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December 30, 1932 page 5 Rev. William L. Scheding, pastor of Mt. Tabor Church on Butternut St., looks back to the turn of the year 10 years ago when he was an agent for the charitable work of the Lutheran Church in Russia. Let's read from a letter of that time, which has come into our hands: "On the Journey to Saratov-Moscow, January 5, 1923. — Have just left Saratov for Moscow. I will arrive during the Russian Christmas season. This year I celebrate two Christmases. However I will write about New Years Eve in Russia on the Volga and the experiences I had crossing the Mighty River. I must go to the city of Pokrovsk, just up the river from Saratov. The A.R.A. (American Relief Administration) put a good horse, a sleigh, and a coachman at my disposal. The journey proceeded; it was foggy, frosty, and quite cold. You couldn't see 200 feet ahead because of the fog. Every once in a while camel's head popped out of the fog, pulling the ridiculously low-slung, tiny sleighs behind them. The hills are covered with frost, as are the large coats, caps and beards of the men. Other people pull the sleighs themselves, which are loaded with various products they want to sell. Everything goes well until we wanted to cross a large island in the middle of the Volga. Upon leaving the island we suddenly slid sideways and before I knew it I was sliding off the sleigh on my hands. The open water was quite near to us when a few Russians extricated us from the situation. "With great effort the drawbar of the sleigh was repaired and we could continue on our long journey. We were still far from the middle of the Volga. One can imagine how happy I was when I heard an automobile horn behind me, which announced the A.R.A. Really, it was a clunky old Ford belonging to the A.R.A. with four Russian officials and a barrel of gasoline. I quickly climbed into the front seat and we made our way to a Pokrovsk warehouse. Having inspected the bundles of clothing for the relief work, I got back into the Ford and we made our way to Saratov. I've certainly had many wild rides in cars but I will never forget the journey in the dilapidated Ford with a daredevil of a driver over the smooth ice of the frozen Volga. Every so often we had to swerve and the Ford lunged 50 to a 100 feet. I constantly thought about skiing, fearing that we would encounter an obstacle and fly off into the air. Everything was going fairly well until we wanted to cross one of the nearby bridges made of firmly packed ice to the island where water seeped through a crevasse four to six inches wide. 'Only' twice did the driver steer the front wheels into the water, and what work it was getting free again could scarcely be described. Yet the men didn't seem annoyed by the task and even I laughed about the incident. Oh, how happy I was as I finally saw the deep harbor of Saratov before me; I'm sure you can imagine it. Up it went, down we came, once, twice, three times. The last time the rear end of the car hit one of the huge, frozen ships. I climbed down the incline and waited until the car could be moved. 'And so, I experienced air travel on the Volga River on New Years Eve!' My whole life long I'll never forget it and the pictures I took will help me never forget the journey over the frozen surface of the great Volga River in Russia" [Translator's Note: A picture of a Camel Caravan can be found at the Hoover Institute's American Relief Administration in Soviet Russia webpage. |
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Translation by Susan Kriegbaum-Hanks
August 26, 2024