“My commander, a lieutenant was wounded. I saw him being wounded. I crawled up to him and dragged him to a trench. That’s how it was – we saved his life… The other one, the soldier who was with me was also awarded the Medal for Combat Merits. That’s how it was”.

Isaak’s service ended after less than a year at the front, when a German missile injured both his legs and lodged a small piece of shrapnel in his head:

“I fell into a ditch… next to two wounded men. Rather they were 4. 2 of them died soon. I lay there for quite a while. I felt pain in my kidney. I was picked up and taken to a hospital”.

Isaak’s injury forced him to spend 6 months in the hospital where he was medically discharged from the army. After the war, Isaak received a medal for saving his lieutenant: “They didn’t award me until some time later. Everyone was happy that we saved the commander that he survived. Such things didn’t happen too often”.

After the war, Isaak stayed in Ukraine and worked in a shoe factory near the Chernobyl reactor. Before immigrating to Canada, he contracted illnesses related to the radiation.