Among the hundreds of individuals who were deported without a court hearing was another young Witness woman, Hiisi Lember. Recalling the events of April 1, 1951, she related: “They came totally unexpectedly at night, ordering us: ‘You have half an hour. Pack your things!’” Under the cover of darkness, Hiisi and her six-year-old daughter were then taken to the train station. The creaky train traveled from station to station and picked up more Witnesses. “We were thrown into an animal boxcar. Thankfully, the animal dung was frozen; otherwise, it would have been difficult to stand in it. We were like animals stuffed into a container.”

Hiisi recalled the heartwarming support that she received from fellow believers during this ordeal: “At one station, our train stopped next to a train from Moldova. Through the wall of the boxcar, we heard a man ask who we were and where we were going. We explained that we didn’t know where we were going and that we were Jehovah’s Witnesses from Estonia. Fellow Witnesses in the train from Moldova overheard the conversation. Through an opening in the boxcar, they threw us a big loaf of bread and some prunes.” She added: “Then we began to understand the extent of the roundup of Jehovah’s Witnesses​—that it was from all the republics of the Soviet Union!”