He Did Not Die in Vain
by Hilda J. Born

My father seldom spoke of his teenage years.  We knew there must have been sadness that still hurt him deeply. 

So we did not pry.  However, in 1993, after Glasnost made it possible, I  finally saw my Klassen aunts, Father’s half-sisters.  They told me some of the terrors they’d experienced.

Grandpa Franz Klassen’s sleep was troubled on the night of November 28, 1919.  Again and again he dreamed that nowhere could he find enough lumber to build a casket for his son. 

He tossed until morning, and then told his wife, Cornelia, about the dream. 

It was with hesitation that they accepted a friend’s invitation to a birthday Fesper that afternoon.

 While they were gone, Machno riders galloped into the village of Tiege where the family lived.   Grandpa Klassen’s place was immaculate, so that’s where they turned in.

 Nineteen-year-old Franz, who was the local schoolteacher, had just walked in with his armful of books.  His sister, Tina, eleven, and Helena, nine, were already at home and were preparing supper under the supervision of their older sister, Maria.  Brothers Johann and Henry were getting ready to head out for barnyard chores.

 Hoof beats on the yard startled the young people into action.  With lightning speed, the girls fled through the back door and vanished into a dugout shelter between the lilacs that had been readied for just such an emergency.

 The riders stomped into the house without knocking.  They spotted Franz’s watch and told him to hand it over.  He did.  Next they poked around for valuables, but found nothing that appealed to them.

 “Money!  Give us money now!”

 The boys emptied they pockets, but this pittance angered the bandits.

 “We don’t have any more!” the boys protested.

 “You are lying.  Give it to us or we’ll shoot!” the robbers demanded, insisting that they wanted one hundred rubles or they’d shoot all three.

 Franz knew it would be impossible to come up with the money and, even if they did, their safety was not guaranteed.  He also knew that while he was sure of his own eternal destiny, his brothers were not, so he offered to stand as hostage while his brothers went off to collect more money.  Secretly, though, he urged them to hurry off and not to return.

 While waiting for the money, the felons heaped clothing and linens on the dining table and emptied the kerosene lamp on the heap.  As dusk fell, and the boys had not returned, they got tired of waiting.  They lit the pyre, carried out their revenge, and rode away.

  About this time, my grandparents, Franz and Cornelia were heading home with their little ones, Anna and Elizabeth.  From the end of the village they smelled smoke and were shocked to see their buildings ablaze.  Rushing toward the barn to free the animals, Grandfather came upon the body of his oldest son.

 Frantically, my grandparents called and called for their other children, but there was no answer.  Fearing the worst, they were about to collapse in despair when Johann and Henry crept out of the darkness.  They had been hiding in the underground root cellar which was so overgrown by creepers that it was indistinguishable from the surrounding countryside.  Finally someone thought to look in the dugout shelter and found the frightened girls.

 But no boards could be found to make a coffin for Franz.

 After suffering two more harrowing days of raids, the villagers dug a long trench for the seventeen men and one woman who’d been murdered in the village.  They found enough sheets to wrap each body.

 Both Johann and Henry rarely spoke of that tragic day when they were sixteen and seventeen.  But it was the pivotal day in which each pledged lifelong service to Christ.