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Threads of Life

27 April 2013  - Weekend Writing Warriors

I continue to write about the family of August Schumann and Auguste Freimann, his wife. These are my great grandparents. In this writing, both are deceased and the children are on their way to Canada with their maternal grandmother. This week it is from the POV of Emma, oldest living sister of my grandmother. She is 14 years old at this time. Above is a button from one of the coats.

“Mother always said that I was her very best helper in the very best family.  I needed to begin helping her a lot when my father was dying, seven years ago when I was only seven.  The last couple of years I have needed to do many of her jobs as she became more and more ill from consumption. Last fall, she managed to make new coats for all of us of thick woven wool. Of course they were much too large for us because she “wanted them to last more than one year." I sewed the buttons on for her and made our dinner. She was so worn out when she came home from work in the mill."


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Threads of Life

3rd Weekend Writing Warrior

I am writing of my family, great grandparents, August and Auguste Schumann,  to make vital records come alive for the family. They are farming, I think subsistence, in Boguslawka, Volhynia. This is a particularly hard time in their lives. It is harvest time and three of there four children are ill, requiring their mother's attendance.  (I do not know what has happened to the fourth child.)

"As the day is coming to an end, August enters his home, hot, sweaty and tired, carrying his scythe from his day’s work. However, there is no aroma of dinner and the only candle shines from the bedroom. Entering the room, he finds his exhausted wife, tears running down her face.

            Taking her in his arms to try to sooth her, he inquires what has produced her distress. Her hand gestures to the children’s bed.  “Auguste Pauline is dead. I’ve tried to get the boys to drink some water, but they are unable. It is a whole month until the circuit pastor comes to our community and my prayers are not working.” "

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