Soviet Abduction

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"I think in the western—in the French, British, and American sides you could pass pretty easily, but it was not easy to pass between the Soviet-controlled side and the western-allotted side. There were checkpoints, and you know, I think only officials could go back and forth.

I think that the Russian agents and the Soviet agents were actually in the western side when [my grandmother] was abducted.

From what I recall, my grandmother was going out on a shopping activity, primarily food, I would guess, and she got off of a streetcar, and as she stepped down onto the street, two men wearing black overcoats were suddenly on either side of her. They essentially picked her up by her elbows, and lifted her off the ground and carried her off and put her in a car.

She described years of—well the first years were interrogations. She was in Moscow held in a cell. She was constantly questioned about what her role was spying for the U.S, which she denied because she wasn’t, but they were convinced that she was working with the American intelligence to identify former German officers from the S.S. and the Gestapo. She denied that, but because she spoke Russian she was suspect."