Midnight Train to Siberia

by Alicja Goral, Teresa Radomska

Overview

One freezing February night in 1940, fifteen-year-old Alicja Goral, her parents and younger sister and brother were dragged from their home and forced to board a cattle train to be transported over a thousand miles to the wastes of Siberia.

They were just one of many thousands of Polish families sent to labour camps by Stalin and his NKVD after the Soviets seized their country at the outbreak of World War II.
They became 'non-persons', forced to work from dawn to dusk in freezing conditions on the most meagre rations.

Ultimately the Gorals and the Radomskis were among the lucky ones – they managed to survive their ordeal, return to Europe and find new homes in post-war England, where Alicia and the family found peace and security.

Alicja, now 89, has finally told her shocking, heart-rending story with the help of her daughter Teresa.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940162246732
Publisher:	Mereo Books
Publication date:	01/21/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

This is the story of my mother Alicja Goral, with additional material added from research to paint the picture as vividly as possible. It is dedicated to my mother and to the memory of my grandparents and Great Uncle Walery and his family. Their courage in defying immeasurable human suffering is hugely significant and must be acknowledged.

Stalin deported at least 1.8 million Poles to Siberia and other bleak outposts of Russia, but not many Western history books record this episode. No politicians honour the victims in speeches commemorating World War II. Yet accounts of the war are incomplete without this neglected historical tragedy.

I am conscious of my roots as a daughter of the eastern Borderland survivors, settlers who were the Red Army’s first target on entering Poland. Their aim was to crush these military families in an act of revenge and retaliation, and there was no place for this ‘clique’ in the Soviet order. Stalin had not forgotten the defeat in the 1920 Polish- Bolshevik war.

I hope my contribution to these memoirs has done justice to the memory of my beloved grandparents, Kazia and Adam and the other members of the family, Walery, Ziuta and family, all linked to the names of Radomski and Goral.

The story continues with the combined thoughts, memories and research of mother and daughter: Alicja
Hartley, formerly Goral, and myself.