Trauma of a Military Burial

Childhood Memories

As I stated in previous posts, many fictional accounts in my novels are based on my childhood experiences. Since these memories are over seventy-years old, they may be lacking in detail and somewhat exaggerated, but they still make good drama.  One occasion I incorporated in my second novel, Banners: For God, Tsar and Russia, happened just after World War Two. 

Returning home for the last time

I was probably four or five when the remains of a neighbor were returned home for burial and I was expected to attend the funeral.  Unfortunately, my older friends took me aside and twisted the event into something horrific.  "After they open the casket," they whispered, "you have to kiss him good-bye." 

The last farewell

My "friends" said the soldier's body would look and smell like the dead dog we had found in the woods earlier that summer.  The ghastly image that pounded in my mind convinced me to stay away from the church and no amount of my mother's begging or threats could make me go.

Real and imagined terror

Poor Stepha

Using this memory, I placed my protagonist Stepha in a similar situation.  Because Stepha was the deceased soldier's godson, his mother told him he was to perform special duties at the funeral.  Akulina explained what an honor it was, but like me, someone had planted black seeds in his mind.

***

         Nothing worked. She screamed, she begged, she threatened, she swatted, but nothing could break Stepha’s stubbornness. Akulina stood over her son and looked down at him in total exasperation. "If your father were here, you would be singing a much louder song.” Stepha refused to look at his mother. Instead he sprawled on the izbah floor, his balled fists rubbing his puffy, tear-flooded eyes. His crying had finally ceased, but his little body still trembled with silent sobs.

* * *

Why did Stepha behave like this?  The usual culprit, his aunt and perpetual tormentor, Kataya.

* * *

Stepha lay on the floor and did not look up even after he was sure his mother was gone. He did not want to bid farewell to Ribba, nor did he want to see Ribba. Tet-ta Kataya had told him Ribba was dead, just like the samka they had found in the woods. Tet-ta also said Ribba would be full of the white worms like the wild pig. Stepha thought of the stink and the flies, the hollow black eyes, and how shrunken lips pulled away from the yellowed tusks. No, Stepha would not go. He wouldn't do what Tet-ta said a good godson must do. He didn't want to see Ribba when they opened the box and most of all he did not want to kiss him. Stepha pressed his face closer to the cold, hard floor and tried to hide from the sight and the smell.

* * *

As it turned out, Stepha need not have worried.  The caskets were symbolic and contained only the memories of Hutava's lost sons.  

* * *

On the burial hill, the last handfuls of earth had been thrown into Ribba's grave. The fearful image Stepha imagined in the coffin did not exist. The only portion of Ribba Kunatz in the ground was his memory. In the hearts of the villagers, Ribba rested along side the two Gerous boys who would no longer work the store, Antonov who would no longer farm, as neither would Kulemhov. Ribba was with young Lev Shimonsky, who they said would have become a fine leather maker and good father had not an Austrian shell blown him to bits. Seven graves marked the soldiers' corner and only one held a body, that of Pinchuk who died of a sickness before he arrived in Pinsk. The others contained only memories: an ikon, a picture, a mallet, a leather knife, a hoe, and a tattered fishing net.

* * *

Shameless Plug

There are many incidents culled from my childhood used in creating my novels.  Notably, the one where Stepha and Vanya are startled by two disfigured veterans.  Akulina uses their reaction to tell the parable of the Mouse, the Rooster and the Cat and how one should not judge by appearances.  But to get the full effect you need to obtain a copy of Banners.