Leningrad 1971 The story of my Grandparents
My Great Grandfather’s Military Cross I would like to tell you the story of why my Great Grandfather, Harry Kerr Aitken, received the Military Cross in Normandy during WW2. I felt, since I am named after him and next week is the 75-year anniversary of VE day, that it would be an appropriate tale. During the summer term, boys were challenged to delve into their family’s past and re-tell a story about their relatives in an engaging way. The research aspect of this competition had boys looking back at photographs, diary entries and letters, but perhaps themost powerful part of finding out about a relative’s past was the conversations that many had with elderly relatives where they found out about stories, both sad and happy, that they never previously knew. The winning entries below give just a snapshot of the rich, diverse and interesting heritage of so many of our families. House History: A story from my family’s past
Ella (my grandma) wasRussianand lived inSaint Petersburg, which at the time was known as Leningrad. She worked as a translator for a machinery factory. At this time an Iron curtain had spread over Russia, whichmeant people couldn’t travel in or out of Russia unless it was for work. My grandad Peter had arrived for work but because of the Iron Curtain he couldn’t go out with friends and he couldn’t go on dates, which was unfortunate, because Peter and Ella fell in love. At Ella’s work there was a woman called Olga who secretly worked for the KGB/intelligence agency and she was jealous of the relationship Peter and Ella had, she really loved Peter but hated Ella, so she decided to report them. Eventually the KGB had enough information to arrest Peter and sent him back to England. Peter felt destroyed. Peter and Ella said their final goodbyes and Peter left Russia to return to England. The next morning Ella was summoned to the KGB headquarters where a man appeared in front of her. “I am very disappointed in you,” he said “I know everything about what has happened between you and this English man, you have betrayed Russia and for this you will lose your job!”
ory Boys Months later Peter returned to Russia to work again, but he wasn’t allowed to go to Leningrad so he had to find a way to see Ella. Ella took a 12 hour train journey to Moscow to meet Peter where he decided to propose to her. Peter found a way to sneak into Leningrad to marry Ella, but she was scared the KGB would find out and give them an even worse punishment than before so she decided to run away as the pressure was too much. Peter looked for Ella for hours and hours until finally he found her sitting outside a café, Ella ran into his arms and cried. Peter calmed her down and they got married later that day. Since Peter wasn’t welcome in Leningrad they decided to move to England, where Peter lived. They travelled to England in Peter’s car and by Ferry. Everything was going so well. I sadly never met Harry because he died before I was born but I heard lots about him frommy Great Granny who passed away last year. He was apparently always reluctant to talk about his time during the war and in fact my Great Granny didn’t even know he had won an MC until after they were engaged. The incident happened at Estray in August 1944. He was a Captain serving in the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. A single German tank planted meticulously in the centre of Estray was holding up the entire infantry as no anti-tank gun could hit it in that position. Harry asked for his M10 (heavy anti-tank gun) to be placed a couple of fields away from the tank and then told them to aim in the rough direction of the tank. He then crawled towards the tank and watched the bullet land before crawling back and telling the crew manning the gun the corrections they needed to make to hit the tank. The first four shots were misses but the fifth and sixth were hits. The tank was abandoned and consequently the infantry took control of Estray.
When Ella and Peter arrived in England she received a call, it was the MI6, the security agency for the UK (English spies). They wanted her to come to their headquarters. Ella was anxious. She arrived at the MI6 office’s in Trafalgar Square and went into another blank office just like the KGB, and behind the desk sat a man. He wanted to know everything about her past in Russia, about Peter, and about the KGB, she didn’t give away a single piece of information. Ella may have been married to an Englishman, but she still had a Russian heart.
After the war when he talked to my Great Granny about it he was more interested in the fact that on no man’s land, between him and the tank, there was a flock of dairy cows. Everyone needed the milk but no one could get to them. Harry’s most vivid memory of that day was those cows cries of distress. I’m called Harry after him and in my family, there is a silver cup, which is passed down through the Harrys of my family. The Harry cup came from someone called Henry who fought and died in Gallipoli in 1916, which was the same year that my Great Grandfather Harry was born so they named him Harry a derivative of Henry.
By Sasha Benn, Year 5
I feel like I have a lot to live up to!
By Harry Blake, Year 6
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