring a war. The Great Patriotic War began. Shortly afterward the evacuation began. I, Mama and David decided to evacuate. My brother and younger sisters refused to join us, however hard I tried to convince them to go with us. They perished during the occupation. There were no survivors in three families.
Our trip was long. At last we were sent to Kamyshlov in Tomsk region. We were accommodated in a small room in a local house. There was one good thing about the room. One wall adjoined to the stove in the kitchen. A few days later my husband went to the military office for registration. He was allowed one day to pack and come back to the military office. From there he was sent to the regiment formation site near Moscow. My husband was assigned to a front-line hospital. Later, in 1942, he was assigned to the Estonian Corps front-line hospital where he served through the wartime. I corresponded with my husband through the wartime. We wrote each other almost every day.
