LMC: We are in Drăgășani. Today is the 20th of July 2004 on Saint Elijah’s Day, we are in the yard of our aunt Luta and we do an interview with aunt Perisga, uncle Si, uncle Papin and aunt Luba. Be full of luck and healthy! I trust I found you all well!

Sia: May you be blessed too!

LMC: Uncle Sia, be so kind to tell us your testimony of the Bug.

Sia: The Bug.

LMC: Whose son, are you?

Sia: I belong to Grânaru.

LMC: Grânaru of the…

Sia: who belongs to Cocina.

LMC: Be blessed! How old were you when you were taken to the Bug?

Sia: I was 17.

LMC: Now please tell us.

Sia: They came and picked us up from one of our villages, Smărdioasa. The gendarmes gathered us and were put to transfer us from police station to police station. Like this they took us up to Tiraspol, at the Bug.

Luba: They took us from station to station.

LMC: Please tell us what you encountered on the roads, what sufferings you went through.

Sia: The gendarmes would beat us; you do not know how the transfer was? The gendarmes were beating us, they were tormenting us. Gendarmes in front of us, gendarmes behind us. The gendarme here was waiting for us to get there and at the other end of the village there was a new gendarme who took us over and brought us further. And in the next village the same, and then the same, from one station to another.

LMC: How many siblings did you have?

Sia: Me. 5 brothers and a sister.

LMC: Please tell us their names.

Sia: One was named Toma, one was named Stan, and one Melu, the Godson-

LMC: Are some of them still alive?

Sia: They live.

Persiga: They are all here, alive.

Sia: Papana died, my sister Luba, died.

LMC: Please tell.

Sia: So, they took us up to Tirasco. We passed through Moldovca.

Pesiga and Marița: They took us over there in Moldovca. And there they took away our horses and our wagon carts.

Sia: There they took our wagons, or horses, our tents. We did not have any gold coins, no brass, all our buckets were taken over there in Moldovca. When Antonescu came to shoot us.

Papin: But then…

Sia: What do you know about this, nothing. You were small. Antonescu came to shoot us.

Luba: And the Queen came from above.

Sia: The Queen, Michael and Karol’s mother, she came and trew the papers from the airplane just as they set the cannons to shoot us and kill us.

LMC: were there many people there?

Sia: Oooo, we were 16.000 families, only families. They took our carts, our horses and all our treasures. Where they found gold coins, they took them.

LMC: Please tell us your Bug testimony.

Persiga: Of the Bug? We were in Craiova. And they picked us up from there, from Craiova, from Grosuri. And the gendarmes took us, and we were brought from station to station. As we went from station to station wherever we paused, wherever we stayed overnight, the next morning when we woke up, the gendarmes took over and brought us further to the next station. Now where were they supposed to take us, that is where we arrived.  We did endure much trouble on the way. Now you see, the gendarmes beat us and said: „Keep the convoy ahead.” The gendarmes also hit us from time to time. They beat or hit us. Now, when gendarmes were hitting us, we would say: „Stop hitting us man. What did we steal that you beat us like this?” ” Come on, let’s keep the convoy ahead.” We traveled ahead. As we were going, we travelled the roads for a month, three weeks.

LMC: Please do be quiet, it’s not ok for me to step in each time.

Persiga: Now we arrived there. When we arrived, the gendarmes were beating us.  They hit us. We arrived at Daminelca. They took our carts, took out horses, took our gold.  We stayed there for one year, in that Dumalevca. And where we stayed, they took our carts, our fire heaters, and our gold. They were killing us, shooting us, they would shoot us so we would not go to the village. Because we were going to the village for seeds, that is why they shot us. These being said, what did we do? We stayed in the houses, so the gendarmes don’t kill us. In the places we stayed, we were starving, we died of hunger as we had nothing to eat. We had nothing to eat, as we did not get anything from the collective, they didn’t give us one thing.  This being said, what did we do? We stayed there and they made those huts for us. We stayed in the huts because they took our carts, they took our stuff, our gold. We had nothing left, not even a place to hit our heads at. We had no alternatives. What were we supposed to do? They told us: „Leave the horses, we made huts for you. We give you a house, we give you food, we give you oxen”

Sia: Cow with milk.

Persiga: Nothing. At the place we went to, we found nothing there, Lumina. We found just huts. At that place, those who could run to occupy a hut, got one, who could not, would die on the top of the huts.

Sia: People died outside.

Luba : People died outside. What could we do, we could not do anything. We ate dogs, we ate them, we had no choice. We had no place to hit our heads at.

Sia: Others would live out of some dead guy and eat him.

Persiga: There was no other solution. What could we do? If we walked to the village, the gendarmes caught us and beat us to death. They beat us. Now, at that place, my grandmother died and we buried her in fir. We had no choice. When my little brothers would go to the village, the gendarmes would kill them. We did not bring anything. We did not bring a dime. We had no food to eat. What were we doing? We fled unseen to go to the village. If the gendarmes grasped us, they beat us, they beat us to the ground, those gendarmes. Why, what harm did we do? We took some things and came back home. We went the next day too, the gendarmes beat us again, that was it. Our gold remained there, they took our clothes, our stuff, we had nothing left. What did we do? We stayed there for two and a half years. After two and a half years, we had nothing. We stayed there and we still had no place to put our heads to rest. People died in the huts, we got blind in there, the huts had no windows, had nothing. Those were huts like those where you used to put cabbage inside over the winter. That’s what they were like. Thats how they looked like. We made a fire in the middle and died asphyxiated inside because of the smoke. And then, my father, Ilia,  

Sia: Ilia was your father’s name?

Persiga: Iliais his name. Well, what did my father do: „ Kids, take those towels and go to the village, because we have nothing left to eat.” And we went, Lumină, we were a little older, and we gathered in the village whatever the Russian women gave us, because I got from them, they gave me potatoes, beans, I got that in the village.

Sia: Flour.

Persiga: They gave me flour. I gathered this much, a bag full. I could not carry it by myself, so I threw stuff away, I threw it away. I could not carry it. Away, far away we were.

LMC: with whom were you in the village? Alone?

Persiga: I went alone to the village, because if there were more of us, the gendarmes would kill us. I was older, I was. The gendarmes caught us, but by myself, I could hide. I brought stuff by myself, alone. I brought it and arrived home. When I came home, I brought food for my father, for my siblings. I brought them food to eat, and they kept that for from today till tomorrow at noon.

LMC: How many siblings did you have?

Persiga: Three brothers. I did not have many.

Sia: Oaia, Oaia is alive.

Persiga: Oaia is alive, Oaia, Gogu died, Gogu.

LMC: God rest his soul.

Persiga: Brati. These three brothers I had., three. I brought them back from the Bug. I brought him from the bug. I brought Brati my brother around my neck. God gave, and he gave that the war line got closer to us. Our things remained there in the huts. The pillows, the goose feather blanket that we slept with, remained there. We had no place to sleep in. Bombs were falling upon us as we walked on the roads. When the war line came to us, we gathered what we could carry and ran away: “Those who want to leave, should leave. Those who do not want to, shall remain” Many people remained at the Bug. Two sisters-in-law, both maidens remained there, my father-in-law left them there. She left them in the middle of the road, two girls, maiden.  

LMC: How old were they?

Persiga: They were old. They were about 15-16 years old.

LMC: Why did he let them on the road? Were the girls sick?

Persiga: Their feet hurt, and they could not walk any further because it started to snow. The girls were pretty undressed, bar foot, so the poor souls remained behind. I left them up to put them in our cart.” Let them stay too” but Mârado, he did not allow them in the cart.  He threw them down, those kids, Mârado the elder one. After he threw them out, I took them both in my arms and said to them: “Marcela and Lucica stay here, we will be back for you, and we will take you with us. “Fake promises. We did not return to take them, both remained there in the field.

LMC: They died there. God have mercy with their souls.

Persiga: God forgive them! We left them there, Lumina, but behind us came the soldiers and the military. They came to take us, now Lumină , with transfer. To take us, to go towards Pitești. What happened afterwards? We came backwards to Bucharest and stayed there. Now everything was gone, carts, clothes, horses, gold. As we stayed there, we ate dogs. There we ate dogs, at the huts. There were many misfortunes there and we ate whatever we found and what we did not find we did not eat. What we people, what we found, we ate: What we had, that is what we ate.

LMC: Back there, I want you to tell me about the great cold when the huts froze down.

Persiga: Now listen. My mother and I went one day. Where did we go, my mother and I, Natalița was her name? Me and her went to get some food. The snow caught up with us. My feet were freezing. Since then, my feet are no good. The snow caught us, it was this high. My uncle Stan died then- We could not carry him, so he was left dead in the field. What else to do? My grandfather died there, my grandmother too. We couldn’t do anything. They died, because of the freezing.  The snow came upon them, they were starving poor souls, there was no salt, no water, they had no food and nothing to drink. They bent their heads and died. Where else to go, dear Lord, to get food, as we could not go out of fear of the gendarmes. We could not go because of the snow, because there was high snow, I could not go because my feet froze, I could not go. I was crippled. I came back with swollen feet, that’s how much I walked barefoot. „ I cannot go any longer, father, I can’t walk.” „Go girl, or else we will starve to death. Go and bring some food.” I can’t father, I can’t”. That was when, Lumină, I told to myself: my grandmother died, my grandfather too, my uncles, my uncle Stan too. My nephews died there, my brothers. All starved to death, what were we supposed to do? At the bug, people would not let us, whenever we went out, they killed us, they shoot us. When we got closer to the Bugriver: „Go away” They killed us. They run after us, hit, hit, hit, hit us. Killing us. And I said to them:  „Dear Lord, why are you doing this?” They shot my nephew, Cioabă, in the heart. They shot him because of some seeds. They shot him on the spot in the sunflower field. They killed him. „What else to do, father. Don’t you see, people die. Where else should we go? We can no longer go.” But still, it was hard, it was dangerous, occasionally but we kept going. Children starved to death; we had nothing to eat. From the collective, we did not get anything, from the people in the village we took here and there something: there was no salt, no water and we died like dogs…

LMC: Did you go to the collective to work?

Persiga and Sia: I worked for almost one year and I went to the collective. But they did not give us anything and I told them „God, you took our carts and our horses, what are we supposed to eat? We do not have anything to eat. “And they would answer: „Did i brought you here? The police brought you from wherever you came.” That is what those people were saying, the Russians, the ceolovicii. Now, we gathered our stuff and came. Our dead remained back there; we could not do anything for them. They remained there. One man died on my hut, a nephew. We do not know when he died. . „Look father, what did we do? We did not let him inside the hut.”

Sia: Where did he come from?

Persiga: Wherever he came from, he came. We do not know where he came from. He remained. He came and he died on our hut. What else could we do after hie died on our hut? But now, God had mercy, and we left. The war line was approaching us. When the war was near, we gathered all together and left. My brother fell, and he was to die, to die on the road. Oaie, whom you do not know. I shake him awake and take him in my arms. „Do not die, brother, don’t die brother!” I put him on my back and carried him like that. I could barely carry him, couse i could not do otherwise „Brother, you die, I’ll let you on the road! “And then he told me: “Well, what should I do sister, I can’t walk any more. I cannot walk. I fell off my feet and died. I cannot walk as I am starving.” Where from should I take something Lumină, there was no food, there was nothing. I had no means to procure anything, beat me. This happened on the road.

Luba: I am Luba a Moșa, doughter of Șopârla. My grandfathers name was Gheordi Bicăuși, Melalo was my uncle. My mother told me about when they took us; she was married here in Teleorman, at Smărdioasa. We had no stability back then. Our people did not have a domicile as we were wandering around wherever we wanted.  My father was wandering with my grandfather to Craiova, they would go and come back. They took us after Easter. One week after Easter. We formed a convoy, we gave a declaration and left from there from Găurici, that is where we left from. They took us from there with transfer, the first time…

„Listen me saying, if you knew, why didn’t you tell it first?

LMC: Please tell us now aunt, continue.

Luba: When they took us first and brought us from one station to another, there were some sick kids coughing who died in the cart. Two children, that’s how many they were. The carts were rolling, and the kids died. Candles were burning. So, they gave us a break from now till tomorrow morning for us to bury the children. This was nothing, we continued our journey. We left there, passed Bucharest, station to station. We run to eat some mulberries, we the kids and the gendarme shoot and shoot the child here through his hand. It cut off his hand. We arrived at tat customs. You tell me, how was it called?

Sia: The customs.

Luba: Poverty might eat it us, Tiraspol. They got everything out up to the bottom of our carts. They dismantled the cart axles and searched all. They dismantled the wheels, the wood, searched under the covers all over the place. What did my mother do? She prepared a big polenta, and she did not know where else to hide the gold. We had a small table, and she poured over the polenta on that table, and she stocked all the gold coin inside the polenta.

LMC: And well she did.

Luba: She stuck them in the smooth polenta. We had no onions. We had nothing. When we arrived, he took everything, he took everything he could get, Dușanu, he got us there at the customs because he was a soldier, Dușanu. He was with us. He took us there from station to station and that is how we arrived for the first time in Frunza.  We stayed for a while there, in Frunza, many people came together there, Moldovans and Roma and all nations and we all crossed to Moldovca. There in Moldovca, they took our carts, took our horses. We were thousands and hundreds, all gypsy nations. Those one would come, the lăieți, thieves and steal the meat as we had meat hanged in our carts with chains. My father slept on the cart up in the back and the lăieț stole all bags with clothes so that my mother was left with that what she wore and one scarf on her head. They took our carts and brought them to the Lubaiovca train station.

LMC: Where did you stay?

Luba: We stayed, because they took the carts and shot Rădicari’s kid. They also shot a man who has had fights in Craiova. People committed crimes and killings back there, were stealing thieves and lăieții equally. We stayed there in Dumalevca from after Easter, we had been on the roads for six weeks, after Easter, and we still had one month until Christmas. The month of Christmas. They were building the huts, that was by the time they were building them. And they took us from there and the tents remained rose just like that. That was the Valey of Sorrow. People’s clothes remained there, their blankets and their gold. The Petorians got them. The Petorian got my father and then my father handed over the gold to my mother and my mother gave it to my sister. The gold was tucked in a men’s shirt. From my sister they reached me. And then came the old Zînca and I gave it to her and the Petorian followed her and took the gold together with the shirt. My father left for the woods. He was gone. All that was left was for us, because my mother never kept it all in one place, she had the coins spread in several places. She had 15 large golden coins inside the belt around her waist, 7 golden poles and 5 small coins she kept on the belt. It’s like I see them before my eyes. That was nothing, they searched, they did what they were supposed to do, and they left the tents arisen. Those who wanted to burn them down, set them on fire, soaps, meat, gold. They did not get broken carts for labor. Those were left on the fields. The ceolovics from a village came with carts and took us from there, from a village, we all have been staying there for two weeks. They took us and took us away in the evening. Some caught a hut, some others did not, those left outside, died. It started to snow, and the blizzard was blowing and scattering everything. Snow was covering the people, and they died.  At the mayor’s office, because they built a mayor’s office there at the huts. Some succeeded to enter the mayor’s office, those who did not, died in the back of is like sheep, like dead dogs. They were gone.  We did not have space, we had no fire, that was not so bad, it was nothing. Earth in those huts, earth was falling there. We had no water or where to drink water from. People would melt snow to drink water. We did not have what to cook either.  They found an acre with radishes, those red ones and that is what they survived with, as there was a collective there, a huge, long kolkhoz, and inside there were potatoes. Those who got there, took some, those who did not remained without food and died. Those who were healthy and brave enough would go and get some, who were not, remaining like that and were gone. People did not have any gold either. My uncle, Tomiță, gave away a big golden coin for four ox hooves and a veal head, that much it costed him, all because his son was ill. We stayed there for a while: one year and a half we lived in the huts.

Papin: That is where we lived …

Luba: What are you talking about? That is how long we stayed until they scattered us to the collectives. When we finished there, they sent us to that place that many, in the other that many, all over the place. Some of us were crying because we were in a foreign country, others because so many of us were falling, were crying that we would die. We arrived at the collectives to work- The ceolovics were beating us, we did not know what we were supposed to do. …  We remained there for a while, we remained for another year and a half until there were two and a half years completed. There was a gendarme from were ever that gendarme came, and that man told them: „If you see that this is not here anymore, that thing they have at the police station, then run too, because that means that the war line is retreating.” What did people do? Some built carts and horses, some smaller horses, those who still had gold. They took horses, took carts. They did not get from here to there, and the Germans confiscated them MY father took a dark spotted horse, after less than 10 kilometers the German came, rose the pistol „Aine clock ”„I shut you here” My father got out of the way and that cart remained deserted on the road the same way the tents remained back in  Dumalovca, the cart and everything in it. My father was scared that they might shoot him, took off in the wide world and left my mother with two girls. Me and my mother and my sister- We did what we could, and we reached one of those collectives, one without fire, without anything, a kolkhoz. We somehow managed to get there. From that place, in the morning we were in Tiraspol. The weather changed and it was warm and unbelievable beautiful. And the night came, during the Holy Week before Easter, all people were on the roads and in the fields and died. Those who succeeded ran away, those who could not …. My mother died with 15 gold Mahmouds, 7 gold poles and 6 small gold coins, she died with them on her belt, and my sister died too.  My mother said: „You should take whatever you can and run. If you can’t, then stay here.” So, we did what was necessary, and my father carried me in a bag. In a bag, my father carried me. From there, my mother remained and died, she died with her daughter and with her gold.  Then the bombing started, and people died like dogs die, oh Lord. My uncle Gogu went to hide in a shelter, but the bomb hit there, and a shrapnel cut off from the back of his head. It took off the top of his head, that shrapnel. Some died, some run away…. We arrived at the bridge to cross over. I did not know that my mother was dead when we crossed on this side of the Dniester.  As we were coming, one came … Tell her–- and after we crossed the bridge, did you make the counting, man?  Those who had no carts crossed, and those who paid the customs could keep the carts. We came, people paid some more 60-70 gold coins, and the others could cross. Here, where we crossed on foot, gendarmes came before us and sent us to a camp. We stayed in that camp, damn it…  We stayed three weeks in the camp. More and more people got typhus. They started to die because of it.

Papin: At Gurilovca

Luba : No.  When we returned, we were next to Bucharest. We somehow managed it and Mîrțanu, Ristoi the elder one, Vrața, Rancu paid 6 golden poles to a man who crossed us over the water.

Papin: At the Dniester, there was…

Luba: You shut up, this was another water as we had already passed the Dniester. And we crossed, at night we crossed.  The water was, like here, we did as said and crossed,  but the gendarmes  encountered us once again.  When those police men caught us and lined us up two by two to shoot us, a car came, like a truck and stopped. When the truck came, the driver asked: “What are you doing here, why?” „ We are in misery for two years now and these guys want to shoot us” And then he took out his ID from his chest, rose it up and yelled: „ You have shot the jews, now you’re shooting gypsies?”  People were crying, they could not believe their eyes as they saw the queen. As she was flying the plane above. We were at a well. We all cried that they would shoot us too. But suddenly there were document falling from the plane, the gendarmes took them and read them: „Do not burn my people down! Do whatever you do to my people, as these are my rich people, and they are everywhere. Do not shoot my people. You were supposed to take Jews only, but you took my people too, my Gypsies. ” That was nothing. We remained. From there they took us to the Bug. They were supposed to send us back from here, but as there was no more time they brought us to Moldovca, there. From there, I do not remember what they did, we escaped the camp, we ran again, we managed to leave and to arrive, but we left behind the mules, the horses, the carts that children sat in. We stayed for two days in a small train station. After two days we took the train, with the train we passed Bucharest and came to Costești. From Costești, we descended in Alexandria. And that is all I know. I came back without a mother, without a sister, with no family. I was raised by my father alone, and there was an aunt who looked after me. That is what we lived through, I do remember it because I was older, I was 10. My father got typhus, and I dragged him by his hand. His hands fell off from here up to here, only because of the bag he carried me in on our way back. How can we not be sick and distressed, all of us who were at the Bug, all of us who ate dead meat, dogs, cats, poor people…  We do have reasons. Look at the one who sits there, his feet and his back are broken since he was a kid, that one is sick, this one is sick, mercy for all the needy ones. The young generation we have now got out quite well. But we, the old ones …. Have you seen Drila how he is because he is not well, Drila. Did those dead meats they ate help the others? Did they help people with their bodies? When this man died, how could I eat his dead body, I spoke to him, and now should I eat him? I cannot put him in my soul? And look, neither I nor my husband got any compensation for the time we spent at the Bug. We handed in all the needed paperwork, we changed two large gold coins and did all the paperwork out of those, but me and my old man are the only ones who did not get a dime. You see, Persiga received it. We were not getting anything. But I thank you, because I actually could tell you, my testimony. I grew up in sorrow, without a mother, without a father.

LMC: Be blessed with luck and health!

Luba: You too dear and may God bless you with luck and health!