The Bones of My People: One German woman’s story of survival as a forced laborer in the Soviet Union after World War II

Gertrud Baltutt, nee Jakumeit, was born in 1913 in Memel, East Prussia, Germany (now Klaipeda, Lithuania), eventually marrying Otto Baltutt in 1934, whereupon they moved to Gilgenburg, East Prussia (because of his military service). It was in Gilgenburg that their first two daughters were born. After Otto’s term of service was complete, they moved to Osterode, East Prussia (now Ostroda, Poland), where her last two daughters were born. During the time they lived in Osterode, Otto commuted to Koenigsberg, East Prussia’s capital, to work as a machinist. When the Soviet Army’s advance in 1945 penetrated the borders of East Prussia, the family fled via refugee train, but were overtaken by Soviet forces in the town of Preussisch Holland, where both Gertrud and Otto were taken into custody for forced labor. It is unknown what happened to Otto, but Gertrud was transported to the Ural Mountains in Russia, where she was forced to do hard labor in the forests and the nearby steppes of the Ural region. After three and a half years of forced labor, she was returned to Germany, and not knowing their fate, began the search for her children.