Nineteenth installment from the diary of my great-grandfather’s sister Alise, written during the First World War. When the diary starts, she is living just a few miles from the front lines of the Eastern Front, and is then forced to flee with her husband and two young daughters to her family’s house near Limbaži as the war moves even closer. It was here that her third child, a son, was born in February 1916. For more background, see here, and click on the tag “diary entries” to see all of the entries that I have posted.

April 3, 1916

Palm Sunday

A beautiful day. Yes – the beauty of spring cannot be stopped by the boom of the cannons, or the bad luck of humanity. The cannonfire could be heard all night, and now it is booming so uncomfortably that I can’t stand listening to it. What sort of days are ahead? What will happen, what with my little children, my little son? Right now again we have a horse, egg, curds [undecipherable]. Eggs already cost 12 kopecks. Everyone is afraid of famine. Many houses nearby are already filled with Austrians. Many of the sick and wounded have been put in the school. Theft and murder is on the rise… oh, if only we could get away to some quiet Russian province, then we could live and there would be plenty of bread.