Sunday, April 25, 1915, at dusk
I am sitting on a sawed-off tree stump at Spirit Lake Internment Camp. It has been so busy since we arrived that I have not had a chance to write about everything I have seen and heard. If I pretend there is no guardhouse in our camp and no barbed wire around the single prisoners’ camp, Spirit Lake is beautiful. There is snow dotting the ground, a beautiful lake and the sun setting on it. The water sparkles like diamonds and there are snow-covered fir trees all around.
I wonder if the Great Spirit is looking down on me as I look out at Spirit Lake?
Monday, April 26, 1915
in bed at night
It was warm today but right now it is chilly. I am wrapped in a blanket sitting on the edge of my new bed and using my lap as a desk. This bed is wooden and the mattress is made of tree branches covered with cloth. It may not sound comfortable, but it is fine. It is nice to have a bed to myself. In some ways it is like the sleeping quarters from the ship, but it smells like sweet wood instead of you-know-what. Like in the ship, it is bunk beds. I sleep on the top and Mykola sleeps on the bottom. Baba has a bed of her own across from Mykola. Slava sleeps on the bunk above her. Mama and Tato each have a bunk bed too.
Each prisoner has been given five blankets, which is a good thing because Tato says it gets very cold here at night.
Slava’s father does not live in this part of the camp because it is for married prisoners. Even though he has a daughter, he must live in the main camp enclosed with barbed wire, with the single men. Slava misses her father. At least she knows that he is close.
We have more space here than at our flat in Montreal. It is nicer too because there is more than one window. But in Montreal we were not prisoners. At least here we only have the soldiers to deal with, and no one calls us names.
Tato says Stefan’s father is in “solitary confinement” but I don’t know what that means.
Wednesday, April 28, 1915, dawn
Dear Diary, it was raining in big icy plops when I first woke up, but now it is just plain rain. I am too wide awake to keep my eyes closed. This bed made of branches is a little bit scratchy, but I wrapped myself up in my blankets so I am cozy. I wish I had my down comforter from the old country.
Baba and Mykola and Slava are still asleep. I can hear Mama and Tato talking in low whispers. I can’t make out what they’re saying, but they are not arguing.
We share our bunkhouse with three other families, so Stefan lives here with his mother, and Mary lives here with her older sisters and parents. I had never really paid attention to Mary’s older sisters before. Olga is a year older than her and worked in a factory. Lesia is even older and she worked for an English family. Lesia is married and expecting a baby, but her husband has been sent to a different internment camp. I hope he will be sent here instead so they can be together when their child is born.
Natalka’s sister Lyalya is younger than Slava but tall for her age. Those two will be good friends.
There are no individual rooms, so Mama has put up sheets to separate the families. We share a side with Mary’s family, and then in the centre of our bunkhouse are two heating stoves and two rows of dining tables plus a big iron bathtub and a cold-water pump and basin. There are two big pails for heating bath water on top of the stove. Stefan lives on the other side and so does Natalka.
Thursday, April 29, 1915
Things that I like about our new house:
— we are with Tato
— it is clean and fresh
— I have seen no mice or cockroaches
— there are no steps to trouble Baba’s knee
Things that I don’t like:
— we are prisoners
— the guard dogs
— this is far away from everything
— the soldiers, except for the one who smiles
Friday, April 30, 1915
something important
Before he left this morning, Tato explained more about Stefan’s father. Mr. Pemlych tried to run away and he was caught. “Solitary confinement” is a kind of punishment. I need to ask Stefan about this but I can’t right now because all the men have gone off to cut down trees and build more bunkhouses. They do this from 7:30 to 5:30 each day and they are supposed to get paid twenty-five cents a day. That is much less than what I was making at the factory. Tato says that the prisoners don’t actually get the money. It is kept for them and they can buy things at the camp store with the money.
I am still trying to figure out why we are all prisoners. If people are mad at us because they see us as Austrians, why doesn’t the government just tell them the truth? I don’t understand how it solves anything to put us in an internment camp.
Later (just after lunch)
In the married prisoners’ village I have counted more than a dozen soldiers. I don’t like the soldiers with dogs and it makes me scared to see their bayonets. I am thankful to be in the married prisoners’ camp though, because we don’t have a barbed-wire fence like the unmarried prisoners’ camp. Their camp has four guard posts manned by soldiers with bayonets. Are we that dangerous?
May 1915
Saturday, May 1, 1915 (cold!)
I just saw an awful thing. Do you remember Private Howard Smythe, that bad man with the dirty brown hat who became a soldier? He is here! He walked through our camp this morning. When he saw me, he gave me an evil smile.
Most of the soldiers march off with the men beyond the camp to work, but a few of them stay with us. Today, one of them who stayed was the smiling young soldier and I now know that his name is Private Palmer. His first name is Robert. He brought us new prisoners some clothing. The women and girls got stockings and the boys got woollen socks. He also brought caps and undershirts for each of the children and some bolts of cloth. As each item was given to us, Private Palmer marked it in a book. Each family was also issued a broom and a towel. This makes Mama happy, as she likes to keep things clean.
I almost forgot —
Private Palmer has a camera. He got all of the children in the camp to stand together and he took our photograph. I saw him taking photographs of the buildings and other things too. I wonder if he will show us these photographs sometime?
Sunday, May 2, 1915
after supper, in my bunkhouse
That little building behind the cemetery is a church. There is a Ukrainian priest in our camp, but he is not here right now. I think he travels to different camps to say Mass. A French priest from the village of Amos (which is a few miles from here) came and said Mass for us this morning. Tato wouldn’t go. Not many of the men went. I think they are tired because Sunday is the only day that they don’t work. They played cards instead. Mama didn’t say anything to Tato about this. I thought she would be angry with him, but she is just so relieved that he is fine and that we’re all together that she sees no need to argue about things they will never agree on.
I went to Mass with Baba and Mama and Mykola and Slava, and after Mass we put pebbles on the graves in the cemetery. I said a prayer for my dear grandfather and brother up in heaven.