Steve Middendorf

“There was very heavy fighting. In that fighting we lost many people, and I was wounded. And after the battle came the funeral. Usually we gave short speeches over the grave. First came the commanders, then the friends. But here, among the dead, was a local fellow, and his mother had come to the funeral. She began to lament: “My little son! We prepared the house for you! You promised you would bring a young wife home! But you are marrying the earth…” The unit stood there, silent, no one touched her. Then she lifted her head and saw that not only her son had been killed, but many other young ones were lying there, and she began to cry over those other sons: “My sons, my dear ones! Your mothers don’t see you, they don’t know you’re being put in the ground! And the ground is so cold. The winter cold is cruel. I will weep instead of them, and pity all of you…My dear ones…Darlings…” She just said, “I will pity all of you” and “my dear ones”—all the men began weeping aloud. No one could help it, no one had strength enough. The unit wept. Then the commander shouted, “Fire the salute!” And the salute silenced everything. And I was so struck that I think of it even now, the greatness of a mother’s heart. In such great grief, as her son was buried, she had enough heart to mourn for the other sons…Mourn for them like her own…”
― Svetlana Alexievich, The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II