Travel

Avi Dobrysh

Avi Dobrysh
Tallinn
Estonia
Interviewer: Ella Levitskaya
Date of the interview: September 2005

I met Avi Dobrysh in the Jewish community of Estonia 1. Avi is a member of the committee. Being a professional construction engineer, he pays a lot of attention to the construction of the synagogue, which is underway in the yard of the Jewish community in Tallinn. He is so pressed for time, that every minute is counted, but still he found the timeslot to give Centropa an interview. I interviewed him in the hotel, where I was staying during my business trip to Tallinn. Avi and his family live in a suburb of Tallinn, so we didn’t have time for commuting. Avi is of medium height. He looks quite athletic. He is still playing tennis. He started playing tennis during his school years. Now he plays tennis twice a week. In general, Avi leads an active life in spite of his age.

My family background

Growing up

Soviet invasion of the Baltics

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My father’s family lived in the Russian town of Pskov [about 700 km west of Moscow; approx. 40 km from the Estonian border]. My grandfather, Abram Dobrysh, was one of the best tailors in town. He made fur-coats for the merchants. He was paid good money for his work and the family did well.

I don’t remember my grandmother’s name. Her maiden name was Zaretskaya, and she kept it after she got married. I don’t know the reason for that. One lady from Pskov, who knew Grandmother, said that she was very beautiful and she allegedly came from a family of impoverished gentry. Maybe grandmother wasn’t a Jew, and my grandparents couldn’t get married in accordance with Jewish traditions. I don’t know that for sure, as I don’t have any information or any documents. In Pskov I couldn’t find any information about Grandmother either. At any rate, something is unclear here.

I got all the information about my family I could from the Pskov Regional Studies Museum. The building rented by Grandfather both for living and working, is still there. Currently, there are some office premises there.

There were three children in the family. All of them were born in Pskov. Father’s brother Hirsh was the eldest in the family. He was two or three years older than Father. My father, Isaac Dobrysh, was born in 1909. Father’s younger sister was born in 1913. She was called Lena in her family. I don’t know her Jewish name. Neither do I know whether Yiddish was spoken in my father’s family. Father spoke Russian.

When in 1917 the revolution began in Russia 2, Grandfather decided to get away from the Bolsheviks 3. In 1919 the family moved to Pechory and then farther. They settled in the Estonian city of Tartu, which was called Yuriyev during the time of the Russian empire. It was a university town, the second largest city in Estonia. They lived in Estonia under the Nansen passport 4. Such a passport was issued in Estonia without the need to have citizenship.

Father had to start working at the age of 15. I don’t know exactly what education he had. I think he finished either six or seven grades. The revolution broke the life of our family. When they fled to Estonia, Father stopped studying. He started working for Mr. Bakst, a Jewish merchant of the first guild 5, an owner of several stores. Most likely Father could cope with his work. Then he started working as a traveling salesman. He went to the south of Estonia and sold goods there. Father worked for Bakst until 1941.

My grandparents passed away either in 1930 or in 1931. They were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Tartu. Father’s sister was still a child when her parents died and my father brought her up.

Mother’s family lived in Tallinn. My maternal great-grandmother was born in Vilnius. Her name was Chesse. She was still alive when I was a baby. I called her ‘bobe’ [grandmother]. My great-grandmother probably moved to Tartu from Vilnius when she got married.

My maternal grandmother, Roche-Leya, was born in Tartu on 29th November 1884. Grandmother was illiterate. She started working at the age of 13. She rolled cigarettes. Grandmother stopped working when she got married. I don’t know where my paternal grandfather, Zalman Meyertal, came from He was born in 1880.

Mother’s parents lived in Tallinn. Grandfather was a cobbler, Grandmother was a housewife. She raised five children. The eldest, Isaac, was born in 1905 and the second, Hirsh, in 1907. Mother’s third brother, Pesach, was born in 1910. My mother Miriam-Deborah was born in 1913 and the youngest, Sheine, in 1916.

All children got good education. My mother and her sister finished the German lyceum in Tallinn, studied music. Mother’s three elder brothers got higher education. They studied in Estonia and then in Czechoslovakia, in Prague, in the technical high school. Subjects were taught in German; all Estonian inhabitants knew German.

I have no idea why my uncles studied in Prague. Many young Estonians went there to study as the tuition for higher education was cheaper there than in other European cities. Besides, at that time there were no technical universities in Estonia. Mother’s eldest brother, Isaac, finished the machine-building department. The other two brothers studied at the chemistry department.

Mother’s brother Hirsh, who was called German in the family, was a wonderful sportsman. He was very good at ping pong and football. He was a goal-keeper in the Maccabi 6 sports team, and he was also a goal-keeper of the Prague team Sparta 7, when he was studying there. There are pictures of my uncle in some museums in Prague, snapshots taken at the matches in which he participated. His active participation in sport contests interfered with his studies. There was no chance for him to pass a certain exam because of a match with a Spanish team, as German’s team refused to play without him. Only after the match, he was given the opportunity to finish his studies. He came back to Tallinn with the diploma of a mechanical engineer.

The youngest of the three brothers, Pesach, got a diploma in chemical engineering. He later became a chemical engineer.

Mother’s family was religious, Jewish traditions were kept. And the children always stuck to Jewish traditions even though they were modern people.

My parents met in Tallinn. Father came from Tartu to their acquaintances in Tallinn, and met mother there. It was not a pre-arranged meeting. They simply met in the place of people both of them knew. As far as I understand, Grandmother was very authoritarian and Mother was happy to get married and get away from Grandmother’s control. My parents got married on 25th December 1933, on Christmas. They had three days off and took advantage of that. They had a traditional Jewish wedding under the chuppah. After getting married, Mother moved to Tartu from Tallinn.

Father’s brother Hirsh also lived in Tartu. He had a store of ready-made clothes in downtown Tartu. Hirsh was married. He had two sons.

When Father got married, his sister left for Tallinn. She lived there with Grandmother Roche-Leya. Lena found a job in a company, owned by a Jew called Mirvits. She painted cups. At work, she met her future husband, Ioan Emelianov, a local Russian from a family of old believers 8. They got married in late June 1941, during the first days of war [cf. Great Patriotic War] 9.

Mother’s elder brothers also got married. Their wives came from wealthy Jewish families. Only the youngest brother, Pesach, remained single. Mother’s younger sister, Sheine, married a Jew from Riga. All of them had Jewish weddings under the chuppah, in accordance with the tradition. I remember the wedding of my aunt Sheine, which took place in our Tallinn choral synagogue 10. I remember that there were a lot of people at her wedding. There was loud music. It was mirthful. We had fun. Then my aunt moved to her husband in Riga.

My parents didn’t have their own house. They rented apartments. Before the war, within six and a half years, we changed four apartments. Our last apartment was in the center of Tartu, in front of the theater. The house was destroyed during the war. There is nothing in that place now. There is only grass. We lived in a large apartment, consisting of five rooms. Father worked for the merchant Bakst. Mother was a housewife after getting married. I was born on 14th December 1934. They named me Avi. I am an only child.

Growing up

My first words were in German. My mother finished a German lyceum. She knew only German baby songs and fairy-tales and so she sang songs and told me children’s stories in German. I learned Estonian by playing with kids in the yard. My father’s mother tongue was Russian. Of course, he was fluent in Estonian, but he wasn’t very good at writing in it. He sent me postcards from the front in Estonian and there were mistakes in them.

At home, my parents spoke Russian, especially when they were trying to hide something from me. In time I started understanding their conversations. Once, in my presence they talked about going to the cinema without me. I couldn’t speak Russian at that time, but could understand everything. I told them in Estonian that I wouldn’t stay home by myself and would go to the cinema with them. They laughed at me, but still didn’t take me to the cinema with them. Then I gradually learned how to speak Russian. So, my third language was Russian. Yiddish wasn’t spoken at home.

Before the war, our family had a good life. First, Father was the only bread-winner. Mother was a housewife. I even had a baby-sitter. Then my mother was probably very bored and also started working. We weren’t rich, but lived comfortably. We had a large apartment. There was enough money for good food and all the necessary clothes. We couldn’t afford expensive things. I remember when Father bought his first Philips radio. It cost a fortune. I think my parents won at a lottery at some Jewish event. In general, they could afford pretty much everything at a reasonable price.

Life was good and peaceful in the Estonian Republic 11. Even during the tsarist regime, when Estonia was part of Russia, it never had such an attitude towards Jews as was the case in Russia. There were no Jewish pogroms 12 in the entire history of Estonia, and no anti-Semitism in pre-Soviet times.

On Sundays all members of the family spent time together. We used to walk around Tartu, had lunch in a restaurant. I was friends with the elder son of Father’s brother Hirsh. He was two years older than me, and his brother was two years younger than me. I was closer with the elder one. In summer we went to the small town Elva, not far from Tallinn.

Jewish traditions were observed in the family. Of course, my parents weren’t as religious as my grandparents, but still we stuck to traditions. It has always been like that. Mother cooked dishes of the Jewish cuisine. We marked Jewish holidays at home. On holidays Father went to the synagogue. Unfortunately, I don’t remember the details of the holiday. I remember that there was a whole box of matzah on Pesach. When I was a baby, I stealthily crawled into that box and ate matzah.

My grandmother Roche-Leya often came from Tallinn to see us. I often went to Tallinn to see them. I was her first grandson and she loved me dearly. The family of my mother’s parents lived on Raua Street in Tallinn. They owned some houses. Grandmother bought two log houses, and leased one of them.

I remember two things from my childhood. My first recollection goes back to the time when the Swedish king came to Estonia for a visit. He came to Tartu and we went to welcome him. It was a warm spring day. There were crowds of people on the central square and an abundance of flowers. The orchestra made it even more festive.

I also remember, when I was four, I underwent an appendix operation. The surgeon who had operated on me often came to my ward and played cards with me. When I asked where my appendix was he said that he had given it to the cat. When I was an adult, I bumped into that doctor in a restaurant. He put a bottle of cognac on the table and asked if he could join the youth. I said that I remembered him and told him the story. The doctor made a joke saying that I was a lucky patient, as most of his patients could not say that.

I also remember events organized at the Jewish lyceum 13. There was a charitable lottery. As far as I remember, such events took place on Chanukkah. In 1941 I was enrolled in preschool at the Jewish lyceum. I didn’t have a chance to go to school because the war broke out.

In 1939 Soviet military bases 14 were established in Estonia. The Estonian population didn’t take the presence of Soviet militaries with hostility, as it had been agreed on by the governments of both countries and people were calm about it. Soviet military pilots and their families lived in our neighborhood. My parents got acquainted with them as they were fluent in Russian. Those pilots came to see us in the evening. One of them was a lieutenant, Mikhail Trivsik, a Jew. He was a very pleasant man. His wife Capitolina was Russian. Mikhail told her that she he wouldn’t have dinners at home until she learned how to cook like my mother. We had fun when they came over. I started speaking better Russian.

By the way, after the war we kept in touch with Trivsik. He survived the war and got the rank of Soviet general – lieutenant. In 1995 I met his nephew Trivsik during a seminar in Jerusalem. It’s a small world.

Soviet invasion of the Baltics

I didn’t notice any changes in the year 1940 when Estonia became a Soviet republic 15. Maybe my parents felt them, but I did not. I was not hostile towards the Soviet regime. Though, Bakst’s store, where Father was working, was nationalized. Father kept working there in the same position.

The Soviet authorities nationalized both houses that belonged to my grandmother. The houses and the plots of land were returned only after 1991 when restitution commenced in independent Estonia 16. I had those buildings demolished. A new building was constructed on that site. The construction company involved in that project was named after my grandmother Meyertal.

It happened later that my kin and friends suffered from nationalization. Of course, people that were affected by nationalization weren’t happy about the new regime. If someone puts his hand in your pocket and takes money away from you, it means that he is your enemy. These were the times when the Soviet regime plundered many people. The straw that broke the camel’s back was what happened on 14th June 1941, a turnaround for many Estonian families – deportation 17.

Before I start talking about that, I will name some historic facts. Beginning from the 18th century Estonia had been occupied by Germany. In Estonian history Germans were described as oppressors. On the one hand, Germans were not so much liked by Estonians. But on the other hand, German culture is very similar to the Estonian one. Our Estonian culture was not very strong, as German culture had been imposed on Estonia for over 600 years. Estonians accepted German culture, which was very dangerous for them – there was an issue whether Estonians would have their own culture. Estonians did not accept Russian culture.

Recently I watched a program where an Estonian writer was invited. The anchorman asked him the following question: ‘Which occupation was more dangerous for Estonians – the Fascist or the Soviet one?’ The writer’s response astounded the anchorman as he had anticipated another answer. The writer said that the German occupation was definitely more dangerous for Estonians. The anchorman expected a different response: how could three years of German occupation be compared to 50 years of Soviet occupation? The writer explained his point of view along these lines: if the German occupation had lasted for 50 years as the Soviet one had, nobody would have spoken Estonian in Estonia as Estonians would have accepted the German culture right away. As for the Russian culture, they would have resisted it. That is why the Estonian culture and the Estonian language have been preserved.

During the war

Until 14th June 1941 Estonians regarded Germans as oppressors and enemies. When in 1939 local Estonian Germans left Estonia as per Hitler’s call, Estonians were happy about it. After the deportation, when 10,000 people were deported from Estonia to Siberia, Russians and Soviets became the enemies. The deportation of Estonian population was a gross mistake of the Soviet regime.

Two of my mother’s elder brothers, Isaac and German, and their families were deported. Only the youngest brother, Pesach, remained untouched. He was single at that time. Isaac and German were married to wealthy ladies and the Soviet regime thought them to be capitalistic parasites, who were supposed to be deported.

When Grandmother found out about that, she rented a car and followed the train from Tallinn up to the Southern border of Estonia. At every stop she gave her sons and their wives money, food and everything she could possible give. After that trip Grandmother came to see us in Tartu. She never went back to Tallinn. A week after deportation we found out about the outbreak of war on 22nd June 1941. We heard on the radio that Germany had attacked the Soviet Union. The war began.

My parents, Uncle Hirsh and some other relatives had a long discussion whether to get evacuated or not. We had discussed it for about two weeks and finally decided that we had to leave. On 5th July 1941, Father went to work in the store. He called Mom from there and said that the store was closed down and all employees were told to evacuate. We left on the same day, and on 9th July Germany occupied Tartu.

Grandmother, Uncle Hirsh and his family left with us. We didn’t know anything about Mother’s relatives who stayed in Tallinn. We went through Pskov, wherefrom we went to Chuvash. We didn’t stay there for a long time. All of us worked in kolkhoz fields 18. It was harvest time.

In September, when the German army was approaching Moscow, we were told to go farther, towards Central Asia. Grandmother was with us. So we went to Central Asia from Chuvash. In Kazan, at night, Grandmother got off the train with her things. She wanted to go to her daughters-in-law in exile. We knew that Mother’s brother Isaac and German were involved in timbering in Siberian camps 19, and their wives were exiled in Siberia, in Kirov oblast, and the settlement Darovskoy was not far from the town of Molnyzh.

Thus, Grandmother got off the train to look for them. She didn’t know Russian at all, but she managed to find her daughters-in-law. Grandmother knew that German’s wife left for the exile when she was in her last months of pregnancy. In 1941 my cousin Marina was born in Darovsk. Grandmother stayed with them during the period of exile and helped them out. 

We moved on and reached Kyrgyz. We were sent to a kolkhoz – I cannot recall its name – in Talass oblast. Germans from Volga region 20 lived there. They were dispossessed in 1932 21. Men were exiled to the Gulag to work in timbering and women and children were to stay in the kolkhoz. They treated us pretty well since we knew German. We were starving all the time. The Germans had everything they needed. They were well-off, but they were not generous. Apart from Germans, there were also wounded people in the kolkhoz, the ones who couldn’t return to the lines because of severe wounds. I remember one of them –a Ukrainian guy, who sang very beautiful Ukrainian songs and played the guitar. When Mother went to work, she often had me stay with him.

My father and Uncle Hirsh were with us at first. In early 1942 when the Estonian corps 22 was established, they were mobilized in Kyrgyz. Mother and I stayed on our own. Mother worked in the kolkhoz. I went to the 1st grade of the local Russian school. The school was in a small one-storied building. Students from the 1st to the 4thgrade studied in one room: the first row of desks – 1st grade, the second row – 2nd grade, the third row – 3rd grade, and the fourth row – 4th grade. There was one teacher for four grades.

In 1942, Mother was invited to study in a place near Moscow, the town of Egoryevsk. One Estonian college trained future experts of Soviet Estonia, so that people could start working upon the liberation of Estonia. There were economic and planning departments. There were also colleges for trade and industry experts. The students were trained for different branches of economy.

Estonians came to Egoryevsk from all over the Soviet Union. They didn’t care about nationality – Estonians or Jews, it didn’t matter; the most important thing was that their motherland should be Estonia.

We left for Egoryevsk. I remember it was the first time for me to see fireworks on the way to Egoryevsk. An Estonian boarding school was established for the children of those who studied at the Estonian college. It was on the same street as the college. There were 95 Estonian children. Both studies and communication were in Estonian. Again I had to go to the 1st grade, but this time in an Estonian school.

We were following the course of military events. There was a map of Europe on the wall, and every day we marked the changes on the front with colored flags. We were looking forward to the liberation of Estonia, as all of us were agog to go back home.

In 1943, I joined the pioneers 23 in boarding school. There was a case when they wanted to expel me from the pioneers. We went hiking and I tied my pioneer scarf on the tent as if it was a flag. They wanted to expel me for such a ‘sacrilege.’ I don’t remember whether I was expelled, but I know for sure that they wanted to do that.

We corresponded with Father. Uncle Hirsh and he went through the entire war. In 1944, Hirsh ended up in hospital. He was driving a truck with ammunition, fell from the truck and was hit by one of the boxes. My uncle broke his leg and had to stay in hospital. When he got better, the war was over.

My father went through the entire war and took part in the liberation of Estonia. He perished on Saaremaa – an island in the western part of Estonia. There is a shoal head at Saaremaa, where the Germans set up a port at the end of war so that they could get evacuated. The Estonian corps had an order to capture that shoal head. Landing troops carried out that operation and about 500 men died there, including my father. Two vessels were sent to Saaremaa with land-troopers. The people from one vessel survived, the rest drowned.

Over the past years, I’ve collected the interviews with Estonian inhabitants. There was an interview with a man, a land trooper, who jumped in the sea after my father. He told me the story. He knew how to swim and survived, but my father didn’t know how to swim. He perished on 12th October 1944, when he was 35 years old. On that day, Father’s sister gave birth to a daughter, my cousin Asya. My other cousin, the son of Father’s brother Hirsh was also born on that day. What a coincidence. We erected a memorial tombstone devoted to all Jewish men from Tartu that perished during the war. My father’s name is also there.

Before Estonia was liberated from fascists, the Germans started mobilizing Estonians in the German army. I know many guys, who served them. They were young boys, who finished school in spring and they were drafted into the army, the Waffen-SS division, the so-called Estonian legion 24. It was compulsory. There were very few volunteers.

My father didn’t join the army voluntarily, he was mobilized. One of those people told me that he put on an SS-uniform once when his picture was taken for the documents. Then he wore the ordinary German military uniform. Germans ordered those young guys to fight with Soviet troops. Estonians fought against the Soviet army because they didn’t want the Bolsheviks to return. It was not their fault. They knew what the Soviet regime was about. They fought for independent Estonian Republic.

Why did Estonians, who had always disliked Germans, welcome the German army? Because they hoped to get rid of the Bolsheviks and the communists, who did so much harm to Estonian people during the Soviet regime that Estonians forgot about their hostility towards the Germans. Everybody remembers the deportations of that time and it is still cutting to the quick. Even now, many Jews, who came to Estonia from the USSR, who were fighting for the Soviets, are not willing to understand those Estonians who fought on the German side. They call them Nazis and fascists, but it is not like that in actuality. It is not as easy and nobody can talk about it like that.

A new occupation of Estonia started with the liberation from the fascists. Many Estonians are perturbed, when those veterans of the Soviet Army get together near the Bronze Soldier of Tallinn in order to mark the anniversary of the liberation of Tallinn from fascists. [Editor’s note: originally named ‘Monument to the Liberators of Tallinn’ and located in a small park in the center of Tallinn, it was relocated to the Defense Forces Cemetery in Tallinn, following riots in April 2007.] Yes, the Soviet Union, and the Soviet army liberated Estonia from fascists. But it also occupied it right away.

Estonians say that had the Soviet army liberated Estonia from fascists and left, giving Estonia a chance as an independent country, everybody would have been thankful to the army, the liberator. And for us, the citizens of Estonia, who had left for evacuation in Russia, it was clear in the year of 1944 that there would be a chance to come home only once the fascists had been ousted from Estonia. It was unconditional for us that Estonia should be liberated from fascists.

After the war

On 22nd September 1944 Tallinn was liberated from the Germans. My mother was one of the first to be sent to Estonia. On 14th October we were in Tallinn. I remember that date clearly, as we went to the birth center to visit Father’s sister, who gave birth to her daughter Asya.

My aunt had an amazing fate. She is one out of the five Estonian Jews, who had remained in Estonia during the war and survived. She married her husband, Ioan Emeliannikov, shortly before war. When over the war started, he changed apartments right away. He chose a district where nobody knew them. Then he hid Lena on a farmstead not far from Tallinn. The villagers were Estonians, whom Ioan knew. They sheltered Lena in the daytime and at night she came out for a walk. She didn’t look like a Jew. After two years they came back to Tallinn. The Germans were still there and Lena walked around Tallinn and wasn’t afraid of them. The Germans arrested Ioan and my aunt went to the police and Gestapo, trying to save him. She managed to rescue him from prison. This is their story.

The day when my father died, 12th October 1944, is the day when their daughter Asya was born. She is my cousin. She is currently living in Tallinn, in the house built by her father. Her parents are not alive any more. My aunt died in 1983 and her husband in the early 1990s.

My grandfather Zalman Meyertal, mother’s father, didn’t get evacuated and stayed in Tallinn. He thought that someone had to watch the house. He was 64. Grandfather was to a great extent short-sighted and he thought that nobody would touch him. The Soviet army left Tallinn on 28th August 1941 and within a couple of days, Grandfather ended up in Tallinn prison. I have a protocol of interrogation of my grandfather from 2nd September 1941. According to the documents from Tallinn prison, 207 Jewish men from Tallinn were executed in September. There is a list of the executed and my grandfather is among them.

Mother’s younger sister Sheine stayed with her family in Riga. Sheine was pregnant, and most likely was afraid to travel. She and her husband were taken to Riga ghetto 25. She gave birth to a son there and the three of them died there.

First, we came to Tallinn. At that time we didn’t know yet that Father was dead. Mother’s younger brother Pesach, or Pavel, was already in Tallinn. He knew about Father’s death, but he was afraid to tell Mother about that. Pavel worked in the food industry. He was in Moscow during the war and worked at a confectionary. When he came to see him, he had a great deal of sweets and chocolate. Pavel got married while in evacuation. He met an Estonian lady on his way to evacuation and they got married. He married a Jew the second time.

Pavel talked us into staying in Tallinn, gave us the keys to his brother’s apartment, but Mother insisted that we should go back to Tartu. In Father’s last letter that we received he was writing that we should come back to Tartu. Mother was supposed to receive a job assignment in the state planning department of Estonia. She asked to be assigned to Tartu. We went there. We were given a room in a communal apartment 26 downtown. Our wonderful Tartu suffered a lot during war, since there were battles on both banks of the river. In Tartu we found out about father’s death.

I went to Tartu secondary school #1 27. It used to be Trefner’s lyceum before 1940, named after its founder in the 19th century. He was a great man. His school is still considered to be one of the best ones in Estonia. I studied there until the 4th grade.

Mother worked in Ispolkom 28, in the planning commission. Then she was admitted to the Party and offered a position to be in charge of the card bureau of Tartu. There were practically no products on free sale; all of them were given out by food cards 29.

Mother was an honest person and probably trusted people too much. At the end of each month the remaining cards were supposed to be destroyed. It was most likely that not all the cards were destroyed and some people pocketed them. We didn’t have anything extra at home. There were the cards that the two of us were supposed to have. I went to the store to get the things with the cards, as Mother didn’t have time.

There was an audit in the commission and there was a want of cards. Since Mother was in charge, she was detained. Mother was sentenced to seven years in prison. I moved to Tallinn, to my grandmother. I lived in Tallinn since the 4th grade. Mother was in Kharku camp, nearby Tallinn. In tsarist times, there were women’s prisons and camps. When the Germans occupied Estonia, Jewish ladies and children were taken to Kharku and shot. It was turned into a women’s prison after the war. Grandmother and I went to see Mother, brought her food.

During the war we were not aware of the mass execution of Jews. Only after the war the information started seeping through. We found out about the mass execution of Jews in Kiev, at Babi Yar 30, in Belarus, Ukraine, concentration camps in Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia. Of course, before the war was over, it was clear what was going on, but the Soviet regime was not willing to talk about the execution of the Jews, trying to conceal it from people.

Klooga 31 was the worst concentration camp in Estonia – only few people managed to survive. I know one survivor from Klooga. His name is Benjamin Anolik. When Estonia gained independence, the memorial devoted to the victims of fascism was unveiled in Klooga. Every year on 19th September people come there from all parts of the world to commemorate the innocent victims. This year the presidents of Estonia and Israel were present at the 51st anniversary of the camp. Recently, a new pavilion was opened in Yad Vashem 32, where the exposition starts with Klooga. Many people ask the following question: ‘Why Klooga?’

In 1944, attachés of alliance troops addressed Stalin with the request to visit Tallinn. The first model of an acoustic torpedo was there and they wanted to see it. Stalin gave them permission for their visit and suggested bringing along reporters as there were other things to see apart from the torpedo. In late September 1944, they were taken to Klooga. In 1944 neither Oswenzim [Auschwitz] nor Buchenwald 33 nor any other camps were liberated. There were rumors that nobody saw them.

In Klooga, they saw burning piles of people. The fires were made in the form of a square, six by six meters: a man – a log. A person lay down, he was shot in the head and another person lay down next to him. There were two fires like that. The Germans didn’t have time to make more fires like that as Soviet troops were attacking. The young journalists Graham Greene, Harrison Salisbury, Erenburg 34 and others came to Klooga. It was the first time when people saw in real life what the Germans did to people, to Jews. Those pictures were on the pages of all newspapers in the world. A newsreel was shot. For the first time the world found out about the fascists’ crimes, namely from Klooga. That is why the exposition of Yad Vashem begins with Klooga.

I entered the Estonian school in Tallinn. I lived with Grandmother. I received the pension of my perished father, but the amount was skimpy. Grandmother had an additional income. She started rolling cigarettes. She knew how to do that since adolescence and it became her source of income after the war. Acquaintances brought Grandmother some things to sell. She went to the flea market and sold those things. She earned a little bit with that as well. So, that was the way we lived.

Grandmother remained religious after the war as well. She explained to me right away that her belief in God was her personal issue and it should not concern me. Grandmother strictly observed Jewish traditions. She worked really hard, but she didn’t do anything on Saturday.

The great Tallinn synagogue burned down in 1944 and there was no synagogue in the city right after the war. Then the municipal authorities gave a small house to the Jewish community and Grandmother’s brother established a prayer house there. The Park Hotel is currently on the spot of the former synagogue. When the hotel construction was underway, the prayer house was demolished as it interfered with the construction. The synagogue was given new premises.

There was no rabbi in Tallinn. Doctor Abu Gomer 35, the Tallinn rabbi, was murdered by fascists in 1941. His functions were performed by someone from the community, who knew Jewish traditions and Yiddishkeit very well. The first professional rabbi, Shmuel Kott, came to Tallinn only five years ago. Even at that time Jewish traditions were observed – there were weddings under the chuppah, and the bar mitzvah ceremony was carried out.

Of course, the Soviet regime struggled against religion in Estonia 36, but not on such a scale as it was the case in the Soviet Union. Certainly, those things were done unofficially, quietly at home. For the brit milah an experienced doctor was invited to the family’s home. I was present at the brit milah of my cousin Eric, German’s son. It was a holiday at home. Men wore traditional attire and hats. We always had matzah. First it was brought from Riga and Vilnius; later they began baking it in Tallinn. Grandmother marked all Jewish holidays in line with the traditions.

I was a Soviet child, raised during the war. All of us children, who survived the war in evacuation, were looking forward to the victory of the Soviet army. We were for the Red Army. I became a pioneer in Egoriyevsk, and then I joined the Komsomol 37 at school. Mother was in prison at that time and I honestly told them about it in the district Komsomol committee. I was admitted in spite of that. It was very important for me at that time as I was a Soviet person.

Mother’s brothers, who were deported in 1941, came back. They were not permitted to live in Tallinn and so they lived in small Estonian towns. They worked upon returning from the camps. Uncle German went in for sport again after work. He lived in a small town called Sindi, not far from Tallinn. There he founded a football team, Kalev. He was a trainer and a goal-keeper. German was very good at ping-pong and even took part in the Estonian championship in table tennis. When I was a schoolboy, I saw German playing in the group of masters, the six best tennis players of Estonia. One Estonian guy became the champion of Estonia. He said if German Meyertal, his partner in tennis, had not lived in Sindi, he would have never become a champion. German was an example to follow. I went in for sport at school thanks to him. I am still into sport.

In 1948 the state of Israel was officially founded 38. Our family was very happy about it. In my heart I have always regarded Israel as our state. It was very important for me. I think that for many Jews the foundation of a Jewish state was a very strong moral support. It was not spoken out loud, but very many Jews had that feeling inside. It was very important.

When in 1948 the campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’ 39 began in the USSR, we knew about it from the papers, but it didn’t reach Estonia. Maybe something happened in the highest party strata, but we didn’t feel anything, it wasn’t felt in everyday life.

There was something different here. The struggle against Estonian nationalists began. Many writers, composers were blamed for nationalism. They were dismissed from their posts; some of them were even exiled to Siberia, the Gulag, though only for a short term. It did not refer to the Jews. In the USSR they fought with rootless ‘cosmopolitans,’ and in Estonia with bourgeois nationalists. There were so many efforts taken in that direction that there was nothing left for the Jewish ‘cosmopolitans.’ 

In 1949 there was another stage of deportation of the Estonian population. Jews remained untouched, Estonian peasants, the owners of land, were exiled. The Soviet regime started the formation of kolkhozes in Estonia. Estonian peasants have always lived on farmsteads. They lived separately and worked in their husbandry. Before 1940 agriculture was one of the major export trends in Estonia. People could not understand why they should unite in kolkhozes and create large state joint ventures. It was savage for them.

Thus, the Soviet regime started the same campaign of dispossession that was carried out in Russia and Ukraine in the 1930s. Those peasants, who refused joining the kolkhoz, were deported. Lists were made. Moscow sent the figures: numbers of people to be deported, but the lists with the names were made on the spot in order to come up with the right number of people. Back then the Estonian population was about 1.5 million people, of which 24,000 were deported in 1949. That’s a huge number.

There wasn’t a single peasant family that could escape that. The lists were made by local authorities, who knew people. The richest were included in the list. Since Jews were not involved in agriculture, they were not touched, only those ones were deported who came back from exile without permission.

My wife and I have very close friends, a mixed couple, a Jew and an Estonian. The mother of my friend Maria was deported when she was only two months old. She survived only because she was an infant and was breastfed by her mother. If she had been older, she would have definitely died of hunger.

When the deported families came to the place of exile, there was no lodging. They practically lived in the open. They started making dug-outs or shanties at first. Then they began building better houses and a husbandry. Estonians are hard-working. One should work hard to be well-off. The exiled worked very hard and started living even better than in their motherland, as Estonian soil is not very fertile. Siberia was rich in fertile soil, forests and those huge territories were unoccupied. Most of the exiled came back to Estonia. Some of them died in exile.

We were untouched and deportation passed by us. I was 14 years old, a student of the 6th grade. A girl from the parallel grade, who I liked, was deported too. After the holidays, four boys from my class didn’t return to school. Then we found out that their families were deported. There were all kinds of rumors. Nobody explained anything. It was quiet and surreptitious.

I finished seven grades of compulsory school and entered the Architecture and Construction College in Tallinn. I learned how to draw very well during the first year of my studies. I got an excellent mark in drawing. I decided that I could make money on that. We were needy. Grandmother also made some money, but she was mostly maintained by her sons. She also tried to help out German, the only one out of the three sons, who had children. His elder daughter, Marina, was born in exile, and when he returned to Tallinn in 1955 his son Eric was born. Isaac and Pesach did not have children. I started working alongside my studies. In general, I financed myself. When I was studying in the college, I worked as a draftsman in the design institute Estonproject.

The Doctors’ Plot 40 in January 1953 almost passed by me unnoticed. Jewish doctors in Estonia kept working and there was no persecution. We read in the newspapers what was going on in the USSR, but it was not happening in Estonia. Maybe party workers did something to show that they were fighting against these so-called ‘doctors/poisoners,’ but at any rate we were not affected by it.

In general, life in Estonia differed from life in other republics of the USSR. We noticed that when we went for sports competitions to other republics of the Soviet Union – life there was absolutely different. We were the West, and everybody who came here understood that Estonia was western.

In March 1953 Stalin died. I was working at Estonproject at that time. I remember everybody stood up to listen to the radio broadcast of Stalin’s death. The Russians were crying. I was not; I didn’t feel the sorrow. Yes, there was a man called Stalin and he died – it is a natural process. I didn’t have a feeling of an irreplaceable loss. I looked at people who were crying and could not understand. Why cry if an outsider has died? When a close person dies, it is a tribulation, it touches your soul, but Stalin … I was probably not a ‘red’ in my soul.

I must have recognized the Soviet regime ideologically. I read Lenin’s works 41. I found them interesting, but still I had mixed emotions. I always remembered a good life in Estonia before war, before the Soviet regime. Our life was different and not as good during the Soviet regime. I often questioned Soviet politics.

I didn’t feel anti-Semitism, neither in school nor in college, though I could see that during the Soviet regime the authorities propagated anti-Semitism. It was a state policy of the USSR.

I graduated from college in 1954. I got my mandatory job assignment 42 in a construction company in Tallinn. That year I entered the extramural construction department of the Tallinn Polytechnic Institute. I could only study extramurally as I was supposed to work for three years under the mandatory job assignment. In a year I got rid of the job and switched to the daily department of the institute. Three more guys from college studied there with me. I kept living with Grandmother. She fed me, took care of my clothes and tried to influence me.

I was friends with Jews and Estonians. Grandmother was always worried when I courted Estonians, saying why I wouldn’t find a Jewish lady. I said that I didn’t mind if she found me a Jewish lady. Grandmother started thinking of all the girls she knew in Tallinn, and couldn’t find a match. Then she uttered a wise prophecy: that my lady was yet to be born. And so it was: my wife Faina, who gave birth to our children, and with whom I have been happy for many years, living in love and harmony, was born only a year after I had this conversation with my grandmother, in 1954. Grandmother was a very wise woman, though illiterate. She died on 20th January 1958, but I still remember her.

I graduated from the institute in 1959. For the last two years I combined my work and studies. My friend and I chose the topic on heating and ventilation for our diploma. There wasn’t any teacher specialized in that subject in the Polytechnic Institute, but both of us were knowledgeable about that since during studies we also worked in design institutes on heating and ventilation. My diploma paper turned out to be good.

I got a mandatory job assignment to Tallinn, to the construction project Santechmontazh [sanitary and technical adjustment works]. The trust company gave me, a young expert, a one-room apartment. I couldn’t leave the job any earlier than after three years and I was also obliged to stay in the apartment I got.

At the institute I was offered to enter postgraduate studies in the School of Engineering and Construction in Leningrad and then come back to our chair to teach heating and ventilation. At that time other USSR institutions of higher education gave Estonia target postgraduate admissions. I wanted to quit trust without aggravation for the people who treated me well. I decided to enter the postgraduate studies in order to leave in a good way.

This was the first time in my life when I came across anti-Semitism. I submitted all the necessary documents. My papers were successfully admitted by our Polytechnic Institute, the Ministry of Higher Education and the central committee of the Communist Party of Estonia. They were sent to Leningrad by official bodies.

A letter from Leningrad was sent to my home address. It was signed by the chief of the postgraduate department of the School of Engineering and Construction in Leningrad, Postnikov, and addressed to the rector of our institute. The letter read: ‘We cannot admit your targeted postgraduate student to the entrance exams since he is not working in the system of higher and secondary education and has not provided a recommendation letter from his job. Enclosure: 11 pages.’

A letter of recommendation was written on the letterhead of the trust Santechmontazh, where I was working. It was stamped and signed by the secretary of the party organization, the manager and chairman of the trade union. The letter of recommendation didn’t include the place where it was sent. The documents were sent by the republic, not by me personally. They just needed a pretext to reject the candidacy of a Jew to the postgraduate studies.

Then that issue was discussed by the ministers of higher education of the Soviet Union republics. 11 proctors of Leningrad institutions of higher education were dismissed for displayed anti-Semitism. I was not the only one who hadn’t been admitted to the post-graduate department . All Jews got their documents back. Estonia was the country, where the nationality factor wasn’t considered among the candidates for the target postgraduate studies. It didn’t matter whether the person was a Jew, Russian or Estonian. They selected people by their capabilities and skills, but they did pay attention to the nationality in Russia.

However, I managed to enter the postgraduate department. It was decided in Estonia that I was treated unfairly and the situation should be corrected. The Academy of Science in Estonia opened a postgraduate department and I was assigned to our construction institute. I think that this case vividly demonstrates the attitude towards Jews in Estonia – as I was a Jew, and everybody understood why I hadn’t been admitted to the postgraduate department in Leningrad.

They did everything to correct that situation. I don’t think that in other USSR republics anyone would have made  life difficult for himself just because of some Dobrysh, who hadn’t been admitted to the target postgraduate department. I talked to the examination board myself and found my scientific supervisor in Moscow.

Frankly speaking, anti-Semitism was a state policy in the Soviet Union. I have never felt –being different from other inhabitants of Estonia because I’m a Jew. People treated Jews so well in Estonia that every summer Jewish school-leavers from all over the Soviet Union came because they could freely enter any educational institution if they passed the entrance exams. Jews were never underestimated at the exams just because of their nationality. The grades were given fairly.

This didn’t only apply to students. Tartu University offered jobs to many graduates of Leningrad University, who failed to find a job in Russia. They are now professors, academicians. At that time they were simply talented young Jews. Academician Bronstein, and the outstanding Lotman 43 are among them.

The philosopher and professor at Tartu University, Stalovich, told me that he sent out his CV to 100 universities in Russia and other republics of the Soviet Union. Some institutions never responded to him and other universities sent a letter of regret. Only in Tartu he was first offered a part-time job and then full time jobs. In the end he became an academician, a professor at Tartu University. There is an entire pleiad of such people. Tartu University and Estonia on the whole take pride in them.

When I was a postgraduate student, I joined the Party. By that time I had fully gotten rid of my adolescent illusions in connection with the communist party and ideology. When, at the Twentieth Party Congress 44, Khrushchev 45 divulged Stalin’s cult of personality, it revealed to me the opportunities and horrors of totalitarianism. Nobody could ever be sure that the same things ‘only in a different view’ would not continue when Khrushchev or someone else was at power. There was no democracy in the USSR. The Party ruled and governed and everybody understood that.

I started criticizing the Soviet regime even more after the Twentieth Party Congress. The more I found out about the things happening in the USSR, the more I rejected that ideology. The more I pondered over and understood things about life, the more enlightened I got that the Soviet ideology didn’t match my ethics and morale. I joined the Party as I was aware that it was necessary to live prosperously and work in the Soviet Union. I understood that it would be easier for me to graduate and find a good job being a party member. I have always remained a Jew no matter whether it was good or bad for me.

I started going in for sport in my childhood. I played tennis. I was the champion of Estonia in tennis among the juniors. I felt that I wouldn’t become a first-class tennis player, but I was fond of it. I am still playing tennis two to three times a week. I haven’t become a professional tennis player, but I became a referee.

I have been the chairman of the referees of the Estonian Tennis Federation and was arbiter at the most important competitions in Estonia, such as the Olympics of the USSR, ‘World Tennis Stars.’ I was famous in Estonia, and it probably helped. I knew all tennis referees of the entire Soviet Union. In Moscow almost all referees were Jews. There were less in Leningrad, only a few in Ukraine and in Lithuania and Latvia there were almost no Jewish referees. I knew the referees and trainers very well. They treated me very well. It helped a lot in my life. They still know and remember me.

I got married for the first time in 1958. My first wife, Aleftina Zavadovskaya, was born in Russia, in Kalinin [now Tver], in 1939. Aleftina was half Jewish: her father, Mikhail Zavadovskiy, was a Jew, and her mother was Russian. Aleftina finished seven grades of compulsory school and worked as a sales assistant. Her family moved to Tallinn after the war.

Our elder daughter, Ilona, was born in 1961 and the second one, Danielа, in 1963. My family life wasn’t easy. Aleftina was extremely jealous and she was even treated by a psychoanalyst at a certain point, but it didn’t help and our life turned into a nightmare, not only for us, but for the daughters as well. It was dreadful and finally I asked for a divorce.

This was right before I finished my postgraduate studies. At that time it was considered that a party member had not right to get divorced. The party committee of our institute told me to choose: to put my party membership card on the table or to go back and live with my family. I said that I could do neither. My decision was final and I wanted a divorce.

As a result, I was expelled from the Party in the institute, where I was a postgraduate student. My membership was restored by the secretary of the municipal committee of the party in Tallinn, who knew me very well as a tennis player. His previous position was the secretary of the central Komsomol committee of Estonia. Every winter we had an open competition for the Komsomol cup of Estonia, and I was an arbiter. He stood up for me along with the director of the enterprise where I was working. At that time I was employed as deputy department chief by the design institute Estgiproselstroy, involved in design and construction in rural areas of Estonia. My party membership was restored within a couple of months and I got my membership card back.

Now I could not defend my thesis. All leading positions in the construction institute were taken by the communists and they were members of the dissertation board. I passed all exams for the scientific degree, but I was aware that they wouldn’t admit me to defend my thesis no matter what, so I decided not to make any attempts. My efforts would have been futile anyway.

I could have tried to defend my thesis in another place, but I didn’t do that. I got an offer from the polytechnic institute to hold lectures on the topic I was working on at Estgiproselstroy. I assisted my colleague in entering the postgraduate department in Leningrad. Then he wrote a book on his topic and gave it to me with the following inscription: ‘This book should have been written by you.’ But he was the one who wrote it.

I was expelled from the Party once again, during the period of the Six-Day-War in Israel 46. In the party meeting the letter from the central committee of the Party was read to us. It was about the termination of diplomatic relations with Israel 47. I took the floor and said that the Soviet Union had supported the foundation of that state back in 1948 and Israel was the progeny of the Soviet Union. Now the Soviet Union is playing the game to be in favor of the Arabs, the bigger Arabic world. It is historically clear that diplomatic relations with Israel will be regained.

That was my speech and the KGB 48 was informed of it. Again, they wanted to expel me from the Party. I said that I wasn’t willing to be a hypocrite, that I thought our life would be better if we would be able to talk in the party meeting about what we are talking about at home. That was the way I was thinking and expressed myself. Again, I got away with that. 

In the 1970s the Soviet regime permitted Jews to immigrate to Israel. I think that was a great move. I found it good when someone was leaving for Israel, and I think if Jews decide to immigrate, it is Israel where they should go to . I would never think that those who left the Soviet Union were betrayers of the motherland. I consider them to be patriots, as Jews have only one motherland – Israel.

My friends and pals left. I went to visit them. We still keep in touch. I didn’t think of immigrating to Israel. I was born here and the Estonian culture is close to me, but I know that I am a Jew, and I stick to traditions. My daughters from the first marriage have lived in New York since the 1970s. They have children of their own.

I have never understood Jews, who were leaving for Germany. Of course, there are exceptions. My aunt, German’s wife, was born in Germany before the fascists came to power. Her family left Germany for Estonia before the war. My aunt was in the third year of her studies at the conservatoire. Germany was her motherland, but my aunt and her family had to leave it. They left behind their houses in Germany. When, during perestroika 49, my aunt immigrated to Germany, I understood that. She went to her motherland, from which she was forced to leave. It was natural for her to go back. She got a lot of prerogatives upon her arrival in Germany.

There are Jews, who have never been connected with Germany in any way, and immigrate there for the sake of material prosperity. This is what I cannot comprehend. They are living in a country, where they will always be strangers. Many of them are not willing to get acclimatized in the new environment, study the language, and follow the customs. They speak Russian. Of course, they have a better life there than in Russia, for instance, but both they and their children and grandchildren will always be treated like strangers in Germany. I know German. I have been in Germany many times, but I’ve never been willing to move there.

I got married for the second time in the early 1980s. My second wife, Faina Kaminskaya, was born in the Ukrainian town of Zaporozhye in 1954. It is also her second marriage. She was divorced when we met. She had two children, a son and a daughter, in her first marriage. Both of them are currently living in Israel. The son left for Israel earlier. The daughter went to the Jewish school in Tallinn and left to continue her education there. She has lived in Israel for five years now.

Faina and I have two children together, two sons called Daniel and Alan. They have one year age difference: Daniel was born in 1985 and Alan in 1986. They were raised in independent Estonia; they were babies during the Soviet regime. My sons were raised Estonians and don’t identify themselves as Jews. Both of them are currently studying at the Tallinn Technical University. They are very good boys.

Faina graduated from the Foreign Languages Department. She is teaching French. Our first economic university, the-Estonia Business Club, was opened in Tallinn, and Faina is teaching there. She is considered to be one of the best French teachers in Estonia.

During Soviet times I worked on construction sites and in design institutes. I have worked for 16 years in Estgiproselstroy. We designed Estonian villages. 40 years ago I met our current president, Reutel. He was the director of a sovkhoz 50 at that time, and I was involved in designing buildings in that village.

I was in charge of all the Olympic constructions in Tallinn, built in 1980. In the course of the Moscow Olympics of 1980 there was a sailing regatta in Tallinn. A sailing sport center was to be built for the regatta. Hotel Olympia, the amusement center and restaurant Pirita, the Sports Palace on the shore were to be built as well. I was in charge of those construction projects. It was a very interesting and the most pleasant job for me, as I am a sportsman, and I knew that what was built at that time would remain. Apart from the budget we received from Estonian we were also funded by Moscow.

When perestroika began, I felt confident being a manager. Taking advantage of the situation, I founded a joint Finnish and Soviet enterprise. I met my Finnish friends during the construction for the Olympics. I purchased boilers from them. We’ve remained friends until today. We founded a joint enterprise dealing with the production of heating equipment.

When I got Grandmother’s house back, I formed a company to be able to build a house. My company was one of the first in independent Estonia; its number was 566. My company built a new six-story house in the place of Grandmother’s two wooden houses. We still keep building a lot of custom-made houses. I think that I took the most from perestroika.

There was a time when I seriously thought of immigration. It was in the period when perestroika was winding up, when there was a putsch in Moscow 51. I was really frightened that with that putsch all would come back, and I said to myself that I would leave as I didn’t want to have such a life like I used to before. There was no way back. Luckily, the putsch ended up with a flunk and the breakup of the USSR. I am still living in Estonia.

During perestroika I got a chance to go to Israel for the first time. It is hard to describe my impressions of Israel in a few words. I was deeply impressed. I went to the southern part during my first trip. I was in such southern countries as Armenia and Georgia and I thought that I would see the same things in Israel. The first thing that impressed was the cleanliness of the toilets by the Dead Sea and by a small shop. I couldn’t expect to see that in a southern country.

Secondly, I was impressed by the Israeli youth. I saw many young people and all of them carried guns and pistols. I thought: if in the Soviet Union – my first visit to Israel was in Soviet times – young people were give weapons, it would be scary to walk outside. I could not imagine how high the moral and level of responsibility could be for the state not to be afraid to give weapons to the youth.

Once I was on a bus and a soldier on his way home was sitting next to me. There were a rucksack and a gun next to him and a pistol in the holster. The guy was sleeping and none of the passengers was paying attention to him, or to his weapon. If an armed soldier was trying to thumb a lift, any vehicle would stop for him. If an armed soldier was trying to ask for a lift on our roads, all drivers would be speeding up. It characterizes the state.

I was very happy for Israel, and for the people who are living there. It is their country. I have been to Israel three times. I am a patriot of Israel, but I am going to live here in Estonia. Young people should go to Israel. The ones who can do something for their country.

My mother died in 1984 at the age of 71, a couple of days after her birthday. Mother survived all her brothers. German died in 1967, when he was 60. Isaac died in 1971, and Pavel, the youngest brother, in 1979. All of them were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Tallinn. My grandmother’s grave was also there. It was natural for us that Jews should be buried in the Jewish cemetery. This was still in Soviet times as well.

In 1991, upon the breakup of the Soviet Union, Estonia got independent. I think it’s wonderful. Of course, not everything could be done at once and a lot should have been done for this country, but the most important thing is that we are living in a free country, our own country. I feel at home in Estonia.

My classmate is a vice speaker of the Estonian parliament. I know about ten people from the Estonian parliament, and five of them are my close friends. Politics is not my cup of tea and I tell all the Jews that they have no place in Estonian politics. If you want to be a politician, go to Israel and do politics there. Luckily, there are no Jews in our politics. A clever Jew wouldn’t be involved in politics. In the general meeting of the Jews of our Estonian Jewish community I also say that we wouldn’t be loved anywhere and by anybody. We should behave in such a way that we would be respected, and that’s it. I act like that. People treat me very well. As far as I know I don’t have enemies.

I have always identified myself as Jew. Sometimes I go to the synagogue. I used to be there more often, but now I live out of town and don’t always get a chance to get there. I go to the synagogue, without knowing and understanding things. Our rabbi Shmuel said that the fact that I go there is also pleasant for God. So I go to the synagogue. We are lucky to have such a rabbi. He is very prudent and patient; in spite of being so young he understands that too much pressure and compulsion can take away people from God and traditional Jewish values.

Since 1992 I have been a board member of the community. I’ve been reelected three or four times. I am an oppositionist, always openly and frankly saying what I think. Many people thought that I wanted to be a leader of our community, but I’m not seeking that. I know that I am unfit for that as I don’t have the rights skills to be a chairman.

I am involved in construction and the history of Estonian Jews. We are creating our own museum. I am collecting quite a lot of material and will be active helping out. I recorded about 30 audio interviews with Estonian Jews. We would like to publish a book with the title ‘Jews in the history of Estonia’ in collaboration with Elhon Saks, who is a member of our community. I prepared materials about Jewish sportsmen and I am currently compiling data on lawyers and economists. Elhon Saks is collecting materials on culture, medicine etc. We are planning to create something like an encyclopedia. This is my last job, and I hope I’ll be able to cope with that.

Of course, we are also looking for material connected with the Holocaust in Estonia. We’ve compiled a lot of data. Together with a former prisoner of Klooga, Benjamin Anolik, we accidentally revealed some information about the Holocaust in Estonia. By chance we found a place where 600 Jews were executed. It was like a blank spot for us and we couldn’t explain it. The fascists took 887 male Jews from France to Kaunas: half of them were executed in Kaunas, and the other half in Tallinn. It is proved by documents. There is a monument in Tallinn that the state built on the spot where 1000 people were executed, and we found out that 400 of them were French Jews. The relatives of those who were shot in early May come here every year.

Since my wife teaches French at the university, we receive French people every year. We didn’t know about the other 600 people that were executed in that place. The execution took place on 18th September 1944, and on the 19th, Hitler’s people destroyed the Klooga concentration camp, and as it turned out those prisoners of Lagedi camp had been executed prior to that.

Benjamin Anolik was in a car, which was on the way to the execution place, as it was found out from a conversation with him. Several trucks with 600 people left there before him, and two trucks with 80 people – 40 women and 40 men – did not reach the place. One truck broke down and the driver of another one stopped on the road to help the other. When the truck was fixed and the prisoners reached the destination, one SS-guy came out from the forest and said, ‘The work is finished for today.’ The prisoners didn’t understand what work he was talking about. Only later on they found out that other people had been shot.

We started pondering about where that place could have been. After a conversation with Anolik I knew which place he was talking about. They had taken a half hour drive from the camp and since the SS guy said that the work had been finished, the prisoners were taken to Tallinn prison. It means that they were in Tallinn, and in the morning they were taken to Klooga. This is how that unclear episode can be explained.

I could not quite get who was executed there as prisoners from Tallinn prison were taken to Stutthof 52 on ships. I was told about it by a Latvian Jew, Izidor Levin. He was rescued by an Estonian professor. The tree devoted to his rescue was planted in Yad Vashem 53.

It means that those were not the Tallinn prisoners who had been executed there. There were no Jews in Estonia, all of them had been executed. Who were they? We had an idea that apart from French Jews, political activists were also executed there. It turned out that those 600, taken from Klooga, had been executed. I cannot assert that 100 percent, but I give it a 95 percent likelihood. It means that it was also the place of execution of the Jews.

Now it should be marked on the monument, there were Jews. This is a very beautiful monument at the cemetery. In 1944 the cemetery was much smaller and there was a forest in its place. This is the way we are restoring history – inch by inch. I am currently working on that. I have a list of the camps in Estonia and I know exactly in which of them there were Jews. There were eight different camps in Estonia: for militaries, repatriates, penal settlements, prisons etc.

One of my family acquaintances worked in the KGB, and before he died he gave me a couple of his files. He told me I could make use of them. He collected the documents, processed by the Estonian KGB. He compiled so much interesting data that it is hard to embrace it. The documents there are about the camps. There are also lists in his files – Jews, non-Jews, gypsies – and for each camp there were list for certain dates. I am going to hand over that material to our museum.

I also have an alphabetic catalogue of Klooga. It is archived on small index cards; I copied the information by hand. It took me four months. I didn’t know what I was writing it down for, but still decided to proceed with it. When I met Anolik I gave him the copy of that list. When the book about Klooga was published in collaboration with Anolik, that list was included in the book, in the way it was – in my handwriting.

The list is complete, containing 2186 names. There are even names of 18 people, who were executed in the forest on 18th September for their attempt to escape. There was the following information about each person: date of birth, what he was doing in the camp, and his number. One man, who is living in Israel, saw that list in the book and found the names of his relatives there. He came to Tallinn from Israel to visit their grave. So, this is my job.

I am also involved in construction; I have a couple of small sites. There are people who are doing the physical work, and I am organizing it all and superintend them. I also do technical inspections. I am working on construction and historical projects simultaneously. I am doing two important jobs. It is not hard for me as I am willing to do that. Each person should do what he can and what he wants to do and what he finds necessary. I find my job necessary.


Glossary

1 Jewish community of Estonia

On 30th March 1988 in a meeting of Jews of Estonia, consisting of 100 people, convened by David Slomka, a resolution was made to establish the Community of Jewish Culture of Estonia (KJCE) and in May 1988 the community was registered in the Tallinn municipal Ispolkom. KJCE was the first independent Jewish cultural organization in the USSR to be officially registered by the Soviet authorities. In 1989 the first Ivrit courses started, although the study of Ivrit was equal to Zionist propaganda and considered to be anti-Soviet activity. Contacts with Jewish organizations of other countries were established. KJCE was part of the Peoples' Front of Estonia, struggling for an independent state. In December 1989 the first issue of the KJCE paper Kashachar (Dawn) was published in Estonian and Russian language. In 1991 the first radio program about Jewish culture and activities of KJCE, 'Sholem Aleichem,' was broadcast in Estonia. In 1991 the Jewish religious community and KJCE had a joined meeting, where it was decided to found the Jewish Community of Estonia.

2 Russian Revolution of 1917

Revolution in which the tsarist regime was overthrown in the Russian Empire and, under Lenin, was replaced by the Bolshevik rule. The two phases of the Revolution were: February Revolution, which came about due to food and fuel shortages during World War I, and during which the tsar abdicated and a provisional government took over. The second phase took place in the form of a coup led by Lenin in October/November (October Revolution) and saw the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.

3 Bolsheviks

Members of the movement led by Lenin. The name 'Bolshevik' was coined in 1903 and denoted the group that emerged in elections to the key bodies in the Social Democratic Party (SDPRR) considering itself in the majority (Rus. bolshynstvo) within the party. It dubbed its opponents the minority (Rus. menshynstvo, the Mensheviks). Until 1906 the two groups formed one party. The Bolsheviks first gained popularity and support in society during the 1905-07 Revolution. During the February Revolution in 1917 the Bolsheviks were initially in the opposition to the Menshevik and SR ('Sotsialrevolyutsionyery', Socialist Revolutionaries) delegates who controlled the Soviets (councils). When Lenin returned from emigration (16th April) they proclaimed his program of action (the April theses) and under the slogan 'All power to the Soviets' began to Bolshevize the Soviets and prepare for a proletariat revolution. Agitation proceeded on a vast scale, especially in the army. The Bolsheviks set about creating their own armed forces, the Red Guard. Having overthrown the Provisional Government, they created a government with the support of the II Congress of Soviets (the October Revolution), to which they admitted some left-wing SRs in order to gain the support of the peasantry. In 1952 the Bolshevik party was renamed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

4 Nansen Passport

Named after the scholar, statesman, diplomat and winner of the Nobel Prize for Peace, the Norwegian Fridtjof Nansen (1861 - 1930). After the end of World War I and until 1921 he worked as chairman of the World League of Nations. All his efforts were directed to protect the interests of the minorities and small nations. He contributed to the organization of the repatriation of 450,000 prisoners of war from 26 countries. He also worked to settle the legal status and economic independence of refugees. The first legal document on the legal protection of refugees was adopted in July 1922 and later endorsed by 52 countries worldwide. That was the so-called 'Nansen Passport,' which established the status of the refugee. All his life the humanist Fridtjof Nansen worked for the establishment of a common international status of the refugees, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace. In 1954 the League of Nations established an award in his name.

5 Guild I

In tsarist Russia merchants belonged to Guild I, II or III. Merchants of Guild I were allowed to trade with foreign merchants, while the others were allowed to trade only within Russia.

6 Maccabi World Union

International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19th century. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth. In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi. The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

7 Sparta

The Sparta Praha club was founded on 16th November 1893. A memorial of the first very famous era of the club's history are first and foremost two victories in the Central European Cup, which in the 1920s and 1930s had the same significance as today's Champions League. Sparta, usually with Slavia, always formed the foundation of the national team and therefore its players were present during the greatest successes of the Czechoslovak and Czech teams.

8 Old Believers

As their name suggests, all of them rejected the reformed service books, which Patriarch Nikon introduced in the 1650s and preserved pre-Nikonian liturgical practices in as complete a form as canonical regulations permitted. For some Old Believers, the defense of the old liturgy and traditional culture was a matter of primary importance; for all, the old ritual was at least a badge of identification and a unifying slogan. The Old Believers were united in their hostility toward the Russian state, which supported the Nikonian reforms and persecuted those who, under the banner of the old faith, opposed the new order in the church and the secular administration. To be sure, the intensity of their hostility and the language and gestures with which they expressed it varied as widely as their social background and their devotional practices. Nevertheless, when the government applied pressure to one section of the movement, all of its adherents instinctively drew together and extended to their beleaguered brethren whatever help they could.

9 Great Patriotic War

On 22nd June 1941 at 5 o'clock in the morning Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union without declaring war. This was the beginning of the so-called Great Patriotic War. The German blitzkrieg, known as Operation Barbarossa, nearly succeeded in breaking the Soviet Union in the months that followed. Caught unprepared, the Soviet forces lost whole armies and vast quantities of equipment to the German onslaught in the first weeks of the war. By November 1941 the German army had seized the Ukrainian Republic, besieged Leningrad, the Soviet Union's second largest city, and threatened Moscow itself. The war ended for the Soviet Union on 9th May 1945.

[10 Tallinn Synagogue: Built in 1883 and designed by architect Nikolai Tamm; burnt down completely in 1944.

11 First Estonian Republic

Until 1917 Estonia was part of the Russian Empire. Due to the revolutionary events in Russia, the political situation in Estonia was extremely unstable in 1917. Various political parties sprang up; the Bolshevik party was particularly strong. National forces became active, too. In February 1918, they succeeded in forming the provisional government of the First Estonian Republic, proclaiming Estonia an independent state on 24th February 1918.

12 Pogroms in Ukraine

In the 1920s there were many anti-Semitic gangs in Ukraine. They killed Jews and burnt their houses, they robbed their houses, raped women and killed children.

13 Tallinn Jewish Gymnasium

During the Soviet period, the building hosted Vocational School #1. In 1990, the school building was restored to the Jewish community of Estonia; it is now home to the Tallinn Jewish School.

14 Estonia in 1939-1940

On 24th September 1939, Moscow demanded that Estonia make available military bases for the Red Army units. On 16th June, Moscow issued an ultimatum insisting on the change of government and the right of occupation of Estonia. On 17th June, Estonia accepted the provisions and ceased to exist de facto, becoming Estonian Soviet Republic within the USSR.

15 Occupation of the Baltic Republics (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania)

Although the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact regarded only Latvia and Estonia as parts of the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, according to a supplementary protocol (signed in 28th September 1939) most of Lithuania was also transferred under the Soviets. The three states were forced to sign the 'Pact of Defense and Mutual Assistance' with the USSR allowing it to station troops in their territories. In June 1940 Moscow issued an ultimatum demanding the change of governments and the occupation of the Baltic Republics. The three states were incorporated into the Soviet Union as the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics.

16 Reestablishment of the Estonian Republic

According to the referendum conducted in the Baltic Republics in March 1991, 77.8 percent of participating Estonian residents supported the restoration of Estonian state independence. On 20th August 1991, at the time of the coup attempt in Moscow, the Estonian Republic's Supreme Council issued the Decree of Estonian Independence. On 6th September 1991, the USSR's State Council recognized full independence of Estonia, and the country was accepted into the UN on 17th September 1991.

17 Deportations from the Baltics (1940-1953)

After the Soviet Union occupied the three Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) in June 1940 as a part of establishing the Soviet system, mass deportation of the local population began. The victims of these were mainly but not exclusively those unwanted by the regime: the local bourgeoisie and the previously politically active strata. Deportations to remote parts of the Soviet Union continued up until the death of Stalin. The first major wave of deportation took place between 11th and 14th June 1941, when 36,000, mostly politically active people were deported. Deportations were reintroduced after the Soviet Army recaptured the three countries from Nazi Germany in 1944. Partisan fights against the Soviet occupiers were going on all up to 1956, when the last squad was eliminated. Between June 1948 and January 1950, in accordance with a Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR under the pretext of 'grossly dodged from labor activity in the agricultural field and led anti-social and parasitic mode of life' from Latvia 52,541, from Lithuania 118,599 and from Estonai 32,450 people were deported. The total number of deportees from the three republics amounted to 203,590. Among them were entire Lithuanian families of different social strata (peasants, workers, intelligentsia), everybody who was able to reject or deemed capable to reject the regime. Most of the exiled died in the foreign land. Besides, about 100,000 people were killed in action and in fusillade for being members of partisan squads and some other 100,000 were sentenced to 25 years in camps.

18 Kolkhoz

In the Soviet Union the policy of gradual and voluntary collectivization of agriculture was adopted in 1927 to encourage food production while freeing labor and capital for industrial development. In 1929, with only 4% of farms in kolkhozes, Stalin ordered the confiscation of peasants' land, tools, and animals; the kolkhoz replaced the family farm.

19 Gulag

The Soviet system of forced labor camps in the remote regions of Siberia and the Far North, which was first established in 1919. However, it was not until the early 1930s that there was a significant number of inmates in the camps. By 1934 the Gulag, or the Main Directorate for Corrective Labor Camps, then under the Cheka's successor organization the NKVD, had several million inmates. The prisoners included murderers, thieves, and other common criminals, along with political and religious dissenters. The Gulag camps made significant contributions to the Soviet economy during the rule of Stalin. Conditions in the camps were extremely harsh. After Stalin died in 1953, the population of the camps was reduced significantly, and conditions for the inmates improved somewhat.

20 German ASSR

Established as Labour Commune of Volga Germans or Volga German AO within the Russian SFSR on 19th October 1918. Transformed into Volga German ASSR on 19th December 1924, abolished on 28th August 1941. The official state name was Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic of the Volga-Germans. The city of Engels is the former capital of the Volga-German Republic.

21 Kulaks

In the Soviet Union the majority of wealthy peasants that refused to join collective farms and give their grain and property to Soviet power were called kulaks, declared enemies of the people and exterminated in the 1930s.

22 Estonian Rifle Corps

Military unit established in late 1941 as a part of the Soviet Army. The Corps was made up of two rifle divisions. Those signed up for the Estonian Corps by military enlistment offices were ethnic Estonians regardless of their residence within the Soviet Union as well as men of call-up age residing in Estonia before the Soviet occupation (1940). The Corps took part in the bloody battle of Velikiye Luki (December 1942 - January 1943), where it suffered great losses and was sent to the back areas for re-formation and training. In the summer of 1944, the Corps took part in the liberation of Estonia and in March 1945 in the actions on Latvian territory. In 1946, the Corps was disbanded.

23 All-Union pioneer organization

A communist organization for teenagers between 10 and 15 years old (cf: boy-/ girlscouts in the US). The organization aimed at educating the young generation in accordance with the communist ideals, preparing pioneers to become members of the Komsomol and later the Communist Party. In the Soviet Union, all teenagers were pioneers.

24 Estonian legion

a military unit within the Combat Support Forces of the Waffen-SS Verfügungstruppe during WWII. The formation was announced on 28th August 1942 by the German occupying powers in Estonia and formally established on 1st October 1942. Oberführer Franz Augsberger was nominated to be the commander of the legion and the later 3 Estonian SS Volunteer Brigade. 500 volunteers had appeared and signed up for the Legion by October 13, 1942. In Spring 1943 additional men were drafted from the police forces and the number rose to 1280. 90% of the volunteers had lost a relative in the Red Terror during 1940-1941. Battalion Narwa was formed from the first 800 men of the Legion who had finished their training at Dębica (Heidelager in 1943), and were sent in April 1943 to join the Division Wiking in Ukraine. They replaced the Finnish Volunteer Battalion, recalled to Finland for political reasons. The Battalion Narva was in the focus of the Red Army's attack near Izjum, Ukraine. The unit entered the battle with 800 men, and only one third were left able to fight. The Red Army, however, suffered heavier losses as they lost over 7,000 men killed and wounded, over 100 tanks were lost. Battalion Narwa participated in the battle of the Korsun-Cherkassy Pocket. Retreating through the escape route called The Hell's Gate, the battalion came under heavy Soviet fire with little cover. The battalion lost almost all of its equipment during the carnage while most of the troops escaped encirclement. In order to recruit more men for the legion, the German Occupying powers turned to forced mobilization in March 1943 by calling up all Estonian men born between 1919 and 1924. As a result 5,300 men were conscripted into the Estonian Legion and 6,800 for the support service of the Wehrmacht. Out of the conscripts was formed the second Estonian Regiment and the Estonian SS Volunteer Brigade was established on 5th May 1943. Another conscription call was announced in October 1943 for men born in 1925-1926. As a result, in order to avoid the draft, about 5,000 men escaped to Finland. Over half of these men volunteered for service in the Finnish Defense Forces and formed the Finnish Infantry Regiment 200. The conscripts were included with the Estonian SS Volunteer Brigade that was renamed the 3 Estonian SS Volunteer Brigade on 22nd October 1944. By January 1944 the German military situation on the Eastern front had worsened so much that a general conscription call was announced in Estonia on 1st February 1944. In the hopes of restoring the independence of Estonia the last prime minister of Republic of Estonia Jüri Uluots gave his support to the draft. As the result about 38,000 men were conscripted, the units of Estonian Legion, the Finnish Infantry Regiment 200 were returned to Estonia and were reformed into the 20th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Estonian). (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_Legion)

25 Riga ghetto

Established on 23rd August 1941, located in the suburb of Riga populated by poor Jews. About 13,000 people resided here before the occupation, and about 30,000 inmates were kept in the ghetto. On 31st November and 8th December 1941 most inmates were killed in the Rumbula forest. On 31st October 15,000 inmates were shot, on 8th December 10 000 inmates were killed. Only younger men were kept alive to do hard work. After the bigger part of the ghetto population was exterminated, a smaller ghetto was established in December 1941. The majority of inmates of this 'smaller ghetto' were Jews, brought from the Reich and Western Europe. On 2nd November 1943 the ghetto was closed. The survivors were taken to nearby concentration camps. In 1944 the remaining Jews were taken to Germany, where few of them survived.

26 Communal apartment

The Soviet power wanted to improve housing conditions by requisitioning 'excess' living space of wealthy families after the Revolution of 1917. Apartments were shared by several families with each family occupying one room and sharing the kitchen, toilet and bathroom with other tenants. Because of the chronic shortage of dwelling space in towns communal or shared apartments continued to exist for decades. Despite state programs for the construction of more houses and the liquidation of communal apartments, which began in the 1960s, shared apartments still exist today.

27 School #

Schools had numbers and not names. It was part of the policy of the state. They were all state schools and were all supposed to be identical.

28 Ispolkom

After the tsar's abdication (March, 1917), power passed to a Provisional Government appointed by a temporary committee of the Duma, which proposed to share power to some extent with councils of workers and soldiers known as 'soviets'. Following a brief and chaotic period of fairly democratic procedures, a mixed body of socialist intellectuals known as the Ispolkom secured the right to 'represent' the soviets. The democratic credentials of the soviets were highly imperfect to begin with: peasants - the overwhelming majority of the Russian population - had virtually no say, and soldiers were grossly over-represented. The Ispolkom's assumption of power turned this highly imperfect democracy into an intellectuals' oligarchy.

29 Card system

The food card system regulating the distribution of food and industrial products was introduced in the USSR in 1929 due to extreme deficit of consumer goods and food. The system was cancelled in 1931. In 1941, food cards were reintroduced to keep records, distribute and regulate food supplies to the population. The card system covered main food products such as bread, meat, oil, sugar, salt, cereals, etc. The rations varied depending on which social group one belonged to, and what kind of work one did. Workers in the heavy industry and defense enterprises received a daily ration of 800 g (miners - 1 kg) of bread per person; workers in other industries 600 g. Non-manual workers received 400 or 500 g based on the significance of their enterprise, and children 400 g. However, the card system only covered industrial workers and residents of towns while villagers never had any provisions of this kind. The card system was cancelled in 1947.

30 Babi Yar

Babi Yar is the site of the first mass shooting of Jews that was carried out openly by fascists. On 29th and 30th September 1941 33,771 Jews were shot there by a special SS unit and Ukrainian militia men. During the Nazi occupation of Kiev between 1941 and 1943 over a 100,000 people were killed in Babi Yar, most of whom were Jewish. The Germans tried in vain to efface the traces of the mass grave in August 1943 and the Soviet public learnt about mass murder after World War II.

31 Klooga

Subcamp of the Vaivara camp in Estonia, set up in 1943 and one of the largest camps in the country. Most of the prisoners came from the Vilnius ghetto; they worked under extreme conditions. There were 3,000 to 5,000 inmates kept in the Klooga camp. It was eliminated together with all of its inmates in spring 1944, before the advance by the Soviet army.

32 Yad Vashem

This museum, founded in 1953 in Jerusalem, honors both Holocaust martyrs and 'the Righteous Among the Nations', non-Jewish rescuers who have been recognized for their 'compassion, courage and morality'.

33 Buchenwald

This museum, founded in 1953 in Jerusalem, honors both Holocaust martyrs and 'the Righteous Among the Nations', non-Jewish rescuers who have been recognized for their 'compassion, courage and morality'.

34 Erenburg, Ilya Grigorievich (1891-1967)

Famous Russian Jewish novelist, poet and journalist who spent his early years in France. His first important novel, The Extraordinary Adventures of Julio Jurento (1922) is a satire on modern European civilization. His other novels include The Thaw (1955), a forthright piece about Stalin's régime which gave its name to the period of relaxation of censorship after Stalin's death.

35 Aba Gomer (?-1941)

Born in Belostok, Poland, and graduated from the Department of Philosophy of Bonn University. He lived in Tallinn from 1927 and was the chief rabbi of Estonia. In 1941, he was determined not to go into Soviet back areas and remained on the German-occupied territory. He was killed by Nazis in the fall of 1941.

36 Struggle against religion

The 1930s was a time of anti-religion struggle in the USSR. In those years it was not safe to go to synagogue or to church. Places of worship, statues of saints, etc. were removed; rabbis, Orthodox and Roman Catholic priests disappeared behind KGB walls.

37 Komsomol

Communist youth political organization created in 1918. The task of the Komsomol was to spread the ideas of communism and involve the worker and peasant youth in building the Soviet Union. The Komsomol also aimed at giving a communist upbringing by involving the worker youth in the political struggle, supplemented by theoretical education. The Komsomol was more popular than the Communist Party because with its aim of education people could accept uninitiated young proletarians, whereas party members had to have at least a minimal political qualification.

38 Creation of the State of Israel

From 1917 Palestine was a British mandate. Also in 1917 the Balfour Declaration was published, which supported the idea of the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Throughout the interwar period, Jews were migrating to Palestine, which caused the conflict with the local Arabs to escalate. On the other hand, British restrictions on immigration sparked increasing opposition to the mandate powers. Immediately after World War II there were increasing numbers of terrorist attacks designed to force Britain to recognize the right of the Jews to their own state. These aspirations provoked the hostile reaction of the Palestinian Arabs and the Arab states. In February 1947 the British foreign minister Ernest Bevin ceded the Palestinian mandate to the UN, which took the decision to divide Palestine into a Jewish section and an Arab section and to create an independent Jewish state. On 14th May 1948 David Ben Gurion proclaimed the creation of the State of Israel. It was recognized immediately by the US and the USSR. On the following day the armies of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon attacked Israel, starting a war that continued, with intermissions, until the beginning of 1949 and ended in a truce.

39 Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’

The campaign against 'cosmopolitans', i.e. Jews, was initiated in articles in the central organs of the Communist Party in 1949. The campaign was directed primarily at the Jewish intelligentsia and it was the first public attack on Soviet Jews as Jews. 'Cosmopolitans' writers were accused of hating the Russian people, of supporting Zionism, etc. Many Yiddish writers as well as the leaders of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested in November 1948 on charges that they maintained ties with Zionism and with American 'imperialism'. They were executed secretly in 1952. The anti-Semitic Doctors' Plot was launched in January 1953. A wave of anti-Semitism spread through the USSR. Jews were removed from their positions, and rumors of an imminent mass deportation of Jews to the eastern part of the USSR began to spread. Stalin's death in March 1953 put an end to the campaign against 'cosmopolitans.'

40 Doctors’ Plot

The Doctors' Plot was an alleged conspiracy of a group of Moscow doctors to murder leading government and party officials. In January 1953, the Soviet press reported that nine doctors, six of whom were Jewish, had been arrested and confessed their guilt. As Stalin died in March 1953, the trial never took place. The official paper of the Party, the Pravda, later announced that the charges against the doctors were false and their confessions obtained by torture. This case was one of the worst anti-Semitic incidents during Stalin's reign. In his secret speech at the Twentieth Party Congress in 1956 Khrushchev stated that Stalin wanted to use the Plot to purge the top Soviet leadership.

41 Lenin (1870-1924)

Pseudonym of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, the Russian Communist leader. A profound student of Marxism, and a revolutionary in the 1890s. He became the leader of the Bolshevik faction of the Social Democratic Party, whom he led to power in the coup d'état of 25th October 1917. Lenin became head of the Soviet state and retained this post until his death.

42 Mandatory job assignment in the USSR

Graduates of higher educational institutions had to complete a mandatory 2-year job assignment issued by the institution from which they graduated. After finishing this assignment young people were allowed to get employment at their discretion in any town or organization.

43 Lotman, Yuri (1922-1993)

One of the greatest semioticians and literary scholars. In 1950 he received his degree from the Philology Department of Leningrad University but was unable to continue with his post-graduate studies as a result of the campaign against 'cosmopolitans' and the wave of anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union. Lotman managed to find a job in Tartu, Estonia. Starting in 1950, he taught Russian literature at Tartu University, and from 1960-77 he was the head of the Department of Russian Literature. He did active research work and is the author of over 800 books and academic articles on the history of Russian literature and public thought, on literary theory, on the history of Russian culture, and on semiotics. He was an elected member of the British Royal Society, Norwegian Royal Academy, and many other academic societies.

44 Twentieth Party Congress

At the Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956 Khrushchev publicly debunked the cult of Stalin and lifted the veil of secrecy from what had happened in the USSR during Stalin's leadership.

45 Khrushchev, Nikita (1894-1971)

Soviet communist leader. After Stalin's death in 1953, he became first secretary of the Central Committee, in effect the head of the Communist Party of the USSR. In 1956, during the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev took an unprecedented step and denounced Stalin and his methods. He was deposed as premier and party head in October 1964. In 1966 he was dropped from the Party's Central Committee.

46 Six-Day-War

(Hebrew: Milhemet Sheshet Hayamim), also known as the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, Six Days War, or June War, was fought between Israel and its Arab neighbors Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. It began when Israel launched a preemptive war on its Arab neighbors; by its end Israel controlled the Gaza Strip, the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. The results of the war affect the geopolitics of the region to this day.

47 Severing the diplomatic ties between the Eastern Block and Israel

After the 1967 Six-Day-War, the Soviet Union cut all diplomatic ties with Israel, under the pretext of Israel being the aggressor and the neighboring Arab states the victims of Israeli imperialism. The Soviet-occupied Eastern European countries (Eastern Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Bulgaria) conformed to the verdict of the Kremlin and followed the Soviet example. Diplomatic relations between Israel and the ex-Communist countries resumed after the fall of communism.

48 KGB

The KGB or Committee for State Security was the main Soviet external security and intelligence agency, as well as the main secret police agency from 1954 to 1991.

49 Perestroika (Russian for restructuring)

Soviet economic and social policy of the late 1980s, associated with the name of Soviet politician Mikhail Gorbachev. The term designated the attempts to transform the stagnant, inefficient command economy of the Soviet Union into a decentralized, market-oriented economy. Industrial managers and local government and party officials were granted greater autonomy, and open elections were introduced in an attempt to democratize the Communist Party organization. By 1991, perestroika was declining and was soon eclipsed by the dissolution of the USSR.

50 Sovkhoz

State-run agricultural enterprise. The first sovkhoz yards were created in the USSR in 1918. According to the law the sovkhoz property was owned by the state, but it was assigned to the sovkhoz which handled it based on the right of business maintenance.

51 1991 Moscow coup d'etat

Starting spontaneously on the streets of Moscow, its leaders went public on 19th August. TASS (Soviet Telegraphical Agency) made an announcement that Gorbachev had been relieved of his duties for health reasons. His powers were assumed by Vice President Gennady Yanayev. A State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP) was established, led by eight officials, including KGB head Vladimir Kryuchkov, Soviet Prime Minister Valentin Pavlov, and Defense Minister Dmitry Yazov. Seizing on President Mikhail Gorbachev's summer absence from the capital, eight of the Soviet leader's most trusted ministers attempted to take control of the government. Within three days, the poorly planned coup collapsed and Gorbachev returned to the Kremlin. But an era had abruptly ended. The Soviet Union, which the coup plotters had desperately tried to save, was dead.

52 Stutthof (Pol

Sztutowo): German concentration camp 36 km east of Gdansk. The Germans also created a series of satellite camps in the vicinity: Stolp, Heiligenbeil, Gerdauen, Jesau, Schippenbeil, Seerappen, Praust, Burggraben, Thorn and Elbing. The Stutthof camp operated from 2nd September 1939 until 9th May 1945. The first group of prisoners (several hundred people) were Jews from Gdansk. Until 1943 small groups of Jews from Warsaw, Bialystok and other places were sent there. In early 1944 some 20,000 Auschwitz survivors were relocated to Stutthof. In spring 1944 the camp was extended significantly and was made into a death camp; subsequent transports comprised groups of Jews from Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary and Lodz in Poland. Towards the end of 1944 around 12,000 prisoners were taken from Stutthof to camps in Germany - Dachau, Buchenwald, Neuengamme and Flossenburg. In January 1945 the evacuation of Stutthof and its satellite camps began. In that period some 29,000 prisoners passed through the camp (including 26,000 women), 26,000 of whom died during the evacuation. Of the 52,000 or so people who were taken to Stutthof and its satellites, around 3,000 survived.

53 Righteous Among the Nations

A medal and honorary title awarded to people who during the Holocaust selflessly and for humanitarian reasons helped Jews. It was instituted in 1953. Awarded by a special commission headed by a justice of the Israeli Supreme Court, which works in the Yad Vashem National Remembrance Institute in Jerusalem. During the ceremony the persons recognized receive a diploma and a medal with the inscription "Whoever saves one life, saves the entire world" and plant a tree in the Avenue of the Righteous on the Remembrance Hill in Jerusalem, which is marked with plaques bearing their names. Since 1985 the Righteous receive honorary citizenship of Israel. So far over 20,000 people have been distinguished with the title, including almost 6,000 Poles.

Jozef W.

Jozef W.
Bratislava
Slovak Republic
Interviewer: Zuzana Slobodnikova and Martin Korcok
Date of interview: November 2005 – January 2006

Mr. Jozef W. is an educated and timeless person with an admirable outlook on the world. His attitude towards life as such is unique and inimitable. Perhaps exactly this is why he managed to speak with us openly and without restraint about the events that he lived through during his long life. To be sure, he like many other Slovak Jews had a beautiful childhood; all the worse then were adolescence and youth with a bitter aftertaste left by the loss of loved ones. Even despite all that met him, he did not cease to be first and foremost a human being. At his request, we are publishing only the initials of his family’s surnames in this interview.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My grandfather on my father’s side was named Natan W., and his wife, my grandmother, was named Rebeka, nee Weilova. She was born in some village not far from Vranov [Vranov nad Toplou – Presov region]. She also told me about her father, thus my great-grandfather, who lived to be 100 or 101 years old. He was named Weil. I don’t know how he made a living.

Grandpa Natan W. was from Jaslo. Today, if I’m not mistaken, Jaslo is in Poland, or the Ukraine, I don’t know, I haven’t looked into it [Jaslo: a town in Poland – Editor’s note]. That was during the time of Austro-Hungary, and how he got to the territory of today’s Slovakia, I don’t know. I as well don’t even know how he met his wife. My father was already born on the territory of today’s Slovakia, in the village of Orlik [Orlik – Presov region], not far from the town of Svidnik [Presov region]. But later my grandparents moved to the town of Chmelov [Presov region], which is about 80 kilometers east of Presov.

My grandfather was an Orthodox Jew. He had a beard, but as opposed to some that don’t take very good care of their beards, he cultivated it. He looked very distinguished. Because he wanted to support his family, he went to find work in America and for some time lived in Chicago. He had this back basket and there in that back basket he had buttons, drawstrings for pants and so on, and he sold these things. There were large slaughter houses in Chicago, and their owners wanted him, because he was Orthodox, to stamp the meat [Hechsher: authorization or permission confirming ritual cleanliness. The most familiar form of hechsher confirms that meat or other foods are prepared according to ritual regulations – Editor’s note]. He turned it down, though, because he didn’t trust those people. He didn’t believe that they wouldn’t foist off on him meat that hadn’t been prepared in ritual fashion. He saved up some money in America, and returned to Chmelov, where he bought a little house. He also bought two cows and a small plot of land.

Besides my father, my grandfather and grandmother also had another son and daughter. My father’s Hebrew name was Joshua. But in the birth register, he’s written as Osias W., and his brother was named Pinchas W. My uncle Pinchas fought in World War I. I don’t know if he was wounded in battle, or suffered from shock, but after that he constantly trembled. He was married, he took a girl from Spis as his wife. They had two sons, Reuben and Jakub. Both of them died during fighting in the Slovak National Uprising 1.

My father’s sister was named Ester. It was said that she had been very pretty. Before World War I, Ester ran away from home to America. There she married a lawyer, Dr. Solomon. Later my son and I tried to find out something more about her, but as there are very many Solomons in America, I didn’t manage to establish contact with this part of the family.

Orthodox Jews were so engrossed in the Talmud that they mainly devoted themselves to its study. This was also the case with my grandfather. As a farmer he worked in the fields. There he would sow, plow, and reap. He took care of the cows, mucked out the manure, and so on. All his life he was healthy, and he lived to be very old. I remember that each morning he would have himself a shot of brandy. Together with my father’s brother and his wife, my grandparents had a little shop. It was a small general store, which my grandma ran with her daughter-in-law. Besides this little shop they also had a pub. But there were no conflicts between them and the other villagers [in Slovakia, Jews are often portrayed as barkeepers that inebriated the Slovak nation – Editor’s note]. I’d say it like this: they would tug on my grandpa’s payes, but it was in fun. Despite the fact that people realized the “otherness” between themselves and Jews, in that village environment I wouldn’t characterize it as anti-Semitism. They simply couldn’t not realize the otherness. Everyone respected my grandfather, and downright liked him.

My grandparents spoke Yiddish to each other. They however also spoke the local dialect, especially Grandma. My father’s brother’s wife also spoke the Spis dialect, as she was from Spis. My grandfather wasn’t very talkative. I do know, though, that he was very strict. Once, when I was about 6 or 7 years old, I lit up on the way to his place. He smelled that I had been smoking, and then he gave me a good licking with his belt.

In her youth my grandmother had been renowned for her beauty. Her daughter Ester then inherited it from her. Granny wore a wig, and when she didn’t have it, she’d cover her head with a headscarf. She led a strictly kosher household. My grandparents prayed every day, and lived according to Jewish regulations – the halakhah. If I still remember properly, then by me my grandfather used to wear a dark suit, a caftan. And Grandma, as far as I remember, used to dress normally. Though she did wear, as I’ve mentioned, a wig, or a headscarf.

My grandparents lived in a small house: a front hall, on the left the general store, on the right a huge room, that was the bar where Granny served brandy, but to a reasonable degree. She never served a drunk even a small shot. And then there was one more little room, which also served as a bedroom. As a small boy I slept there with Grandpa. Grandpa also had a lot of religious books in this room, even a tabernacle with the Torah. Sometimes Jews from the village and its immediate surroundings would come to pray there. My grandparents’ house also had a typical farm courtyard. They raised cows, poultry and other animals, and also had cats. Of course there was also a stable and hayloft. In the back part of the courtyard there was a manure pit.

My grandparents lived together with their son Pinchas and his family. As far their daughter-in-law was able, she helped out with the household. On Saturdays a so-called shabesgoy used to come help out. Goy means non-Jew. It was a lady neighbor of theirs, who used to help out with various light work and would get paid for it. On Saturday, they for example weren’t even allowed to light candles. On Friday they’d still light candles themselves, but not anymore on Saturday [during the Sabbath, 39 main work activities are forbidden, to which the injunction against others is related. The “kindling of fire” is also among the forbidden activities – Editor’s note].

My grandfather’s family was very religious. My grandfather even went about circumcising far and wide [mohel: performs ritual circumcision – brit milah. Circumcision is one of the fundamental rules of Judaism – Editor’s note]. Here I also recall one hiding I got from him. The circumcision tools had to be sterile. I don’t know what kind of metal they were made from, but they were beautiful, shiny and stored in a tube. That tube was inserted into another cover, and was carefully hidden in the hay in the attic. As a young boy I found this hiding place. My bad luck was that my grandfather caught me and gave me a good hiding. Twice in my life I got it from him. Once when I was playing with those tools, and the second time when I had been smoking.

In my grandparents’ neighborhood there lived non-Jews with whom they got along very well. They were Slovaks that had returned from America, so Americans [at the turn of the 19th and 20th Century, many people, especially those from poor areas of today’s Slovakia, left for the USA for work. Those that returned were called Americans – Editor’s note]. The only thing that my grandmother couldn’t understand was her neighbor’s peculiar inclination. She had as many cats at home as in a Zoo, and when a cat died, she would bury it in the garden. She even gave every cat a little tablet with its name. Their whole courtyard looked like a cemetery. My grandmother thought it was bizarre. After all, she also had cats at home, but for catching mice.

On the whole, relations between people in the village were friendly. This is based on the fact that the Protestant priest in the town of Chmelov, Marencin, didn’t distinguish between Christians and Jews, and that villagers were very generous and were friendly to Jews that they met.

Both of my grandparents died before the war. I don’t remember exactly when anymore, but it was either in 1936 or 1937. Grandma was sickly, but I know that my grandfather was never ill. And that thanks to his lifestyle. Well, according to neighboring farmers, he probably had something with his prostate, maybe prostate cancer. They’re both buried in the town of Podlipniky [Presov region]. I went to find them, but unfortunately it’s so overgrown with weeds that I didn’t even find their gravestones.

Uncle Pinchas and his wife were deported in 1942. And their sons? During the war Jakub was being hidden by one 90-year-old farmer. When the Czechoslovak army was approaching, he didn’t want to hide any more. According to an eyewitness, he went to nearby Milkulas [Liptovsky Mikulas – Zilina region] to join the army. Svoboda’s Army 2. Of course there was fighting, and that’s why soldiers used passwords to communicate. Well, because he didn’t know the password, and on top of that was blond, they thought that he was a spy, and shot him.

I met Reuben as a partisan, north of Banska Bystrica. He was serving in a rebel unit of the Slovak police. The way it was, was that one part of the Slovak State 3 police joined the rebels, just like many soldiers and others served the Fascist Slovak State. Unfortunately, he also died tragically, which another eyewitness told me about. Reuben was sent to a partisan unit whose commander was a Russian, a big anti-Semite, which sealed my cousin’s fate. When he arrived with his orders, the Russian spotted him. As a blue-eyed blonde, he seemed suspicious to him. But Reuben protested, that he was a Jew. With this he was ordered to show that he’s circumcised. And it was this that sealed his fate, as he was leaving they shot him in the back. That’s how my two cousins Reuben and Jakub died.

As far as my mother’s [Etela Weit] family goes, I don’t know as much about them.  My mother was born in what is today Poland, not far from the town of Tarnow there’s this village that’s called Gruszow Wielki. How she got to Slovakia and how she met my father, I don’t know.

When she was already married, she would visit her parents in Poland. When I was a small boy she also took me along with her. I was there twice on a visit. My mother told me about this one thing that happened to her at the border. I was still a baby, and at the border, when she was taking care of passport matters, she put me down one some woodpile that was there. And while she was taking care of the passport paperwork, I suddenly began crying, and the people that were there and saw me began shouting that someone had forgotten their child there. My mother was completely flustered by it.

I remember my Polish grandparents only dimly. Grandpa was named Juda Kohane and was a kohanite [kohenim: members of the tribe of Levi, descendants of Aaron. Priestly origins are inherited from the father. Most of the kohenim’s responsibilities ceased after the destruction of the Temple, however several of them have survived to this day. For example, a kohen is the first to be called to read from the Torah – Editor’s note]. This means that he was of priestly descent. I don’t remember the name of his wife, my grandmother, any more. I unfortunately don’t know anything else about these grandparents. I never got to know them very well. I don’t think that my mother had any siblings, as she never mentioned any.

My birth father was named Osias W. and was born in 1887. I don’t remember my father, because he died the same year I was born [1916]. I was born in February, and in October he died tragically at the Russian front as a soldier of the Austro-Hungarian Army. What I’m going to tell you now is 100% true. A person who was in the same unit as my father, and was witness to this incredible death told it to my mother.  My father had finished a letter to my mother and put it in a pocket of his uniform. Then he began to clean his rifle. While he was doing that, a man from a neighboring village came to talk to him. The village was named Proc. Because he was illiterate, he wanted my father to write a letter to his mother for him. My father asked him to dictate to him what the letter should say. And while he was dictating, for him to clean the rifle. As he was dictating to my father, he was cleaning the rifle, and accidentally pulled the trigger. He shot my father right in the head, and my father’s blood also soaked the letter that he had written to my mother beforehand. The acquaintance, who survived, brought the letter to my mother. It was then a family relic of ours. I hid this letter and my mother’s last letter during the war as an invaluable remembrance of my parents. In 1944, when I was in the Slovak National Uprising, while marching across the Martin meadows, we stopped to wash at a stream. I put my rucksack down to one side. When I finished washing, I saw that the rucksack had disappeared. Someone had stolen it along with the reminders of my parents.

Apparently my parents’ marriage was arranged. I don’t doubt that they had an Orthodox wedding. All Jewish rules were observed in our family. My mother was an Orthodox Jewess and dressed accordingly. She always wore a wig or a headscarf. On normal weekdays she dressed normally, like the other farmwomen, but during holidays she always dressed up. She also kept a kosher household. Despite her religious convictions, she wasn’t a fanatic; she always said that we’re all people.

As a widow, my mother got a newsstand, but she probably wouldn’t have survived on the newsstand alone. She also had a little general store as well as a little pub. The same as my father’s parents. When she looked at a person and saw that he’d already had enough, she didn’t serve him any more. And I remember that this caused scandals. They’d yell at her: “You Jewess, damn you!”

Growing up

I was already 8 years old when she married a second time. She married her cousin. He was also from Gruszow Wielki, from some poor family with a lot of children. I know that he was a cattle merchant and being a cattle merchant is what brought him here. When they met, my mother didn’t want to live alone, so they married. They had a daughter, Maria, in Hebrew Miriam. I was very glad to have a sister. I loved her very much and she loved me very much too. She was interested in embroidery, and somewhere I’ve got some embroidery that she did, to remember her by.

My stepfather was named Viktor Weit and my sister was named Maria Weitova. When she was born I wasn’t living at home, but with my grandparents in Chmelov, where I was attending a regular elementary school where there was also a teacher of religion. He was quite the original character! He had a classroom in the basement of one richer Jewish citizen, and that’s where he taught us, Jewish children starting from 3 years of age, the Bible [Hummash: The five books of Moses – Editor’s note] and Hebrew. Apparently he also taught us to write in the Latin alphabet, because when I entered 1st grade of people’s school, I didn’t like it. I was constantly bored, because I already knew it. That happens very often to Jewish children in normal schools.

And Viktor? Viktor was an interesting person. I held Viktor in high esteem. Though he could read Hebrew, he didn’t understand what he was reading. But what made him special? Not only was he an excellent farmer, he very much lived for it and knew all about it. And what was the most important, and what I very much regret, that I never had a tape recorder and that I didn’t record it. Because when the villagers used to gather in that large room of ours where the bar was and where people would drink, people would tell stories. Who had experienced what at the front. My stepfather was a naturally talented humorist. I remember that the Pusovce locals laughed till their bellies hurt when he told stories. He knew how to turn everything into a joke. He had a special talent for telling funny stories. He didn’t read the jokes somewhere, he made them up. But they were excellent.

My native village of Pusovce [Presov region] was predominantly Catholic. There were about 34 houses, of which I think four families were Protestant, those were the Anderkos, and the rest were Catholics. The house where I was born was earthen, made from unfired bricks. We had this modest house. It had only one larger room, where my mother had the bar; there the floor was made of dirt. Then there was a little room, that’s where the store was. I remember that I also occasionally sold cigarettes, or sugar. I helped out when I came home during vacation. Well, and one room, that was already big luxury, because it had a wooden floor. And we also had a kitchenette. We raised chickens until my mother remarried. Besides this we had a pigeon coop. I loved pigeons.

Then, when my mother was already remarried, we had a farm. Viktor was a very good farmer. He was a cattle merchant, but when he made enough money he left the business, because he liked farming. So he bought a neglected piece of land, where nothing would grow. He meliorated it [melioration: a combination of measures that permanently improve soil for various uses – Editor’s note] by draining it. To this day it’s the most fertile land in Pusovce! It’s land left by Viktor. So that was the first field that he bought and made fertile. Then he bought more and more, until he finally had 14 hectares. For those times that was really a lot. Because most farmers had five, six hectares. He grew everything, potatoes, wheat, barley and oats. He also raised horses. As a good farmer, the residents of Pusovce trusted him to the degree that he even had a breeding bull. The villagers used to come to our place to fertilize their cows. He was such an expert that he bred cattle.

Then he sold that house where I was born. He bought a brick house with a beautiful garden. We of course had a helper for the household, when my mother couldn’t manage it all herself, and we also had a coachman. Back then they called him a coachman, but he was a servant. And the furniture in that house was better too. I was nice and modern. However, from the age of 3 or 4 I was with my grandpa in Chmelov, because I was attending religion school there. I had to live with him there, because it would have been impossible for me to commute between Chmelov and Pusovce. Back then there weren’t buses yet.

When I was at my parents’, I got used to going to the hayloft to smoke. Once one hayloft almost burned down. Viktor Weit’s brother, who was a shoemaker, was at our place for a visit. My mother found out that she was missing some cigarettes and matches, and he came looking for me. I was smoking in the hayloft, and I threw the match someplace off to the side. Then I only remember that he didn’t catch up to me, because he was putting out the fire that I had unwittingly lit in the hayloft.

Let me return to my home. So, in Pusovce I had a good friend from school, who was also my neighbor. My mother was also friends with his mother. He was named Juraj Migas. For example, when my mother had work to do, she asked Mrs. Migasova to feed me. I was still a baby, so she nursed me and on the contrary, when Mrs. Migasova was out in the field, then my mother would nurse Juraj. We were milk brothers [milk brother: children from different mothers, nursed by the same woman – Editor’s note] and later excellent friends.

We were the only Jewish family in Pusovce. We used to travel to Chmelov to pray. The prayer hall was at my grandpa’s place in that little room which was also a bedroom. The ten people [minyan: a prayer minimum of ten men older than 13 – Editor’s note] for prayers came from the towns of Radvanovce, Chmelov and Pusovce. In Chmelov there were two more families, the Schönfelds and the Altmans. From the whole larger region, only one of the Schönfeld daughters and I survived the Holocaust. They would always all meet at my grandfather’s on Saturdays and holidays. At the age of 13 I had a bar mitzvah. Well, it was a big celebration. I don’t remember it all that precisely any more, but I know that there was a feast. My mother was happy. My grandfather was proud of me.

I liked celebrating the Sabbath very much. But you won’t find a person that wouldn’t reminisce about it. It belongs to the poetry of the Jewish religion. Everywhere absolute cleanliness and a set table. On the table wine, barches and chicken soup. On Saturday we had shoulet for lunch. My mother would make it on Friday. We had an oven that was lit, and I remember that when the shoulet was put in the oven, she didn’t take it out until later, on Saturday. It smelled wonderful! We also had meat – usually goose. It was very festive. We of course observed all the holidays. I remember that I liked the carnival – Purim, because I liked acting. Jewish children from several villages would get together, and we’d put on plays. I usually played the part of a drunk. We made fun of Haman, the Hitler from three thousand years ago. During the Purim holiday my grandfather would tell me about how in the Persian Empire the Jews were threatened by genocide, which Haman [Purim recalls the victory over Haman, the minister of the Persian king Ahasuerus, who wanted to exterminate the Jewish nation. These events took place during the years 369 – 356 BCE – Editor’s note] wanted to unleash. When we were talking about it, he reminded me that the Jews were persecuted later as well, in Spain. They forced them to convert to the Christian faith, and those that didn’t do it, they murdered, burned them alive 4. From him I learned of the Inquisition.

During childhood there was one more holiday that I liked, that that was because it was poetic. It was Sukkot, the holiday of tents. It’s a commemoration of the fact that Jews didn’t have any houses, when they were wandering through the desert for 40 years, being led by Moses. The sukkah was covered by evergreen branches, and my sister and I would make all sorts of decorative garlands. It was beautiful. Also an interesting holiday. My mother served food into the sukkah through the window. And no one in Pusovce damaged the sukkah.

Well, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement and purification. At the age of 13 I fasted. I didn’t even drink water. Even as a Communist, when I remembered Yom Kippur, I went to the Heyduk [in Heyduk Street in Bratislava stands the only preserved synagogue in the city – Editor’s note] and studied the prayer book there for a while. I at least partly fasted. And then a person is glad that the fast is over, and supper follows. I’ll still return briefly to the evening before this High Holiday. I’ll always be connected to it by the enchantment by the beautiful melody Kol Nidre [Kol Nidre (all vows): sung three times at the beginning of services during Yom Kippur – Editor’s note].

I also have to mention an important thing, which is why my mother got along so well with the locals. She quickly became familiar with Saris [Saris dialect: one of the dialects used in the territory of Eastern Slovakia – Editor’s note], and spoke it fluently. At home we spoke Yiddish, with the neighbors in Saris, but she also learned German. She even learned grammatically correct Slovak. She was also very interested in culture. There was an amateur theater group in the village, boys and girls would put on plays. My mother attended the performances and wrote reviews or critiques. She was also self-taught in health sciences. She was quite well versed in pills and medicines. When someone fell ill, she went to help them. She was terribly kindhearted. My mother was an exceptionally good person, and that’s why they liked her very much.

As far as political or other opinions are concerned, my stepfather Viktor, being relatively uneducated, didn’t show any interest in such things. My mother, however, very much admired Masaryk 5. When Masaryk died in 1937, she wept.

As I’ve already said, from the age of 3 I had a religion teacher in Chmelov, where we learned the Torah. Then I attended elementary school, for four or five years, I think. I don’t know if it was a state school or a church school. I know that the principal was named Jarmay, a Hungarian name, but of course spoke Slovak and also taught in Slovak. Then my mother decided that besides Slovak I have to also learn German. Back then it was this trend, as it was the international language of Central Europe. No only Jews, but also many of those who wanted to succeed in that geographic region, needed to know German.

So I began attending school in Gelnica [Kosice region]. A Jewish religion teacher lived in Gelnica, I think he was named Reichner. He was some relative of my aunt’s, the wife of Pinchas from Circ [the town of Circ – Presov region], probably a cousin. My mother arranged that he’d not only teach me, but that I’d also live with him. At the same time she sent me to and registered me in a German elementary school, into higher grades. I don’t know, but probably it was from the time I was 10. In the German school all subjects were taught in German, and of course Slovak was compulsory as well. After finishing elementary school, I continued at a German council school 6. Reichner taught only the lower grade of religion education. My mother had this idea, though she wasn’t any fanatic, that I could at the very least better educated in the Talmud. I’m guessing that she wanted me to be a rabbi – certainly she wouldn’t have had any objections to it.

There was a yeshivah in Gelnica. Though it wasn’t as well-known as for example the yeshivah in Huncovce. Back then Huncovce was very famous. Almost as much as the yeshivah in Bratislava. So I attended it at the same time. To this day I can’t imagine how it was. I attended council school, finished council school, and continued with the rabbi. Then I didn’t live with Mr. Reichner any more, but at a dormitory. The rabbi that led the yeshivah had a dormitory for boys of my age. I remember that it was this duplex building. On the one side lived the rabbi with his family, and there was also a classroom there, the yeshivah, and on the other side was the dormitory.

The yeshivah was a larger room. We had our books open, the Talmud. The rabbi lectured and explained. The explanations! The Talmud is one big mystery. What did that person two thousand years ago actually mean? It can be explained like this, and like that. It’s an incredible treasure trove of explanatory possibilities. One can tell riddles, but also hone reason. We young ones didn’t dare argue with the rabbi, but his assistants, who would then take us into smaller groups, they argued. We were witness to how they didn’t agree with the rabbi’s explanations, and said: “You’re not right, Rabbi. It’s actually like this...!” We liked it very much, and we’d say to ourselves: “Just wait. When we finally...!” When the rabbi was finished explaining, studies continued in small groups. The groups weren’t very big. Usually the way it was, was that there were about five or six of us 13 to 14-year-olds, and one of the older ones, the rabbi’s assistants. In Yiddish he was called the chaser bocher. In Yiddish chaser means to repeat, and bocher is a young person, a student. So it means a student that repeats things with students. Well, and now, when he’d tell us his explanation, we’d of course pipe up, discuss and argue. The windows were open, and it was an awful commotion. That’s why they say: “A commotion like in a Jewish school.” That commotion is always very important. On the one hand, the citizens and Christian boys made fun of us, that we’re kicking up a fuss there. The importance of it was that it was excellent at honing brains. For us the teaching at the secular council school was ridiculous, that there was no need to explain anything there, everything was written down and you only needed to know it the way it was written.

What was worse was that I apparently wasn’t inclined towards being religious. Simply put, I was obstinate. Well, and once it happened that we had a fight one Saturday morning at the dormitory. The rabbi heard yelling and came over "What are you doing here? Why, it’s Saturday! You can’t fight! You’re breaking the holy Sabbath!” And we made faces at the rabbi. And I remember that he grabbed me by my shirt collar and shook me. And I said: “Rabbi, sir, the collar will tear off and it’ll be your sin. That’s also work, when you’re shaking me.” He gave me a slap. I said: “That’s even more work. That’s a sin.” [during the Sabbath, 39 main work activities are forbidden, to which the injunction against others is related. During the subsequent scuffle the Rabbi broke several rules, in that he was basically doing physical work – Editor’s note]. Well, that was bad. He complained to my mother. I don’t know if he wrote her, or what. And when I came home for the holidays, my mother already knew about the conflict. My stepfather wasn’t home right then, and she was rolling some dough. And I said: “Mom, I don’t think that God exists.” She started crying, and I remember that she showered the dough with tears. I felt terribly guilty. After that I apologized to her. It was terrible. But the truth is that I refused to return there. So that’s how my studies at the yeshivah ended. I didn’t become a rabbi. At least I finished council school.

My mother was then worried about what we were going to do, but my stepfather said: “After all, he’s already quite smart, let him work.” My mother wouldn’t let it alone. Because I was quite good at drawing and I was interested in art and photography, I decided to go to Presov. In Presov there was a photographer and at the same time painter who was well known at the time. I think that he was named Szekes. He also did religious paintings. I made up my mind and told my mother that I was going to go and study with that painter. “Now you’ve gone crazy! You won’t make a living with that!” That was her reaction.

Instead, she registered me into a fourth council school, a Slovak one this time. I finished this school as well, and had good grades. Only one grade wasn’t good, math. At that time we had an excellent principal. He was a Czech, and I came to see him: “Sir, I can’t have a grade like that. I’ve got to have all good grades.” “Why?” he asked me. “Because I want to apply to the teacher’s institute. And they won’t even accept me for entrance exams if I don’t have a better grade.” So he said: “All right, you study and I’ll let you know. You’ll have a make-up exam.” Ultimately I think I even got an A in math, though I wasn’t all that good in it.

So I got to the entrance exam for the teacher’s institute, where they accepted me. Among four hundred students there were about five, six of us Jews. Two boys and three or four girls. One Jewish girl from Bardejov was an amazing mathematician. I remember that even the professor admired her. That’s where I ended up graduating from. They gave me a C in Slovak, despite the fact that I was good in it. This was because the Slovak language professor was a nationalist. He was named Janosik. A big purist when it came to the Slovak language, and to this day I’m a purist after him. I’ve got to say, that my ears hurt when I hear something that doesn’t meet “Janosik’s standard”. And this Janosik gave me a C in Slovak. He said that a Jew couldn’t know Slovak. It was in the year 1937.

After my studies at the teacher’s institute I became a teacher. I began looking for work. I found out that the Kosice Jewish community had a Jewish primary school.  So I submitted at application for this school. My competition was someone by the name of Kraus. Because he knew Hebrew better than me, I didn’t succeed in the competition. Finally I passed exams for Levoca, where there was a one-room school [meaning children from multiple grades studied in one classroom, and the teacher had to devote himself to each grade separately during class – Editor’s note]. I taught there during the 1937/38 school year.

Originally I had inclined to Communism. I was influenced greatly by Professor Lon at the teachers’ institute in Presov. The Professor was from Moravia, and was a Communist. He never concealed his convictions. During strikes he liked to discuss this theme with us. Gradually I began getting to Communist literature in Czech, and later also in German. When I became a social democrat, because also the Minister of Education at the time was a social democrat. But later I went to teach at the Jewish school in Levoca, where a member of the Zionist organization Hashomer Hatzair 7 was working, so I became a ‘shomer’.

In Hashomer we used to go to summer camps. I remember that we were not far from Spisske Vlachy [Kosice region] and those were scouting experiences. We were Jewish leftists, Zionists. We definitely rejected Jabotinsky’s 8 nationalism.

I still have to return to my sister. She liked our parents, but she was very fixated on me as well. I’ve got this impression that didn’t study further than elementary school. When we had a farm, she worked on it like every other farmer’s daughter. Her friends were the local girls. Shortly after my wedding, in March of 1942, the Guardists 9 took her away. When they came for her, our father wasn’t home. When he found out what had happened, he wanted to commit suicide. Mother stopped him. Before it happened, they had been warned by a Slovak policeman by the name of Cincala. He warned my parents that Mana [Maria’s nickname] should hide, because the Guardists were coming. I don’t know if our parents didn’t believe it, or if they were afraid. In the end Viktor didn’t commit suicide, but then their turn came. They thought that they were being sent to work. So they gave away the furniture, which was of better quality, to their friend Anderko, and my mother gave him my father’s watch, which he had inherited from his grandfather, who had in turn inherited it from his grandfather. That courageous person, Juraj Anderko, has a certain measure of credit for my survival. But I’ll get back to that later. They took my sister, who was 18 years old at the time, away to Poprad.

During the war

My sister went on the first transport 10 that was sent out of the Slovak State. A friend of mine from Levoca told me that she saw her in 1943, working in the so-called Canada [Canada was the name of a warehouse in the Auschwitz concentration camp, where arriving prisoners’ luggage was sorted – Editor’s note]. My sister supposedly borrowed a comb from her. That’s all that I know of her fate.

Now back to Levoca, where I worked as a teacher. From there I got to Bratislava as a functionary of the Hashomer Hatzair movement. At that time several Jewish organizations were headquartered at 3 Venturska Street in Bratislava. A Zionist one was among them as well. Back then Hashomer was supposed to nominate one of its members for the position of head of the Office for emigration of Jewish young people to what was then the Palestine, the youth Aliyah. As I was a teacher and had a relationship to young people, they nominated me for this position, even despite my youth. Besides me, there was one more shomer, who looked like an Ethiopian, and so we called him Negush. Besides us there was Dr. Schlessinger, who was responsible for contacts with the Slovak State civil service. The Slovak civil service had very corrupt people working for it, and he knew how to deal with them. Back then Jews were still allowed to emigrate. Almost every Jew wanted permission to emigrate. The Damocles’ sword of Hitler hung above us. In our positions we tried to justly evaluate all requests.  I personally never took a bribe, not one crown. So it happened that during 1939/40 I managed to get about 200 young people from all of Slovakia to the Palestine. Later I met many of them again.

One day while I was working in that office, a poor, scruffy, shabbily dressed person came to see us. He was a poor tailor from Tesin in Poland. He had gotten onto Slovak territory thanks to Slovak border guards, who didn’t sympathize with the Fascist state. For sure they were also aware of the situation in Poland, where the Germans were shooting people en masse. That man came in and said: “You’re sitting here, holding office, you’re sending children to the Palestine, and there they’re killing our people. They’re being driven into the forests, killed. One Polack, a Catholic, has taken in a small group of children and is sheltering those children in a sod hut not far from Polish Tesin. The children have to be saved.” I think that there were fourteen of them. The youngest one was 5, and the oldest, a very pretty girl, Brona, was 16. I told the Hashomer Hatzair leadership that we were going to Poland to go get those children. So it happened that thanks to the Slovak border guards the tailor and I got over to the other side, into Polish Tesin. We walked across hills and valleys for six hours, in December. Eventually we came to a pub where there was a large picture of the Führer. We were completely exhausted. The tailor connected me with a certain lawyer. With him I was supposed to go to Berlin, to the Youth Aliyah headquarters, where they already knew me through correspondence. Luckily I managed to get to Berlin without any papers whatsoever, and received the necessary money from our headquarters. The Polack finally handed the children over to me after I gave him a password that I had from the tailor. I set out with the children for the Slovak border. The Polack that had been hiding them and I alternated carrying the smallest one. They say that the Polish are genetically afflicted by anti-Semitism, but as you can see, you can find good people everywhere. He was a good person. Finally we and the children got to Slovakia. There we divided them up amongst poor Jewish families. What happened to them after that? To this day I’m still looking for them, especially the youngest one. If he’s alive, he’s about 70 years old.

I didn’t remain at that office for much longer. Very soon the Slovak state stopped officially permitting emigration. From Hashomer they sent me for hachshara. Hachshara means physical work and preparation for Aliyah. Not far from Velke Levare [Bratislava Region] we had our hachshara. We were helping regulate the Morava River, so that it wouldn’t overflow its banks. In time I found out that they needed a Jewish teacher in Trencin. I think three of us applied for that post, and I got the job. During 1941 and 1942 I worked at the Jewish primary school in Trencin.

In Trencin in March 1942 I married Anka. Anicka Rosefeldova was also a shomer. By coincidence she was doing hachshara in Trencin, where we met. Her father, a Czech Jew, and a doctor, worked in Rozhanovce [Kosice region]. From there he’d been expelled to Czechia, for one as a Jew, for another as a Czech 11, and for yet another as an officer of the Czechoslovak army. So Anicka remained alone. Her mother had died before the war, of blood poisoning. She had gotten blood poisoning, and her husband, a doctor, was of the opinion that her arm needed to be amputated, but she didn’t want to have it done, and finally died of her wound.

Those were sad times, the principal of the Jewish primary school, Belo Brunner was deported. Right before the deportations, Belo had a child born to him. They deported him along with his wife and baby. Another colleague of mine, Alica Rosenbaumova, hid along with her mother. After the war I found out that they had been in hiding. After the suppression of the uprising [Slovak National Uprising] they caught them, and dragged them off to Nemecka [Banska Bystrica region] where there was a limekiln. There they shot them all and threw them straight into the burning lime. Gradually my class began to empty. Until one day it was completely empty.

Before the deportation from Trencin, they created a collection camp by the station, and there they collected children, which is how they would trap their parents. I found out that they were guarded by a Guardist. I said to myself: “What should I do, as a teacher?” So I bought two, three kilos of candy and went to at least sweeten those children’s lives a bit. We didn’t yet know that it was going to be the extermination of Jews. We knew that they were going to be very badly off, but we didn’t know about the murdering. At that time the Jewish Center 12 was spreading information, whether for consolation, or whether they had to, that people are going to go work. When I came with the candy, the Guardist immediately addressed me in a familiar tone: “Where are you going?” I said: “I’m these children’s teacher. I want to say goodbye to them and I want to give them candy.” “I’m not gonna let you!” And that’s when my nature showed itself. I don’t know who I inherited it from. Maybe it’s because I’m a village boy and as such I was used to fighting. I grabbed that Guardist by the shirt collar and said: “When I whack you one, you’ll let me all right!” And he stood there surprised. “Go then, but I won’t let you out!  You’ll go with them!” I said; “We’ll see whether you won’t let me out.” So I said goodbye to the children, and at least gave out the candy. When I was coming back out, I looked the Guardist straight in the eyes. He stood there with his rifle as if hypnotized, and let me out.

In 1942 the Guardists didn’t take me and my wife. We only had to move out of our apartment, we couldn’t afford to pay for it any more. At the beginning of June 1942, though, they deported my parents, my mother and stepfather.  A few days before their deportation, the postal carrier, who was a friend of my parents, sent me a telegram. She informed me that the Guardists had taken my parents away. The postal carrier was related to Marencin, the Protestant priest from the town of Chmelov. I knew that they’d send them to the collection camp in Zilina. The camp’s commander, who was named Marcek, was bribable, but I didn’t have any money. So I turned to the Jewish community in Trencin. The chairman of the community helped me organize a collection among people that they hadn’t deported yet. We collected ten thousand crowns. I arrived in Zilina on the day that the train from Eastern Slovakia that my parents were on was also due to arrive. They herded people from those cattle wagons to the camp. Suddenly you could hear singing. Right at that moment, a Catholic procession carrying holy icons was passing by, of course also with the Virgin Mary, and the Guardists that were driving the people along stopped beating them. As soon as the procession passed, they continued in their “work”. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to buy my parents out, because the camp commander was already asking for 15 thousand. On 6th June 1942 they transported my parents to Auschwitz.

I of course traveled to Zilina illegally. At that time the anti-Jewish laws 13 were already in effect, and Jews weren’t allowed to travel. Everyone that traveled had to obtain a Fahrschein, or permission to travel. I didn’t have any document. I didn’t wear a star 14 out of principle. I bought myself a copy of Gardista Magazine, and when the Guardists were checking ID, I read the paper and they left me alone. When I finally met my parents, Viktor was completely numb. Because he was a farmer, and in the fields the wheat was slowly ripening. He couldn’t understand how they could tear him away from his land. My mother was somehow resigned to what was to come. I tried to pass them bread through a gap in the wagon. Some Guardist saw it and threw a rock at me from behind. If I wouldn’t have ducked, it would’ve killed me. From that time I had no news of my parents.

After many years I found out that I had had an exemption until the end of August 1942. I didn’t know about it at all. It wasn’t a presidential exemption 15, but an exemption from the Minister of Education. It’s well known that the Minister of Education helped where he could. He was one of the moderate supporters of the Slovak State. And then I found out that the school inspector in Trencin, who was an exceptionally decent person, had arranged the exception.

On the 14th or 24th of October, my wife and I arrived in the Novaky labor camp 16. Like all the other prisoners, we also worked. Anicka worked in the sewing shop, and I was a bricklayer. There was one Guardist there, named Breznik, who took pleasure in beating us. In time they transferred me to the quarry. There was one Guardist there, originally a miner from Handlov [Trenciany region], a decent person. He taught us how to drill into the cliff wall, how much dynamite to insert, how to jump away when the wall was collapsing. I even enjoyed it, as I like creative work, and this was creative work. Later they permitted the founding of a school in the Novaky labor camp. With the camp commander’s agreement, they put me in charge of setting it up. The Guardists put me in a truck and drove me off to look for furnishings and equipment for the school. We brought back blackboards and desks from abandoned Jewish schools. I don’t even know any more if it was from Nitra [Nitra region] or Sered [Trnava region]. Then Juraj Spitzer moved my wife and me into the school building. We got one little room, and across from it was another, larger one. That’s where we set up the one-room school. I was even allowed to bring my pedagogical library from Trencin. Well, and so I began working as a teacher in the Novaky concentration and labor camp.

I worked there up until 31st January 1944. Back in 1943, Sano Mach [Alexander Mach] came out with the following statement: “Come March, come April, and the transports will come!” But in 1943 the transports didn’t come. My wife Anicka said in January 1944: “Come March, come April, and in ’44 those transports will come. Let’s not wait for the transport!” We decided to escape from the camp. We lived near the main gate. We’d noticed that every day at midnight the Guardists walked around the camp, and the gate wasn’t as closely watched. We slipped through the gate and literally jumped into a riverbed – there was a small stream there. There we squatted, waited for signs of anything behind us, and then on our feet! Across fields, above the town of Kos [Trenciany region] to Prievidza [Trenciany region]. We had been getting wages of 50 halers a day. We were farsighted enough to not spend that money on any trifles. We put it all away. We managed to save enough to buy train tickets during our escape. We set out for the town of Rozhanovce [Kosice region], in Eastern Slovakia.

We aimed for Rozhanovce, Anicka’s hometown. Before the war her father had been a doctor there. Out of principle he had treated poor people for free. During the night Anicka knocked on one poor Rozhanovce resident’s window and he looked out: “The doctor’s Anicka!” So he immediately welcomed us. Anicka had an aunt, her mother’s sister in Budapest. Her husband was a lawyer. She hoped that as a relative her aunt would take her in. That’s why we told this person that we needed to get to Budapest. My wife spoke Hungarian, but I didn’t and to this day don’t. He said that at night he’d lead us through the mountains and forests to Kosice. 18. That apparently another person from Rozhanovce was working there, a formerly poor person whom Dr. Rosenfeld had also treated for free, that he’ll help us for sure. So we got to Kosice, to Presovska Street. Back then it of course had a Hungarian name, Eperjesi Utca. That person greeted us very warmly and hid us in the cellar.

While Horthy’s regime 19 in Hungary did persecute and discriminate against Jews, it wasn’t done in such a manner as in our country. That man in Kosice gave us money, bought train tickets to Budapest, and accompanied us there himself. In Budapest my wife and I separated, she lived in Buda and I in Pest. In Budapest I managed to find the address of my old friend from Michalovce [Kosice region]. We’d met each other during the time in Hashomer. He was named Jozef Baumer. He lived with his friends under a false name, and he also arranged false papers to other people, as well as illegal emigration to the Palestine. He even arranged work for me with one businessman who manufactured dolls. My job was to paint their faces.

In Budapest I lived in relative calm from the end of January to the end of March [1944], until the Germans occupied the city [Hungary was occupied by the Germans on 19th March 1944 – Editor’s note]. At that time my friends and I wanted to illegally take a boat down the Danube to the Palestine. The problem, however, was that the boat was small, and applicants many. As I was among the last on the list, I had to stay behind. In the end, although with difficulty, they did succeed.

My wife and I had gotten used to Budapest to such a degree, that one nice March day we bought tickets to the operetta. Back then I was using false papers under the name of Wojcechowski. For I had found out that Horthy had good relations with the Polish government in exile in England. That’s why he let Polacks live in Hungary. I went to the police and spoke in the Saris dialect.  The Hungarian police thought it was Polish. So I got documents with the name of Wojcechowski. On the way to the operetta, we met a former member of the Hashomer, who was from Poland. It was the same day that the Germans occupied Hungary. That acquaintance told us that he knew a German communist woman, who was hiding Polacks for a small sum. So we decided to not go to the operetta, but to the German woman’s place. We stayed at her place for only a little while.

During one raid, my wife and I were crossing the street. When I noticed that the Germans were checking everyone’s papers, I sent my wife to go hide in the basement of a nearby theater. In the moment t hat I remained alone, I remembered the plot of one American detective film that I had seen during my student days. At that moment I made use of it. I stepped out towards them, and addressed the Gestapo officer in German: “Entschuldigen Sie bitte, wieviel Uhr ist es?” [German: Excuse me, what time is it?] He looked at his watch: “Halb Zwölf.” [German: eleven thirty]. I disappeared behind his back and continued onwards. That was a moment of surprise, a moment that truly decided whether I would live.

After that I told Anicka: “We’re not staying here, we’ll return to Slovakia.” We knew that Slovakia wasn’t deporting [deportations from the territory of the Slovak State were stopped in October 1942 – Editor’s note. See also 10]. That was in March 1944, and somehow we suspected that something horrible was being readied in Hungary [on 5th April 1944, Horthy agreed to the deportation of 700,000 Hungarian Jews – Editor’s note]. So we went to the station, Keleti Palyaudvar [train station in Budapest – Editor’s note], and there we watched which trains were leaving, how they were checking people and so on. We found out that both Hungarians and Germans were performing the checks. Hungarian cops were checking citizenship cards, and Germans the Fahrschein [travel permit]. I had learned to make false stamps, and so I forged us some documents. But I didn’t know how to forge a Fahrschein, I didn’t have a sample and so Anicka and I decided that we’d fold an ordinary piece of paper and just hold it in our hands. The departure plan was as follows.  We went separately, as if we didn’t know each other. We had only light bags. We arrived at the station a few seconds before the train’s departure. So we just quickly waved the papers at the inspectors. They asked: “Hova, hova?” Hungarian: “Where, where?” Anicka answered “Kassaba.” “To Kosice.” The Hungarian cop yelled: “Hamar, hamar”. In translation from Hungarian: “Quickly, quickly”. So we jumped on the train. At that moment you could have cut me to the quick and not found blood. It was horrible. You can imagine it, when a person escapes death. At each station we were stood in fear and watched the police. We jumped back and forth from one wagon another as needed to avoid them. Finally we arrived in Kosice.

Anicka had a cousin in Kosice. She was married to a tradesman, an electrician. Both were Jews. I had a friend there, a shomer. I knew his address. He got me a form. Because it wasn’t possible to get into the city center without papers, and we needed to get to the other side, to Eperjesi Utca. I made false papers for Anicka and myself. Her cousin and her husband joined us, but they already had papers. We again decided to separate. The women dressed up in local costumes and took a different route from us. A German and Hungarian checked our identification. They examined our papers for a very long time, and finally told us that we could go. When we were a couple of steps away from them, I whispered: “And now he’ll shoot. And now he’ll shoot.” He didn’t shoot. We rounded the corner and got to our railwayman, who I already talked about. Right away he took us in, fed us, and in dialect told us: “You’ll go to Budzimir” He meant the village of Budimir [Kosice region]. I don’t know why not to Rozhanovce, where we’d already been before. Apparently there they also knew Anicka’s father, Dr. Rosenfeld. His son led us to Budimir. There he knocked on someone’s window: “I’m bringing you Jews”. They gave us buttermilk and bread. Then they sent us to the barn behind the house. It was cold; we got a blanket and hid in the hay.

We stayed there only a short time. As we were already on Slovak territory, we needed to obtain false Slovak papers as soon as possible. In what manner we managed to get to Bratislava, that I don’t know any more today. In Bratislava I had an interesting meeting with a former classmate from Presov, Vojtech Andreansky. He hailed me on the street: “Jozka, what’re you doing here? Are you crazy?” He took us to his place and advised me: “Try going to the notary office, maybe you’ll somehow manage to get some sort of birth certificate.” Luckily at that time there were only two people at the notary, and the birth register was opened like this [the interviewee indicates an open book]. A person ahead of me was receiving a birth certificate. That person was born in 1916, and so was I. Unnoticed I glanced into the register, and saw that some Vladimir Buchta had been born in 1916. My turn came up: “What would you like?” “A birth certificate”. “What’s your name?” “Vladimir Buchta”. “When were you born?” I told them, paid a fee and had a birth certificate. Though Anicka didn’t have a birth certificate, we did mange to get travel papers once again.

We set out for Zilina. My colleague, a Jewish teacher, was still in Zilina. At that time there were still two, three such Jews in Zilina, ones that I knew. One Jewish boy, a friend of his, was an electrician. That electrician was employed, I don’t know if secretly or officially, in Hlinkova Street, by a businessman that had an electrical workshop and was named Malik. He was a Czech, and his wife was Slovak. That electrician told Malik who we were, what we were. He employed me as an accountant on my false papers. I objected: “I’m not an accountant.” “That doesn’t matter.” He got me an accounting textbook, and for one or two days I studied accounting day and night. I started and began working. Eventually I began wondering how to save Malik some money in taxes. For me the state was the enemy. I remember that I also got a very good salary. We lived in Borik [Borik: currently a neighborhood of Zilina – Editor’s note]. The owner of the building where we were renting a room was named Adamov, and knew that we were regularly employed. We made friends in Borik. We made them by noticing that Adamov occasionally listened to Moscow, or London, and then also other neighbors. When the Germans invaded Zilina because of the uprising [Slovak National Uprising], it was possible to escape from Borik across a hill. The Zilina barracks also rose up, and joined the uprising. Soldiers and officers were handing out weapons to the rebels. Whoever came got one. We also got rifles. But we didn’t know how to use them. We didn’t wait around to see how it would end up in Zilina, and over the hills we got to the other side. In the morning, when I was washing after the night and after many hardships in the mountains, someone stole, as I’ve already mentioned, my backpack where I also had my mother’s letters and family relics.

My wife was still with me. She was a partisan as well. We volunteered in Sklabina [Zilina region]. The commander was named Velicko. Our brigade was named the Milan Rastislav Stefanik 20 Brigade, and our partisan column was named the Sovorov column. They deployed us into battle, and though I didn’t know how to use a weapon, I got a machine gun. A Russian partisan, who was teaching us how to shoot, told us that we have to save the ammunition for the enemy. They sent us to fight by Drazkovce [Zilina region]. They were bloody battles, because the Germans were firing mortars at us from the Martinske Hole [Martinske Hole: mountains in the Mala Fatra mountain range, rising above the town of Martin (Zilina region) – Editor’s note]. Then we made it to Vrutky [Zilina region]. I remember that my wife was saving people as a Red Cross nurse. The experiences that I had there I recorded and published in the rebel Pravda 21. I published under the name V.B. Later the then editor-in-chief of the rebel Pravda, Miroslav Hysky, testified that it really was I who brought him that manuscript.

About two weeks before the uprising’s end, I got to Banska Bystrica [Banska Bystrica region]. I was supposed to work there as a writer for the Nove Slovo weekly 22. Gustav Husak 23, who was at that time the representative of the Interior on rebel territory needed someone for this paper. I worked in Nove Slovo up until the uprising was suppressed. Gustav Husak was the managing editor at Nove Slovo, and the editor-in-chief was I think Lubomir Linhart. He was a Czech member of the resistance, who had a Slovak wife and used the pseudonym Ftorek [and also the pseudonym Blodek – Editor’s note]. I remember how the Germans were bombing Banska Bystrica, and one bomb fell in the courtyard of the Nove Slovo offices. It knocked us to the ground, and to this day I have this smaller scar from glass, but it wasn’t anything serious.

British paratroopers came to Banska Bystrica as part of assistance to the uprising, and among them were four paratroopers from the Palestine. Three men and one woman. She later died in Kremnicka, they killed her. Her name was Chaviva Reich 24. We had known each other from the time I had been in Hashomer Hatzair. I got in touch with her in Banska Bystrica right before the Germans were drawing near the town.

When the Germans were already close to Bystrica, these paratroopers said that we had to disappear into the mountains. One lieutenant, or second lieutenant, from Svoboda’s Army also joined us. A Slovak from Myjava [Trenciany region] who had been dropped into Sliac [Banska Bystrica region]. We went through Slovenska Lupca [Banska Bystrica region]. There the locals gave us some potatoes and food. We got to the top of a hill above the village of Pohronsky Bukovec [Banska Bystrica region]. There we built some zemljankas [zemljanka: underground shelter, usually military – Editor’s note]. There was also a shepherd’s shed, and closer to the town also an abandoned gamekeeper’s lodge. We hid in the zemljankas. The lieutenant said that he had information that the rebel army would be retreating to Chabenec [Chabenec (1955 m): a large mountain massif in the Nizke Tatry (Low Tatras) mountains – Editor’s note], and that we should attempt to get to the retreating Czechoslovak army. It was at the beginning of November 1944. Of course, in that freezing cold, we warmed ourselves by a fire at night. But we were tired and sleepy, and went into the zemljanka. Lying first from the edge was Sano Wollner, I was second, and third was the lieutenant. Only the lieutenant was armed, he had a revolver and a grenade. We weren’t armed; after all, I had just come from the newspaper office. My wife, Anicka, had stayed behind with some group by the fire. Just before morning we were attacked by Vlasovites 25. Suddenly we heard explosions. They killed the guards. The lieutenant grabbed me, that you’re quickly coming with me! I wanted to shout to my wife Anicka, but he clapped a hand over my mouth. “Don’t yell, or they’ll shoot you, and her as well, when she answers you.” So we made off down in the direction of the gamekeeper’s lodge. There we stopped, and he said: “We’re going towards Chabenec.”

He gave me the grenade, and kept the revolver. When we reached some scrub bush, we heard someone speaking Russian. We didn’t know, however, whether they were Russian partisans or Vlasov’s men. We hid behind the scrub and watched them. We saw that they had equipment that they had taken from us during that attack. We knew that we had to be careful of them, and that it would be better to avoid them. In Brezno and Podbrezova [both in the Banska Bystrica region] there were steelworks that the Germans had taken over and renamed to the Hermann Göring Werke. Because they needed people who could communicate with the Slovak workers, they had installed Czech engineers there. When we were walking in the direction of Chabenec, we heard some voices in the distance. It seemed to us to be the Czech language. They were Czech engineers with their wives and children.  They were afraid of German reprisals, and so were running away from there. They were loaded down with food and cakes. As we didn’t have any bags, the father of one of the families asked us to grab a rucksack. We led the way and they followed us. They asked us where we were going, and we told them to Chabenec. The hilltops were covered in snow, and I saw something suspicious. Something was moving. Suddenly the lieutenant tells me: “Quick, throw that grenade over there in that direction!” I threw the grenade and machine-gun fire started! We could feel the bullets whizzing around us, and what’s interesting is that apparently they didn’t hit anyone, because there was no screaming or crying to be heard. When the shooting stopped, we hid behind some bushes. And this I’ll never forget, that in extreme situations, when it’s a matter of life and death, a person is capable of overcoming terrible shocks. We overcame it by sitting down behind a bush, opened that rucksack, and both of us ate with great relish everything that it contained. Up till then we hadn’t had anything proper to eat. We’d been living on berries that we found in the forest. It also happened that people from the surrounding villages would be running away from the Germans. When we’d meet them, they’d give us something to eat. It sometimes happened that we ate only raw meat. As soon as I had finished enjoying the cakes in that rucksack, I got dysentery, but not from the cakes [dysentery; a serious infectious intestinal illness. Its symptoms are severe diarrhea mixed with blood and fever that is accompanied by stomach pains – Editor’s note]. That’s a horrible disease. Instead of a stool I bled. The disease was accompanied by severe pain. The lieutenant was a real pal. He said: “We’ll go downhill, as there’s a village near here.” So we aimed for that village. Near the village we approached the first person we met: “I’m seriously ill. We need to get to a hospital.” That person said to me: “Don’t worry. I’m the chairman of the revolutionary National Committee. I’ll drive you to the station and you’ll get to the hospital in Brezno.” I said my goodbyes to the lieutenant, who had saved my life, and whom I never saw again.

The chairman of the National Committee made sure that I got to Brezno by train. I arrived at the hospital’s reception. Not far from the hospital, there was a building occupied by the Gestapo. The head physician at the hospital was a very decent person. He gave orders that they should admit and treat everyone, regardless of who he was, what he was! I said to a nurse: “I’m a Jew and a partisan. You could hand me over to the Germans.” “We’ll never hand you over, the head doctor said that we’re supposed to treat people, and we’ll put you in a ward where the Gestapo doesn’t go.” They put me in the typhus ward. In that typhus ward I got unsweetened tea, cooked unsweetened and non-greasy rice and of course medicines. I stayed there until I was cured.

When they released me, I said to myself that if my wife is alive, she’ll be trying to get to the East, where she was from. In the East the front was already approaching. Both the Soviet Army and the Czechoslovak Svoboda’s Army were advancing. When I left the hospital, one of Vlasov’s soldiers approached me. I had a watch. I didn’t wait for him to take it from me, but offered it to him straight away. He answered: “I don’t want it!” Imagine, he paid me for it. Then I set out by train for Eastern Slovakia. I got near Presov, and suddenly a fellow countryman noticed me. He greeted me in a very friendly fashion. He asked where I was headed. I said: “I want to get to the other side of the front, otherwise they’ll kill me.” I asked him to get in touch with Juraj Anderko, our family friend. He told me that I should hide out at his sister’s place until he finds Anderko. After some time Juraj Anderko also arrived. He gave me a gold watch, a family heirloom from my father that my parents had hidden with him. I then sold the watch to a jeweler. I’m sure that I sold it too cheaply, but despite that I got a lot of money for it. Once I had that money I was able to move about.

Now I could set out for the front. I got to a village not far from Margecany. I remember buying a razor blade. A razor blade so that in the event that the Germans captured me, I’d commit suicide. I wouldn’t let myself me captured. I stayed in that village for a while. I told people that I was running away from the Germans, so that they couldn’t send me for forced labor. Because I had money, I was able to pay for accommodations. I even attended church there, so that I wouldn’t be conspicuous. I don’t know how they would have reacted had they known I was a Jew. I was already quite exhausted by the constant hiding and so I went to the pub in Margecany, like that time when we had been saving the Jewish children in Polish Tesin. I ordered a beer. Sitting beside me was a Hungarian soldier from Kosice. We started talking and suddenly I sensed that he’s probably not a big Hungarian, and a big supporter of Fascism. He told me how at the Eastern front they’d been dropping leaflets down on the Hungarian and German units, for them to surrender, that the war was lost. Because he had confided in me, I also told him who I was. He was named Hoffmann and told me that he’d try to save me. We became friends.

Hoffmann right away went to see his commander and told him that he’s got a Hungarian colleague who wants to join the army. That the problem is, however, that he doesn’t speak Hungarian, because his mother was Hungarian, but died and he was raised by his father, a Slovak. As they didn’t have any more uniforms, I got only a Hungarian cap. The next day an order sounded, which was, retreat! The Soviet Army is advancing. So we got from Margecany to Nizny Medzev [in 1960 the town of Nizny Medzev and Vysny Medzev merged into the town of Medzev – Kosice region]. It was a mostly German village. The Germans that lived here were loyal Hitler supporters. We were boarded with one Fascist, who would have done anything for us due to the fact that we were fighting alongside the Germans. Suddenly the commander summoned my friend, that it was necessary to go get pants for the soldiers at the joint Hungarian – Slovak army warehouse. The warehouse wasn’t far from Martin [Zilina region]. Hoffmann said: “All right, but I won’t go alone, as I’ve got my friend here.” And so we got near Martin as soldiers, showed our papers and each got one sack of pants. We were returning via Krutky and Poprad [Presov region].  In Poprad we got off and walked in the direction of Krompachy [Kosice region]. Behind Krompachy was already the front line. We kept going until we arrived above the town of Zakarovce [Kosice region]. The forest was full of people. Down below there was already shooting. The people from Zakarovce who were hiding from the Germans in the forest didn’t trust us. Luckily Hoffmann, or rather his father, had had some contact with people from Zakarovce. He remembered the name of one miner from Zakarovce. That identified us. We had basically deserted from the Hungarian Fascist army.

Finally a boy arrived with news that the Soviet army was already in the town. Right away a celebration started, with liquor and all. The Soviet soldiers got properly drunk. The friend from Zakarovce took us two in right away. We stayed there for about two days. Suddenly a Russian soldier, who supplied the units with food, arrived. Kosice had been liberated [Kosice were liberated on 19th January 1945 – Editor’s note]. Neither the Hungarian nor the German army was there. Hoffmann and I left for Kosice, to go see his parents. As they hadn’t had any news of their son up to then, they were very glad to see him. It was an unbelievably joyful occasion.

After the war

A short time later I was crossing Hlavnej [Main] Street in Kosice, and saw a sign that said editorial office. It was the office of the newspaper of Svoboda’s Army. I applied and they took me on. I worked there for only a short time. In Kosice I had met a lawyer by the name of Rasl, and he told me that Pravda 26 also needed journalists. Pravda was a mouthpiece of the Communist Party. The editor-in-chief of Pravda was Julo Sefranek. I told him that I had briefly worked for the Czechoslovak Army magazine and before that for Nove Slovo. They hired me. I worked there until Bratislava was liberated [Bratislava was liberated on 4th April 1945 – Editor’s note]. After the liberation of Bratislava everything was moved to Bratislava. In Eastern Slovakia the Party began publishing new daily paper Vychodoslovenska Pravda. And I started working for it as an editor and later became editor-in-chief.

Once, that was still in the Kosice offices of Pravda, the General Secretary of the Slovak Communist Party, Edo Fris, announced at a staff meeting of the paper that: “They need an editor in Moscow, as everyone has already returned home, and the Czechoslovak department of Moscow Radio needs an editor. Who agrees? Who’d want to go?” Right away my hand shot up. Back then I thought that a person could have no greater mission than to be an editor in the radio of a victorious anti-Fascist country. So he wrote down my name. This was in 1945.

Some time later, my good friend from Presov, a Jewish boy, Tibor Rosenwasser, appeared in Presov. We ran into each other on the street: “Jozko, you’re alive? Your wife, Anicka, is in Presov.” I said: “That’s impossible.” “Yes, it’s possible, I’ll bring her to you.” Then I learned what had happened to her. The group of people that Vlasov’s soldiers caught in the forest had been taken to Banska Bystrica, to the offices of the Gestapo. The overwhelming majority of them were dragged off to Kremnicka and there they shot them. Among them was also the Palestinian paratrooper Chaviva Reich. My wife had also managed to escape during the attack. She had aimed for Zilina. There she worked as a laborer, and used the money she earned to get to the East. She ended up in some Ruthenian village not far from Bardejov [Presov region], and from there got to Presov.

In 1946, in Kosice, our son was born. Janko. Unfortunately, he got an inner ear infection. Despite the fact that one of our friends was a good doctor, we were unable to save him. Back then there weren’t antibiotics yet, and people died of these sorts of diseases. We buried Janko in Kosice.

In March of 1947 we arrived in Moscow. At that time I didn’t speak Russian yet. Back then I met Soviet workers for the first time. I remember that they had a work holiday. It was named Stakhanovsky Vtornik, Stakhanov Tuesday. I don’t know, I don’t remember anymore exactly what its significance was. I think that it had something to do with suggestions for improvement, the improvement and rationalization of work. In the Czechoslovak broadcast offices we mastered Russian relatively quickly through contact with our Russian colleagues. Anicka also worked for our office. She had graduated from academic high school. She had an exceptional talent for physics and math. In Moscow, on 1st January 1946, our son Vlado [Vladimir] was born. We didn’t have an apartment. We lived in a hotel room.

Unfortunately, my and Anicka’s relationship was no longer as rosy. On the anniversary of the Great October Revolution 27, in 1949, I was terribly busy, as delegations from Czechoslovakia had arrived. I had to devote myself to them. We no longer lived in the hotel by Kiev Station, but downtown, closer to the radio offices and close to a very good Georgian restaurant. At the time Vlado was a little over a year and a half old. That day I went to that restaurant with him. The service there was very slow. When we returned to the hotel, we couldn’t get into our room. I had it forced open. Anicka was lying on the floor, half-dead. It was discovered that she had overdosed on some pills and was unconscious. I quickly called the Red Cross and we took her to the hospital. But it was on the anniversary of the Great October Revolution. At that time Russians drink and party, and the hospital was full of drunks. I took a long time before her turn came. I remember that several days later they notified me that she had died. It was on 12th November 1949. The funeral took place at a crematorium in Moscow.

As I was a widower and had a lot of work, Vlado was put in a children’s home. They grew extremely fond of him there. One of the caretakers took care of him as if she were his own mother. Of course, I visited him often. I remember that when we were leaving the Soviet Union in 1953, I gave that children’s home almost all the money I had for how well they had taken care of my son.

Immediately after Slansky’s trial 28, in February 1953, Vlado and I returned to Prague. The management of the radio in Moscow assumed that I could have problems due to the trials that had just taken place, because during the trial they hung and shot most significant functionaries of Jewish origin. That’s why they sent a letter praising me from Moscow to the Czechoslovak ministry. Upon my return I wanted to return to Pravda as an editor. In Moscow, besides working in radio, I had been a correspondent for the Bratislava offices of Pravda. When I told the Party’s central committee that I wanted to return as an editor, they said: “No! You’ve worked in Moscow. You’ll get a position of responsibility.” I said: “I’m not a functionary, but a journalist.” But in short, nothing could be done, they stuck me into the position of deputy to the director of Czechoslovak Radio in Slovakia, in charge of programming. I was in charge of music, literature, politics, children’s programming. In other words, everything. It was a very responsible position. I didn’t like some organizational aspects that had dominated there up until then. For example, up until my arrival, there hadn’t been any record library. I basically founded it there. I remained in the position of first deputy until the year 1956.

After Stalin’s death in 1953, an overall relaxation took place. Khrushchev 29 needed to get international cooperation moving. It was also necessary to activate the international radio organization, OIR, which had offices in Prague. In 1956 they made me the General Secretary of OIR in Prague. Its members were radio stations in socialist countries, plus two non-socialist ones, Egyptian and Finnish radio. My task was to get it going. I consider organization to be creative work, and I have to say that I was successful in organizing cooperation and the exchange of programs and experiences of member as well as non-member radio stations.

In the meantime I had remarried. My wife worked for the Academy of Sciences. She was probably the one most afflicted by my work. Because during a time span of three years, I wasn’t at home for 220 days. I traveled to many countries, organized meetings. Finally in 1959 we returned from Prague to Bratislava, where I became editor-in-chief of political broadcasts of Slovak Radio. I worked there until 1963, when I applied for the position of teacher at the Department of Journalism at Comenius University. I won the competition.

In 1968, as a teacher at the Department of Journalism, I took part in a conference on information and international relations in Ljubljana, Yugoslavia. My paper got a good reception. At the conference I was approached by the rector of the Munich Academy for Television and Film. He proposed that I come lecture at their university. In those days they were leading very stormy discussions with their leftist students. I told him to send the invitation to the Department of Journalism, and that the department will pass it on to the Minister of Education. If he agrees, I’ll gladly accept the invitation. During that time 30 the entire procedure wasn’t very complicated. It went relatively quickly and if I’m not mistaken, during the winter semester of 1969/70 I was already working in Munich. I was very much surprised by the students at that school. They were fanatical Communists. Their idols were Che Guevara and Fidel Castro. Of course there were also some opponents of Communist regimes to be found. My task was to familiarize them with socialist theories of journalistic sciences. My work connected with lectures as well as informal meetings with students in Munich was good, from the viewpoint of the school’s management.  I’d say also successful. I think that those students expected a more radical and leftist attitude from a person from Communist Czechoslovakia. They, on the other hand, surprised me that radical leftists were returning to the era before the Great October Revolution, when the issue of free love had been an oft-discussed theme. Vulgarly put, their attitude was one of everyone doing it with everyone. Apparently it was related to the fact that they were returning to early times, when besides revolutionary ideas carried by the ideal of justice, the fight against ossified customs and conventions was being formulated. The students imagined it as completely uncontrolled and uncontrollable freedom. About the same as we see today, when even people without any sort of responsibility are in important positions.

When I returned to Czechoslovakia from Munich, cadre [political] interviews were taking place. These interviews ended badly for me. They designated me as a traitor and imperialist. They attributed things to me that I never done or said. They expelled me from the Party and I wasn’t allowed to lecture. Despite the fact that I wasn’t lecturing, I continued to receive a salary. This was unpleasant to me, and so I turned to Professor Krna, the head of the Department of Journalism at the time. He said: “You know what, Jozef? Pick a theme, if it’s interesting we’ll approve it and you can work on it. Whether it’ll be published though, that I don’t know.” So I worked on the theme: Information, Journalistic Information, or journalistic intelligence and facts. This is how it was for a half year. I wasn’t allowed to publish. Finally in 1971 they summoned me to the cadre department, where the department head informed me: “Comrade, you can no longer work here.” He gave me a form letter, that I’m leaving voluntarily. I had to sign it, there was no other option.

I visited my former colleague and the then secretary of the UV KSS [Central Committee of the Communist Party of Slovakia]. He received me, and I told him: “Comrade, I’m unemployed in socialism. I’m not allowed to publish.” He said: “Comrade, it’ll all settle down, that was a political earthquake. They also threw out my brother, the director of the Bardejov shoe factory. It’ll all settle down. You can work, but you can’t work in areas of ideology. Find some other type of work.” The deputy of the Minister of Industry was a very decent person. I had already met him. I contacted him through the wife of the former director of Czech, later Slovak Radio. The deputy received me and I told him what sort of situation I was in. He said: “The Academy of Industrial Systems Engineering belongs under our ministry, you’ll work there. I’ll call the director right away.” They gave me a job, and I got my first position, the director’s secretary. My job was to take minutes and besides this to serve coffee. So as a college lecturer I served coffee to functionaries who were discussing issues connected to industrial automation in Slovakia. There I learned that some programs are compatible, and some aren’t compatible. But what kinds of programs they were, I had not even the slightest idea. I didn’t understand a thing. When I came home, my wife asked me: “So, how was it?” And I answered her: “Well, besides preparing coffee, I didn’t understand anything.”

But it didn’t take long, I’d guess no more than a half year, and after a half year the academy moved, to Prievoz. And as a pedagogue they asked me to develop techniques to convince the directors of Slovak industrial companies to not be afraid of computers. And they were afraid that hidden reserves would be discovered. So I had to first know what that automated control system was, and what that computer actually is. I began reading books, but it wasn’t enough. They put me in touch with one excellent computer expert, for those times, from Slovnaft. I don’t remember his name, otherwise he was also physically disabled, very talented and intelligent, and lectured excellently for me, as a layman, and led me to understand it. And so it happened that after a year or two, I gradually worked on that methodology and became the leader of one team that was responsible for this. The team was composed of sociologists, journalists, psychologists and economists. I was the manager and would send them out into the field to put my methodology into practice. Along with the rest of them, I also went about and lectured at various companies. I lectured for directors, and that methodology, when it had already been published as a whole, had great success at the general directorship of Skloplast in Trnava. When we had a departmental conference, I received thanks and even a diploma from the director. And in 1976, at the age of 60, I retired.

My wife and I met in Moscow. As a student she occasionally helped out at the radio station. She was a friend of my first wife. My second wife is also a Jewess. But to be honest, that wasn’t at all why I married her. We had a civil wedding. My wife and I didn’t observe any religious rules at home, and neither did we observe holidays. I only go to synagogue during the High Holidays. One daughter came of our marriage.

I’d like to tell one story, perhaps an educational one, but in those days certainly not an unusual one. I didn’t tell my son that I was a Jew. When he was 14 or 15 years old, we were on vacation by the Cerveny Kamen castle. There was a well-preserved Jewish cemetery. My son and I sat down and I began to read the writing on the tombstones. My son said: “You can read it?” To which I replied: “Yes, I’m a Jew.” At that point I told him everything, that his mother had also been, and so was he. He began shaking and said: “Why didn’t you tell me? Why?” After this experience we decided it would be better to tell our daughter everything right away.

In 1968 our son met his wife-to-be. She was studying art restoration. In 1969, on the anniversary of the August 21 occupation 31 they were on SNP [Slovak National Uprising] Square and were witnesses to a cop beating some woman. This was one of the reasons they decided to leave Czechoslovakia. They got to Italy, to Rome. They went with their child in arms. In Rome they found out that a charitable Jewish organization was helping Jews. With the help of this organization they got to New York. Up to 1973 we had no information about them. In 1973 we got a letter from our son, where he wrote about what all they had gone through. From that time onwards we’ve kept in touch. He and his wife settled permanently in the USA. They had a pair of twins there.

As far as my friends are concerned, I’ve got to say that I don’t seek out only Jewish company. I’ve got friends both among Jews and non-Jews. I don’t differentiate between them.

In closing I’d like to say a few words. We, who survived the Holocaust, often ask ourselves, why and how? To this day we can’t understand why the Nazi regime picked Jews as victims of the slaughter. The SS were worse than predators. They considered it an honor to cleanse their race by exterminating us. Sometimes, while talking about what we lived through and how we lived through it, we stop and ask, was it possible? Is it true? How was it possible? If I have to sum it up, it was possible only thanks to the fact that there were good people to be found, who helped us. Sometimes they were people that were grateful to our parents for something, or to our grandparents. Friends helped us, former classmates. Very often what helped us was lightning-quick wit and resourcefulness, which took those murderers by surprise. And when we weren’t afraid to risk in a given situation, we survived. First we survived the day, then another and finally the entire Third Reich. Another thing I’d like to say is that totalitarian regimes are regimes that murder. The Nazi regime picked the Jewish race. I don’t believe that there is such a thing as the Jewish race. Because many Jews are descendants of crossbreeding, just like the “Aryans”. So the Nazis picked a race that they had made up. The Stalinists also murdered millions. They, however, didn’t make up a race, but so-called enemies of the people, and arbitrarily destroyed and murdered even their nearest and dearest. Basically, even today it’s horrible. In this democratically oriented system, people are afraid to express resistance to neo-Nazism and terrorism. I’m coming to the conclusion that a completely just society doesn’t exist. Either the regime destroys people, or in a freer society, people destroy each other. Everything depends on the responsibility and conscience of the individual.

Glossary:

1 Slovak National Uprising

At Christmas 1943 the Slovak National Council was formed, consisting of various oppositional groups (communists, social democrats, agrarians etc.). Their aim was to fight the Slovak fascist state. The uprising broke out in Banska Bystrica, central Slovakia, on 20th August 1944. On 18th October the Germans launched an offensive. A large part of the regular Slovak army joined the uprising and the Soviet Army also joined in. Nevertheless the Germans put down the riot and occupied Banska Bystrica on 27th October, but weren’t able to stop the partisan activities. As the Soviet army was drawing closer many of the Slovak partisans joined them in Eastern Slovakia under either Soviet or Slovak command.

2 Army of General Svoboda

During World War II General Ludvik Svoboda (1895-1979) commanded Czechoslovak troops under Soviet military leadership, which took part in liberating Eastern Slovakia. After the war Svoboda became minister of defence (1945-1950) and then President of Czechoslovakia (1968-1975).

3 Slovak State (1939-1945)

Czechoslovakia, which was created after the disintegration of Austria-Hungary, lasted until it was broken up by the Munich Pact of 1938; Slovakia became a separate (autonomous) republic on 6th October 1938 with Jozef Tiso as Slovak PM. Becoming suspicious of the Slovakian moves to gain independence, the Prague government applied martial law and deposed Tiso at the beginning of March 1939, replacing him with Karol Sidor. Slovakian personalities appealed to Hitler, who used this appeal as a pretext for making Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia a German protectorate. On 14th March 1939 the Slovak Diet declared the independence of Slovakia, which in fact was a nominal one, tightly controlled by Nazi Germany.

4 The expulsion of the Jews (Sephardim) from Spain

In the 13th century, after a period of stimulating spiritual and cultural life, the economic development and wide-range internal autonomy obtained by the Jewish communities in the previous centuries was curtailed by anti-Jewish repression emerging from under the aegis of the Dominican and the Franciscan orders. Following the pogrom of Seville in 1391, thousands of Jews were massacred throughout Spain, women and children were sold as slaves, and synagogues were transformed into churches. About 100,000 Jews were forcibly converted between 1391 and 1412. The Spanish Inquisition began to operate in 1481 with the aim of exterminating the supposed heresy of new Christians. In 1492 a royal order was issued to expel resisting Jews in the hope that if old co-religionists would be removed new Christians would be strengthened in their faith. The number of the displaced is estimated to lie between 100,000-150,000.

5 Masaryk, Tomas Garrigue (1850-1937)

Czechoslovak political leader and philosopher and chief founder of the First Czechoslovak Republic. He founded the Czech People’s Party in 1900, which strove for Czech independence within the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, for the protection of minorities and the unity of Czechs and Slovaks. After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1918, Masaryk became the first president of Czechoslovakia. He was reelected in 1920, 1927, and 1934. Among the first acts of his government was an extensive land reform. He steered a moderate course on such sensitive issues as the status of minorities, especially the Slovaks and Germans, and the relations between the church and the state. Masaryk resigned in 1935 and Edvard Benes, his former foreign minister, succeeded him.

6 People’s and Public schools in Czechoslovakia

In the 18th century the state intervened in the evolution of schools – in 1877 Empress Maria Theresa issued the Ratio Educationis decree, which reformed all levels of education. After the passing of a law regarding six years of compulsory school attendance in 1868, people’s schools were fundamentally changed, and could now also be secular. During the First Czechoslovak Republic, the Small School Law of 1922 increased compulsory school attendance to eight years. The lower grades of people’s schools were public schools (four years) and the higher grades were council schools. A council school was a general education school for youth between the ages of 10 and 15. Council schools were created in the last quarter of the 19th century as having 4 years, and were usually state-run. Their curriculum was dominated by natural sciences with a practical orientation towards trade and business. During the First Czechoslovak Republic they became 3-year with a 1-year course. After 1945 their curriculum was merged with that of lower gymnasium. After 1948 they disappeared, because all schools were nationalized.

7 Hashomer Hatzair in Slovakia

the Hashomer Hatzair movement came into being in Slovakia after WWI. It was Jewish youths from Poland, who on their way to Palestine crossed through Slovakia and here helped to found a Zionist youth movement, that took upon itself to educate young people via scouting methods, and called itself Hashomer (guard). It joined with the Kadima (forward) movement in Ruthenia. The combined movement was called Hashomer Kadima. Within the membership there were several ideologues that created a dogma that was binding for the rest of the members. The ideology was based on Borchov’s theory that the Jewish nation must also become a nation just like all the others. That’s why the social pyramid of the Jewish nation had to be turned upside down. He claimed that the base must be formed by those doing manual labor, especially in agriculture – that is why young people should be raised for life in kibbutzim, in Palestine. During its time of activity it organized six kibbutzim: Shaar Hagolan, Dfar Masaryk, Maanit, Haogen, Somrat and Lehavot Chaviva, whose members settled in Palestine. From 1928 the movement was called Hashomer Hatzair (Young Guard). From 1938 Nazi influence dominated in Slovakia. Zionist youth movements became homes for Jewish youth after their expulsion from high schools and universities. Hashomer Hatzair organized high school courses, re-schooling centers for youth, summer and winter camps. Hashomer Hatzair members were active in underground movements in labor camps, and when the Slovak National Uprising broke out, they joined the rebel army and partisan units. After liberation the movement renewed its activities, created youth homes in which lived mainly children who returned from the camps without their parents, organized re-schooling centers and branches in towns. After the putsch in 1948 that ended the democratic regime, half of Slovak Jews left Slovakia. Among them were members of Hashomer Hatzair. In the year 1950 the movement ended its activity in Slovakia.

8 Jabotinsky, Vladimir (1880-1940)

Founder and leader of the Revisionist Zionist movement; soldier, orator and a prolific author writing in Hebrew, Russian, and English. During World War I he established and served as an officer in the Jewish Legion, which fought in the British army for the liberation of the Land of Israel from Turkish rule. He was a member of the Board of Directors of the Keren Hayesod, the financial arm of the World Zionist Organization, founded in London in 1920, and was later elected to the Zionist Executive. He resigned in 1923 in protest over Chaim Weizmann’s pro-British policy and founded the Revisionist Zionist movement and the Betar youth movement two years later. Jabotinsky also founded the ETZEL (National Military Organization) during the 1936-39 Arab rebellion in Palestine.

9 Hlinka-Guards

Military group under the leadership of the radical wing of the Slovakian Popular Party. The radicals claimed an independent Slovakia and a fascist political and public life. The Hlinka-Guards deported brutally, and without German help, 58,000 (according to other sources 68,000) Slovak Jews between March and October 1942.

10 Deportation of Jews from the Slovak State

The size of the Jewish community in the Slovak State in 1939 was around 89,000 residents (according to the 1930 census – it was around 135,000 residents), while after the I. Vienna Arbitration in November 1938, around 40,000 Jews were on the territory gained by Hungary. At a government session on 24th March 1942, the Minister of the Interior, A. Mach, presented a proposed law regarding the expulsion of Jews. From March 1942 to October 1942, 58 transports left Slovakia, and 57,628 people (2/3 of the Jewish population) were deported. The deportees, according to a constitutional law regarding the divestment of state citizenship, they could take with them only 50 kg of precisely specified personal property. The Slovak government paid Nazi Germany a “settlement” subsidy, 500 RM (around 5,000 Sk in the currency of the time) for each person. Constitutional law legalized deportations. After the deportations, not even 20,000 Jews remained in Slovakia. In the fall of 1944 – after the arrival of the Nazi army on the territory of Slovakia, which suppressed the Slovak National Uprising – deportations were renewed. This time the Slovak side fully left their realization to Nazi Germany. In the second phase of 1944-1945, 13,500 Jews were deported from Slovakia, with about 1000 Jewish persons being executed directly on Slovak territory. About 10,000 Jewish citizens were saved thanks to the help of the Slovak populace.
Niznansky, Eduard: Zidovska komunita na Slovensku 1939-1945,
http://www.holocaust.cz/cz2/resources/texts/niznansky_komunita

11 Czechs in Slovakia from 1938–1945

The rise of Fascism in Europe also had its impact on the fate of Czechs living in Slovakia. The Vienna Arbitration of 1938 had as its consequence the loss of southern Slovakia to Hungary, as a result of which the number of Czechs living in Slovakia declined. A Slovak census held on 31st December 1938 listed 77,488 persons of Czech nationality, a majority of which did not have Slovak residential status. During the period of Slovak autonomy (1938-1939) a government decree was in effect, on the basis of which 9,000 Czech civil servants were let go. The situation of the Czech population grew even worse after the creation of the Slovak State (1939-1945), when these people had the status of foreigners. As a result, by 1943 there were only 31,451 Czechs left in Slovakia.

12 Jewish Center in Bratislava

its creation was closely tied to Dieter Wisliceny, German advisor for resolution of Jewish affairs, a close colleague of Eichmann. Wisliceny arguments for the creation of a Jewish Center were that it will act as a partner in negotiation regarding the eviction of Jews, that for those that due to Aryanization will be removed from their current positions, it will secure re-schooling for other occupations. The Jewish Center’s jurisdiction was determined by the scope and regulations of the particular instance it fell under. This fact fundamentally influenced the center’s operation. It limited the freedom of activity of individual clerks. The center’s personnel was made up of three categories of people. From bureaucrats, who in their approach to the obeying of orders did more harm than good (second head clerk of the Jewish Center A. Sebestyen), further of those that saw the purpose of their activities foremost in the selfless helping of people who were the most afflicted by the persecutions (G. Fleischmannova), and finally of soulless executors of orders, who were really capable of doing everything (K. Hochberg). Besides the Jewish Center there was also the Work Group, led by the Orthodox rabbi M. Weissmandel, but whose real leader was the Zionist G. Fleischmannova. Though Weissmandel wasn’t a member of the Jewish Center, he was such a respected personage that it would be difficult to imagine rescue missions being carried out without him. The main activity of the Work Group was to save as many Jews as possible from deportation. Of those in the Work Group, O. Neumann, A. Steiner and Rabbi Weissmandel and Neumann survived. In the last phase of activity of this underground group Neumann, who also became the chairman of the Jewish Center, lived in Israel. Steiner and Rabbi Weissmandel emigrated to Canada and the USA. Weissmandel and Neumann wrote their memoirs, in which they quite justifiably asked the question if the Jewish Center and especially the Work Group hadn’t remained indebted towards Jewish citizens.

13 Jewish Codex

Jewish Codex: Order no. 198 of the Slovakian government, issued in September 1941, on the legal status of the Jews, went down in history as Jewish Codex. Based on the Nuremberg Laws, it was one of the most stringent and inhuman anti-Jewish laws all over Europe. It paraphrased the Jewish issue on a racial basis, religious considerations were fading into the background; categories of Jew, Half Jew, moreover 'Mixture' were specified by it. The majority of the 270 paragraphs dealt with the transfer of Jewish property (so-called Aryanizing; replacing Jews by non-Jews) and the exclusion of Jews from economic, political and public life.

14 Yellow star in Slovakia

On 18th September 1941 an order passed by the Slovakian Minister of the Interior required all Jews to wear a clearly visible yellow star, at least 6 cm in diameter, on the left side of their clothing. After 20th October 1941 only stars issued by the Jewish Centre were permitted. Children under the age of six, Jews married to non-Jews and their children if not of Jewish religion, were exempt, as well as those who had converted before 10th September 1941. Further exemptions were given to Jews who filled certain posts (civil servants, industrial executives, leaders of institutions and funds) and to those receiving reprieve from the state president. Exempted Jews were certified at the relevant constabulary authority. The order was valid from 22nd September 1941.

15 Exemption and exceptions in the Slovak State (1939-1945); in the Jewish Codex they are included under § 254 and § 255

Exemption and exceptions, § 255 – the President of the Slovak Republic may and exemption from the stipulations of this decree. Exemption may be complete or partial and may be subject to conditions. Exemption may be revoked at any time. In the case of exemption, administrative fees are collected according to § 255 in the following amounts;
a) for the granting of an exception according to § 1, the sum of 1,000 to 500,000 Ks.
b) for the granting of an exception according to § 2, the sum of 500 to 100,000 Ks
c) for the granting of an exception according to single or multiple decrees, the sum of 10 Ks to 300,000 Ks
d) a certificate issued according to § 3 is charged at 10 Ks
§ 255 enabled the President to grand exceptions from decrees for a fee. Disputes are still led regarding how this paragraph got into the Jewish Codex and how many exceptions the President granted. According to documents there were 1111 Jews protected by exceptions, including family members. Exceptions were valid from the commencement of deportations from the territory of the Slovak State, in 1942, up until the outbreak of the Slovak National Rebellion, in the year 1944.

16 Novaky labor camp

established in 1941 in the central Slovakian town of Novaky. In an area of 2.27 km² 24 barracks were built, which accommodated 2,500-3,000 people in 1943. Many of the people detained in Novaky were transported to the Polish camps. The camp was liberated by the partisans on 30th August 1944 and the inmates joined the partisans.
17 Mach Alexander (1902 – 1980): Slovak leader who headed the fascistic Hlinka Guard and held various positions in the Slovak government. Mach was one of the main supporters of the Deportation of Slovak Jewry. In the summer of 1940 Mach became Minister of Internal Affairs in the Slovak government, which was a sattelite of Nazi Germany from 1939 – 1945. In september 1941 Mach and Tuka called for the deportation of 10,000 Jews from Bratislava, Slovakia´s capital, to eastern Slovakia. The deportations began in March 1942 and were carried out buy Mach´s ministry. Almost 58,000 Jews were deported over he next seven months. In February 1943 Mach tried to restart the deportations. However, he was unsuccessful. Mach stayed in his ministerial position until the Slovak national uprising. After the war, he was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
18 First Vienna Decision: On 2nd November 1938 a German-Italian international committee in Vienna obliged Czechoslovakia to surrender much of the southern Slovakian territories that were inhabited mainly by Hungarians. The cities of Kassa (Kosice), Komarom (Komarno), Ersekujvar (Nove Zamky), Ungvar (Uzhorod) and Munkacs (Mukacevo), all in all 11.927 km² of land, and a population of 1.6 million people became part of Hungary. According to the Hungarian census in 1941 84% of the people in the annexed lands were Hungarian-speaking.

19 Horthy, Miklos (1868-1957)

Regent of Hungary from 1920 to 1944. Relying on the conservative plutocrats and the great landowners and Christian middle classes, he maintained a right-wing regime in interwar Hungary. In foreign policy he tried to attain the revision of the Trianon peace treaty ‑ on the basis of which two thirds of Hungary’s territory were seceded after WWI – which led to Hungary entering WWII as an ally of Germany and Italy. When the Germans occupied Hungary in March 1944, Horthy was forced to appoint as Prime Minister the former ambassador of Hungary in Berlin, who organized the deportations of Hungarian Jews. On 15th October 1944 Horthy announced on the radio that he would ask the Allied Powers for truce. The leader of the extreme right-wing fascist Arrow Cross Party, Ferenc Szalasi, supported by the German army, took over power. Horthy was detained in Germany and was later liberated by American troops. He moved to Portugal in 1949 and died there in 1957.

20 Stefanik, Milan Rastislav (1880 – 1919)

Slovak astronomer, politician and a general in the French Army. In 1914 he received from the French government the Order of a Knight of the Honorary Legion for scientific and diplomatic successes. During the years 1913 – 1918 he organized the Czech-Slovak legions in Serbia, Romania, Russia and Italy, and in 1918 the anti-Soviet intervention in Siberia. He died in the year 1919 during an unexplained plane crash during his return to Slovakia. Is buried at a burial mound in Bradlo. http://www.osobnosti.sk/index.php?os=zivotopis&ID=755


21 Povstalecka Pravda (“Rebel Pravda”): started being published on 9th September 1944 during the Slovak National Uprising, in Banska Bystrica. It was published by the central body of the Communist Party of Slovakia. Pravda informed its readers about the progress of the war at home and in the rest of the world, helped in the mobilization and organization of all forces in the fight against Fascism. The editorial offices were led by M. Hysko, later J. Sefranek. The last issue was published on 25 October 1944 in Mezibrod, near Slovenska Lupca. By the end of the war, half of the editorial staff had been murdered.

22 Nove Slovo

a political, economic and cultural weekly. It was published by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Slovakia via the Pravda publishing house. It was created in Banska Bystrica during the Slovak National Uprising, where from 24th September 1944 to 22nd October 1944, five issues were published with a press run of 4,000 - 5,000 issues. The founder and managing editor was Gustav Husak. After liberation, the publication of the weekly was renewed on 1st June 1945, in Bratislava.

23 Husak, Gustav (1913–1991)

entered into politics already in the 1930s as a member of the Communist Party. Drew attention to himself in 1944, during preparations for and course of the Slovak National Uprising. After the war he filled numerous party positions, but of special importance was his chairmanship of the Executive Committee during the years 1946 to 1950. His activities in this area were aimed against the Democratic Party, the most influential force in Slovakia. In 1951 he was arrested, convicted of bourgeois nationalism and in April 1954 sentenced to life imprisonment. Long years of imprisonment, during which he acted courageously and which didn’t end until 1960, neither broke Husak’s belief in Communism, nor his desire to excel. He used the relaxing of conditions at the beginning of 1968 for a vigorous return to political life. Because he had gained great confidence and support in Slovakia, on the wishes of Moscow he replaced Alexander Dubcek in the function of First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party. More and more he gave way to Soviet pressure and approved mass purges in the Communist Party. When he was elected president on 29th May 1975, the situation in the country was seemingly calm. The Communist Party leaders were under the impression that given material sufficiency, people will reconcile themselves with a lack of political and intellectual freedom and a worsening environment. In the second half of the 1980s social crises deepened, multiplied by developments in the Soviet Union. Husak had likely imagined the end of his political career differently. In December 1987 he resigned from his position as General Secretary of the Communist Party, and on 10th December 1989 as a result of the revolutionary events also abdicated from the presidency. Symbolically, this happened on Human Rights Day, and immediately after he was forced to appoint a government of ‘national reconciliation.’ The foundering of his political career quickened his physical end. Right before his death he reconciled himself with the Catholic Church. He died on 18th February 1991 in Bratislava.

24 Reich, Chaviva (1914 – 1944)

real name Marta Reikova. Joined Hashomer Hatzair in 1930, where she took the name Chaviva. In 1938 – 1939 she worked as a secretary in the Keren Kayemet Lejisrael organization. In 1939 she married and emigrated to the Palestine. In 1942 she joined the Palmach military organization, after secret military training she became a member of the Royal Air Force (RAF). On 17th September 1944 she flew to Slovakia as one of five Jewish volunteers in the Amsterdam group. Her task was to liaise between the English Allied Command and the command of the 1st Czechoslovak Army in Slovakia. On 31st October 1944 she was captured, and after interrogation and torture she was executed in Kremnicka on 10th November 1944.
DURANOVA, Ludmila: Chaviva Reiková – Mladá hrdinka z Povstana, In.  Zaujímavé Zeny v nasej histórii, SNK, Vol. 5, No. 4, 2004, pg. 205

25 Vlasov military

Members of the voluntary military formations of Russian former prisoners of war that fought on the German side during World War II. They were led by the former Soviet general, A. Vlasov, hence their name.

26 Pravda

started being published as a daily paper from 1st October 1925. It was the press organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Slovakia (UV KSS). During the time of the Slovak State, it was prohibited and was published illegally as the rebel Pravda. Pravda began to be legally published from 7th January 1945 in Michalovce, from where the editorial offices moved via Kosice to Bratislava (13th April 1945). Pravda is published as an independent daily paper in Slovakia up to the present day (2006), and at the same time is among the most widely read dailies. Regional versions of the Pravda paper are published in five additional Slovak cities.

27 October Revolution Day

October 25 (according to the old calendar), 1917 went down in history as victory day for the Great October Socialist Revolution in Russia. This day is the most significant date in the history of the USSR. Today the anniversary is celebrated as ‘Day of Accord and Reconciliation’ on November 7.

28 Slansky trial

In the years 1948-1949 the Czechoslovak government together with the Soviet Union strongly supported the idea of the founding of a new state, Israel. Despite all efforts, Stalin’s politics never found fertile ground in Israel; therefore the Arab states became objects of his interest. In the first place the Communists had to allay suspicions that they had supplied the Jewish state with arms. The Soviet leadership announced that arms shipments to Israel had been arranged by Zionists in Czechoslovakia. The times required that every Jew in Czechoslovakia be automatically considered a Zionist and cosmopolitan. In 1951 on the basis of a show trial, 14 defendants (eleven of them were Jews) with Rudolf Slansky, First Secretary of the Communist Party at the head were convicted. Eleven of the accused got the death penalty; three were sentenced to life imprisonment. The executions were carried out on 3rd December 1952. The Communist Party later finally admitted its mistakes in carrying out the trial and all those sentenced were socially and legally rehabilitated in 1963.

29 Khrushchev, Nikita (1894-1971)

Soviet communist leader. After Stalin’s death in 1953, he became first secretary of the Central Committee, in effect the head of the Communist Party of the USSR. In 1956, during the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev took an unprecedented step and denounced Stalin and his methods. He was deposed as premier and party head in October 1964. In 1966 he was dropped from the Party's Central Committee.

30 Prague Spring

A period of democratic reforms in Czechoslovakia, from January to August 1968. Reformatory politicians were secretly elected to leading functions of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSC). Josef Smrkovsky became president of the National Assembly, and Oldrich Cernik became the Prime Minister. Connected with the reformist efforts was also an important figure on the Czechoslovak political scene, Alexander Dubcek, General Secretary of the KSC Central Committee (UV KSC). In April 1968 the UV KSC adopted the party’s Action Program, which was meant to show the new path to socialism. It promised fundamental economic and political reforms. On 21st March 1968, at a meeting of representatives of the USSR, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, East Germany and Czechoslovakia in Dresden, Germany, the Czechoslovaks were notified that the course of events in their country was not to the liking of the remaining conference participants, and that they should implement appropriate measures. In July 1968 a meeting in Warsaw took place, where the reformist efforts in Czechoslovakia were designated as “counter-revolutionary.” The invasion of the USSR and Warsaw Pact armed forces on the night of 20th August 1968, and the signing of the so-called Moscow Protocol ended the process of democratization, and the Normalization period began.

31 Warsaw Pact Occupation of Czechoslovakia

The liberalization of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia during the Prague Spring (1967-68) went further than anywhere else in the Soviet block countries. These new developments was perceived by the conservative Soviet communist leadership as intolerable heresy dangerous for Soviet political supremacy in the region. Moscow decided to put a radical end to the chain of events and with the participation of four other Warsaw Pact countries (Poland, East Germany, Hungary and Bulgaria) ran over Czechoslovakia in August, 1968.

Ladislav Urban

Ladislav Urban

Iza

Slovak Republic

Interviewer: Martin Flekenstein

Date of interview: February 2007

Mr. Ladislav Urban was born a few years before the outbreak of World War II, into a financially secure family. He didn't get to enjoy much of the carefree childhood that would have awaited him under normal circumstances. First of all came the persecution of Jews, which directly affected him and his family. In 1942 he lost his mother. The remainder of his family spent the following years in hiding and as inmates of concentration camps. After the war, he studied and graduated from a technical university. For almost his entire life, he worked as a manager in a company that concerned itself with the building of hydro projects and dams. He is currently in retirement, and thus has more time, which he devotes among other things to the study of history, especially in relation to the Holocaust.

My paternal grandfather was named Sigmund Urban. He was born in Piestany in 1858. His wife was named Terezia. She was born in 1863. I don't remember my grandparents the Urbans at all; they died before I was born. My grandfather in 1931, and my grandmother in 1925. They're both buried at the Jewish cemetery in Piestany. My grandfather had a textile store in the town, which my father then took over. The store is still there. But our family no longer runs it. My grandmother was a housewife.

My grandparents the Urbans had 13 children. All were born in Piestany. Their names were Alexander, Emanuel, Eugen [Jenö], Gizela [Gizi] Helena [Ilus (pron. Ilush)], Johana [Hana], Jozefina [Jozka (pron. Jozhka)], Julius [Gyula], Rudolf, Sidonia [Sidka], Tibor. I don't remember the names of the rest at the moment. Emanuel died in childhood of tuberculosis.

Eugen Urban was the oldest of the siblings. His wife was named Janka, informally Jeany. They had a son, Robert. They lived in Bratislava. Uncle Eugen was the owner of Kohlengrüben Urban. The company offices were on what is today Hviezdoslav Square in Bratislava, across from the American embassy. The lived in an apartment house in Na Palisadoch St. They owned two whole buildings there. They also owned a villa in Na Cervenovej St. Currently that villa is home to ether the Austrian or Italian Embassy. He also owned a villa on a large piece of property across from Slavin. My uncle's buyer, Dr. Banhegyi, rented it from him. Later they built a Jewish hospital on part of the property. He donated the property, where it was later built. Besides this, he also owned properties that were on what were back then the outskirts of Bratislava. Recently there was a large central market there. In the past there was a coal railway station there. They used to transport coal there from mines in Austria, and it was then further distributed and sold.

Uncle Eugen was what today we could call a workaholic. He wore terribly thick glasses and worked from morning till night. It was a large company, with many employees. All of my uncle's employees were Jews. His office buildings and staff were in Februarka [February Victory Street]. The buildings are still there. His two chauffeurs lived there too; they drove his cars, which were parked in garages there.

My uncle's wife, Aunt Jeany, was born in Zlate Moravce. I remember one comical incident that happened in the family. During the beginnings of World War II, the entire family used to get together for lunch at my parents' place. My father's sister Jozefina [Jozka] Deutschova would cook for us. When the weather was good, we'd eat out in the garden. First the kids would eat, then the men, and finally the women. Jeany was a vegetarian. My father [Alexander Urban] yelled at her: "Jeany, come eat already, or your lunch will wilt!"

Jeany used to go picking herbs with her son Robert. She'd then dry and monnkey around with them. This family couldn't stand physical work, couldn't handle it, to be more precise. They weren't capable of physical work. Without his glasses, my uncle was completely blind. Robert was the same. I was there when he got a slap and his glasses flew off. He really couldn't see a thing without them! During the war, they were hiding out in Piestany. They caught and deported them. Probably to Auschwitz, or Lublin. Only Robert survived the Holocaust. They nationalized all their property 1. So nothing was left of it.

During the war, he lived with us for a certain time. My father adopted him, along with our cousin Ludevit [Lulo, Louis]. After the war, Robert graduated from high school in Piestany. In time he left with Joint 2 to Canada. Finally he graduated from law. After the revolution, in 1989, he wanted to move in with us. We couldn't agree with it. His personality can be illustrated with the following anecdote. At one time he was working in Prague. Once during the night, my phone rang. It was Robert. He says: "Imagine, I bought an apartment in Prague, and the can doesn't work. It won't flush." No one wanted to come and fix it for him, and he asked whether I wouldn't come to Prague , to fix his toilet. That shows his strange way of thinking. I'm not saying that he wasn't normal, but he had ideas that bordered on abnormality.

Gizela Klinger, née Urban. We called her Gizi neni [Aunt Gizi in Hungarian]. She was married to Mr. Klinger, who was a watchmaker. They lived in Budapest. They had a daughter, Maria, Marcsa. After the war, Maria moved with her husband to Paris. When Mr. Klinger died, Gizi neni left for France to live with her daughter.

Helena Quittner, née Urban. In the family we called her Ilush neni. Her husband was named Ignatz Quittner, and owned a store with lumber and construction materials. Her husband died before I was born. Aunt Helena owned and operated a well-known and notorious restaurant in Piestany. It was named Kominar [Chimneysweep]. She employed two cooks and a barman. The barman, besides pouring beer, also took care everything that was necessary. One of the rooms in the restaurant was decorated with hunting trophies. There were antlers, heads of wild boar, deer, and so on. The food was excellent there. We used to go there often. We'd always get something sweet. In the restaurant courtyard, there was a large icehouse. In the winter, when the Vah [River] would freeze over,  they'd organize ice-cutting. The ice would then be stored, and that's where they'd chill beverages. There weren't any refrigerators. Everything that needed to be chilled, or frozen, was chilled with natural ice. Aunt Helena was childless. Alas, she didn't survive the war. They took her to a concentration camp, where she was murdered like almost all the women in our family.

Johana Lichtensteinova, née Urban. We called her Hana. For many years, she worked as a member of the Piestany city council, where she was in charge of the social commission. Her husband, Erno Lichtenstein, was the superintendent of a large farm belonging to Count Erdody. The farm was located in the municipality of Rakovice, about eight kilometers from Piestany. They had one son. His name was Leo. He was quite a bit older than I. In the second half of the 1930s, Leo finished his medicine studies in Prague. He was then in hiding there during the entire war, and managed to survive. Before the war, he changed his name to Leo Liska. He helped us a lot then, and when we were returning from the concentration camps as well. He examined me in Prague. Back then, we were there for about two weeks, but I'll get to that later. Later I used to play competitive basketball, among others for Slovan Bratislava. When our team went to Prague for a league game, I'd always call him. "Leo, I'm here, do you have time?" When he had time, he always came to see me. He was accustomed to slipping me a hundred, so that I'd have some money to "see the town". His mother was murdered in a concentration camp.

Jozefina Deutschova, née Urban. For everyone in the family, she was Jozka. Her husband was named Julius [Gyula] Deutsch. They lived in Bratislava, and were childless. Aunt Jozka used to cook for the entire family at the start of the war. They were in hiding at our place. Uncle Guyla used to sit in just one room. He couldn't go anyplace, as he didn't have papers. I used to go there to visit him and talk to him.

Julius Urban lived in Paris. He has a daughter, Tereza. I'm not in touch with her. They survived the war, they were in hiding someplace. I was at their place for a visit about 30 years ago. They were living in very bad conditions. In the 19th District, in one old building that was in horrible shape. Tereza worked in health care all her life. She was a CT [Computer Tomography] operator.

Rudolf Urban had two sons. One was named Tibor, and the other Imre. Imre left with the Aliyah for the Palestine in 1938. There he joined the army, and worked his way up to colonel. He was in the Israeli army his whole life. When he retired from the army, he moved to Australia. His brother Tibor survived the Holocaust and moved to Israel to be with his brother. He started a tailoring business in the town of Ramat Gan. He employed around 50 people. They've both since died.

Sidonia Sohnenfeldova, née Urban. In the family we called her Sidka. Mr. Sohnenfeld was a traveling salesman. They had a son Ludevit, Lula. They lived in Bratislava, on Vysoka St. Lula's parents were also killed during the war. After the war, my father adopted him. At that time Lula also changed his surname to Urban. He did his basic army service in the Czechoslovak Army. They put him in with the Black Barons 3. So he served his time in the army as a lumberjack by Ruzomberk. He studied civil engineering. He worked for the Civil Engineering Research Institute. Once he went with Cedok [The official Czechoslovak state travel agency during Communist times] to Cannes for a week-long holiday. He never returned home from France. He settled down in Paris. He never married. He worked as a chief engineer at water and waste treatment plants. He died last winter [2006].

Tibor Urban lived in Samorin. He had a house on the main square. He sold textiles there, just like my father. Tibor and his family survived the war. They've all since died, though. Most of them are buried at the Jewish cemetery in Budapest.

The youngest of the Urbans' sons was my father. My father was named Alexander Urban, and was born on 22nd November 1901. As he was the youngest of the entire bevy of children, his uncle, who lived in Alexandria, took over his upbringing. His uncle owned a hat shop, and my father grew up with him. He attended school there for about four years. Thus he also learned languages. He knew seven world languages, both spoken and written. He spoke English, German, French, Spanish, Arabic, Hungarian and Slovak, and could of course read Hebrew. He then began studying business in Vienna, and eventually at a school for diplomats in the Swiss town of Schafhausen. It's still there. It's one of the oldest schools of its type in the world. Many of his classmates later held important political functions, and during their diplomatic visits to Czechoslovakia they'd to visit my father as well. After his father died, my father returned to Piestany to take over the family business. That was around 1931. He lived in Piestany after the war too. He died in the hospital in Bratislava in 1984. He's buried at the Piestany Jewish cemetery, in his parents' grave.

My father also served in the Czechoslovak army. He joined up in Trencin. He told me that they even promoted him. He worked as a laborer in the kitchen. A local Jewish merchant used to supply them with meat. Well, and once it didn't smell good, and they refused to cook it. By the barracks there was an alley with plum trees. They ordered some soldiers over to pick the plums, and made plum dumplings from them. They cooked them out in the courtyard. Their superiors liked the lunch so much that they promoted the cooks. The second time was when they drafted my father during the mobilization in 1938 4. But he stayed there for only a short time.

The whole family on my father's side was religious. On Friday they attended synagogue, and observed all holidays. They'd take poultry to be slaughtered to the shachter [shachter: ritual butcher – Editor's note]. Bread we'd take to the Jewish baker. The bakery was by the old, Orthodox synagogue. There they also baked matzot for Passover [Passover: commemorates the departure of the Israelites from Egyptian captivity and is characterized by many regulations and customs. The foremost is the prohibition of consuming anything containing yeast – Editor’s note]. As I child, I used to take bread there every week. I had a little wagon, and in it would be two or three loaves of bread in a basket. I'd take them to the baker in the morning, before school, and on the way back from school I'd pick them up.

My mother's parents [Alzbeta Urban, née Grünfeld] lived in Trnava. My grandfather was named Bernat Grünfeld. He was a tall, strong man. He wore a mustache that had a bit of a curl. I don't remember my grandma's name. They were both deported. First they were in the collection camp in Zilina, and from there they took them to Poland. They killed them in Majdanek 5.

My grandfather owned a pub. It was called 'Zeleny strom' [The Green Tree]. To this day, there's still a pub in that location in Trnava. The pub was by a sugar refinery, and served as a "travelers' inn". It was mainly for the coachmen who used to bring sugarbeet to the refinery. They'd also bring it from Rakovice, where my uncle Erno Lichtenstein was the superintendent. Because the coachmen came from far away and couldn't return the same day, they'd stay there. They also had a water trough for the horses in the courtyard. It was all at their disposal. They also cooked at the pub. The food wasn't kosher 6. They cooked for everyone. It was a very nice, clean inn. On the counter, beside the beer taps, stood a beautiful, shiny cash register. It would ring when it opened. Beside the register were pretzels on a stick. They cost 10, maybe 15 hellers [in 1929 it was decreed by law that one Czechoslovak crown (Kc) – 1 Kc = 100 hellers, was equal in value to 44.58 mg of gold – Editor's note], and when they were making change, the guests would get a pretzel instead of those few hellers. As kids, we'd always come and take those pretzels. I also remember that once, right before Christmas, some carolers came to Grandpa's pub. They were wearing masks. It was very nice. They sang carols, and also put on performances. That was the first time I'd seen anything like that in my life. Then my grandfather gave them gifts, and they went on. We didn't ever stay too long in Trnava. When we did go there, it was only for the day. We'd eat something, my parents would talk a bit with our relatives, and right away we'd go back home again. It was a question of several hours. I don't even remember how my grandparents lived, how their house was furnished.

My mother's name was Alzbeta Urban, née Grünfeld. She was born in Trnava in 1913. I don't know how many siblings she had. We knew only one of her brothers. He appeared at our place after World War II. It was a very hectic time. I can't even tell you anything more about him.

I don't know how my parents met, but before my brother and I were born, they used to go on various outings and vacations. I've for example got a ton of photographs from trips and vacations in Georgia and Italy. Of them bathing, and on a motorboat. My parents had two sons. First I, Ladislav Urban, was born in 1934, and in 1938 my brother Tomas. Our mother tongue is Slovak, but in our family everyone also spoke German and Hungarian. Before the war we didn't have a chance to play much together, as my brother was still little. Here and there, we'd go for a walk in the park. I used to attend Maccabi 7 with my older friends. We used to play ping-pong, or go on outings. We used to go into the hills around Piestany, and in the winter there'd be skiing on Cervena Vez [The Red Tower]. We were of various ages. I was still quite small, and there were even 20-year-olds among us.

I attended a Protestant school. Actually first a Catholic one, but they threw me out of there. They didn't allow Jews to attend it. For about two months, I was at home. So that I could continue my studies, my parents had me baptized. I attended this course, where we studied the Bible. The parson's name was Dr. Alexander Barica. I've still got the baptism certificate he gave me, which later was of no use to me after all...

When I was in Grade 3, our teacher was Alica Zelienkova. She was a real Xanthippe [a reference to Socrates' wife who was said to be domineering and sharp-tongued – Translator's note], who beat me. One anecdote occurs to me in relation to her. It was my birthday, and my father's sister, Aunt Ilus Quittnerova had bought me a soccer ball. I took it to school, and almost the entire school was playing with it. There were about 50 students there. We were all chasing the ball around. Someone kicked it into the latrine. I had two good friends. One was Ivan Stankovic, and the other Dusan Goljer. They were Protestants. They held me by my feet, and I pulled the ball out of the john. It was all covered in shit. We washed it off, and Dusan took it to class. It was sitting in the corner, and smelled awful. When class began, this teacher came in. She asked whose ball it was. I admitted to it. She took a cane, and beat me so badly that I had to go see a doctor. The next day, Aunt Ilus went to complain to the principal about her, and that was even worse. After the war, I had one more incident with this teacher. I was studying in Bratislava, and I'd run into her every day on the way to school. She walked at the same time on the same sidewalk as I did. I said to myself that I won't say hello to her. She got so angry that once on Sunday she set out from Bratislava to see my father in Piestany, to complain about me.

The soccer ball didn't have a happy end either. When I returned from the doctor's, Ilus neni sent me to play with some children near the Vah [River]. Because it was my birthday, I invited them to come play soccer in a field. Ilus neni had prepared a basket full of cakes and some cocoa in a thermos for us. I didn't play, because I was so sore from the beating I'd gotten from my teacher. So I didn't get anything out of the soccer, plus the ball got all torn up, as there was gravel there. With us there at that time was my classmate Judita Goldbergerova, who they later murdered in Auschwitz.

The building where we lived had been finished in 1842. I know this because a few years ago we found a cast-iron plaque walled-up there that said this. Our apartment was upstairs, and downstairs my father had his textile store. We always had running water as well as electricity. The building belonged to our family. The store is there to this day. We recently enlarge the building. We added another floor. Currently some of the space is being rented to the companies Allianz and Home Credit. During my youth, there was a warehouse behind my father's textile store, and then a tailor's shop, where Mr. Goldsteinova sewed; later she changed her name to Galova. Mrs. Goldsteinova sewed custom shirts and men's underwear. Her daughter graduated from medical school, and after the war worked as a doctor.

We used to go on vacation with our parents regularly. Every year we'd go to the High Tatras, to Tatranska Lomnica. We'd go there both in the summer as well as during the winter. Most of the time we'd stay at the Grand Hotel. The last time we were there was in 1941, I think. I've also got photos from those times. I remember that the trains were so high that we children weren't able to get on. The trip lasted quite long, for us. In the Tatras we'd go sledding, and in the summer we'd walk around and play. Chasing squirrels and so on. Our parents would also take us to restaurants. We used to go there together with friends. Mainly our father, who used to play soccer in Piestany. He'd begun back when he was a student in Vienna. He even played defense for some team there.

We observed holidays mostly at home. For the high holidays my father would go to synagogue, and as a little boy I used to come see him. As children we didn't last long just sitting there, and so we'd run around and play in the courtyard. We attended the new, Neolog synagogue 8. The Maccabi clubhouse was close by too. Karol Grünwald and Pavol Blum used to go there too, for example. Pavol was the Czechoslovak cultural attaché in Rome, and Karol was the Israeli ambassador in Prague.

Before the war, my father bought a villa near Piestany from Janko Alexy [Alexy, Janko (1894 – 1970) was a Slovak writer, painter and publicist – Editor's note]. The villa was in the direction of Cervena Vez. Before that, Janko Alexy had had a studio there. Trainees, painters, used to come visit him. We lived in that villa for some time. I used to go to school from there on a bicycle. Together with my father; he'd go to work, and I to school. I'd leave the bicycle at my father's work, and after lunch we'd got home together.

The villa was by the Vah River. We had a kayak stand by the river, along with a dock. My mother used to go kayaking with Mrs. Majercakova a lot. Her husband, Dr. Eugen Majercak, was a lawyer for the Piestany spas. When the anti-Jewish laws 9 began coming out, we had to give up the villa. My father came to an agreement with Mr. Alexy that he'd buy the villa back from us. It then became a conspiratorial house for partisans. We'll come back to this chapter, as during the war we hid out here for a long time.

How did the anti-Jewish laws affect me? At that age I didn't understand them yet. In the first place, we had to move out of our villa and return to the house in the city, where we'd lived before. But by then we were only living in the rear part of the house, because the architect Alfred Perl from Vienna and his wife had moved into the front part, which faced the park. He was an Austrian, and wore a swastika pinned to his suit. He had his studio in Vienna, where he'd sometimes disappear, but in two or three days he'd be back. We got along well with him. They used to have my brother and I over. I think that was sometime in 1941. We had only one room that had windows facing the park. There all the men in our family would meet. My father had a Lorenz brand radio, which he hadn't turned in, and there they'd illegally listen to broadcasts. I later used this same radio too, when I was a university student in Bratislava.

The Aryanizer [Aryanization:  the transfer of Jewish stores, businesses, companies, etc. to the ownership of another, non-Jewish person – the Aryanizer – Editor’s note] of my father's store was a young German woman. Her name was Lea Klostemann. She might have been about 24 years old. She was a woman of lighter morals. The Germans had garages nearby, and already in the morning she'd be sitting around there with them. Benko's Garages they were called. These days there's a shopping arcade there. There were still Jewish salesmen working there [in the store]. Those that my father had employed. There were two women in the office. In the front, in the store, there were two or three men. One of them was named Oskar Stern. Alis [Alica Urbanova, née Haasova], who my father married after the war, worked there too. Alis worked for us as a helper. She cleaned, brought the mail, basically whatever. After the war, when they returned the store to us, she worked at the till. When the store was being Aryanized, my father tried to hide some of the goods. He had a lot of ready-made clothes, and so he and my cousin, Lulo Urban, "stole" it and walled it up at the rear of the attic. The made an entrance through the roof. You had to prop up a ladder, and that's how you got in. There was a large quantity of clothes there, coats, but also textiles and similar goods. Later part of these goods was distributed to partisans. The rest stayed there, and when we returned from the concentration camp, my father quickly got the store running again. It was painted, cleaned up, and these hidden goods formed the foundation of the newly opened store. After the war my father also bought a truck, which he used to drive to Brno to get goods.

Back then you didn't know who you could trust. For example, before the harsh anti-Jewish laws began, my father liked to fish. He used to go fishing with his friends, and once he ran into some man who worked at the SS headquarters in Piestany. His name was Jan Isachenko. After the war he turned out to be a Russian agent. His real name was Alexander Alexandrovich Isachenko. He became the head of the Russian language department in Bratislava. My father already knew that he was an agent in 1941, when they moved us out of the top floor of our house into the rear part. Back then they also stole our piano. Ten soldiers were carrying it down the stairs. One officer had come with him, which was him. So he'd actually come to introduce himself. He said to my father in German, you're Mr. Urban? We'll be seeing a lot of each other yet. He was friendly to us. He hinted that if we wanted to play the piano, we can come to his place. He was living at the Royal Hotel. Later this hotel was renamed to Slovan. After the war we could've taken the piano back, but who would have wrestled with it?

During the war, my father became the head of the Jewish religious community in Piestany. His deputies were Mr. Faber and Alexander Spronc. Shortly upon that they put him in jail. He was an irritant – he was very enterprising and that got in a lot of people's way. They took him to a jail in Bratislava. From there they helped him escape. It was apparently organized by my uncle, Ernest Lichtenstein. The jail was across from a brewery. The escape was perfectly prepared and timed. Here's what happened: there was a railway track next door. His escape was coordinated with the arrival of the train. It made noise, and thus the guards didn't hear anything. By the jail the train slowed down so that my father could jump on. They took him to Rac, where he jumped onto another train, which was heading in the direction of Prague. Past the tunnel in Lamac he jumped off, and there some railway worker was waiting for him. Then they hid him for some time. In time they arranged a Tiso exception 10 for him, and so he was able to return home. He got the exception in 1942.

That same year, they rounded up all the Urban women. They were looking for my father, and set up some sort of financial maneuvers to get at him. They didn't find him, so they took all the women, except for Gizi Klinger. She alone wasn't in Piestany. They took them all to Ruzovy Mlyn [The Pink Mill]. It was a big mill where they were gathering all the Jews from Piestany and its surroundings. From there they transported them to the collection camp in Zilina. My father and I set out to go look for them. They tried to have them released in all manner of ways. In Zilina we booked into Hotel Polom. There we hid out. My father tried to make some contacts and get my mother and his sisters out of jail. That same night that they were supposed to set them free, a different event took place. Partisans broke into the jail in Ilava, and freed about a hundred prisoners. The same night, they also broke into the collection camp in Zilina. They got in over the fence, and were pressed for time. They looked for them there, but there were lots of people there. The mission was unsuccessful. My mother's parents were there at that time. In the end they all ended up in the Majdanek concentration camp in the town of Lublin. My mother and her parents were murdered in Majdanek in 1942.

After the unsuccessful liberation mission, we got on a train and traveled to Nitra. There we booked into the Hotel Löffler. The owner, Mr. Löffler, was a Jew. He was still running his hotel. You know how it is, a hotelier like that knows lots of people. Lots of people helped him in exchange for money. After everything that had happened, my father said something which he then maintained until the end of his life: "You won't find a single decent person in Zilina." Always, when after the war someone mentioned Zilina, he'd just give a wave of his hand and say: "You won't find a single decent person there."

Then we returned to Piestany. My father had an exception, which protected us for a certain time. The we had to hide again. We hid out in Alexy's villa, which had belonged to us before the war. There was a phone there, and when there was supposed to be a raid, his brother always let us know. He'd call, and the code was: "let out the pigeons, because there's bad weather coming." Which meant that we were supposed to leave. The Germans chased me as well. An entire squad was running after me, but didn't catch me. I ran all the way to a huge haystack. There were deep holes dug into that stack. Into one we used to put bags, and in the second we slept. Often I slept there all night alone. I'd stay there until someone came and told me that I can come out. In 1944 partisans started gathering there.

Mr. Alexy had a beekeeper's cottage at Havran, about five or six kilometers from Piestany. We had a key to this cottage, and when they notified us that "you have to let out the pigeons...", we'd usually go there. After the partisans arrived, things began to get bad. As I've already mentioned, by the villa there was a dock, with a couple of boats. One night, the partisans "borrowed" them, and paddled to the other side of the Vah, to Piestany. In the town they pilfered some grocery stores, and returned. It was clear that the next day the Germans would be searching the surrounding area. They increased the sentries on the bridge. We were about 300 meters away from the bridge, so we had a good view of it. They were checking the ID of everyone crossing the bridge.

Michal Wagner had a mine nearby, where they mined painters' clay. It would be then ground up and sold to painters as pigment. My father dug a tunnel above the shaft, where we could hide in an emergency. You couldn't stand up in it, but it had benches dug into the walls, on them hay, and you could sit there. You could even sleep there. It wasn't cold in there. Mr. Wagner also helped us a lot. When we needed to send someone a message and things like that. He behaved quite insolently, which was an advantage during those times.

In time searches in the surrounding area became a daily occurrence. That's why we decided to go to the cottage that was further away, at Havran. Alexy's villa had two cottages in the yard. One was for trainee painters, and in the second lived the gardener and his family. We occasionally met in that gardener's cottage, and sometimes also slept there. The gardener's wife, Mr. Pelikanova, used to help us. The trainees were two young painters, during the war lieutenants in the Slovak State army. They'd both deserted from the army. One of them was Josef Dubravsky, who after the war lived in the town of Soporna, and the second Ladislav Snajdar from Piestany. Ladislav Snajdar rode horses and was the connection between us and the partisans. But mostly he stayed with the partisans. Leading up to the cottage at Havran, there were I'd guess about a hundred steps. The steps were quite high. One morning I went to empty out the basin I'd been washing in, and suddenly I looked and saw an SS helmet and heard a metallic clodding. A guy with a submachine gun was going up the stairs. There were four of us hiding there, my father, brother, I, and Alis, who was taking care of us. She cooked for us, did the laundry and so on. That was in October of 1944.

The day before there'd also been a raid, but that time we'd spotted them. It had been too late to escape. My brother and I hid underneath some duvets. Alis hid in the pigsty, and my father hid behind the door. Already at that time we had incredible luck. The first one to enter was a Guardist 11, and two steps behind him a German with a submachine gun. The Guardist entered, and saw my father behind the door, recognized him, and started. He yelled: "There's nothing here!" and they left. From what people told us we learned that the Germans were suspicious as to why the Guardist had run out of the room so quickly without searching it at all. That's why they returned the next day. They weren't rude to us. They told us to come with them. When we'd packed out things, they sent us down to wait for them by a truck. There wasn't anyone by the truck, and the keys were even there. In a while the Guardist that had been there the day before appeared. My father asked him: "What would happen if I started it?" He says to him: "Where do you want to go? You can't go to the bridge, because I have to fire off a shot, and if I suddenly fire one off, they'll make mincemeat of you down there. There's no use going in the other direction, because it doesn't lead anywhere." Because in that direction we would've left the forest, and they would've easily caught us. They drove us off to the jail of the district court in Piestany.

They kept us in the jail for about 10 to 14 days. My brother, Alis and I were in one cell. In another were Mrs. Terezie Kollmannova and her son Juraj, and my father was in a third. There were also 3 or 4 captured partisans there. Today the building houses the Electrical Technology High School, where a friend of mine teaches. Once I met him on the street and asked him for a favor. I explained to him that I'd like to recall what it looked like, and whether he wouldn't show it to me. Now there are labs there. From there, they took us all to the camp in Sered 12.

After about three days, they separated us from our father. The men went to the right, and the women and children to the left. We stayed together with Alis. Mr. Spronc, who'd been with my father on the board of the Jewish community in Piestany, was already in the camp. He even had some sort of a position on the organizational committee. He helped us arrange various  things. We knew that we'd be deported further onwards. All we had were suitcases, which were impractical. We needed a knapsack, or something similar. He rounded up some potato sacks, and we braided some straps together from string. So my brother, Alis and I had these sort of "knapsacks". One day a big commotion suddenly broke out, and they told us that we'd be going further onwards. They were loading us onto wagons. It was about 3:00 p.m. Into each wagon they also loaded paper bags full of bread and some little things to eat. It was so full that we could barely sit down. Mr. Spronc told us that we should sit by the door, and when they'd be opening the sacks, we should take the bread on top. Baked inside it were tools for opening up the wagon doors. Our father had the same thing in the other wagon. They'd prepared our escape. Everything had been arranged ahead of time. Ladislav Snajdar was supposed to be waiting for us.

The train departed the station in Sered around 4:00 or 5:00 p.m. The train crawled at almost a walking pace from Sered to Leopoldov all night. Then from Leopoldov to Puchov, the driver drove it like a racecar. But something in the organization of that escape had gone wrong. Because the partisans were waiting for us by Horna Streda, so on the second section, which we flew through. There we were supposed to all jump out and then continue on the Vah by boat. Most likely the engine driver had been given the wrong information.

In Puchov we turned in the direction of Morava. Then we saw the station at Cesky Tesin. We thought that we were going to Poland. The second morning, we were suddenly at the station Ceska Trebova. They turned the train around, and sent it on the tracks to Prague. At around lunchtime that day, we were in Kolin. We were standing there about 30, maybe 40 meters from the first platform. People were walking by us. As I was standing right by the door, every time they opened, I had to jump up, so that they wouldn't scrape me. I was glad to get up, at least I could straighten up. In the wagon we had one pail, which was dirty. The pail was being poured out, and a German handed it to me, saying: "See that tap? Bring some water." On the other side there was a locomotive, and the engine driver in it said to me: "Screw the water, jump in and we're off." He was calling me over, but how could I, when in the wagon beside me were my brother and Alis? If they would have said, run away, we'll hide you... It as all kind of suspicious. Plus I was only a child. I got the water and brought it back. The next stop was at the Czech-German border. We were stopped in a forest. When I jumped out of the wagon, there was so much snow that I wasn't able to climb my way out of it. We heard them talking amongst themselves, that we'd be standing there for a some time. During the entire trip, we basically didn't even know our guards were there. They didn't do anything to us. Just that we were shut up there. The next station was Berlin, the train station hall. There was a train on almost every track. We stood there for a couple of hours, and then it continued on. The next station was Bergen-Belsen 13. We arrived there at around 9:00 p.m. It was raining hard, pouring down.

In Bergen-Belsen we basically didn't do anything for days on end. We were put into a newer blockhouse. You could say that it was in relatively good shape, I mean as opposed to the rest. Because it was raining during our arrival, there was so much mud in front of the blockhouse that we were slogging through it up to our ankles. The mud was at least 20 cm high. Something awful. Some prisoners, women, brought us tools. We were ordered to dig a ditch around the blockhouse so that the rainwater could run off. The water was already coming into the blockhouse as well. I was still a child, and so I was hanging around the women digging the ditch, so that I'd get outside. At that time I also experienced my first roll call. We stood outside for around half the day. Around us were 20 SS-men, with Kramer 14 in front. There was so much arrogance and yelling... Names were called out, and we had to yell "hier". If someone didn't yell it out, they made a fuss.

It's my guess that we must've gotten into a sector where Russians had been before. The night we arrived, there was a huge orange tent standing there. It reminded me of a circus tent. We were separated from it by barbed wire. All of Bergen-Belsen was divided up into various sectors by barbed wire. Individual parts were also then divided up into smaller parts. So between us and this tent there was a smaller fence. Smaller in comparison to the ones that separated the sectors. Well, and when the roll call took place,  they'd eliminated the entire tent along with the Russians. There wasn't anything at all there anymore.

At first they were giving us black coffee and square bread that was as black as coal. A ration of this bread was about 35 cm, and was about 3 cm thick. Gradually the rations grew smaller. The last month, they were almost nonexistent! Then we also got soup made from fodder beets, with pieces of poor-quality meat or skin floating in it. At first you couldn't eat it. In order to get used to it, you had to "train". Occasionally you'd even find a spud in this "soup". The soup became gradually thinner and more meager. At first they stopped putting spuds into it, and finally also the "meat". They stopped giving us coffee after three months. For Christmas and New Year, instead of that disgusting soup, we got two or three potatoes cooked in their skin, and red cabbage.

We were in Bergen-Belsen from the end of October up until its liberation [15th April 1945 – Editor's note]. It lasted 7 months. Not far from our blockhouse, to the east, was another, empty one. The blockhouses were separated from each other by a fence and gate. Around the third or fourth day after our arrival, a transport of women arrived there. It wasn't until then that we saw what kind of shape people who'd been in concentration camps since 1942 were in. They looked horrible. They were more dead than alive. They were so starved that they ate everything we didn't eat. I have to emphasize that in the beginning we weren't used to such food.

During our entire stay in the concentration camp, we lived in three different places. From there we got a few meters over, behind a different fence. There they were doing medical experiments on people. I can't tell you what sort of experiments they were. My file from Bergen-Belsen was found, and the Red Cross stored it away in Geneva. Due to this, they later also examined me in Bratislava as well. They did experiments on both women and on children. I myself got two injections. After the war I had health problems. Already as a schoolchild I had a shortage of stomach acid, and chronic intestinal problems. I absolved many examinations. They found something in my lungs, I had frostbite up to my knees...

Finally, in the coldest depths of winter, we were put into some sort of "hall". I'd guess it to be at the end of January and beginning of February 1945. It wasn't until then that we saw that the whole camp looked like. We ended up close to the so-called "Main Street". We called in Lager Hauptstrasse. It was a long corridor about 35 to 40 meters wide. In certain sections, let's say every kilometer, there were army kitchens, a shelter with huge cauldrons. That's where they cooked that swill, the soup. Around them were mounds of spuds prepared for use. But I don't know where they were putting them, because there were almost none in the soup we used to get. If you were on good terms with someone there, they'd throw you a spud over the fence, or an onion, which would sometimes be there too. Some of the SS-men walking around would entertain themselves by picking up a potato or onion and throwing it amongst some children. Then they'd entertain themselves watching them fighting over it.

The third place where we stayed was blockhouse number 211. In front of our blockhouse was a ward, a hospital. There was practically no escape from the hospital. Once you got in there, you didn't leave alive. Right across from the ward was a guard tower, from which they would shoot according to "necessity". These towers were along the entire road, spaced around 200 to 250 meters apart. Of course everything was surrounded by an electric fence. I remember an incident when two women ran out of the hospital, holding hands, and aimed straight for that fence. They sizzled and that was the end of them. Close to the tower that stood by us was a latrine. People from the hospital used the latrine as well. The whole thing was a large pit, in front of which was a long, rough tree trunk. You had to sit on this tree trunk, and do your thing. People were in such horrible shape that they couldn't even stand on their feet. Some terrible things took place there in front of my eyes.

We had almost no contact with the Germans. You had to avoid them. They were capable of playing cruel jokes on us in the name of fun. For example, women guards used to go for walks after lunch beside the last blockhouse we lived in. Each SS-woman had a German Shepherd with her. At that time it was useful to leave the latrine. Sick people that had diarrhea sat there for even tens of minutes. They had cramps and weren't able to empty themselves. A German woman would let her dog loose on a sitting person, and the dog would push him into the shit. No one would pull a poor sod like that out again.

The sectors were divided into sections, and everything was separated by narrow alleys that were surrounded by barbed wire. These narrow alleys led into Lager Hauptstrasse. People had to walk down these alleys in single file. You entered the alleys through a gate by which a guards stood. The gates were about a meter wide, so that more than one person couldn't go through at a time. To the right of us was a little  blockhouse where Polish Jewish women lived. This little blockhouse was very pretty. It had curtains, inside were checkered blankets, and it was clean. There were about 30 beds. These women worked in the kitchen, and we children got to know them. At that time I had a big problem with shoes. I was growing, so were my feet, and I needed bigger shoes. My feet hurt so much that I couldn't walk. These women contacted someone from the stores for me, and exchanged my shoes for me. At night they used to let us go there. It was dark, it was all arranged with the guard, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to cross the alley. We used to go there in twos, and would get fed. Usually they'd give us a larger piece of meat cooked in that beet soup. It looked almost like a piece of cooked bacon, and bread to go with it. We had about a quarter hour to eat, and then we had to quickly disappear. We children would always take turns there. When there were two of us, one waited outside, and then we'd change places and then we'd go back together. There were about 30 of us children, all of us were from Slovakia. Not all of us risked such nighttime outings.

Right beside the Polish women's blockhouse was a kitchen, where they cooked for German soldiers. Their blockhouse was situated in such a way that two doors led to the fence. Through the window you could either jump into the part that led towards us, or to the entry into Hauptstrasse. We didn't hand around much there, as it was dangerous. The only functional well in the entire sector was about a hundred meters away from that blockhouse. Towards the end of the war, before the liberation,  there was almost no water anywhere in the camp. The water in all the wells around was infected. Typhus was very widespread, and people were afraid to drink. Those of us that were still running around the camp used to go to that well for water. Gradually long queues formed there. People stood in rows five wide, and waited for water for two or even three days. Thousands of people stood in line. The way we did it was that several of us would stand in various parts of a line, and after several hours we'd change places. So everyone who got a liter of water, you didn't get more than that, then shared with the others. When someone else got water, he again shared it, and so on it went. My brother was already in close proximity to the well, it could have maybe been another hour or two, and he'd have gotten to the water. Suddenly a tractor fully loaded with canisters arrived, and the Germans wanted to start drawing water into the canisters. You couldn't pull more than seven or eight liters of water out of the well at one time. At that rate it could have taken all day. The prisoners rebelled, and didn't want to let the Germans past. I saw that they'd taken a table out of the nearby kitchen through the window. I thought to myself that something was going to take place there. I stood a ways away, leaning against a tree, and watched. Suddenly an SS soldier got up on the table, and I saw that they were handing him a submachine gun. I began yelling, and suddenly he started firing. He mowed down everyone standing by the well. My brother was exactly in that bunch into which he was firing. I hid behind the tree, so there was no way he could shoot through it. When he suddenly changed magazines, everyone who could ran. I also started running away. My brother didn't arrive for a long time. He returned the morning of the second day. There'd been such a brouhaha there that he'd fallen into the well. An SS-man pulled him out. They then held him somewhere. When he arrived he had the cup with which he'd set out for water, full of pea soup. They'd even dried him off and given him dry clothes. This took place about ten days before the liberation of the concentration camp.

During our stay at Bergen-Belsen, I also had my share of suffering. I had sore feet from shoes that were too small. They were very slippery boots. In general, it was hard to walk on the main street. It was paved with so-called unfinished stones. They were very sharp, and in the winter ice formed between them. You had to walk carefully in order to not slip. So I had to watch out in order to not sprain my ankle, and my small shoes caused my feet to be constantly cold. It of course happened that you'd catch the flu. I also had high fevers  after the injections they gave us.

After the liberation, the English were filming everything there. I knew where everything in the camp was, so in the beginning I was walking around with the film crew. Not far from us they set up a place with an intercom. From morning till evening they broadcast in many languages who was looking for whom. It was a whirlpool of nations. They also set up a board, where people would come and pin up notes for family and friends. After the liberation, I got typhus. In the meantime, there were already ambulances driving around the camp, taking away the ill. The English film crew arranged for them to take me right away. I got into a hospital that they'd set up in the barracks left by the Germans. Everyone who got in there had to go through a delousing procedure and a steam bath. At that time I could no longer walk. They left me lying there in the steam for a certain time. From there I was put into a room where three Englishmen were lying. These soldiers took care of me. A lot of English soldiers there also caught typhus. In Bergen-Belsen, several dozens of doctors, nurses and soldiers who'd become infected there even died. In two months they liquidated practically the entire camp, and torched it so that the infectious diseases wouldn't spread any further.

After the liberation, my brother lasted in the blockhouse only a few days longer than I did. Then he got malaria. He basically underwent the same procedure as I did, only they were isolated in a different location. They were in the sector on the edge of the woods. The building looked like a former monastery. I don't know what it could have been before. Everyone else was forbidden to go there. You couldn't get in there at all. When I got a bit better, I began asking what was up with my brother. The building where I was lying was at the very end of the barracks. Under the window was just a tall fence of barbed wire. In front of the fence ran a wide, two-lane paved road that ended here, and after that it was just nature. There was a huge meadow there, and here and there a copse of trees. Military vehicles were arriving on this road. Tanks, heavy machinery, and cannons; people who were capable of walking would come by to have a look. It took about five hours before the last vehicle parked. In the crowd I recognized Mrs. Kollmannova, who was also from Piestany. I shouted to her from the window. She recognized me. She was looking for her son Juraj. She told me where my brother Tomi was. They kept me in the hospital for about a month. Then I returned to the blockhouse, where there were people who'd arrived in the same transport as we had. To be more precise, those lucky ones that had survived. They were women and children. My brother also got well, and in time joined us. Alis was also with us. She was with us from the beginning to the end. Only a handful of us remained. Juraj, whose mother was looking for him, was in such poor health that they had to take him to Sweden. They then took his mother there to join him. They stayed in Sweden for three years. Eventually they returned and lived in Piestany.

In those days there was a bus connection between Prague and Bergen-Belsen. It used to take home the survivors. It worked as follows. By the kitchen there was an office. It was headed by an English captain who spoke Czech. There was also an English soldier named Foltyn. This office functioned as a "consulate". They investigated from which family, who survived, and where he was. They were also persuading people to not return home, but to go to the USA, the Palestine, or whereever they might want to go. As there were a lot of children there that had lost their families, they investigated where they had relatives. When someone said that they had family anywhere in the world, they contacted those relatives and asked whether they wanted to take them in. The driver of  the bus that used to come there would also write down names. We dictate our names and address to him. He went back and forth every week. Once he came to see us and told us that our father was alive, that he was in Prague and was looking for us. It really was true. Alas, when we arrived in Prague, all we found was a note on the doors of one school where people were also leaving messages. The trip from Bergen-Belsen to Prague was long. We were passing from the American sector to the English one, and we had to wait a long time at this "border". I remember that it was in Köln, Nuremberg, and finally in Pilsen in Czechoslovakia. Everywhere they checked our papers, and then fed us. The bus was full of children and also a few mothers too. There might have been about 35 people. I'd guess that about two thirds were children. The trip to Prague took about a week.

I'd like to mention one incident. On Sunday at around 4:00 p.m. we arrived in Pilsen. The bus stopped in a square in front of a large church. Our guide, who was traveling along with the driver, got out. He was probably arranging where we'd eat. In the meantime some old ladies came out of the church, and when they saw us, they started weeping. I remember that right there in the street they organized a collection and collected 100 crowns for each one of us.

We arrived in Prague at around 8:30 p.m. It was just getting dark. They put us up in Branik. We stayed there for about two weeks. We also met with our cousin Leo Lichtenstein, who'd changed his name to Liska. He helped us register at the repatriation office. We got ID and some money. A Catholic charity gave us some more money. In Prague I also went to the hospital, because of my frostbitten feet. It was from my too-small shoes. They were almost all black, up to my knees. There they re-bandaged and washed them. They X-rayed my lungs, and similar things. It was in the hospital where Leo was a doctor. Then we wandered around Prague. We were at Hradcany, Charles Bridge, and Wenceslaus Square. We walked up and down and watched what was going on around us. We couldn't get any further in the direction of Bratislava. It was possible to buy train tickets, but they were dissuading us. The were saying for us to wait, that we'd get tickets. So we waited for our turn to come up. The trip from Prague to Bratislava took all day. The train was so packed full that people were even sitting on the roof. In Bratislava, dormitories had been set up on what is today Slovak National Uprising Square. During the war it was named Adolf Hitler Platz. In the room we were assigned, there were beds for about 10 to 15 people. It was just an overnight bed, nothing more. There we stayed for a few days and waited for an opportunity to get to Piestany. Finally we got to our home town, where our father was waiting for us with my cousin Lulo Sohnenfeld, who later took the surname Urban. Another couple of people were waiting along with them. They were standing a few meters away from us, didn't come any closer, and wept.

My father had been transported to Sachsenhausen 15. From there they assigned him to some neighboring camp, from where he and a few fellow prisoners managed to escape. They crossed the border of the Protectorate east of the town of Jachymov. There were about ten other miners with them, led by the Party head Ondrej Tatar. They were quite scattered, because some of them were in better condition, and some in worse. They'd been working together in some mine by Sachsenhausen. It was actually some sort of war industry, where part of the production was inside a mountain. The miners were tasked with enlarging the space for the arms factory. The entrance to the complex led across a bridge that spanned some water. Each day they walked three kilometers to the mine, and three back to the camp. My father worked there in an electrical workshop with some Frenchmen. When the miners were getting ready to leave, my father joined them along with one doctor. The doctor's name was Dr. Soltes. After the war he became the health care commissioner in Slovakia [The Health Care Commission: a specialized institution equivalent to the Ministry of Health – Editor's note]. When they were trying to get across the German-Czech border, my father climbed a tree. He wanted to find out if there wasn't anyone around. Suddenly a machine gun started firing, and wounded his arm in several places. After a few days he developed high fevers, so they had to look for help. They got him to the town of Dolni Bela, where Dr. Boris Jacenko treated him. He was an immigrant that was working in the town as a doctor. He operated on my father. He had another two people that he was hiding at his place, and so they decided that they'd try to take a car across the front to the Americans. Finally they also succeeded. Until the end of the war, my father worked for the American army as an interpreter. He wore a uniform, and made it all the way to Prague. There he worked for some time at the repatriation office. From there he then returned to Piestany. In Piestany he ran into my cousin Lulo, and together they threw the people out of our apartment. He came there and said: "Leave here, I'll be moving in here in two hours. It's my property." Lulo was helping them carry things out. When we came home, the apartment once again belonged to our family. We kept in touch with Dr. Jacenko after the war too. When I was attending university, I visited him often.

After the war, they renewed the Jewish community in Piestany. My father didn't return to its leadership. I'm not saying he didn't get involved, but gave up leading the community. Some of the community officials also returned. For example Mr. Faber, and Spronc. Of the other returnees, I can mention Oskar Stern, who worked for my father at the store. During the war he was in hiding. In Bergen-Belsen his sister Aranka Sternova approached us. She'd been deported from Budapest, where she'd been living on false papers. In the concentration camp she was in the same blockhouse as the rest of the Hungarian women. They somehow knew how to find food. They helped the capo carry infirm women to roll calls, and thus were a bit better off. She used to call us over to see her. The Hungarian women guarded their blockhouse, as people stole. So they always had someone at the door. We'd agreed as to what time we'd come, and the woman on watch would let us in. Aranka had bread and a pail full of jam. So we got a half-centimeter thick piece of bread and on top of that three centimeters of jam.

After the war, my father opened his store again in a relatively short time, and began selling. With the advent of the Communists 16, he became a capitalist, and so he couldn't find work. At first he worked as a driver's assistant in this still half-private company that specialized in medical equipment. Later it turned into Chirana [Chirana Piestany a.s. was founded in 1962 – Editor's note]. He worked for a department that specialized in the repair of old medical equipment. He worked there for several years as a driver's assistant. Then when they set up a central collection point for equipment repairs, he became the head. He gradually got better and better at it, and worked there for practically the rest of his life. It didn't ever occur to my father to emigrate. He was a big capitalist, and kept claiming that socialism couldn't last long, and that it couldn't continue on like this. He didn't like any of their measures. Whether it was the banking sector, the financial sector or economy, it all went against his logic. We had buildings that they confiscated. My father died in 1984. He's buried at the Jewish cemetery in Piestany, in the same place as his parents and later also his second wife.

The Slansky trials 7 didn't affect us in any particular fashion. My father didn't have any problems. As for me, I got more than my share of anti-Semitic remarks from my  teachers at the Piestany high school. They made fun of us, because we looked very bad. When I arrived in Piestany, the doctors gave me about two years to live. I got the flu. The doctor came, and said: "He won't suffer long. He won't survive it!"

During high school I was this outcast. I played basketball, first I tried to play basketball for the school, but also for the city team. There were five or six of us our class that also played for the city, basically one lineup. The city club players were all veterans, and didn't let us participate much. Because I was very persistent, I was the first to succeed in getting onto the top team. Otherwise I was a good swimmer, despite having only learned at the age of 13. I don't remember ever having gone to a pool before the war. After the war, at the Eva swimming pool, my classmates caught me and threw me into deep water. I drank half the pool, and learned to swim. The members of the Piestany swim club were mostly children whose parents were doctors, it was hard for anyone else to get in. They were all excellent swimmers. In Piestany our family belonged among the quite important ones. The building we owned in the center of town before the war belongs to us to this day. We renovated it recently. My stepsister Hana Urbanova lives in the back part.

My health wasn't the best; I couldn't breathe well. I stopped swimming and started playing basketball, running, and cross-country swimming. I ran 3000 and then 10,000 meters. In the winter I took part in ski races. I was among the best in Slovakia. I was a member of the Piestany Spa Team. Soldiers also took part in the races. They belonged among the elite. They'd take the top prizes, but I was definitely right after them. The soldiers did all they could to prevent me from winning. During one race, they pushed me off the track so badly that I tore a tendon. I had a very bad fall. I fell down a terribly steep hill. They treated me in the hospital in Hradec Kralove. I was even nominated for the national team, but in the end I didn't become a member, because I did one stupid thing. I exchanged my skis, which wasn't allowed. My father always bought me the best skis and equipment. They custom-made it for me. I had several pairs of skis. My father would always plane, wax and tension them. He took care of all that. I was the only one that went to races with two pairs of skis.

They didn't recommend me for university, because in my cadre assessment I had: imprisoned in a concentration camp, which was a synonym for Jew. But in high school I had a teacher, Mr. Emil Zahoransky, the former principal of the council school. He was from around Brezna. He was a Slovak, and my father's trusted friend, and in the end also our neighbor at our cottage. Dr. Valach lived on the other side. Professor Emil Zahoransky went with me to the entrance exams, and made a fuss there. He walked right up to the commission in front of which I was supposed to do my exams and said: "Now Laco Urban is going to come, a person who's been in a concentration camp, and there's no way you won't take him!" I picked civil engineering. I started school in 1952. Originally my father had wanted me to attend textile college, because he'd been planning to build a small textile plant. The factory owners from Brno that used to sell him goods were persuading him to prepare a young person from the textile trade. He even took some steps, and had some property reserved. The property had to be by some water, so there'd be a place for the water from the textile factory to flow into. In the end nothing came of it. The textile trade was taught in Liberec, from where the state each year sent two people to Poland to study. It was unthinkable to push through that they send me.

During my studies they were building hydro stations, so I said to myself that I'll take hydro engineering. I had this notion that they'd build a whole bunch more hydro stations on the Vah, and that I'd have work for the rest of my life. I was excellent at school. In second year, Professor Potiagin and his wife invited me for a special lunch at the Hotel Devin. He was an 85-year-old granddad. Once during a lecture of his, we were calculating a very complex example. There were at least 200 students sitting in the lecture hall, listening to his lecture. I was writing it down, word for word. As I was calculating, I found a mistake. Because I knew about the mistake, I calculated it for myself, and came to a certain conclusion that couldn't be the same as his result. Well, and when he asked where he'd made a mistake, I got up and showed him. He asked me: "What's your name?" I told him my name, and after that his assistants began paying attention to me. Every class I was asked to come up to the blackboard, and they dreaded it terribly. We had this one Xantippe, now she's already a professor. She's this bearded virago. She was very good in math, and kept on calling on me. She gave me a hard time, but that helped me, because I passed my exams without any problems. There was one assistant there from Piestany, and his hand shook when I picked up the chalk and went to the board, that I'd show him something. I always made things up, and when he said one thing, I tried to say another. I was good; I finished hydro engineering with honors.

After school I started working at a waterworks construction project in Sala. I wasn't there long. My professor who I did my thesis with convinced me to go work for Vahostav [The company VAHOSTAV Zilina was founded in 1954 by the then Ministry of Construction of the Czech Republic. Its mission was the building of dams and hydro stations on the central and upper Vah River – Editor's note]. Vahostav was beginning a new waterworks project in Zilina. I went there as a head technician. They were supposed to issue me an apartment in town. The director at the time, who's still alive, told me to make myself at home in Zilina, as they were going to be building more dams there. He claimed that there was work there for the next 40 years. But this director left to go to Bratislava, and forgot about me. That's when bad times for me started. It was at the beginning of the 1960s. They called me up for army service. I was at Bor U Tachova, near Pilsen. I worked as the construction manager for a tank shooting range. I practically wasn't even a soldier, I just wore a uniform and ate with the others. From Vahostav I later transferred to Hydrostav [Hydrostav: a construction company. Provides comprehensive construction services – Editor's note].

I started my army service in 1959. I felt very good there. It was the first time that I went skiing every Saturday and Sunday. I was building a tank firing range in the border region, seven kilometers from the border in the neutral zone. There were Soviet advisors there, and a Czechoslovak-Chinese friendship regiment. We often ate rice, which didn't hurt. My division was in Pilsen, where my commanding officer was. His name was Lieutenant-Colonel Strasik, later Colonel. He was a very fair guy, and I would submit my reports to him. He used to go to the Ministry of Defense, and when he'd return, he'd invite me to the best hotel in Pilsen, because I always did my work perfectly. When I was in Pilsen, I'd go swimming practically every day, with the local Dukla team. They accepted me without any problems, because there were many guys from Piestany there. For example Mato Majercak, an older guy from an aquatic company in a battalion in Pilsen. He'd lived in the same street in Piestany as our family. Mato had apprenticed under my father. He even put together a report for me which was part of my officer's exams. I reached the rank of First Lieutenant. That was in 1960. I built a tank firing range, as well as a control tower.

I met my first wife in a relatively interesting fashion. I was introduced to this one music professor. I don't remember his name. He found an apartment for me at Mr. Stark's place in Fucikova St. The Stark family was from Liptovsky Mikulas. They were a Jewish. The Starks observed Jewish customs. Mr. Stark attended synagogue in Heydukova St. in Bratislava. It was a meeting place for Jews. Back then there were still many families. Young Jewish people met there too, to play roulette. After the war I didn't observe anything [religious customs] at all.

Their son, Peter Stark, was older than I, and was studying electricity. He wasn't very independent, and would tag along with me. In those days I was playing basketball for Slovan Bratislava. I traveled a lot, and had a lot of friends. When we finished school, Peter emigrated. He finished a half year before me. At first he emigrated to Belgium, and then to America. He worked for General Electric for about 20 years. Then he ended up back in Europe, he was with General Electric in Vienna. He was general director for Western Europe. My first wife, Agi Sandorova, was helping Peter when he was moving. They knew each other from back in Liptovsky Mikulas, they'd been classmates. It was actually at the Starks' that I met Agi. When I was in the army, she lived at this one professor's place. It wasn't heated, and was frightfully cold. I got along with the Starks very well, and they were happy with me. Once I came there, and she was there too... Our wedding was in Piestany.

We were married in 1961. We were living in Bratislava. At that time I was still in the army, but I was able to find an apartment very quickly, because I started a housing co-op. I had a friend that worked for the city. I said to him: "Listen, I need an apartment.' He said: "Start a co-op, and then we'll help you." So I started a co-op. Right away, they assigned us a building. I had to deposit a certain sum of money within a week. I had to borrow it. In the meantime I arranged for Mrs. Sandorova's family home to be sold. It was actually the demolition of my wife's family home. In Ruzomberk, they were going to be regulating the flow of a stream that flowed into the Vah River. Their house was in the way, so we managed to take advantage of the situation and sell it to the town for a decent price. Old Mrs. Sandorova's siblings were still alive and were financially well off, so I borrowed the aforementioned sum from them. By Christmas 1961 we were already living in our own apartment. Before that I'd had nothing, just a guitar, one suitcase and a clothesline. I'd stretch a string from the window latch to the doorknob, and hang up my couple of pairs of pants and two, three jackets. Those were horrible conditions.

We didn't go abroad very often. We were in Hungary a couple of times. My wife had an aunt who lived in Budapest. I never went to the seaside with my first wife. Back then it wasn't possible yet, and neither did we have the money. On the other hand, we often went to the Tatras.

In the beginning, we used to go on vacations to our cottage in Nova Lehota. Often we'd also go to the Tatras and to Vratna Dolina. Vahostav, where I worked, had a company cottage there. When I began my postgraduate studies, I made friends with the cottage supervisor. He was at the same time also a shepherd at a farm in Sutovsko. Often I used to go visit him at his place. I've got very good memories of this. We used to go to Vratna, where we'd go skiing as well. We used to go to a cottage below Sokoli. We knew all the lift operators at Malino Brd. I had a friend by the name of Pista Bradiak. When I'd come from Bratislava to visit him, I'd always buy him a bottle of rum, as he drank rum. The whole week I'd be there I wouldn't have to pay for the lift. Here and there I'd also run the lift. For example it was carnival time, and people were in the mood for skiing, and so they came and said: "Listen, can you turn on the lift for us?" It was midnight. "Are you crazy? I can't." "Go arrange it." So I had to go wake up Bradiak, who gave me the keys from the cabinets. "Do you know what to turn on?" So at midnight I turned on the lift and who wanted to ski, skied.

After the war, my brother, Tomas Urban, started attending electrical engineering with Duro [Juraj] Kollmann. They were like twins. Best friends, they did everything together. But my brother was lazy, to be more precise he had it good. Back then one of our uncles, Ernest Lichtenstein, who was de facto his tutor, was still alive. When Tominko [Tomas] showed up in Piestany, he always said: "Tominko, come visit me." There he'd get lunch, and some money. It gradually got to the point that when he needed money, he asked Ernest for it. Ernest Lichtenstein was alone, he didn't have anyone, and so he willingly gave it to him. He got used to not being in need, though he didn't have anyplace to live. He hung around with my friends that I played basketball with. We were a very good bunch; when he didn't have a place to live, they even took care of him. They took him to Mlada garda [Mlada garda: student dormitories at the Slovak Technical Univesity – Editor's note], and found him a place in the dorm. He lived there for about a year on the sly. No one knew about it, and he didn't even have to pay.

My brother didn't finish school. They threw him out in second year. Then he began taking chemistry, but after two years they threw him out again. By then our father began taking an interest in his ideas on life. He started as an apprentice at Slovanaft [SLOVNAFT, whose headquarters are in Bratislava, is a petrochemical company – Editor's note], where he worked after leaving school. His boss ended up being a man from Piestany, Mr. Sojcek. He began working for Slovnaft as a laborer, but he gradually worked his way up. In the meantime technology was changing. Because he knew both electricity and chemistry, he had two years in each field, he knew a lot. He had a solid foundation. He got out, to Iraq. He was there for about five years. They were commissioning a large thermal generating station.

Tomas got married before his trip to Iraq. It was in the 1960s, at that time I wasn't in Bratislava, but in Zilina. I was just commuting to Bratislava. He married the daughter of Mrs. Hermina Berkovicova from Bergen-Belsen. They were from the East. This lady had lost her husband and had married a colonel. She was then named Kollarova. My brother's wife was Dr. Eva Urbanova. She was a pediatrician, today she no longer works. They lived near Grosslingova St. in Bratislava. His mother-in-law was very active. She fished and rode horses. She was a heavy smoker, even though she had asthma.

My brother and his wife didn't observe Jewish traditions at all. From a religious standpoint, my brother didn't even understand Judaism. He had no relationship to it, because he grew up in fascism, and then ended up in socialism. He was a completely different type from me. He smoked like a chimney, and stank of cigarettes. Alas, he's dead now. He died after a heart valve operation. His doctor, Viliam Fischer, sketched out for him what he was going to do on a piece of paper. I went to see him, because we know each other, and said to him: "Listen, you can't even do this on a cow, five bypasses in one go, plus ones like these!?" "What are you afraid of, what are you talking about, you don't know anything about it." That's what he told me. After the operation, my brother was behind a glass wall and wrote on a large piece of paper that "everyone's a either whore or a prick" My brother is buried at the Bratislava crematorium.

In 1968 I had a huge amount of work. I couldn't even leave work, I was so busy. The director of Hydrostav, whom I worked for at the time, was on vacation in Yugoslavia. He was constantly phoning and giving orders: "Don't even go home, if need be, stay there, because everything has to hustle along!" We finally met our objectives, and everything was going well; we didn't have any problems. We were working like mad. Back then I was working in Komarno on the construction of a dam and levee. We commuted there every week, and stayed in a dormitory. In the morning there'd be a mess there, as a whole bunch of guys would be going off to work. I lived with the head of the technical department and with the main personnel manager, Porubsky. In the morning he ran out and was yelling: "Get up! Russians! Occupation! 18" I thought to myself: "Have they gone nuts?" I shot back: "I'm sleeping, I don't start work till nine." Everyone else left, but I came in at nine, as if nothing was happening.

That night we were working on an underground wall, which made history as the first of its kind in the whole of Czechoslovakia. We saw the Russians crossing underwater in tanks, under the Komarno bridge. At 4:00 p.m. one foreman ran over and said: "Listen, hurry up and come have a look, there's all sorts of things going on here, tanks are going along the top, they're ripping up rails on the railway bridge, and three are driving in the water. "How do you know?" "I saw them!" He drove by our yard and kept going. I said to him: "Don't worry about it." One of my colleagues, a former classmate, who I'd brought over to Komarno, told me: "On Wednesday we're going home [to Bratislava], get ready, we'll take you too." We took a company car along the levee all the way to Bratislava. No one stopped us. Bratislava was full of Russians.

The ministry had bought the license for underground wall technology from Soletance, a French company. There were two suppliers in Czechoslovakia. One was Vodni Stavby Praha, and the second was Hydrostav. At that time I'd already worked my way up to being head of technical supervision. I was in this position for 17 years. I was in Paris a few times too. They selected me as the liaison officer between Soletance and Hydrostav. That was in 1966. I was in Paris about five times, and then also in Montreaux, because that's where their research facility was. Montreaux is about 50 km south of Paris.

The director of Soletance was named Professor Hafen. He was coming here often back then. Once he was here when there was that famous hockey tournament between Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, when Golonka [Golonka, Jozef (b. 1938): former Slovak hockey player and coach. One of the best forwards that played for the national team of the former Czechoslovakia – Editor's note] was beating the ice with his stick. The professor and his assistants were living at the Hotel Devin [Hotel Devin: a traditional four-star hotel located in the center of Bratislava – Editor's note]. The professor says to me: "Isn't there a TV somewhere here, where we could watch the game in peace?" I answered him: "Only at my place." "Can't we go to your place?" "Sure we can, c'mon, I've got my car here." At that time I had a brand-new Skoda. I'd bought it in 1967. I drove him home to our place. We watched the hockey game and they returned to the hotel. The next day our head director called me, that he'd heard that the Frenchmen had been at my place, and how did I dare to do that. I told him, we were watching the hockey game, I put a bottle of gin on the table, and wanted to make coffee too, but they didn't want anything at all. They didn't touch a single thing.

There were of course great differences between life in Czechoslovakia and in France. You can't even compare the two. Life there was calm, perfect. I spent some time in southern France too. First I was in Avignon. There we were looking at large marine structures, by La Ciotat. They were building garages for submarines. There were huge numbers of American soldiers there. We saw all of southern France, because we had a car at our disposal. I went on these trips mainly with Czechs, from Prague. We got along well.

Besides France, I was also in Russia. Twice I was the guest of the Soviet Academy of Sciences. There was this one Jew there, Viktor Danushevski. He was from Lithuania; today he teaches in Philadelphia. His mother-in-law, Olga Davidovna Lipschitz, was the head of the German department at Lomonosov University in Moscow. I used to like going to her place very much. At Christmas I'd even send her presents. She was one superb professor. I've even got one of her dictionaries with a dedication from her.

I had a good relationship with Israel, because the Israeli ambassador in Czechoslovakia was Karol Grünwald. I don't know his Israeli name. I used to meet with him regularly, as he used to come to Bratislava. They were these secret visits. That was during the years 1960 – 1965, lets say. I used to arrange accommodations at the Hotel Devin for him. I'd arrange for him to be able to see the people that he wanted to meet. No one was allowed to know about it. Then, when I went to Prague, all I had to do was call and say "I'm here." Nothing else was needed, he'd find me. He always knew where I was. He lived in Prague 4. He had an apartment there, and also employed a cook and a maid. They both belonged to the StB 19. When I'd arrive, he'd give them time off. He had to prepare for my visits up to two weeks in advance, so that they'd go on a trip, or to see a movie. No one could see me when I was at his place. I was never in Israel; I just used to see him.

I got married for a second time, and moved to the town of Iza. I'd already known my second wife long before that. A friend of mine, Frico Horsky, worked at a shipyard, and was the secretary of the soccer team and sports club. He told me to come there, that's I'd have it good there. I'd have cheap food here [The town of Iza is in the Komarno district. The area around this district is well-known as a developed agricultural region. A surplus of produce meant economic self-sufficiency and lower prices – Editor's note], and the Hungarians won't abuse me for being a Jew. I tried to get here. I was working on preparations for Gabcikovo [Construction on the Gabcikov – Nagymaros hydro project on the Danube River began in 1977 – Editor's note], and tried to have the head office locate research closer to Komarno, so that I wouldn't have to travel so much from Bratislava to Gabcikovo. Gradually I educated a whole number of operational managers. I also worked in eastern Slovakia. I worked on the foundations for an oil pipeline by Bodrog. I participated in the building of the highest chimney in Slovakia, in Novaky.

I began to play basketball again. I started a basketball team in Komarno, and even had a hand in the creation of this regional contest for older men. About five teams participated. Pravda 20 played, they had Karol Fako, formerly an excellent hockey player, and Milos Bobocky, the director of Pravda. I myself had once played basketball for Slovan Bratislava. In Sali there was a Hydrostav plant, where a lot of our classmates worked; they got together there and formed a team. We put on tournaments, once here, another time there. Another of our classmates, Emil Kubo, worked for Vahostav. He lived in this house, where he raised ducks. He had about a hundred ducks. The cleaning ladies used to take care of them for him. When we were going to be playing in some big match, I'd say to him: "Emil, we'll go to the match, and afterwards we'll go to the pub. You'll supply the ducks, and I'll roast them there..." That's how it went. We became famous for putting these parties, with food and good wine. We treated everyone who came to play. We all became mutual friends.

Back then I began speculating that I could settle down permanently. But I couldn't live in a dormitory. At work they suggested that I start building a house, that they'd help me. So the director issued an order: "He's building a house, so bring him everything that he'll need, as far as equipment is concerned." One day a van arrived, and delivered everything from shovels, picks, nails, wire, boards to who knows what else. Basically everything. I asked the company committee, and got it officially. When I needed to order something in the workshop, I wrote up a request, that I need such and such piece of sheet metal, welded in such and such a way. They billed me for it, but as an employee I paid a lower rate.

Our old director was transferred, and a new one arrived. He was a bit flighty. He didn't understand the work at all, and he became the director of Gabcikov. About a month after I'd booked out of Bratislava, he submitted my papers for transfer to Gabcikov. I told him: "Put in the papers what I'll be doing there!" At that time I could boast that I wasn't just an ordinary Urban, but was the only PhD candidate at that location, that I was in charge of all the technology, in charge of the concrete plant. Everyone respected my authority. Once he transferred me, that I had 24 hours to go to Gabcikov. My wife was pregnant, we were building that house, and he suddenly transfers me. I told him that it wasn't possible. I had ambitions to be the head plant engineer, which carried with it a certain salary and prestige. They didn't want to give the job to me. Finally they threw me out. That was in about 1983. First we wanted to go to Bratislava. I'd found a job for my wife Eva, and as far as I went, work wasn't a problem. Vahostav wanted me to come work for them too, but Eva was a Party candidate for the position of hospital director in Komarno. But the regional committee jumped in. There was this one Jew there, named Tibor Breiner. He said: "What are you thinking, you don't have to go anywhere, you're our man. You'll stay here, and well find you work." He was the director of Agrostav [Agrostav: a company extant in all of Czechoslovakia, that performed project design, construction, trades and installation work and so on – Editor's note] and didn't have an technical deputy, so they installed me in that position. Under me was Edmund Klein, an engineer. He was already an older man. He was head of the project engineering department. I managed 50 people: designers, engineers, and technicians. It wasn't easy, but we excelled at it. We regularly ended up amongst the best when project engineering organizations were evaluated. We even prepared a potato germinating project for Russia. We supplied the project plan for the building of an automated computer-controlled germinating warehouse. I worked there for about ten, eleven years. I built solar grain dryers, did geothermal shafts. I drilled five of them: in Marcelov, in Zemianska Olse, in Komarno, in Svaty Petr, and by Chotin.

At the beginning of the 1990s I retired. I started a small business, I was the first small businessman in the entire region. Even still during the time of "bad socialism" ["bad socialism": an expression for the last stage of socialism in the former Czechoslovakia, and the beginning of the Velvet Revolution, see 21 – Editor's note]. The regional party secretary summoned me, and asked me what I was living on. I told him to not worry about it, that he didn't have the right. The heads of individual cooperatives were very good acquaintances of mine, two or three were even excellent friends. They were the ones I worked for. I worked on contracts. And so what? I always thought up all sorts of things. A member of the Federal Assembly, and at the same time the chairman of the Marcelov co-op, came to see me, and said: "Think of something that others won't have, so I can brag." So I thought it up. Besides this, one of my sons-in-law is also a project engineer, so I look at his work, advise him...

Now that I'm retired, I devote myself to politics, history and mainly concentration camps. I work on perfecting my knowledge, speak to people and sometimes I even find subject matter that I've already forgotten about. When they call me from the Komarno Jewish community to say a few words, I go. Once a year I speak during a memorial ceremony for the victims of the Holocaust. That's even in the papers.

Glossary:

1 Nationalization in Czechoslovakia

The goal of nationalization was to put privately-owned means of production and private property into public control and into the hands of the Socialist state. The attempts to change property relations after WWI (1918-1921) were unsuccessful. Directly after WWII, already by May 1945, the heads of state took over possession of the collaborators’ (that is, Hungarian and German) property. In July 1945, members of the Communist Party before the National Front, openly called for the nationalization of banks, financial institutions, insurance companies and industrial enterprises, the execution of which fell to the Nationalization Central Committee. The first decree for nationalization was signed 11th August 1945 by the Republic President. This decree affected agricultural production, the film industry and foreign trade. Members of the Communist Party fought representatives of the National Socialist Party and the Democratic Party for further expansion of the process of nationalization, which resulted in the president signing four new decrees on 24th October, barely two months after taking office. These called for nationalization of the mining industry companies and industrial plants, the food industry plants, as well as joint-stock companies, banks and life insurance companies. The nationalization established the Czechoslovakia’s financial development, and shaped the ‘Socialist financial sphere’. Despite this, significantly valuable property disappeared from companies in public ownership into the private and foreign trade network. Because of this, the activist committee of the trade unions called for further nationalizations on 22nd February 1948. This process was stopped in Czechoslovakia by new laws of the National Assembly in April 1948, which were passed that December.

2 Joint (American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee)

The Joint was formed in 1914 with the fusion of three American Jewish committees of assistance, which were alarmed by the suffering of Jews during World War I. In late 1944, the Joint entered Europe’s liberated areas and organized a massive relief operation. It provided food for Jewish survivors all over Europe, it supplied clothing, books and school supplies for children. It supported cultural amenities and brought religious supplies for the Jewish communities. The Joint also operated DP camps, in which it organized retraining programs to help people learn trades that would enable them to earn a living, while its cultural and religious activities helped re-establish Jewish life. The Joint was also closely involved in helping Jews to emigrate from Europe and from Muslim countries. The Joint was expelled from East Central Europe for decades during the Cold War and it has only come back to many of these countries after the fall of communism. Today the Joint provides social welfare programs for elderly Holocaust survivors and encourages Jewish renewal and communal development.

3 PTP (Technical Assistance Battalion)

was created in 1948 for politically unreliable persons, such as for example people of noble descent, capitalists, sons of farmers and estate owners that didn’t agree with collectivization, clergymen,... “PTPers” didn’t have a time limit for their army service (basic army service lasted two years). Because of their political unreliability they weren’t issued a weapon. They mainly performed arduous physical labour. In the 1950s over 44,000 men absolved the army work camps. In the time of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, the Technical Assistance Battalion officially never existed. Colloquially they were called the Black Barons.

4 September 1938 mobilization

The ascent of the Nazis to power in Germany in 1933 represented a fundamental turning point in the foreign political situation of Czechoslovakia. The growing tension of the second half of the 1930s finally culminated in 1938, when the growing aggressiveness of neighboring Germany led first to the adoption of emergency measures from May 20th to June 22nd, and finally to the proclamation of a general mobilization on 23rd September 1938. At the end of September 1938, however, Czechoslovakia’s defense system, for years laboriously built up, collapsed. Czechoslovakia’s main ally, France, forced them to submit to Germany, and made no secret of the fact that they did not intend to provide military assistance. The support of the Soviet Union, otherwise in itself quite problematic, was contingent upon the support of France. Other countries, i.e. Hungary and Poland, were only waiting for the opportunity to gain something for themselves. (Source: http://www.military.cz/opevneni/mobilizace.html)

5 Majdanek concentration camp

situated five kilometers from the city center of Lublin, Poland, originally established as a labor camp in October 1941. It was officially called Prisoner of War Camp of the Waffen-SS Lublin until 16th February 1943, when the name was changed to Concentration Camp of the Waffen-SS Lublin. Unlike most other Nazi death camps, Majdanek, located in a completely open field, was not hidden from view. About 130,000 Jews were deported there during 1942-43 as part of the ‘Final Solution’. Initially there were two gas chambers housed in a wooden building, which were later replaced by gas chambers in a brick building. The estimated number of deaths is 360,000, including Jews, Soviets POWs and Poles. The camp was liquidated in July 1944, but by the time the Red Army arrived the camp was only partially destroyed. Although approximately 1,000 inmates were executed on a death march, the Red Army found thousand of prisoners still in the camp, an evidence of the mass murder that had occurred in Majdanek.

6 Kashrut in eating habits

kashrut means ritual behavior. A term indicating the religious validity of some object or article according to Jewish law, mainly in the case of foodstuffs. Biblical law dictates which living creatures are allowed to be eaten. The use of blood is strictly forbidden. The method of slaughter is prescribed, the so-called shechitah. The main rule of kashrut is the prohibition of eating dairy and meat products at the same time, even when they weren’t cooked together. The time interval between eating foods differs. On the territory of Slovakia six hours must pass between the eating of a meat and dairy product. In the opposite case, when a dairy product is eaten first and then a meat product, the time interval is different. In some Jewish communities it is sufficient to wash out one’s mouth with water. The longest time interval was three hours – for example in Orthodox communities in Southwestern Slovakia.

7 Maccabi Sports Club in the Czechoslovak Republic

The Maccabi World Union was founded in 1903 in Basel aT the VI. Zionist Congress. In 1935 the Maccabi World Union had 100,000 members, 10,000 of which were in Czechoslovakia. Physical education organizations in Bohemia have their roots in the 19th century. For example, the first Maccabi gymnastic club in Bohemia was founded in 1899. The first sport club, Bar Kochba, was founded in 1893 in Moravia. The total number of Maccabi clubs in Bohemia and Moravia before WWI was fifteen. The Czechoslovak Maccabi Union was officially founded in June 1924, and in the same year became a member of the Maccabi World Union, located in Berlin.

8 Neolog Jewry

Following a Congress in 1868/69 in Budapest, where the Jewish community was supposed to discuss several issues on which the opinion of the traditionalists and the modernizers differed and which aimed at uniting Hungarian Jews, Hungarian Jewry was officially split into to (later three) communities, which all built up their own national community network. The Neologs were the modernizers, who opposed the Orthodox on various questions. The third group, the sop-called Status Quo Ante advocated that the Jewish community was maintained the same as before the 1868/69 Congress.

9 Jewish Codex

Order no. 198 of the Slovakian government, issued in September 1941, on the legal status of the Jews, went down in history as Jewish Codex. Based on the Nuremberg Laws, it was one of the most stringent and inhuman anti-Jewish laws all over Europe. It paraphrased the Jewish issue on a racial basis, religious considerations were fading into the background; categories of Jew, Half Jew, moreover 'Mixture' were specified by it. The majority of the 270 paragraphs dealt with the transfer of Jewish property (so-called Aryanizing; replacing Jews by non-Jews) and the exclusion of Jews from economic, political and public life.

10 Exemption and exceptions in the Slovak State (1939-1945)

in the Jewish Codex they are included under § 254 and § 255. Exemption and exceptions, § 255 – the President of the Slovak Republic may grant an exemption from the stipulations of this decree. Exemption may be complete or partial and may be subject to conditions. Exemption may be revoked at any time. In the case of exemption, administrative fees are collected according to § 255 in the following amounts:

  1. for the granting of an exception according to § 1, the sum of 1,000 to 500,000 Ks.
  2. for the granting of an exception according to § 2, the sum of 500 to 100,000 Ks
  3. for the granting of an exception according to single or multiple decrees, the sum of 10 Ks to 300,000 Ks
  4. a certificate issued according to § 3 is charged at 10 Ks

§ 255 enabled the President to grant exceptions from decrees for a fee. Disputes are still led regarding how this paragraph got into the Jewish Codex and how many exceptions the President granted. According to documents there were 1111 Jews protected by exceptions, including family members. Exceptions were valid from the commencement of deportations from the territory of the Slovak State, in 1942, up until the outbreak of the Slovak National Rebellion, in the year 1944.

11 Hlinka-Guards

Military group under the leadership of the radical wing of the Slovakian Popular Party. The radicals claimed an independent Slovakia and a fascist political and public life. The Hlinka-Guards deported brutally, and without German help, 58,000 (according to other sources 68,000) Slovak Jews between March and October 1942.

12 Sered labor camp

created in 1941 as a Jewish labor camp. The camp functioned until the beginning of the Slovak National Uprising, when it was dissolved. At the beginning of September 1944 its activities were renewed and deportations began. Due to the deportations, SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Alois Brunner was named camp commander at the end of September. Brunner was a long-time colleague of Adolf Eichmann and had already organized the deportation of French Jews in 1943. Because the camp registers were destroyed, the most trustworthy information regarding the number of deportees has been provided by witnesses who worked with prisoner records. According to this information, from September 1944 until the end of March 1945, 11 transports containing 11,532 persons were dispatched from the Sered camp. Up until the end of November 1944 the transports were destined for the Auschwitz concentration camp, later prisoners were transported to other camps in the Reich. The Sered camp was liquidated on 31st March 1945, when the last evacuation transport, destined for the Terezin ghetto, was dispatched. On this transport also departed the commander of the Sered camp, Alois Brunner.

13 Bergen-Belsen

concentration camp located in northern Germany. Bergen-Belsen was established in April 1943 as a detention camp for prisoners who were to be exchanged with Germans imprisoned in Allied countries. Bergen-Belsen was liberated by the British army on April 15, 1945. The soldiers were shocked at what they found, including 60,000 prisoners in the camp, many on on the brink of death, and thousands of unburied bodies lying about. Rozett R. – Spector S.: Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Facts on File, G.G. The Jerusalem Publishing House Ltd. 2000, pg. 139 – 141

14 Kramer Josef (1906 – 1945)

SS official who served as the commandant at Natzweiler from April 1941 to May 1944, and at Bergen-Belsen from December 1944 until the camp’s liberation in April 1945. He was tried and executed by the British. Rozett R. – Spector S.: Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Facts on File, G.G. The Jerusalem Publishing House Ltd. 2000, pg. 293

15 Sachsenhausen

concentration camp in Germany, operating between 1936 and April 1945. It was named after the Sachsenhausen quarter, part of the town of Oranienburg. It is estimated that some 200,000 prisoners passed through Sachsenhausen and that 30,000 perished there. That number does not include the Soviet prisoners of war who were exterminated immediately upon arrival at the camp, as they were never even registred on the camp´s lists. The number also does not account for those prisoners who died on the way to the camp, while being transferred elsewhere, or during the camp´s evacuation. Sachsenhausen was liberated by Soviet troops on April 27, 1945. They found only 3,000 prisoners who had been too ill to leave on the death march. Rozett R. – Spector S.: Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Facts on File, G.G. The Jerusalem Publishing House Ltd. 2000, pg. 396 – 398

16 February 1948

Communist take-over in Czechoslovakia. The 'people’s domocracy' became one of the Soviet satelites in Eastern Europe. The state aparatus was centralized under the leadership of the Czechoslovak Communist Party (KSC). In the economy private ovnership was banned and submitted to central planning. The state took control of the educational system, too. Political opposition and dissident elements were persecuted.

17 Slansky trial

In the years 1948-1949 the Czechoslovak government together with the Soviet Union strongly supported the idea of the founding of a new state, Israel. Despite all efforts, Stalin’s politics never found fertile ground in Israel; therefore the Arab states became objects of his interest. In the first place the Communists had to allay suspicions that they had supplied the Jewish state with arms. The Soviet leadership announced that arms shipments to Israel had been arranged by Zionists in Czechoslovakia. The times required that every Jew in Czechoslovakia be automatically considered a Zionist and cosmopolitan. In 1951 on the basis of a show trial, 14 defendants (eleven of them were Jews) with Rudolf Slansky, First Secretary of the Communist Party at the head were convicted. Eleven of the accused got the death penalty; three were sentenced to life imprisonment. The executions were carried out on 3rd December 1952. The Communist Party later finally admitted its mistakes in carrying out the trial and all those sentenced were socially and legally rehabilitated in 1963.

18 Warsaw Pact Occupation of Czechoslovakia

The liberalization of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia during the Prague Spring (1967-68) went further than anywhere else in the Soviet block countries. These new developments was perceived by the conservative Soviet communist leadership as intolerable heresy dangerous for Soviet political supremacy in the region. Moscow decided to put a radical end to the chain of events and with the participation of four other Warsaw Pact countries (Poland, East Germany, Hungary and Bulgaria) ran over Czechoslovakia in August, 1968.

19 Statni Tajna Bezpecnost

Czechoslovak intelligence and security service founded in 1948.

20 Pravda

in the past, the newspaper was the Slovak equivalent of the Soviet/Russian newspaper Pravda. Founded in 1945 (other Slovak Pravdas existing before [in 1925-1932, 1944] were shut down), it was a publication of the Communist Party of Slovakia and, as such, it became a state-owned newspaper. Its equivalent in the Czech part of Czechoslovakia was the Rude Pravo. After the Velvet Revolution, Pravda temporarily became the newspaper of the Social Democratic Party, the successor to the Communist Party of Slovakia. Today, however, it is a modern neutral newspaper and one of Slovakia’s main newspapers.

21 Velvet Revolution

Also known as November Events, this term is used for the period between 17th November and 29th December 1989, which resulted in the downfall of the Czechoslovak communist regime. A non-violent political revolution in Czechoslovakia that meant the transition from Communist dictatorship to democracy. The Velvet Revolution began with a police attack against Prague students on 17th November 1989. That same month the citizen’s democratic movement Civic Forum (OF) in Czech and Public Against Violence (VPN) in Slovakia were formed. On 10th December a government of National Reconciliation was established, which started to realize democratic reforms. On 29th December Vaclav Havel was elected president. In June 1990 the first democratic elections since 1948 took place.

Zuzana Wachtlova

Zuzana Wachtlova
Brno
Czech Republic
Interviewer: Zuzana Pastorkova
Date of interview: November 2004

Mrs. Wachtlova lives on her own in a single-room apartment in Brno, actually not far from her daughter. Almost every Tuesday she comes to the premises of the Brno Jewish Community and the grounds of the Community became the venue for this interview. Mrs. Wachtlova is one of the oldest members of the Brno Jewish Community. She has already had some experience with similar research from the past; however, she admits that students and researchers focused their interest predominantly on the Holocaust. She expressed surprise at what details from the life of her family and her relatives we are interested in and she was quite skeptical about these topics from the beginning. On the other hand, she talked rather openly about the Holocaust and owing to that, we have gained a lot of valuable information. Since a three-hour long interview was very exhausting for Mrs. Wachtlova, it was necessary to shorten the questionnaire, also at her own request.    

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My grandfather on the father’s side was Moritz Hertzka and he was born in Slavkov in the period of the Habsburg monarchy. My grandmother’s maiden name was Zeni or Jeanette Polak and she came from Uherský Brod. [Editor’s note: 1068 Jews lived in the city in 1857, 26% of the total number of inhabitants, their number decreased to 825 (16%) in 1900.] The grandparents probably met in Slavkov where they also got married.  

Moritz and Zeni had four children – Alfred, Adela, Emilie and Bedrich. When my father – Bedrich Hertzka, their youngest son – was four years old [in 1897], the whole family moved to Libavske Udoli not far from Frantiskovi Lazne. Grandfather got a job there as a cashier in a textile company and he and his family could move to a company apartment. Grandmother was a housewife bringing up her four children. I never really asked them where my grandfather worked in Slavkov and why they actually decided to move to Libavske Udoli but they possibly had better living conditions in the new place. 

In Slavkov, they lived in a small house opposite the synagogue. [Editor’s note: The Slavkov synagogue was built in the Middle Ages. It was completely demolished in 1857 and newly rebuilt at approximately the same place the following year.] When they decided to move to Libavske Udoli, they sold their house. They lived in a family house in Libavske Udoli. The grandparents were not rich and furnishings of their house were rather modest but not poor.

I remember visiting them when I was a child. Grandmother used to cook on a stove in the kitchen and they already had electricity in the house. They did not breed any animals but their house was situated in a garden in which they planted fruits and vegetables for their own need. I don’t know whether they had a housemaid or not, I was not interested in it as a child. To tell the truth, I used to visit them together with my parents approximately once a year because they lived very far. When we arrived from Brno by train, they used to pick us up at the station and drive us to their home on a cart that they must have rented. At that time they didn’t even have a car. 

My grandparents talked to each other mainly in German. They both spoke Czech as well as German and used to communicate with me in both languages. Both of them dressed the same way as other people in Libavske Udoli. It was not possible to recognize their Jewish origin according to the dresses they were wearing. My grandfather didn’t have side curls or a moustache and my grandmother didn’t wear a wig or a headscarf because they weren’t Orthodox Jews 1.

Libavske Udoli was a small town. Its inhabitants were mainly workers and employees of the textile factory. They didn’t have any synagogue or a place of worship. I suppose that my grandfather used to travel to some close town to go to the synagogue on the major holidays, for example to a present-day Sokolov [former Falkenov] but I’m not really sure about these things. I don’t think they kept a kosher household. They probably didn’t cook any pork but I don’t remember anymore whether they used separate dishes for milk and meat. I don’t know how Father’s parents spent their leisure time but I recollect they used to travel to a nearby spa, Frantiskove Lazne, to relax and take advantage of some healing treatment.
  
My father’s mother had three sisters but I can remember only two of them. One of them was Adela Perles, nee Polak. She was born in Uherský Brod and got married to a certain Mr. Perles who owned a boarding house in Vienna. After the wedding, Auntie Adela helped him out in the boarding house. Together they had a son, Paul, and a daughter, Marianne. Just like other members of my family, they weren’t Orthodox Jews either. After World War II broke out, they fled to London. They all died during bombing of the city in 1944. [Editor’s note: The last German air offensive against Great Britain (code name ‘Steinbock’ - Capricorn) began with overnight air raids on London on 22nd January 1944. The operation, sarcastically referred to as ‘Baby Blitz’ by the Brits, ended on 29th May 1944 when the last Luftwaffe air raid on the city took place.]

Another one of grandmother’s sisters was Rudolfa but everybody called her Rudi. She was also born in Uherský Brod. She got married to Ludvik Schnabel. I don’t remember anymore how he earned his living. Auntie Rudi was probably a housewife. They had a daughter, Edita. I suppose they weren’t very religious Jews. Auntie Rudi died in the Holocaust and I have no idea what happened to the rest of them. I know hardly anything about the grandfather’s siblings. I think the name of one of his sisters was Linda Hertzka.

My father’s father died at the age of 76 in Cheb [491 people of Jewish origin lived here in 1930, i.e. 1% of the total number of inhabitants] before the outbreak of World War II, and Granny died in Karlovy Vary 2 in a senior-citizens home shortly after his death.

My grandfather on my mother’s side was Simon Kohnstein. He was born in Trebic, probably in 1855. [Editor’s note: 1612 Jews lived here in 1848, they made up 20% of the total number of inhabitants.] I don’t remember his Jewish name because only the name Simon Kohnstein is engraved on his gravestone. My grandmother on my mother’s side was Hedviga Cohen. She came from Germany; she was probably born in Postupim [Potsdam in German ] in 1858. I have no idea how they got to know each other but after their wedding, they settled down in Brno.

My grandpa owned a liquor store in Trebic. I don’t know what the reason behind his moving to Brno was. In Brno, he opened a fruit juice manufacture. It was located at the former Vienna Street. Today this street doesn’t exist anymore because apartment blocks were built in that area. I think my grandfather didn’t have any employees and most likely, his own children helped him out. My grandmother was a housewife – it was common at that time. They had four children together: Helena, Alice, Bedrich and Marta.

The Grandparents talked to each other mostly in German. My grandfather’s mother tongue was Czech but he also spoke German. Grandmother was of German origin, therefore, her German was perfect but she never really mastered the Czech language in her new home. My grandpa wore average clothes that didn’t differ in any way from the conventional clothing of other men in the town. Obviously, back in those days, men wore suits in the streets and other public places. Grandma also wore the same type of clothing as other women in Brno. She never wore a wig, not even a scarf because she wasn’t an Orthodox Jewish woman. She used to wear a hat, though, but probably not due to religious reasons. In those days, a hat was part of a fashionable outfit and was worn by women of any confession. 

The grandparents lived in Brno, in a small semi-detached house in Kralove Pole. They lost the house during the Holocaust. Since I was very small back then, I don’t remember the interior that much. They had a bedroom and a dinning room for sure. They weren’t that rich and the house furnishings actually corresponded to their prosperity. They already had water mains installed in the house but when I was a child, they lit the rooms with gas lamps and heated the place with a Dutch stove. Electricity was installed later on, approximately at the beginning of the 1930s.

Granny planted flowers in a small garden that belonged to the house. They didn’t breed any domestic animals. As far as I know, they took care of their household alone. They didn’t have any Jewish neighbors. Their next-door neighbor was a teacher. They used to get along very well together. I presume they never had any problems with the neighbors due to their Jewish origin. I don’t remember their friends and acquaintances, I don’t know if they took part in some social life or not. I cannot recollect how they used to spend their leisure time and if they went for a trip from time to time. I used to visit my granny in Kralove Pole together with my sister quite often.

The Kohnstein grandparents were not Orthodox. They didn’t keep a kosher household. However, they celebrated all Jewish holidays: Chanukah, Yom Kippur, New Year’s [Rosh Hashanah], Pesach etc. On Saturday and on holidays, Grandpa went to the synagogue or a prayer house. Most commonly, he used to visit the prayer house at Prague Street 3. I still remember that my grandmother was fasting during Yom Kippur and I used to bring her juicy apples fragranced with cloves to the synagogue. When she smelled them, she forgot about hunger. I’m not sure if they kept the Sabbath. Yet, on Friday evening they lit the candles. I cannot recall everything that clearly anymore because I wasn’t interested in these things that much when I was a child, but I have seen candles in their house, that’s for sure.

I am not familiar at all with political standpoints of my mother’s parents. All I know is that they weren’t involved in any political or cultural organization. In fact, politics wasn’t discussed in front of children as it is now. I actually don’t know much about my grandfather, but I do remember he liked to go to the cinema very much. Even though his sight was failing and he also had some hearing problems, he enjoyed watching silent films. He always used to sit next to a pretty young girl and asked her to read the subtitles for him. 

My mom told me her father had some siblings. Unfortunately, I don’t remember any of them anymore. I know hardly anything about Grandpa Kohnstein’s family. However, I clearly remember my grandmother’s sister. Her maiden name was Jeanette Cohen. Everybody called her just Zeni. She got married to an attorney whose name was Freund. Just as my grandmother, she and her husband also settled in Brno. Auntie Zeni didn’t work; she was a housewife. She had two children – a son and a daughter. I knew only her daughter, but we didn’t visit each other. Since we didn’t have Orthodox Jews in our family, I presume also the Freunds weren’t Orthodox. Auntie Zeni died in Brno, probably at the end of the 1930s. She was probably buried in the Brno Jewish cemetery; we searched for the grave later on, though, but couldn’t find it. Both her children died during the Holocaust.     

My grandfather [Simon Kohnstein] died in Brno before World War II, probably in 1932, and is buried in the Jewish cemetery. I was only twelve years old at that time that’s why I don’t remember much from his funeral. Grandmother died in Terezin 4 in 1944 at the age of 86. I couldn’t even take part in her funeral because I got sick.

In fact, Brno was a smaller town at the beginning of the 1920s. Gradually, new housing estates and neighborhoods were growing around the town. I don’t know exactly how many Jews lived in Brno. I remember, though, that 10,000 Jews were deported from the city at the beginning of the 1940s but I am not sure whether this figure included also Jewish people from the adjacent villages. [Editor’s note: 9064 Jews were deported from Brno and its surroundings, only 684 survived.]

My grandparents told me that in the past there used to be a ghetto next to the present-day Brno railway station. However, when I was a child the ghetto didn’t exist anymore and the majority of Jewish families lived at Vlhka Street. Several religious Jewish families also lived at Krenova Street 5. Their synagogue was also on this street; the synagogue was very simple and sober, almost gaunt, because it had no ornaments whatsoever. A passer-by wouldn’t even recognize from the outside that it actually was a synagogue because the building looked like an average house. Maybe also owing to this the Germans didn’t destroy the synagogue during World War II.

Besides this synagogue, the Great Synagogue with a cupola and beautiful ornaments stood behind the recent Brno railway station. On 15th March 1939, the Germans put it on fire and the synagogue burned down completely. [Editor’s note: The Great Synagogue was built in 1855 on the spot where Spalena and Prizova Streets meet. It was burned down and demolished by the Nazis in March 1939.] Our family preferred to go the synagogue that was referred to as the Small Synagogue. It was at Vlhka Street. This synagogue was preserved during the war; it was used for storage purposes.

The seat of the Jewish Community was in the same street as now but in those days the street was called Legionarska [today Trieda Kapitana Jarosa 3]. I still remember that my parents, even though not being actively involved in the Community, supported its activities with financial donations. As a matter of fact, Brno had quite a large Jewish community. During Simchat Torah, the Jewish children used to walk around with lanterns, the trams were full of these children particularly during this holiday; it was so visible how many Jews lived in the city.

I remember two rabbis from the period before World War II. The chief rabbi, Louis Levy came from Alsatia and spoke fluently German and French. He was a well-built and handsome man with a small beard. He preached in German language in the Great Synagogue. His wife was probably also from Alsatia. She was an attractive and elegant lady but, unfortunately, I don’t remember her name. As I’ve heard, Rabbi Levy managed to flee back to France during the Holocaust where he survived World War II.

The other rabbi that I remember was Rabbi Glaser. Doctor Glaser preached in the Small Synagogue that we used to visit most often. Rabbi Glaser was probably liberal but I’m not quite sure. I don’t even know whether he lived in a kosher household. I remember he had two daughters about my age. I only knew about them but we weren’t friends. The Brno Jewish Community was very large, therefore, really familiar relations between the rabbi and the members of the community could not be established. I didn’t even know our rabbis in person and we never actually visited them with my parents.   

In the second half of the 1930s, Brno also had its cantor whose name was Ingman. He probably came from Romania. He had a beautiful voice and sometimes I went to the Small Synagogue only because I wanted to hear him singing. He had several children and one of his daughters went to Palestine. Maybe he also managed to flee there but, to tell the truth, I don’t know what happened to him and his family during the Holocaust.

Brno had its mikveh [probably since 1942] apparently at Krenova Street where Orthodox Jews lived. Since I didn’t visit the mikveh, I don’t know for sure where exactly it was. The city also had a Jewish elementary school and a Jewish secondary grammar school. Ivrit was taught in Jewish schools and in comparison to the state schools, in history classes, more attention was devoted to the history of Judaism and Palestine. The Jewish secondary grammar school ended with a school-leaving examination and its main objective was to prepare students for further studies at university. I am not sure, if there was a yeshivah in Brno; I attended the state schools and didn’t know much about the Jewish schools. 

People of Jewish origin owned several stores, taverns and restaurants directly in Brno as well as in the surrounding villages. Some Jews even owned factories while others were skilful craftsmen, shoemakers, tailors etc. Before the outbreak of World War II, position and living conditions of the Jewish inhabitants substantially deteriorated. As a consequence, many young Jewish boys decided to take up professions of which they could make a living also in unfavorable conditions. A quite popular occupation those days was for example a plumber.  

Czechoslovakia belonged to the developed countries already before World War II. Water supply and electricity were installed everywhere in Brno, trams traveled along rails laid in its streets. Some roads were flagged, some were already paved, the city was constantly developing, and new town quarters were created.

My father’s name was Bedrich Hertzka. He was born in Slavkov on 30th March 1893. My mother’s maiden name was Marta Kohnstein. She was born in Brno on 27th June 1887. She was older than my father.

My dad attended schools in which German was spoken. At first, he went to elementary school in Sokolov, former Falkenov. After completing four grades, he spent four years in a textile school in Brno at the end of which he probably must have taken a school-leaving examination. My mom completed four grades at the elementary school in Brno. She was a very talented painter and singer.

My father was injured in World War I – a bullet wounded his calf and he therefore returned from the front already in 1917. I don’t know at which front he was fighting. His injury caused troubles to him mainly when swimming because he couldn’t move his leg properly. Often, he used to tell me stories about it but the military experiences never left deep traces in my memory. In 1917, the Austro-Hungarian Army 6 employed him in a depot in which uniforms were issued. This depot was located at Stefanikova Street. He worked there until the end of World War I.

At the end of 1910s, my father became a salesman. He offered goods of various companies and producers. At that time, this occupation was referred to as traveling salesman. At first, in 1930, he bought an old Praga car and later on a Skoda car. He traveled also to Slovakia and to Subcarpathian Ukraine 7. Sometimes his business trips lasted for six weeks. Every now and then he used to bring Mom some jewelry or something nice that he caught sight of on his business trips. When we grew older, he used to take my mother with him.

My parents first met in the Brno Jewish Sports Club Maccabi 8 where they used to come and do sports. They got married on 11th February 1917 in the Great Synagogue in Brno and I believe it was Rabbi Levy who tied the wedlock. Unfortunately, I don’t know any details concerning my parents’ wedding. 

We spoke mainly German at home. My father went to German schools, that’s why his Czech wasn’t that good. My mother was proficient in both Czech and German. My parents used to wear average clothing that wasn’t any different from clothes of other people living in the town. Dad usually wore a suit because of his work. Mom didn’t have many dresses, in spite of that she liked to dress nicely and tastefully, she was an attractive lady. I don’t remember her wearing a scarf on her head or a wig. My parents weren’t Orthodox Jews.

Growing up

When I was born we lived in Brno in a two-room apartment at Prazska Street No. 59. Some Jewish family lived in each house at this street. At the beginning, we only had some old pieces of furniture that my parents got from their parents. Later on, my father had better earnings and gradually, they bought new and more up-to-date furniture.

We moved from Prazska Street to today’s Masaryk’s neighborhood when I was ten years old. We lived in a very nice four-room apartment in this suburb. We had a kitchen, dinning room, bedroom, a room for us children and a living room. The Masaryk’s neighborhood was quite far from the center of the town and it was always a long trip for me and my sister to get to the town and take English lessons, do some sports or go for a swim. Usually, we returned home alone very late in the evening. Therefore, my parents decided to move directly to the center of the town – to what is today Janska Street. This was a four-room apartment as well. Since my sister got married soon, only the three of us lived in the apartment.

Most of our neighbors were not Jewish. However, all of them knew we were Jewish simply because we didn’t try to conceal it. To tell the truth, we never experienced any conflicts or misunderstandings. As children, we used to play with other children from the neighborhood. Sometimes, we would go to the Brno Veterinary Station together to look at the animals.

When the Sudetenland was annexed to the Third Reich 9, my father thought the best thing to do was to sell the relatively large four-room apartment and move to a smaller one on Obilný trh [the Corn Market]. We lived here in two rooms, but it was rather sufficient for us. Later on, German doctors came to the maternity ward just opposite and my father somehow anticipated that they would want to get hold of our apartment. So, we had to move again. For a short period of time, we lived in a small house in Reckovice. Unfortunately, we were forced by the Germans to leave the house approximately in 1940 and move to a house in Zabovresky. It was called ‘Einquartierung’ [i.e. forced accommodation of several families into one house or apartment]. We had to squeeze in this small semi-detached house together with two other Jewish families. One of them was the Holtz family that had two rooms assigned. Originally, Mr. Holz was a secondary grammar school teacher. Later on, we were dragged away to the transport directly from the house in Zabovresky.

When we were little girls my mother always used to employ one young woman that helped out with the household chores. She was sort of our friend. When we got slightly older, Mom came to the decision that she could manage alone in the household. 

My parents had an abundant library with German and Czech books and, of course, Jewish literature as well. My dad liked to read Max Brod 10. My mother preferred to read novels. We were subscribers of Prager Tagblatt 11, Jewish newspapers written in German language. Both my sister and I could read whatever we wanted, our parents didn’t prohibit anything nor did they influence us concerning the selection of books. I still remember that during the Protectorate 12, it was prohibited to read ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover,’ but I just couldn’t resist the temptation. [Editor’s note: a novel by English author D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930), written in 1928. Printed privately in Florence in the same year, it was not published in the UK until 1960. The book caused a scandal due to its explicit sex scenes, and perhaps because the lovers were a working-class male and an aristocratic female.]
We were not an Orthodox [Jewish] family. My parents, though, were very conscious Jews. They weren’t ashamed of their origin and never denied it. Our household wasn’t kosher and we would easily eat also ham. We didn’t even have a mezuzah at home. Sabbath wasn’t strictly observed in our family, either. Sometimes we would light the candles on Friday evening but I don’t remember either of our parents making us stay at home and have a big dinner together. On holidays we usually went to the Small Synagogue at Vlhka Street but, of course, sometimes we also went to the Great Synagogue that was behind the current main railway station.

As a matter of fact, we celebrated holidays also at home. We celebrated Chanukkah, Yom Kippur, Rosh Hashanah, Pesach, Sukkot and Simchat Torah. My father used to light a new candle each day of the Chanukkah holiday and presented the brachot [Hebrew for ‘prayers’ or ‘blessings’]. At the end, all eight candles were always lit. We also got some presents such as shoes, some pieces of clothing, etc…. mostly things that we needed.

On Yom Kippur, we had a day off school. My mother always kept the fast. I still remember how I used to bring her apples fragrant with cloves to the synagogue. When she smelled them she forgot about hunger. As a young girl, I also fasted but after I returned from the concentration camp, I abandoned this tradition. On Rosh Hashanah, we always had a beef dinner together and afterwards, we all went to the synagogue.

Pesach was the time of the year when my mother’s father came to visit us and he prepared the Seder plate, on which he placed lamb bones, parsley tops and a bowl with salty water. [Editor’s note: Seder – a home prayer and prescribed ritual during the first night of the Pesach holiday. A Seder plate is placed on a festively set table and according to this plate, the events that made the Israelis leave Egypt are discussed. Ritual items – bitter herbs (maror), boiled eggs, lamb leg and sweet medley charoset are placed on this dish and salty water should always be on the Seder table as well.] The youngest member of the family – in case of our family it was me – had to read the Pesach story from the Haggadah. I read the German translation because I didn’t speak Ivrit.

We also celebrated Sukkot but we never built a sukkah. I think it was built in the yard of the synagogue. My favorite holiday was Purim. When we were children, we used to prepare some performance. Once we did ballet dancing. On that occasion, my mother sewed an oriental pair of trousers from organdy for me. In the evening, masquerades were held. I loved to attend these balls when I was a young girl.

When my father’s parents had their death anniversary, my father went to the synagogue for the Kaddish. When he was on business trips, he possibly also went to the synagogue, for instance in Bratislava in Slovakia.

Generally speaking, we considered ourselves Zionists 13. A blue-and-white box bearing a map of Palestine and the inscription KKL 14 was hanging on the wall of our apartment. This inscription stood for a Jewish fund for purchase of land in Palestine. When my sister and I became members of the Jewish Youth Movement, we received a small portable moneybox made of paper. It had a slit on the top and a canvas hanging underneath. Everybody could make a donation for KKL into this box.

As I have mentioned before, our father was a sales man and he often used to travel to Slovakia and Subcarpathian Ukraine. He always took this moneybox with him and when someone, possibly also a person of different confession, wanted to give him something in reward for some favor such as giving him/her a ride, my father refused to accept payment, instead, he said that this person, if he/she really wanted, could contribute to KKL. He then handed over the money that he collected to the Brno Jewish Community. He himself didn’t serve in any position in the Jewish Community simply because he didn’t have any time for it due to his business trips.

My sister and I, as members of the Jewish Youth Movement would sometimes visit Jewish families and collect the money from their moneyboxes. We always had to empty the boxes in front of witnesses; we recorded the amount of money in the moneybox and gave a copy of this receipt to the respective family. In accordance with the other copy, we then handed in the money to the fund at the Jewish Community.

Even though we were Zionists, we never immigrated to Palestine. We stayed in Brno and in 1941 we ended up in a transport. Before World War II, my father voted for the Social Democratic Party. In those days people used to say that almost all Jews in Brno were social democrats. My father knew also a Jewish political representative whose name was Angelo Goldstein 15 and he was active in Ostrava.

My parents spent much of their time mainly in the company of Jewish people. They were members of a Jewish fellowship the name of which I don’t remember anymore. Besides other things, the fellowship concentrated on charitable activities. For example, it provided financial support to poorer widows. The fellowship also organized various lectures and cultural events. The members used to meet on a kind of regular basis, approximately every other Saturday or once a month. My parents would usually go there for about two-three hours in the evening. They also took part in balls and dance parties that were organized by the Jewish Women Association in Brno and other Jewish organizations.

The majority of my father’s friends were from Maccabi but, obviously, he also knew many other people. He didn’t have much time, though, to keep friendly relations because he had to leave home for business trips very often. My mother had friends mainly among women of Jewish origin. She had one friend that used to visit us regularly together with her daughters that were approximately the same age as my sister and I. I remember that they always were very elegantly dressed and used to wear white stockings. There were days when our place turned into a ‘Kinderhaus’ [German: play site for children] – that was when several children together with their mothers met in our house.

Our parents would sometimes take us to the cinema and theater. From time to time, we went to a cafe where my parents met their acquaintances. In the holiday season, we used to travel abroad, for example to the lakes in Austria. When my parents got older, they preferred to go to a spa and take advantage of medical treatment whereas we favored various trips organized by the Jewish Youth Movement. Once a year, the whole family traveled by train to Libavske Udoli to visit my grandparents. My father’s sister, Adela Goldberg, lived close to them so we usually spent several days at her place. Possibly, we had some friends there as well, but I really cannot bring to my mind those visits anymore because I was a young girl back then. Since we didn’t have a car in those days, we had to travel by train. Most of the time I felt very sick and had to spend the whole journey lying down.

My father had three siblings – they were all born in Slavkov. They weren’t Orthodox Jews either. The oldest of them, Alfred Hertzka, was a teacher at a secondary grammar school in Brno. He married Cecilia Strakosch. They settled in Litomerice therefore my father didn’t get to see much of them. They had two daughters – Lizbet [Elizabeth] and Truda [Gertrude]. Auntie Cecilia was a housewife. Uncle Alfred died in the ghetto in Lodz 16 in Poland. Truda was deported in September 1944 and died in the concentration camp in Auschwitz. Lizbet survived the Holocaust and at present, she lives in Berlin.

Alfred was followed, I believe, by Adela who got married to Max Goldberg. Max Goldberg came from the Mlada Boleslav area and worked as an accountant in one of the factories in Brno. They had two sons – Rudolf and Karel. Rudolf married a non-Jewish woman. Auntie Adela died in Terezin and her husband in the concentration camp in Auschwitz. Karel was imprisoned in Riga [today Latvia], but, fortunately, returned after the war. He later died in Karlovy Vary and Rudi in Prague.

Another of my father’s sisters was Emilie Hertzka. She never got married. She worked for her Auntie – Adela Perles, nee Polak, her mother’s sister, in some guesthouse in Vienna. After the outbreak of World War II, they fled to London where she died during bombing of the town in April 1944.

My mother had two sisters, Helena and Alice, and a brother, Bedrich. They were all born in Brno in the period of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The oldest of them was probably Helena Kohnstein who never married. I don’t know what her occupation was. Auntie Alica was single, too. She gave private French lessons. Bedrich Kohnstein was the owner of a fruit juice manufactory in Brno. He married a Jewish woman, Elisabeth Fischer, and they had a son, Pavel. They divorced afterwards. Pavel lived with his mother. None of my mother’s siblings was an Orthodox Jew. Eliska and her son Pavel Kohnstein were deported to Minsk where they died probably in 1944. My mother’s siblings died during the Holocaust as well. In 1942, they were in the transport that went to Riga in the Soviet Union and nobody ever saw them again.

My name is Zuzana Wachtlova. My maiden name was Zuzana Herztkova. Unfortunately, I cannot remember my Jewish name. I was born in Brno in 1920.

I started to attend a public school in Brno in 1926. All subjects were taught in German at this school. The school was located at the corner of the street where the conservatoire is today [Avenue of Captain Jaros]. I had several Jewish classmates. The Jewish children didn’t have to take part in the Catholic religion classes. Instead of that, we, the Jewish kids, had Jewish religion classes in the afternoon. After the public school, I continued my studies at the secondary grammar school. After four years, I successfully completed my studies and enrolled in Vesna, that is, a school where women’s occupations were taught. [Vesna: women’s educational fellowship, established in Brno in 1871. It organized various educational activities and courses and at the same time supported the development of cultural and artistic activities.]

My father was aware of the fact that the situation of Jews was getting more and more serious and harsh, and a growing number of men were unemployed. He therefore wanted to grant his daughters a possibility of acquiring an occupation that would enable them to earn their living even in hard times. Both of us were excellent students; my sister was even smarter than I. In spite of that, on my father’s proposal, we both enrolled in Vesna and became tailors. After passing the final exams, we got a tailor’s apprentice certificate. Afterwards, I spent a year as tailor’s apprentice in one department house that had a tailor’s workshop on the top floor. Its recent name is Petrof. After passing the qualification exams I became a professional tailor.

I think that one of my favorite subjects was geography. I also took piano classes. Together with my sister, we either visited our teacher or she would come to our apartment. We practiced quite often and sometimes we played the same song over and over again. I remember a neighbor from the Masaryk’s quarter stopping my mother on the stairs and asking whether we would also play some new pieces.

We used to speak German and Czech at home. I spoke both languages fluently. Besides that, my auntie Alica Kohnstein, my mother’s sister, tried to teach me French but it is almost impossible to learn something with a relative. Particularly in my case, since I used to be such a naughty and restless girl. My father paid for my private English lessons. In the period of the First Republic 17, I attended English classes at the English Institute in Brno. I had classes almost daily because I didn’t go to school anymore. In 1939, I was even supposed to travel to England as an au-pair but the war foiled all my plans. Today I don’t speak English as well as I used to back in those days.

My friends at school knew about my Jewish origin in spite of the fact that I had blue eyes and blond hair. I never tried to conceal my origin – actually, I’ve always been proud of it. Back in those days, I used to wear a small David’s star on my necklace. In fact, I tried to avoid potential unpleasant situations by somehow declaring from the very beginning that I am Jewish. I knew myself and realized that I wasn’t able to tolerate any comments offending Jews without reacting to them. Like this, I prevented misunderstandings and conflicts.

Once, a girl at the public school told m ‘You stupid Jew!’ As a child, I was very sensitive and therefore, came back home crying and felt miserable. My mother went to school and explained to that little girl that I am the same like she is and asked her never to outrage me again. Obviously, one could hear people say things like that, even various anecdotes and proverbs about Jews. Today I, of course, know they shouldn’t be taken so seriously. Later on, I even regretted that my mother went to talk to her because her mother died shortly afterwards.

In Vesna, I had a similar experience. Once I was cutting a fabric and one schoolmate told me my hands were shaking like the hands of an old Jew. So I replied, ‘I actually am Jewish but I think all old people’s hands are shaking.’ I at least had an opportunity to declare my origin and then all my classmates liked me and I came to terms with everybody.

In my private life, I made many friends predominantly with Jewish girls that were members of the Jewish Youth Movement or the Jewish Sports Club Maccabi. In the summer, we used to go swimming to Zabrdovice [the swimming pool in Zabrdovice near Brno was opened in 1879 and is still open to the public] near Brno or we went swimming to Bar Kochba 18.

Together with my sister, we were members of the Jewish Youth Movement Maccabi Hacajir 19. Its seat was in the same building as today’s Jewish Community in Brno [Avenue of Captain Jaros], on the ground floor. I don’t know exactly how many members this movement could have had but there was quite a group of us youngsters. We used to wear blue shirts and a blue-and-white scarf around our necks.

We also used to go to the Maccabi sports club that organized various sports activities. These sports activities included exercise, tennis, skiing in winter and later on also horseback riding. I wasn’t very good at tennis but I was quite keen on skiing. However, my most favorite was horseback ridding. Unfortunately, I could devote myself to this sport only for a relatively short time because Maccabi ceased to operate after the outbreak of World War II.

The Jewish Youth Movement organized summer camps and trips also to Slovakia, Hungary or to Subcarpathian Ukraine. We had an opportunity to travel to places every weekend. We weren’t picky and fastidious; we sometimes even washed ourselves with water from a well. But we didn’t mind at all because as a reward, we could visit beautiful places.

My sister’s maiden name was Marketa Hertzkova. She was born on 2nd January 1918 in Brno. She attended the same public school as I did, but she was two grades higher than me. I remember one teacher once saying that he taught 16 Jews out of 24 students in my sister’s class and that he had never had such an intelligent class. Marketa continued her studies at a secondary grammar school and afterwards got enrolled in Vesna. After passing the apprentice and qualification exams, she became a professional tailor. 

Marketa had three husbands. She married her first husband – Herbert Strauss – on 13th August 1938. They had a civil wedding and no children were born in their wedlock. Herbert worked as a managing clerk in some factory in Prostejov. He died in the concentration camp in Auschwitz in 1944. After World War II, Marketa got married again and her husband was Ervin Hirsch who later changed his surname to Holan. Ervin came from Brno and he and my sister knew each other already before World War II. They got married on 9th October 1946. My sister and I got married concurrently, on the same day, at the City Hall in Brno. Marketa and Ervin decided to stay in an apartment that my sister and I managed to obtain shortly after the war. Ervin owned a shop with fountain pens.

In 1948, the State of Israel was established 20 and Jews could legally move out to this new country. [Editor’s note: At a Zionist conference in January 1949 in Piestany, the last one to take place in Czechoslovakia, 20 thousand Jews got permission to emigrate. This practically meant emigration of all Jews from Czechoslovakia that were interested in moving to Israel.] Marta emigrated together with her husband and settled in Herzlia, a small town close to Tel Aviv. Ervin continued in his business with fountain pens and pencils. They had two children together – Hana and Gideon. My sister didn’t work; she took care of the children. Ervin died of cardio-vascular problems in the 1950s.

After her second husband’s death, Marketa found a job in a home for disabled children. Two years after her husband’s death, she got married for the third time – she married Ernst Berner who was originally from Prague. Mr. Berner was divorced and had a daughter from his previous marriage. He and Marketa didn’t have any more children together. Ernst liked his stepchildren – Hanka and Gideon – very much though. Ernst Berner died in Herzlia in 1985. My sister also died in Herzlia, in 1998, and was buried in a Jewish cemetery. Regrettably, I wasn’t present at her funeral. Illnesses and diseases devastated my sister’s body and her wish was that I shouldn’t see her in such a bad condition. She wished to remain healthy and happy in my memories.

During the war

When Hitler came to power in Germany 21, we started to be more wary of the situation. In spite of that, though, until the very last moment we didn’t believe those terrible things could ever come to us. After Hitler annexed the Sudetenland – the border area with the Czech Republic – to the Third Reich [on 30th October 1938], we knew what to expect. We had heard about the Crystal Night 22 in Germany and also about the Jews being persecuted in Austria. My parents counted on the necessity of emigrating and they therefore immediately applied for Panama visas that were obviously later annulled. My father attempted to get us abroad, he wrote letters and sent parcels to various people. Unfortunately, nothing helped and we all ended up in a transport.

The Americans were parsimonious. In my opinion, they could have taken action and saved much more human lives. I wanted to get to England as an au-pair. I already started corresponding with one family in which I would have taken care of a two-year-old girl. I was to travel to England in the summer of 1939. Also my parents wanted me to go abroad. At that time, an SS-office 23 already operated in Prague that granted permits for leaving the country. Obviously, I didn’t get it due to my Jewish origin. I was actually forced to stay in the country. The thing that came to my mind at that time: ‘At least, I won’t leave my parents at home alone.’ 

After the outbreak of World War II on 1st September 1939 24, no Jew was allowed to leave the country. In accordance with the Anti-Jewish laws 25, we had to hand in all our jewelry to the bank. Since everything was registered, we didn’t have the courage not to give in the jewelry and object to the orders. Later on, also fur coats and musical instruments were handed in. We were prohibited to enter a confectionery. The Germans weren’t even in the town yet and the owner of the confectionery at Freedom Square already hung up a board with the inscription ‘Jews are not welcomed’ in his store. In fact, we weren’t allowed to go to any restaurants and cafes.

We, youngsters, managed to put up with these regulations, we at least used to go swimming together until it was possible and we used to visit each other. The restrictions applied also to public transportation. We couldn’t sit in the trams, we had to stand on the front platform. Once I traveled like this and the guide told me to take a seat since there were places vacant. Since I had blue eyes and blond hair, I probably didn’t look Jewish at first sight. He couldn’t believe that both my parents were Jewish. I obviously explained this to the guide and remained standing for the rest of my trip. At the beginning of the 1940s, the Jews had to wear a yellow star 26 on a visible place. My parents received the fabric and sewed the stars themselves. None of us dared to object to the directive because we could have had great problems for it. Some Jews were taken to the concentration camps right away.    

The janitor hid my suitcase with bed sheets and she returned it to me after the war. All our furniture and Persian carpets that my father liked to buy remained in our apartment though. We didn’t want to endanger any people by storing our property in their places. They could have been persecuted for it, even pay the highest price for it. We could easily live without those Persian carpets but we wouldn’t be able to live with pangs of remorse. 

Together with my parents, I was taken in the first transport to the ghetto in Terezin on 2nd December 1941. [Editor’s note: 1000 people were deported in the first transport from Brno that arrived in Terezin on 2nd December 1941.] First, we had to hand in our luggage in the Small Synagogue on Vlhka Street in Brno. Afterwards, we were assembled in one school and from there taken directly to the transport after two days. At night we were taken by tram to the railway station where we got on a passenger train. We obviously didn’t know where we were taken. We heard about the concentration camp in Lodz and from time to time, we heard some rumors about Terezin and Jozefov. When we arrived in Prague, we felt relief because we realized we were not heading eastwards. One of the railway staff revealed to us that we are being transported to Terezin. We were even happy that we would be staying in our country.

We got off the train in Bohusovice because the railroad tracks didn’t lead all the way to Terezin yet. Each one of us was dragging at least 50 kg heavy luggage several kilometers. The next day men and women were divided. Women went to the so-called Dresden barracks. I stayed with my mother. At the beginning I worked as a courier for the guards. My task was to bring messages from one barrack to another. I got a permit and could freely wander in the town where the original inhabitants lived. It was fairly good work; at least I didn’t feel imprisoned. The others had tasks assigned and worked in groups.

In June or July 1942, the original inhabitants were forced to leave the town due to a rather high number of transports arriving in Terezin. Some time before World War II, I took a course on small babies care. Owing to this, I started working in a children’s house in the ghetto. Mothers relied on us and believed we would take good care of their babies and treat them properly. It was a rather sad job because children that were born at home and brought up in a family had great difficulties with getting used to the conditions in the ghetto. Children already born in the ghetto got accustomed to this way of life easier because they never knew anything better. Many children died. I worked in the infant’s barrack until the October transports in 1944.

My sister and her husband came to Terezin in a transport from Brno approximately in June 1942. Her job was to look after pre-school and school children that were also assembled in one place. My sister’s husband was deported to Auschwitz in a transport before us, in October 1944, we never heard of him again.

After almost three years spent in the Terezin ghetto, in October 1944, we were deported to the concentration camp in the Polish Auschwitz. By pure coincidence, my mother and sister were in the same transport as me. My mother was already were skinny, three years spent in Terezin left harsh traces on her. On our journey in a stock car, we seated her between us.

We arrived in Auschwitz on 8th October 1944. On the ramp, my sister and I were separated from my parents and that was the last time I saw them. My mother had to go on one side while my sister and I had to go on the other one. We objected to it and tried to explain to the guard that our mother was on the other side. He was uncompromising. As a matter of fact, he actually saved our lives because my parents were almost certainly sent to the gas chamber. I have heard from other Jewish women that one of our friends that arrived in Auschwitz in an earlier transport urged the guard to let her go with her mother. He agreed and both of them died in the gas chamber.

People of our transport didn’t even get the numbers tattooed on their forearm. The elder people went to the gas chambers and we, youngsters, were apparently needed as costless workforce. The invasion of Normandy took place in October 1944 and Hitler sent almost all his people there. The Germans needed some workforce for sure. I remained together with my sister. That was the only positive thing in that horrible situation because we at least had somebody to live for.

In Auschwitz, all our clothes were taken away, we received some shabby togs and had to take a shower. We had absolutely no idea that gas chambers exist. The other people were also told that they were going to the shower and they actually ended up in the gas. We spent the nights in a thousand-block [a block in which 1000 prisoners were accommodated]. We stayed there for probably ten to twelve days but we gradually lost track of time. Metaphorically speaking, we held each other’s hands, my sister and I, so that nobody could separate us. A line-up took place consisting of groups of five women and when the number reached 100, the whole group was transported somewhere. This way my sister and I ended up in a transport that went to Merzdorf. We had to hurry to the train station late at night and had to do everything ‘schnell, schnell’ [German for ‘quickly, quickly’].

In stock cars, we arrived in the German Merzdorf that is located near the border with the Czech Republic on the German side of the Giant Mountains. This small village was home for staff of the linen processing plant. Besides the hundred of us, there were two hundred Polish Jews and one hundred Hungarian Jewish women arrived later on. A huge concrete room with three-story bunk beds was located above the factory plant. All of us stayed in this big room but at least, we didn’t have to freeze because the room was heated. People of some transports lived in much worse conditions.

We partially worked in the factories and besides this there was also ‘Aussendienst’ [German: outside service]. During this service, we worked outside when bricks or coal arrived. The factory head assigned a job in the heating plant to me and one other young girl. This work was extremely hard; we had to rake over smoldering coal with iron bars. Once we had to chop the coal in freezing weather and transport it from the yard to the heating room. I dared to tell the ‘Leiter’ [German for ‘leader‘], that it was awfully hard work for women. He immediately asked for my number. I was terribly scared that he would send me to the concentration camp. I don’t know why but I stayed.

We had to work very hard but we could manage. About eight women from the hundred of us died either due to illness or just because they couldn’t get used to the food. A young woman whose name was Eva, also lived with us. In these harsh conditions women commonly didn’t have their period and for this reason Eva didn’t even notice that she was pregnant. One suspicious guard in Auschwitz sent her to the doctor. In the hospital, though, one woman underwent surgery on her inflamed finger – Eva had terrible experience seeing the pus coming out of the wound and got frightened she would get infected. Therefore she escaped. This is how she got to our transport.

For some time we managed to hide her pregnancy. At our work, a special semi-product was created in the process of linen processing – some kind of fleece. From time to time, one of us would bring her a handful of fleece that we used for stuffing her dress so that no one could notice her belly. However, after some period of time everyone knew that there was a pregnant woman in the camp. The guard made us line up and ordered the pregnant woman to step forward from the line. Eva finally stepped forward and received two strong slaps in her face from the SS-guard. This SS-guard immediately wrote a report to Auschwitz and later on also to other concentration camps but she never received any answer, probably because in the meantime, they were liberated. In the end, Eva gave birth to a healthy boy. 

On our way out, we used to see a board with the inscription ‘Trautenau 40 km,’ or in Czech: ‘Trutnov 40 km.’ We said to ourselves that if we survive, we would go home on foot. This wish actually came true. We were extremely lucky we didn’t have to take part in the death march 27. Heavy battles near Vratislav lasted for a long time. We could hear the cannons. At that time, the Territorial Army, consisting of older men who were wounded in the battles, was on guard in our place. Once they disclosed information that they were forbidden to shoot prisoners who would try to escape. When the SS-guards made us line up and wanted to load us in a transport we refused to get on. They suspected that they had lost the war and were terribly afraid of the approaching Russian soldiers.

One morning we got up and there was no ‘Aufseher’ [German for ‘guard’]. Uniforms were thrown in their rooms as if they had stripped of their own skin. They deserted to the other side and let the Americans take them captive. We stayed in the camp without any supervision and in order to prevent chaos, we organized this ‘Appell’ [German for ‘roll-call’] ourselves until the arrival of a young boy on a bicycle and with a star on his cap [i.e. in the Red Army uniform] who announced the end of the war. The factory head had a calf killed immediately in order to impress us.

After the war

Some prisoners formed groups and went home on foot. We were a group of about seven women and Eva pushed a baby carriage with her little son in front of her. We thought we would walk those 40 kilometers and slowly get to Trutnov. A baker prepared a loaf of bread for each one of us to take on the journey. When we were tired after a whole day trip, we took a rest in a deserted house. We took some food but besides that we never took anything else.

After some time we arrived at a house with some inhabitant. We asked him whether we could spend a night there but he said that the local women preferred to hide in the forest so that the Russians wouldn’t find them. But we were not afraid so he let us stay overnight in one room. Some Russians arrived on their horses but left us alone. Women that stayed in Merzdorf came off much worse. They were so grateful for the liberation they would even kiss the feet of the Russian liberators. One cannot wonder at it because people experienced such great euphoria. In the evenings, the soldiers played the accordion, sang and afterwards raped the majority of women. We found out about it only later on.

The next day we arrived in Trutnov. The National Guard was already there. The Guard registered us. We were accommodated in a hotel and it was after a very long time that we could sleep again in a white bed. A truck drove us from Trutnov to Nachod where the Red Cross was drawing up a list of repatriates. Eva had a sister in Zamberk so she and some other girls got off the truck on our way to Nachod and went home. We were registered in Nachod and the Red Cross provided us with money for the train ticket. We took a train to Prague where we met my cousin Rudi Goldberg who got there from Terezin. He first asked us whether we had lice. It was probably the only thing we didn’t catch in Merzdorf because we could shower in hot water. We stayed in his place for two days and afterwards together with my sister I set off for Brno, for our birthplace.

We didn’t even have a place to return to. Our parents and my sister’s husband died in Auschwitz. I don’t know what happened with our parents’ apartment. We were accommodated in a hotel for repatriates. Since my sister and I wanted to live alone, we were looking for an apartment. Nobody opened the door to us, though, and our feet started to hurt and were completely swollen from all that walking.

My sister came up with the idea that we should get a police escort since that would elicit greater respect in people’s minds. We went to the police station and said we had returned from the concentration camp and in fact, it was visible on us at first sight because we had very short hair. My sister explained that it was impossible for us to find accommodation because nobody opened the door to us. A policeman was finally assigned to us and owing to this, we managed to find a small two-room apartment that had originally belonged to a deported woman.

We earned our living as tailors – we worked for one Jewish woman who sewed clothes unofficially. Our parent’s property was irrecoverably lost – we had to provide for ourselves. During the Holocaust, we lost our parents and experienced awful things but I think all that suffering strengthened our faith even more.


I first met Jiri Wachtl – my future husband – in the ghetto in Terezin. After World War II, my acquaintances from Velke Mezirici organized a meeting of friends in Brno. Jiri was also from Velke Mezirici so he came to the party. We met again and the sparks of our love began to fly. Ever since my childhood I spent most of the time predominantly in company of Jewish people, I couldn’t even imagine I would marry a non-Jew. Obviously, as people say, love works miracles, and I have absolutely no prejudices against goyim whatsoever. I just considered his Jewishness being so close. We got married on 9th October 1946. We had a double civil wedding together with my sister and Ernest Holan at the Brno City Hall.

My husband was born in Velke Mezirici on 15th December 1910. His mother language was Czech; German wasn’t spoken much in Velke Mezirici. In spite of that, Jiri spoke some German.

My husband attended elementary school in Velke Mezirici. Afterwards, he attended a secondary grammar school and finally some business school in his home town. After graduating from secondary school, he had to work in his father’s restaurant and couldn’t continue his studies.

During World War II, he was imprisoned in a camp in Lipa. Afterwards, he was deported to Terezin and from there to Auschwitz and later on to a labor camp. He returned with a severe leg injury.

After World War II, my husband got his family restaurant in Velke Mezirici back. In 1951, the restaurant was nationalized and he couldn’t continue to work in the restaurant, not even as its head. The restaurant staff asked him to at least keep the books because nobody from the staff was capable of doing it. After some time, though, the whole administration was moved to Trebic and later on to Zdar nad Sazavou. As a consequence, my husband became a waiter in a restaurant previously owned by us. He worked in this position until 1978 when he retired.

I never knew my husband’s parents. I only know their names were Antonia and Max Wachtl. My husband’s father died before World War II. His mother was deported to Terezin from where she returned to Velke Mezirici in 1945. She died shortly after the war. Jiri had two real sisters and several stepsiblings. I knew only his sister whose name was Marketa Korinkova, nee Wachtlova. Her husband wasn’t Jewish. She lived in Prerov before the war. During the war she was in Terezin. She died in Velke Mezirici in 1988.

My husband died in Brno on 11th November 1983. In spite of the fact that according to the Jewish tradition, the dead should be buried in the ground, he was taken to the crematorium. That was his last wish. I have no idea what influenced his decision. At least, he had a Jewish pass-away ceremony. Together with the other mourners, we stood around his coffin and one of the mourners held a valedictory speech. After the cantor sang his song, the coffin was transported to the crematorium. I had my husband’s urn fit into my grandfather’s – Simon Kohnstein’s – gravestone. Every year, on the day of my closest family’s death anniversary, I honor their memory by lighting up a candle on their grave.

I have three children. Two sons and a daughter. My oldest son’s name is Petr Wachtl and he was born in Brno in 1947. My second son Michael was born in Brno in 1949. My daughter’s name is Marta and she was born in Velke Mezirici in 1954. My sons were not circumcised. My husband didn’t agree with it because he supposedly  almost bled to death at his brit milah.

My children were very smart and had no problems at school. Petr attended elementary school in Velke Mezirici and continued his studies at a secondary school and he graduated after passing the school-leaving exam. Later on, he started to study economy at university in Prague but he interrupted his studies because in 1968, he received a permission to travel abroad. Michael graduated from secondary school of chemistry after passing the school-leaving exam and Marta studied dentistry at Masaryk University in Brno.

During the Prague Spring 28 in 1968, Petr and Michael as students received a permission to travel abroad. They never intended to emigrate but in the meantime, August 1968 29 came and they decided not to return. Michael finally settled in Basel in Switzerland. He received a scholarship at a local university and started to study chemistry. Petr followed his brother to Basel where he enrolled at the economic university. They both graduated from university. They got employed in the chemical plant Ciba-Geigy [today Novartis]. Petr works there to this day; Michael has his own business now. He purchases and sells dried mushrooms. Petr and Michael got married to Swiss partners. Petr has two daughters – Miriam and Jana. Miriam got married to a young man whose family is from former Yugoslavia. She kept her surname at birth – Wachtl. Janka is single. She studies sociology. Michael has no children.

My daughter married a man of non-Jewish origin. They had a civil wedding at the Brno City Hall. I sewed her wedding dress myself. Actually, I wished she had found a Jewish partner but after the war there was not such a large young Jewish community in Brno anymore. I am very satisfied with my son-in-law. Even his family got to like Marta. They have two sons – Jan was born in 1980 and Jiri in 1984. Neither of my grandsons was circumcised. Jan studies medicine at Masaryk University and this year [2004], Jiri was accepted to this university as well; he will study dentistry. After turning 18, Jan became a member of the Brno Jewish Community. His room is full of Jewish artifacts and on one of the walls he even hung an Israeli flag that my nephew, my sister’s son Gideon Holan, brought from Israel. He is very proud of his Jewish origin.

After the emigration, Petr and Michael automatically became dissidents and enemies of the political regime in Czechoslovakia. We, their family members, had to cope with the persecution by the state bodies. Secret police used to visit us regularly and questioned us about the children – what did they write from abroad etc. My husband was a very straightforward kind of person and once he responded to the policeman, ‘You know earlier than we do because you read the letters that they write.’ We couldn’t see our own sons for seven years. Due to unknown reasons, after all those years the restrictions loosened slightly and we could travel abroad to meet them. We phone each other a lot now. I am already old now and wouldn’t make it all the way to Switzerland. But I have wonderful children; they come and visit me often.

After World War II, I continued to proudly acknowledge my Jewish origin. I always wore a necklace with a David’s star on it. This way, I managed to avoid unpleasant situations. I always tried to create such an atmosphere where it became apparent that I was Jewish. When people discovered the truth about my origin and that I had been in a concentration camp, they kept the jokes about Jews and various allusions to themselves.

We wanted our children to be aware of their Jewishness so we brought them up with this intention. When we had a feeling that they were already mature enough, we told them that we had been in concentration camps. Obviously, I didn’t go into details describing all the horrors that we had lived through. I remember them asking me about my return to the Czech Republic. They wanted to hear the story about my trip to Trutnov. Later on they studied literature and watched documentaries from which they’ve learned more about the Holocaust. Today I can talk to them about everything. I wanted them to know about their Jewish origin and about the suffering of Jews during the Holocaust. I knew one family in which the parents decided not to tell their children that they were Jewish. The children heard other kids at school outraging each other by calling each other Jews and brought this behavior home. They didn’t understand what this term actually meant. I never wanted to experience such a situation.

After the wedding, we moved to a small house in my husband’s home town – Velke Mezirici. Until 1951, I helped out in our restaurant. As long as our sons slept in a baby carriage in front of the restaurant, I helped out in the kitchen, served the guests and worked as an accountant. This was until 1954 when my daughter Marta was born. I stayed home with her for some time. At the beginning of the 1960s, I went on supply for one woman who left on maternity leave in a dental care center in Velke Mezirici. I worked as a clerk responsible for administration. Later on, I got a job as a stock-keeper in a hospital not far from Velke Mezirici.

In 1969, I retired as a disabled pensioner because I suffered from inflammations of varicose veins. After my husband retired [in 1978], we returned to Brno and rented a three-room apartment in a housing estate. After my husband’s death in 1983, I moved into a smaller two-room apartment in Kohoutovice [a quarter in Brno] in order to be closer to my daughter.

No other Jews lived in Velke Mezirici besides us. We had to travel all the way to Brno to meet our Jewish friends. My husband and I were members of the Brno Jewish community. We had some friends, though, in Velke Mezirici as well. However, we didn’t have any time left for maintaining of our friendly relations because we had to work so much and I had to bring up three children. From time to time, all our family would join them on hiking tours and camping in the surrounding mountains. In 1963, we bought a small chalet surrounded by beautiful countryside and the kids loved it there.

We didn’t have a kosher household. We used to visit the Brno Synagogue only on the high holidays. Our family didn’t particularly celebrate Jewish holidays but there was no Chanukkah without lighting candles and exchanging presents and no Pesach without matzot. In fact, we never decorated a Christmas tree. We always considered ourselves Jewish.

At home, we subscribed to Lidove noviny 30 and Slobodne Slovo, now I read Mlada Fronta 31. The salesperson in the Kniha bookstore knew me very well; she used to immediately show me the latest Jewish literature. My favorite author is Lustig 32. During the Socialist era, we regularly listened to broadcasting of the Austrian radio station Vienna. News on the Czechoslovak radio were one-sided, people had to read between the lines.

In the communist era, I didn’t care much about politics. Even though I was never prosecuted, I know many people paid much too high a price for their ‘subversive’ acting. The greatest restriction for me was the prohibition to freely travel abroad. Our children had to wear red pioneer scarves and were taught poems at school about people in the old times not having a place to live and rich people owning vast palaces. The regime brought up children this way and it didn’t make any sense to persuade them of anything else. On 1st May, the youngsters as well as other people marched in the town center with banners in their hands. My husband and I never took part in the 1st May March. The Holocaust was such a severe school of life for us Jews that we didn’t even perceive communism so skeptically. We always used to say that we had lived through even much worse times.

The Prague Spring embodied some tiny sparkle of hope and promise of a better future. I remember many people believed that Dubcek 33 would succeed in implementing reforms. Unfortunately, he faced too strong an opposition and failed in his endeavors. The Russians came in 1968. The biggest tragedy for us was that our sons didn’t return from abroad. After all, my husband and I said to each other they lived their lives and we had no power of preventing them from doing what they decided to do. 

When the State of Israel was established in 1948, I was tremendously happy. Obviously, I was happy that the idea of Theodor Herzl 34 came true and the Jews finally got their territory back. There was no peace, though, for a long time, many people, both Jews and Muslims, paid the highest price during the two wars in 1967 35 and 1973 36.

Ever since my youth, I had been a member of the Zionist youth movement and I grew up predominantly in Jewish environs, so obviously I was thinking about emigrating to Israel. My sister and her husband settled in Israel in 1948. My husband Jiri somehow couldn’t make up his mind about this. In 1947, our son Petr was born and Michael was born two years later. Jiri considered it too risky to move to Israel with two small children. Since we couldn’t travel abroad, I could just exchange letters with my only sister that lived in Herzlia. I visited her for the first time in 1964 when I got permission to leave the country. I traveled individually with my younger son Michael. His name was recorded in my passport since he wasn’t 15 years old yet. After our arrival, we tried to see as many sights as possible. I liked the whole country very much and I felt like at home there as if among own peers mainly because so many Jews live there and also because I could finally meet my only sister. In 1967, I visited Israel again but we had to return earlier due to outbreak of the Six-Day-War.

After 1967, when the Warsaw Pact countries 37 – that means also Czechoslovakia – broke up the diplomatic relations with Israel, we couldn’t even speak about Israel. Officially, it was an enemy state. For me personally, nothing changed, I continued to exchange letters with my sister. She and her husband came to visit us during the Prague Spring and we spent some time together in Slovakia in the Piestany spa.
News about the political upheaval in 1989 38 reached me in Vienna. I was just returning from Israel – I had visited my sister there. On my way from the Vienna airport, I felt rather strange about the numerous buses heading from Czechoslovakia to Austria. I asked one man what was going on. He told me many people are traveling to Rome because the Pope shall sanctify Anezka Ceska 39. He then looked at me and asked, ‘Don’t you know what’s going on here?’ Of course I didn’t know what was going on. So he actually explained everything to me.
After the year 1989 I felt like a free person because I could travel without restraint. I believe the situation improved also for Jews because during the totalitarian regime, we weren’t allowed to openly speak about Israel. For example, in a lawsuit against Slansky 40, the term Zionists was preferred in order to avoid suspicions of anti-Semitism.

Jewishness is for me an automatic and inseparable part of my life. I’m not an Orthodox Jew, I don’t have a kosher household. However, during the high holidays I go to the synagogue at the former Vlhka Street. Almost every Tuesday, I use to go the Brno Jewish community and meet other pensioners there. We talk and recollect memories of the past. Even though I have family, I like these meetings in the community because at least once a week, I have a place to go and a feeling of belonging to a certain group of people.

We also take part in Jewish funerals. Three members of the Brno Jewish community always wash and dress the dead and prepare him/her for the funeral. The former chairman of the Brno Jewish community, Mr. Weber, several times talked me into giving some kind of interview or into making speeches on the Holocaust at schools. In fact, some Jews who returned from the concentration camps are not able to talk about their suffering and torture. Once I delivered a speech for students of one secondary school in Brno. The audience was very attentive and the interest with which they listened to me surprised me a lot. My speech was also recorded on video.

Later on, I provided an interview to students of the Palackeho University in Olomouc and to Doctor Lorencova from the Jewish Museum in Prague. Everybody was interested only in the Holocaust. Spielberg also recorded interviews in Brno about the Jews who survived the Holocaust. As a matter of fact, I didn’t want to stand in front of the camera, so I refused the interview.

In January 2002, on my 82nd birthday, my daughter secretly organized a small celebration at the Jewish community. Mr. Weber – the former chairman of the Jewish community – congratulated me as well as Mr. Neufeld, our cantor. My daughter bought wine and cakes and we spent a pleasant evening together.

After the political upheaval, we started receiving certain financial reparation for persecution and imprisonment throughout the Holocaust. We got some money from an American organization, the Claims Conference, and a contribution from the Czech-German Future Fund 41. However, I always say that no money in the world will ever compensate for the loss of my parents who died I don’t even know how. People will never free themselves from the terrible memories of the past.


Glossary

1 Orthodox Jewish dress

Main characteristics of observant Jewish appearance and dresses: men wear a cap or hat while women wear a shawl (the latter is obligatory in case of married women only). The most peculiar skull-cap is called kippah (other name: yarmulkah; kapedli in Yiddish), worn by men when they leave the house, reminding them of the presence of God and thus providing spiritual protection and safety. Orthodox Jewish women had their hair shaved and wore a wig. In addition, Orthodox Jewish men wear a tallit (Hebrew term; talles in Yiddish) [prayer shawl] and its accessories all day long under their clothes but not directly on their body. Wearing payes (Yiddish term; payot in Hebrew) [long sideburns] is linked with the relevant prohibition in the Torah [shaving or trimming the beard as well as the hair around the head was forbidden]. The above habits originate from the Torah and the Shulchan Arukh. Other pieces of dresses, the kaftan [Russian, later Polish wear] among others, thought to be typical, are an imitation. According to non-Jews these characterize the Jews while they are not compulsory for the Jews.

2 Karlovy Vary (German name

Karlsbad): The most famous Bohemian spa, named after Bohemian King Charles (Karel) IV, who allegedly found the springs during a hunting expedition in 1358. It was one of the most popular resorts among the royalty and aristocracy in Europe for centuries.

3 Brno synagogues

The synagogue from the Middle Ages in the city’s historical center was converted to a Christian church in 1453. In the 16th century it was torn down. The so-called Great Synagogue from the years 1853-55 stood at the intersection of Spalena and Prizova streets. In March 1939 it was burned and demolished by the Nazis. The so-called Polish Temple in Krenova Street was built in the year 1993. In 1954 it was adapted into an advertising studio, and later it served as a warehouse. The New Synagogue from the years 1905-1906 in Ponavka Street was destroyed in 1985-86. The New Orthodox Synagogue was built at 13 Skorepka Street during the years 1935-36. Services are held to this day in this functionalist building with a traditionally conceived interior, designed by the architect Otto Eisler. Besides this there were also several prayer halls in Brno.

4 Terezin/Theresienstadt

A ghetto in the Czech Republic, run by the SS. Jews were transferred from there to various extermination camps. The Nazis, who presented Theresienstadt as a 'model Jewish settlement,' used it to camouflage the extermination of European Jews. Czech gendarmes served as ghetto guards, and with their help the Jews were able to maintain contact with the outside world. Although education was prohibited, regular classes were held, clandestinely. Thanks to the large number of artists, writers, and scholars in the ghetto, there was an intensive program of cultural activities. At the end of 1943, when word spread of what was happening in the Nazi camps, the Germans decided to allow an International Red Cross investigation committee to visit Theresienstadt. In preparation, more prisoners were deported to Auschwitz, in order to reduce congestion in the ghetto. Dummy stores, a café, a bank, kindergartens, a school, and flower gardens were put up to deceive the committee.

5 Jews in Brno

Jewish residents were present on the site of present-day Brno most likely already in the 12th century. The autonomous medieval Jewish Quarter was formed mainly by the southern part of today’s Masarykova Street, and the perpendicular Fratiskanska Street (in the year 1365 there were 30 buildings with at least 600 occupants). This large Jewish community was expelled in 1454. Later Jewish merchants were allowed to stay overnight only in the south-eastern suburb of Krenova/Krona, where in the 8th century a smaller Jewish community (for example, 81 persons of Jewish faith in 1774) with a prayer hall took root. (Also the modern synagogues from the second half of the 19th century were built in Krenova). Starting at the end of the 18th century, several Jewish families gradually gained the right of permanent residency in the fortified city, during the years 1753-1766 and 1778-1816 even an Hebrew printing house was in operation in the inner city (run however by a Catholic businessman). The modern Jewish religious community was founded in Brno in the middle of the 19th century, and its numbers continually increased. From 1885 onwards the Moravian provincial rabbi lived here. In 1848 there were 445 people professing the Jewish faith living in Brno (slightly less than 1% of the population), in 1880 already 5,498 persons (6%), in 1930 it was 11,003 persons (4%). During the Nazi occupation about 8,400 died.

6 KuK (Kaiserlich und Königlich) army

The name 'Imperial and Royal' was used for the army of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, as well as for other state institutions of the Monarchy originated from the dual political system. Following the Compromise of 1867, which established the Dual Monarchy, Austrian emperor and Hungarian King Franz Joseph was the head of the state and also commander-in-chief of the army. Hence the name 'Imperial and Royal.'

7 Subcarpathian Ruthenia

Is found in the region where the Carpathian Mountains meet the Central Dnieper Lowlands. Its larger towns are Beregovo, Mukacevo and Hust. Up until the World War I the region belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, but in the year 1919, according to the St. Germain peace treaty, was made a part of Czechoslovakia. Exact statistics regarding ethnic and linguistic composition of the population aren't available. Between the two World Wars Ruthenia's inhabitants included Hungarians, Ruthenians, Russians, Ukrainians, Czechs and Slovaks, plus numerous Jewish and Gypsy communities. The first Vienna  Decision (1938) gave Hungary that part of Ruthenia inhabited by Hungarians. The remainder of the region gained autonomy within Czechoslovakia, and was occupied by Hungarian troops. In 1944 the Soviet Army and local resistance units took power in Ruthenia. According to an agreement dated 29th June 1945, Czechoslovakia ceded the region to the Soviet Union. Up until 1991 it was a part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. After Ukraine declared its independence, it became one of the country's administrative regions.

8 Maccabi World Union

International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19th century. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth. In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi. The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

9 Sudetenland

Highly industrialized north-west frontier region that was transferred from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the new state of Czechoslovakia in 1919. Together with the land a German-speaking minority of 3 million people was annexed, which became a constant source of tension both between the states of Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia, and within Czechoslovakia. In 1935 a Nazi-type party, the Sudeten German Party financed by the German government, was set up. Following the Munich Agreement in 1938 German troops occupied the Sudetenland. In 1945 Czechoslovakia regained the territory and pogroms started against the German and Hungarian minority. The Potsdam Agreement authorized Czechoslovakia to expel the entire German and Hungarian minority from the country.

10 Brod, Max (1884-1968)

German writer, lyricist, playwright, essayist, cultural philosopher, literary and art critic from Prague of Jewish origins, a committed pacifist and Zionist. Brod was the organizer of the German literary community in Prague and a promoter of Czech culture abroad. In 1939 he immigrated to Palestine, where he participated in the building of an independent Jewish state. Up until his death he was a literary and artistic director at the Israeli National Theater, from the year 1948 also a music critic. He died in Tel Aviv.

11 Prager Tagblatt

German daily established in 1875, the largest Austro-Hungarian daily paper outside of Vienna and the most widely read German paper in Bohemia. During the time of the First Republic (Czechoslovakia - CSR) the Prager Tagblatt had a number of Jewish journalists and many Jewish authors as contributors: Max Brod, Willy Haas, Rudolf Fuchs, Egon E. Kisch, Theodor Lessing and others. The last issue came out in March 1939, during World War II the paper's offices on Panska Street in Prague were used by the daily Der neue Tag, after the war the building and printing plant was taken over by the Czech daily Mlada Fronta.

12 Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

Bohemia and Moravia were occupied by the Germans and transformed into a German Protectorate in March 1939, after Slovakia declared its independence. The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was placed under the supervision of the Reich protector, Konstantin von Neurath. The Gestapo assumed police authority. Jews were dismissed from civil service and placed in an extralegal position. In the fall of 1941, the Reich adopted a more radical policy in the Protectorate. The Gestapo became very active in arrests and executions. The deportation of Jews to concentration camps was organized, and Terezin/Theresienstadt was turned into a ghetto for Jewish families. During the existence of the Protectorate the Jewish population of Bohemia and Moravia was virtually annihilated. After World War II the pre-1938 boundaries were restored, and most of the German-speaking population was expelled.

13 Zionism

A movement defending and supporting the idea of a sovereign and independent Jewish state, and the return of the Jewish nation to the home of their ancestors, Eretz Israel - the Israeli homeland. The final impetus towards a modern return to Zion was given by the show trial of Alfred Dreyfuss, who in 1894 was unjustly sentenced for espionage during a wave of anti-Jewish feeling that had gripped France. The events prompted Dr. Theodor Herzl (1860-1904) to draft a plan of political Zionism in the tract 'Der Judenstaat' ('The Jewish State', 1896), which led to the holding of the first Zionist congress in Basel (1897) and the founding of the World Zionist Organization (WZO). The WZO accepted the Zionist emblem and flag (Magen David), hymn (Hatikvah) and an action program.

14 Keren Kayemet Leisrael (K

K.L.): Jewish National Fund (JNF) founded in 1901 at the Fifth Zionist Congress in Basel. From its inception, the JNF was charged with the task of fundraising in Jewish communities for the purpose of purchasing land in the Land of Israel to create a homeland for the Jewish people. After 1948 the fund was used to improve and afforest the territories gained. Every Jewish family that wished to help the cause had a JNF money box, called the 'blue box.' They threw in at least one lei each day, while on Sabbath and high holidays they threw in as many lei as candles they lit for that holiday. This is how they partly used to collect the necessary funds. Now these boxes are known worldwide as a symbol of Zionism.

15 Goldstein, Angelo (1889 -1947)

Lawyer, politician, Member of Parliament for the Czechoslovak Jewish Party, which was founded in 1919 at the National Jewish Council conference in Prague. The party worked towards the representation of the Jewish minority at municipal and parliamentary levels, but didn't enter Parliament until 1929 in coalition with Polish social democrats. In 1935, when the Jewish Party participated in elections in coalition with Czech social democrats, Angelo Goldstein and Chaim Kugel were elected to Parliament.

16 Lodz Ghetto

It was set up in February 1940 in the former Jewish quarter on the northern outskirts of the city. 164,000 Jews from Lodz were packed together in a 4 sq. km. area. In 1941 and 1942, 38,500 more Jews were deported to the ghetto. In November 1941, 5,000 Roma were also deported to the ghetto from Burgenland province, Austria. The Jewish self-government, led by Mordechai Rumkowsky, sought to make the ghetto as productive as possible and to put as many inmates to work as he could. But not even this could prevent overcrowding and hunger or improve the inhuman living conditions. As a result of epidemics, shortages of fuel and food and insufficient sanitary conditions, about 43,500 people (21% of all the residents of the ghetto) died of undernourishment, cold and illness. The others were transported to death camps; only a very small number of them survived.

17 First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938)

The First Czechoslovak Republic was created after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy following World War I. The union of the Czech lands and Slovakia was officially proclaimed in Prague in 1918, and formally recognized by the Treaty of St. Germain in 1919. Ruthenia was added by the Treaty of Trianon in 1920. Czechoslovakia inherited the greater part of the industries of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the new government carried out an extensive land reform, as a result of which the living conditions of the peasantry increasingly improved. However, the constitution of 1920 set up a highly centralized state and failed to take into account the issue of national minorities, and thus internal political life was dominated by the struggle of national minorities (especially the Hungarians and the Germans) against Czech rule. In foreign policy Czechoslovakia kept close contacts with France and initiated the foundation of the Little Entente in 1921.

18 SK Bar Kochba Bratislava

The most important representative of swimming sports in the First Czechoslovak Republic. The club was a participant in Czechoslovak championships, which it dominated in the late 1930s. The performance of SK Bar Kochba Bratislava swimmers is also documented by the world record in the 4 x 200m freestyle relay, which was achieved by four swimmers: Frucht, Baderle, Steiner, Foldes. They also won several Czechoslovak championships in relays. SK Bar Kochba was also the most successful from the standpoint of number of titles of Czechoslovak champion in individual disciplines. In 1936, despite being nominated, athletes of Jewish nationality didn't participate in the Olympic Games in Berlin. The Czechoslovak Olympic Committee didn't recognize this legitimate protest against the political situation in Germany, denounced it in the media and financially penalized the athletes.

19 Maccabi Sports Club in Czech Republic

The Maccabi World Union was founded in 1903 in Basel at the VI. Zionist Congress. In 1935 the Maccabi World Union had 100,000 members, 10,000 of which were in Czechoslovakia. Physical education organizations in Bohemia have their roots in the 19th century. For example, the first Maccabi gymnastic club in Bohemia was founded in 1899. The first sport club, Bar Kochba, was founded in 1893 in Moravia. The total number of Maccabi clubs in Bohemia and Moravia before WWI was fifteen. The Czechoslovak Maccabi Union was officially founded in June 1924, and in the same year became a member of the Maccabi World Union, located in Berlin.

20 Creation of the State of Israel

From 1917 Palestine was a British mandate. Also in 1917 the Balfour Declaration was published, which supported the idea of the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Throughout the interwar period, Jews were migrating to Palestine, which caused the conflict with the local Arabs to escalate. On the other hand, British restrictions on immigration sparked increasing opposition to the mandate powers. Immediately after World War II there were increasing numbers of terrorist attacks designed to force Britain to recognize the right of the Jews to their own state. These aspirations provoked the hostile reaction of the Palestinian Arabs and the Arab states. In February 1947 the British foreign minister Ernest Bevin ceded the Palestinian mandate to the UN, which took the decision to divide Palestine into a Jewish section and an Arab section and to create an independent Jewish state. On 14th May 1948 David Ben Gurion proclaimed the creation of the State of Israel. It was recognized immediately by the US and the USSR. On the following day the armies of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon attacked Israel, starting a war that continued, with intermissions, until the beginning of 1949 and ended in a truce.

21 Hitler's rise to power

In the German parliamentary elections in January 1933, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) won one-third of the votes. On 30th January 1933 the German president swore in Adolf Hitler, the party's leader, as chancellor. On 27th February 1933 the building of the Reichstag (the parliament) in Berlin was burned down. The government laid the blame with the Bulgarian communists, and a show trial was staged. This served as the pretext for ushering in a state of emergency and holding a re-election. It was won by the NSDAP, which gained 44% of the votes, and following the cancellation of the communists' votes it commanded over half of the mandates. The new Reichstag passed an extraordinary resolution granting the government special legislative powers and waiving the constitution for 4 years. This enabled the implementation of a series of moves that laid the foundations of the totalitarian state: all parties other than the NSDAP were dissolved, key state offices were filled by party luminaries, and the political police and the apparatus of terror swiftly developed.

22 Kristallnacht

Nazi anti-Jewish outrage on the night of 10th November 1938. It was officially provoked by the assassination of Ernst vom Rath, third secretary of the German embassy in Paris two days earlier by a Polish Jew named Herschel Grynszpan. Following the Germans' engineered atmosphere of tension, widespread attacks on Jews, Jewish property and synagogues took place throughout Germany and Austria. Shops were destroyed; warehouses, dwellings and synagogues were set on fire or otherwise destroyed. Many windows were broken and the action therefore became known as Kristallnacht (Crystal Night). At least 30,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps in Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald and Dachau. Though the German government attempted to present it as a spontaneous protest and punishment on the part of the Aryan, i.e. non-Jewish population, it was, in fact, carried out by order of the Nazi leaders.

23 Schutzstaffel (SS)

  Created in 1925 as part of the SA as an elite organizations reporting directly to Hitler. The SS had the main responsibility for the mass murder of the residents of occupied countries. The SS was pronounced a  criminal organization by the international tribunal in Nuremberg.

24 German Invasion of Poland

The German attack of Poland on 1st September 1939 is widely considered the date in the West for the start of World War II. After having gained both Austria and the Bohemian and Moravian parts of Czechoslovakia, Hitler was confident that he could acquire Poland without having to fight Britain and France. (To eliminate the possibility of the Soviet Union fighting if Poland were attacked, Hitler made a pact with the Soviet Union, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.) On the morning of 1st September 1939, German troops entered Poland. The German air attack hit so quickly that most of Poland's air force was destroyed while still on the ground. To hinder Polish mobilization, the Germans bombed bridges and roads. Groups of marching soldiers were machine-gunned from the air, and they also aimed at civilians. On 1st September, the beginning of the attack, Great Britain and France sent Hitler an ultimatum - withdraw German forces from Poland or Great Britain and France would go to war against Germany. On 3rd September, with Germany's forces penetrating deeper into Poland, Great Britain and France both declared war on Germany.

25 Anti-Jewish laws in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

In March 1939, there lived in the Protectorate 92,199 inhabitants classified according to the so-called Nuremberg Laws as Jews. On 21st June 1939, Konstantin von Neurath, the Reich Protector, passed the so-called Edict Regarding Jewish Property, which put restrictions on Jewish property. On 24th April 1940, a government edict was passed which eliminated Jews from economic activity. Similarly like previous legal changes it was based on the Nuremburg Law definitions and limited the legal standing of Jews. According to the law, Jews couldn't perform any functions (honorary or paid) in the courts or public service and couldn't participate at all in politics, be members of Jewish organizations and other organizations of social, cultural and economic nature. They were completely barred from performing any independent occupation, couldn't work as lawyers, doctors, veterinarians, notaries, defense attorneys and so on. Jewish residents could participate in public life only in the realm of religious Jewish organizations. Jews were forbidden to enter certain streets, squares, parks and other public places. From September 1939 they were forbidden from being outside their home after 8pm. Beginning in November 1939 they couldn't leave, even temporarily, their place of residence without special permission. Residents of Jewish extraction were barred from visiting theaters and cinemas, restaurants and cafés, swimming pools, libraries and other entertainment and sports centers. On public transport they were limited to standing room in the last car, in trains they weren't allowed to use dining or sleeping cars and could ride only in the lowest class, again only in the last car. They weren't allowed entry into waiting rooms and other station facilities. The Nazis limited shopping hours for Jews to twice two hours and later only two hours per day. They confiscated radio equipment and limited their choice of groceries. Jews weren't allowed to keep animals at home. Jewish children were prevented from visiting German, and, from August 1940, also Czech public and private schools. In March 1941 even so-called re-education courses organized by the Jewish Religious Community were forbidden, and from June 1942 also education in Jewish schools. To eliminate Jews from society it was important that they be easily identifiable. Beginning in March 1940, citizenship cards of Jews were marked by the letter 'J' (for Jude - Jew). From 1st September 1941 Jews older than six could only go out in public if they wore a yellow six-pointed star with 'Jude' written on it on their clothing.

26 Yellow star – Jewish star in Protectorate

On 1st September 1941 an edict was issued according to which all Jews having reached the age of six were forbidden to appear in public without the Jewish star. The Jewish star is represented by a hand-sized, six-pointed yellow star outlined in black, with the word 'Jude' in black letters. It had to be worn in a visible place on the left side of the article of clothing. This edict came into force on 19th September 1941. It was another step aimed at eliminating Jews from society. The idea's author was Reinhard Heydrich himself.

27 Death march

In fear of the approaching Allied armies, the Germans tried to erase all evidence of the concentration camps. They often destroyed all the facilities and forced all Jews regardless of their age or sex to go on a death march. This march often led nowhere and there was no specific destination. The marchers received neither food nor water and were forbidden to stop and rest at night. It was solely up to the guards how they treated the prisoners, if and what they gave them to eat and they even had in their hands the power on the prisoners' life or death. The conditions during the march were so cruel that this journey became a journey that ended in the death of most marchers.

28 Prague Spring

A period of democratic reforms in Czechoslovakia, from January to August 1968. Reformatory politicians were secretly elected to leading functions of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSC). Josef Smrkovsky became president of the National Assembly, and Oldrich Cernik became the Prime Minister. Connected with the reformist efforts was also an important figure on the Czechoslovak political scene, Alexander Dubcek, General Secretary of the KSC Central Committee (UV KSC). In April 1968 the UV KSC adopted the party's Action Program, which was meant to show the new path to socialism. It promised fundamental economic and political reforms. On 21st March 1968, at a meeting of representatives of the USSR, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, East Germany and Czechoslovakia in Dresden, Germany, the Czechoslovaks were notified that the course of events in their country was not to the liking of the remaining conference participants, and that they should implement appropriate measures. In July 1968 a meeting in Warsaw took place, where the reformist efforts in Czechoslovakia were designated as "counter-revolutionary." The invasion of the USSR and Warsaw Pact armed forces on the night of 20th August 1968, and the signing of the so-called Moscow Protocol ended the process of democratization, and the Normalization period began.

29 August 1968

On the night of 20th August 1968, the armies of the USSR and its Warsaw Pact allies (Poland, Hungary, East Germany and Bulgaria) crossed the borders of Czechoslovakia. The armed intervention was to stop the 'counter-revolutionary' process in the country. The invasion resulted in many casualties, in Prague alone they were estimated at more than 300 injured and around 20 deaths. With the occupation of Czechoslovakia ended the so-called Prague Spring - a time of democratic reforms, and the era of normalization began, another phase of the totalitarian regime, which lasted 21 years.

30 Lidove Noviny (People’s News)

The oldest of the contemporary Czech newspapers, founded at the end of 1893 by lawyer Adolf Stransky in Brno. Before WWII Lidove Noviny became a modern daily of the Czech democratic intelligentsia. Later free-thinking journalists were forced out by the Nazi protectors, and then by communist authorities. In 1959 its publication was stopped. The first attempt at resurrection in 1968 was halted by Soviet intervention. Re-registration of this highly regarded publication took place in 1990.

31 Mlada Fronta

The idea of the creation of a young people's publisher came about during World War II in the illegal Youth Movement for Freedom. For this purpose they selected a printer's oin Panska Street in Prague, where the Nazi daily "Der Neue Tag" was being published, and in May 1945 they occupied it and began publishing their own daily paper. The first editor-in-chief of Mlada Fronta was the poet Vladimir Horec. Up until the end of 1989, the daily paper Mlada Fronta was published by the publishing house of the same name. From September 1990, the readership base and editorial staff were transferred over to the MaFra company, which began to publish a daily paper with a similar name, Mlada Fronta DNES.

32 Lustig, Arnost (b

1926): Czech-Jewish writer. 1950-58 a reporter of Czechoslovak Radio; 1961-68 scriptwriter for Barrandov Film Studios (Prague). Emigrated in 1968, from 1972 he lectured on film and literature at the American University in Washington.

33 Alexander Dubcek (1921-1992)

Slovak and Czechoslovak politician and statesman, protagonist of the reform movement in the CSSR. In 1963 he became the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Slovakia. With his succession to this function began the period of the relaxation of the Communist regime. In 1968 he assumed the function of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and opened the way for the influence of reformist elements in the Communist party and in society, which had struggled for the implementation of a democratically pluralist system, for the resolution of economic, social and societal problems by methods suitable for the times and the needs of society. Intimately connected with his name are the events that in the world received the name Prague Spring. After the occupation of the republic by the armies of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact on 21st August 1968, he was arrested and dragged to the USSR. On the request of Czechoslovak representatives and under pressure from Czechoslovak and world public opinion, they invited him to the negotiations between Soviet and Czechoslovak representatives in Moscow. After long hesitation he also signed the so-called Moscow Protocol, which set the conditions and methods of the resolution of the situation, which basically however meant the beginning of the end of the Prague Spring.

34 Herzl, Theodor (1860-1904)

Hungarian-born Jewish playwright, journalist and founder of the World Zionist Organization (WZO). His thought of realizing the idea of political Zionism was inspired by among other things the so-called Dreyfus affair. In the polemical essay The Jewish State (Der Judenstaat, 1896) he declares that Jews aren't only a community of believers, but also a nation with the right to its own territory and state. He was of the opinion that in the anti-Jewish mood extant in Europe, it was not possible to solve the Jewish question via either civic emancipation or cultural assimilation. After a significant diplomatic effort he succeeded in the calling of the 1st International Jewish Congress in Basil on 29-31st August 1897. The congress accepted the "Basel Program" and elected Herzl as its first president. Herzl wasn't the first to long for the return of the Jews to Palestine. He was, however, able to not only support the idea, but also to promote it politically; without his efforts the creation of the new state of Israel in the Palestine on 14th May 1948 would not have been possible. Theodor Herzl died in 1904 at the age of 44 and was buried in a Jewish cemetery in Vienna. In 1949 his remains were transported to Jerusalem, where they were laid to rest on a mountain that today carries his name (Mount Herzl).

35 Six-Day-War

(Hebrew: Milhemet Sheshet Hayamim), also known as the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, Six Days War, or June War, was fought between Israel and its Arab neighbors Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. It began when Israel launched a preemptive war on its Arab neighbors; by its end Israel controlled the Gaza Strip, the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. The results of the war affect the geopolitics of the region to this day.
36 Yom Kippur War (1973 Arab-Israeli War): (Hebrew: Milchemet Yom HaKipurim), also known as the October War, the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, and the Ramadan War, was fought from 6th October (the day of Yom Kippur) to 24th October 1973, between Israel and a coalition of Egypt and Syria. The war began when Egypt and Syria launched a surprise joint attack in the Sinai and Golan Heights, respectively, both of which had been captured by Israel during the Six-Day-War six years earlier. The war had far-reaching implications for many nations. The Arab world, which had been humiliated by the lopsided defeat of the Egyptian-Syrian-Jordanian alliance during the Six-Day-War, felt psychologically vindicated by its string of victories early in the conflict. This vindication, in many ways, cleared the way for the peace process which followed the war. The Camp David Accords, which came soon after, led to normalized relations between Egypt and Israel - the first time any Arab country had recognized the Israeli state. Egypt, which had already been drifting away from the Soviet Union, then left the Soviet sphere of influence almost entirely.
37 Severing the diplomatic ties between the Eastern Block and Israel: After the 1967 Six-Day-War, the Soviet Union cut all diplomatic ties with Israel, under the pretext of Israel being the aggressor and the neighboring Arab states the victims of Israeli imperialism. The Soviet-occupied Eastern European countries (Eastern Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Bulgaria) conformed to the verdict of the Kremlin and followed the Soviet example. Diplomatic relations between Israel and the ex-Communist countries resumed after the fall of communism.
38 Velvet Revolution: Also known as November Events, this term is used for the period between 17th November and 29th December 1989, which resulted in the downfall of the Czechoslovak communist regime. A non-violent political revolution in Czechoslovakia that meant the transition from Communist dictatorship to democracy. The Velvet Revolution began with a police attack against Prague students on 17th November 1989. That same month the citizen's democratic movement Civic Forum (OF) in Czech and Public Against Violence (VPN) in Slovakia were formed. On 10th December a government of National Reconciliation was established, which started to realize democratic reforms. On 29th December Vaclav Havel was elected president. In June 1990 the first democratic elections since 1948 took place.

39 St

Agnes of Bohemia: The daughter of the Czech king Premysl Otakar I. During her entire life Agnes of Bohemia was active as a member of the Clarisian Order, she also significantly participated in the public life of her times, had significant influence on among others her brother, King Vaclav [Wenceslaus] I the One-eyed. Agnes was also behind the fact that the burial ground of Czech kings was transferred from the St. Vitus Cathedral at the Prague Castle to the Clarisian convent Na Frantisku. Agnes of Bohemia died in 1282. Soon after her death Agnes began to be considered a saint by the Czech people, it was believed that numerous miracles were happening at her intercession. The canonization of Agnes was attempted, unsuccessfully beginning with Jan Lucembursky, then his son Charles IV, and later for example Leopold II of the Habsburgs - it wasn't until 1874 that the Archbishop of Prague, Cardinal B.J. Schwarzenberg managed to have Agnes beatified - she was then proclaimed a Saint on 12th November 1989 by Pope John Paul II.

40 Slansky trial

In the years 1948-1949 the Czechoslovak government together with the Soviet Union strongly supported the idea of the founding of a new state, Israel. Despite all efforts, Stalin's politics never found fertile ground in Israel; therefore the Arab states became objects of his interest. In the first place the Communists had to allay suspicions that they had supplied the Jewish state with arms. The Soviet leadership announced that arms shipments to Israel had been arranged by Zionists in Czechoslovakia. The times required that every Jew in Czechoslovakia be automatically considered a Zionist and cosmopolitan. In 1951 on the basis of a show trial, 14 defendants (eleven of them were Jews) with Rudolf Slansky, First Secretary of the Communist Party at the head were convicted. Eleven of the accused got the death penalty; three were sentenced to life imprisonment. The executions were carried out on 3rd December 1952. The Communist Party later finally admitted its mistakes in carrying out the trial and all those sentenced were socially and legally rehabilitated in 1963.

41 Czech-German Future Fund

A multi-state institution resulting directly from the Czech-German Declaration of 21st January 1997. By laws passed by the Czech and German governments it was founded on 29th December 1997 as an endowment fund according to Czech statutes, headquartered in Prague.


 

Morris Schiff

Morris Schiff
Tallinn
Estonia
Date of the interview: March 2006
Interviewer: Ella Levitskaya

Morris Schiff is living by himself. He suggested being interviewed in the premises of the Jewish community of Estonia as he might feel uncomfortable for the mess in old bachelor’s house 1. Morris eagerly agreed to tell about his life and the life of his family. His tale was long and detailed. Morris is of short height, bald, with childish gullible eyes. He is very sociable and easy-going. In spite of having finished five grades of compulsory school, Morris read a lot. He was especially keen on history. It is interesting to talk with him. His views on many things are unconventional. Morris daily goes to the synagogue. There are a lot of his friends there. He does not have relatives. Morris studies the history of his family. He also asked me to convey the following message in his biography. His grandmother’s brother Morris Klein, after whom Morris was named, had lived in Vienna, Austria, until 1930s. Then he immigrated to the USA. This is all Morris Schiff knows about Morris Klein. He would like to find out more about the person, after whom he had been named. Morris Schiff would be happy, if someone could tell him about Morris Klein.

My family background

The Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

There was time when I was interested in origin of my surname, Schiff. In German Schiff means a ship. This surname is common in many countries where German is spoken, but mostly Jews carry it. In my opinion, the surname originated in Frankfurt upon Main. I was in the Jewish block of the city Frankfurt upon Main in  Germany, and noticed that there were drawings instead of numbers on the building. There was a house with a picture of ship. I was told that if the person used to live in that place and then left he was given the nickname «Schiff» – «ship». It think it must be the origin of my surname. I also found out that about 400-500 years ago there was rabbi Schiff in this district. All my ancestors (up to the line of my paternal grandparents) were the subjects of Hungarian and Austrian Empire. My paternal great grandmother Mrs Klein, was a businesslike woman and owned one of the best leather haberdashery stores in Vienna. There is hardly anything I know about great grandfather. He died at a rather young age, when his kids were small and great grandmother raised all her children and managed to come into money.

Grandmother’s parents had one son and a lot of daughters. I even do not know how many sisters grandmother had. My grandmother Adel Elisabeth Klein was born on 8 December 1879 in Vienna. Great grandparents were Jews, but all their daughters were baptized for some reason, though their son remained a Jew. I do not remember what his name was exactly: Moritz in German or Maurice – the French way. I hardly know anything about him. I do not know when he was born and when he died. Morris was wealthy. That wealth was the merit of paternal grandmother, and after her death Morris was the main heir. He inherited one of the best leather haberdashery stores in Vienna and shares of train station. I cannot tell when he exactly left Vienna, either when fascists occupied Vienna or before that. At any rate he settled in America before the outbreak of Great Patriotic War. Being sagacious, Morris did not have to flee in the 1930s like other European Jews. He even managed to take his capital out of the country. In America he became even richer. Morris remained single and had no children. Of course, there were a lot of heirs after his death- nephews and nieces. My grandmother, his only direct heir had been dead by that time, so nobody informed us of Morris’s death. This is all I know about Morris Klein. I would like to know more about the person after whom I had been named: his correct name, his birth place, date of his death and his burial place. I would be happy, if someone could tell me about him.

Great grandmother was very businesslike and entrepreneurial. She worked very hard and finally she became the owner of the posh store in the center of Vienna. Great grandmother did not rely on manager and ran the store herself. She purchased the goods, and serviced the most respectable clients herself. According to the family legend, the paramour of heir of the throne, the son of Emperor Franz Joseph II,was one of her customers. I think, great grandmother’s store really must have been the best, if such person went there.

Of course, my great grandparents looked into good education for their children. At any rate, my grandmother, apart from mother tongue, German, she spoke fluent English and French. My father said that she composed verses in three languages. I think that she knew some more foreign languages. French was her favorite.

In childhood grandmother had some deceased (I think it was scarlet fever), which resulted in hearing problems. She was not deaf, but just dull of hearing as they say. That is why it was hard for her parents to marry her off.. Finally my future grandfather Heinrik-August Schiff wooed to her. Grandfather was much older than grandmother; he was born on 3 January 1870. For some reason, grandmother did not like him and she refused to marry him. It was very hard to argue with great grandmother. She was a dictator, and it never let unpunished those who were against her.  Grandmother said that great grandmother always used to tell her daughters that she gave them life and they were ought to do what she said,but grandmother was flat and even took some poison, which did not help. Doctors saved grandmother, but she became completely deaf after having taken the poison. So, great grandmother had my grandmother marry grandfather. Their wedding was in Vienna on 10 March 1898.

My great grandmother was a real dictator and had her daughters get married without their accord. There was only one of her daughters who had love wedlock. I do not remember her name. Grandmother said about her sister that she hade mother’s character – was very decisive and tough. She refused from her dowry and inheritance, and married a poor man, whom she loved. She was the only one from the sisters who had a happy marriage. Great grandmother did not feel her fault for ruining her daughter’s life. She felt that she was guilty only because of one daughter. Great grandmother married one of her daughters off to a bankrupt aristocrat, who was allured by the dowry. Money even made him forget that his future wife was a baptized Jew. When he married her, he constantly reproached her for that, even beat. Once, he hit her head with a whip so hard that she became insane and had to stay in the mental asylum till the end of her days. Great grandmother tried to redress her wrong-doing and put her daughter in the best clinic, but still it was of no help.

The family moved to Estonia before my father was born. We settled in Valga, in the town bordering on Latvia. At that time all that territory, both Latvia and Estonia were part of Russian Empire. German and Russian were spoken there. German was a mother tongue for grandmother, but she did not know Russian at all, but in spite of her deafness she managed to learn the language. Grandmother was a housewife, which was customary for those times. My father Max Schiff was born in Valga on 30 November 1903. His full name was René-Maks-Aleksander-Johann. In 1910 father’s younger brother was born in Valga. I cannot recall his name. The matter is that we never talked about him in the family. Both of them were baptized when they were born.

Before the outbreak of World War One my grandfather kept a café at the train station in Valga. In 1914 World War One was unleashed. Neither grandfather no grandmother had Russian citizenship; both of them were the subjects of Austrian and Hungarian empire. They were not affected by that before the war and did not see the sense in getting Russian citizenship. During the war their family was deported to Irkutsk [far north of Russia, about 4500 km from Moscow] for the being the citizens of bellicose to Russia country. They stayed there during the war and then moved back to Estonia, but not in Valga, but Tallinn. It was the period of war for Estonian independence 2, and only during that time3 grandmother and grandfather got Estonian citizenship. My father and his brother were subjects of Estonia, since there were born there.

I would not say that the family of father’s parents was rich, but they were well off rather. They did not have their own lodging in Tallinn, so they rented a big apartment in the center of Tallinn. In spite of the fact that grandmother had big hearing problems, they had two grand-pianos and she could play the piano very well. She took care children and of the household, while grandfather earned money. Grandfather kept had a small café in Tallinn in Chernogolov club (there was an aristocratic club). Grandparents were very different. Grandmother must have been like her mother- tightfisted, but grandfather knew how to maker money and how to spend them. He was a womanizer, he liked guests and feasts. It is strange that they had lived together for such a long time. It seems to me that in 1939 grandfather divorced grandmother, but he often called on her to have a cup of coffee. He lived with a lover, who was much younger than he was. She was about 30. Grandfather died in 1941 couple of weeks before Germans entered Tallinn. He had an easy death- his heart stopped beating. He was much luckier than many Tallinn Jews – he was not killed, but died at the eleventh hour, not to see the atrocity of German occupation.

Father and his brother studied at lyceum in Tallinn. Having finished lyceum father entered Tartu University. I do not know what department he entered. When he was a little over 20, being in the third year, it turned out that he had tuberculosis, at that time it was fraught with lethality. At that time almost all TB patients died.. Father quitted studies. My great grandmother from Vienna interfered. She was a very wealth woman and sent father to the sanatorium in Alps having covered all expenses. Tuberculosis was treated there,but they only took patients with healthy heart and stomach. The treatment cost a lot of money though it was without any medicine. The sanatorium was in the mountains. No matter how cold it was outside the patients had to stay outside all the time, wrapped up in the quilts. They inhaled mountain air and that the treatment. Another important constituent was nutrition. They had to eat a lot, even if people were not hungry, they were made to eat. There were stables by the sanatorium, where horses were milked for koumys. Apart from food, each patient had to drink one liter of koumis per day. People really got cured. My father had stayed there for half a year until full convalescence. After that he never had problems with his lungs. Though, in sanatorium he got in habit to eat a lot and his good appetite was always there.

After sanatorium father had spent one year in Vienna as great grandmother insisted. He liked Vienna very much. Great grandmother was entrepreneurial. She was the only who made money and she enjoyed respect of businessmen. As for her agents, the Christians, she could enter their place only from the back door, because she was a Jew. These were such humiliating rules for the Jews and even money could not change it. A Jew had no right to go to the ball room. My father was baptized and those rules did not apply to him. He was a habitué of the dancing parties. He was often invited there as he was considered to be a rich heir. Great grandmother was cruel. He did not let father live in her apartment, she rented some lodging for him.. Father told me about one case, which characterized great grandmother. Once father came home and saw that the door was burgled in. He came in the room and saw that his desk was open and papers were all over the floor. Father could not get what was happening. The neighbors told him that some old lady came, rang the door and when nobody answered, she called the janitor, pointed at the door and said: «Break!». Great grandmother came to see what her grandson was doing. She had the toughest character.

Only in Vienna father found out that he came of Jewish family and that his great grandmother was a Jew and her son Morris was a Jew. Father did not know anything about his Jewish origin before that. It changed his life. Probably in Vienna he decided that he would marry only a Jew. At any rate when he was back home, he started looking for a bride among Jewish girls, without telling anything to his parents. Grandmother would definitely be against that marriage. My father met mother by chance. Mother told me that during the shopping father came up to her and asked her why she had such accent when speaking Estonian. Mother lied to dad saying that she was from Russia. In actuality she was born in Estonian town Narva [about 200 km from Tallinn], bordering on Russia. My mother really spoke bad Estonian and her Russian was no so good. Narva dialect differed from typical Russia. Somehow mother felt awkward to tell father the truth. This is how they met and started seeing each other.

I do not know much about mother’s family. My maternal grandmother’s name is Gita, nee Garus. Her father’s name was Saul Garus in grandmother’s words, but in her birth record, which was lost during WW2, his name was Saveliy. Thus, I do not know what his name really was.  Great grandfather had served in the tsarist army for 25 years 4. During Crimean war 5 he was awarded with St. George Cross 6 and was given honorary title « Hero of Sevastopol». I cannot tell for sure how many St. George Crosses great grandfather had, either 3 or 4. There was a law in tsarist Russia, according to which the cavaliers of St. George cross were granted land plots from the state. That rule worked for everybody, but Jews. Nevertheless, grandfather got the land. I do not know whether it was an award or offense as he was given the land without the right of entailment- he was not entitle to demise him or sell, but he had the right to use it. The land plot was in the remote place. The nearest house was three kilometers away. Besides, great grandfather was offered some position in the state,which was rare with the Jews. He was a light-keeper on Neva, in the vicinity of Ladoga lake. While great grandfather was working there, his family used that land. They had a cow and other husbandry. The family ate what they had grown.

There is little I know about Seviov. It is as pity. Grandfather, must have been a very good and unusual person. He was born in 1868 in the city of Gdov, Pskov, oblast, Russia, about [700 km from Moscow, close to Estonian border]. I even do not know if it still exists. Great grandfather was also the soldier of the tsarist army. He had served for 25 years. When he was decommissioned from the army, he married. There was a pale of settlement in Russia 7, and Jews were no allowed to live anywhere they were willing to. This did not refer to those Jews who had served in the army- they were permitted to chose from larger territory of Russia. There were several children, but I did not know them. Grandfather was a tailor. He moved to Narva from Gdov. I do not know how grandparents met. Probably it was a prearranged marriage. When they got married, grandmother moved to Narva. Grandmother, as most of the married Jewish women was a homemaker,. She gave birth to children, raised them and took care of the house. Grandparents did not have their own house. The rented the 2nd floor of the loghouse from one Estonian man. The first floor of the house was occupied by the landlord and his family. There were 7 children in the family. The eldest son was Isaac, then was daughter Esfir was born on, the third was my future mother Rebecca, born on 1 February 1906. At the end of 1907 son Lazar was born in son and in couple of years another son, Mulya, and then another one, Abram. The last child was daughter Ida.

All children got religious education. Boys went to cheder and daughters were taught by. All children went to the elementary school only. Only Lazar got a secular education, whom grandfather sent to lyceum. Lazar was very gifted since childhood. Grandfather paid his son’s tuition, but there was no money for the books. Lazar managed to become the second top student in the lyceum without having his own books.

Shortly after WW1 elder son Isaac left for Russia to seek fortune. When revolution took place in Russia 8, Isaac happened to be on the soviet territory and was separated from his family. First he wrote letters to the family, especially to Esfir, as they were bonded. Then it became dangerous for the citizens of Soviet Union to keep in touch with the relatives abroad 9, and they stopped writing to each other. Esfir was very worried thinking that Isaac was dead., but there were other people in Estonia, whose relatives were living in the USSR, and they also got no letters. Suddenly, one letter came from Isaac. It resembled the headlines of the soviet newspaper- eulogy to the soviet regime. The last phrase was: a lot of food, full abundance, especially there is much kadoches [editor’s note: in Yiddish kadoches mean trouble]. The last phrase contained the main message in the letter. The censorship let the letter go. It was great that the censor was not a Jew. There were no other letters from Isaac and did not know what was happening with him.

Grandfather was very religious. Narva Jew respected him, listened to his words, though he was a simple man. He was considered almost a saint. He kept the door open for people and almost anybody could come to him for a support. If the new-comer did not have a place to stay, he went to grandpa. He was given food and a place to sleep. Of course, grandfather always tried helping people the best way he could. He was the only bread-winner in the family, though the family was large. If grandfather could not help anybody himself, he went to other Jews and said: «Need help!». If grandfather said it, noboby refused him. There was a trarist regiment in Narva and there were some Jewish soldiers. They were given absence without leave, where could they go in a strange? Grandpa always had a door open to them, especially in Sabbath or on the days of Jewish holidays. We had a lot of people in our house on Jewish people. Some people forgot about grandfather, but he was friends with some of them. Once, one Jew, whom grandfather helped, left for America. He got settled well there and started suggesting grandfather move to America with the family. He also offered his support. Grandfather started processing the documents for departure. It was the year of 1913. Pictures were needed for the documents to be processed, and grandfather went to rabbi to ask where he could take picture for the photograph. Of course, rabbi gave him permission. It was the only photograph of grandfather that I have. Grandfather was 46 in that picture. When grandfather got the documents, WW1 was unleashed and they could not leave. In 1920 grandfather Iosif Seviov died. He was buried according to the Jewish rite in the Jewish cemetery in Narva. All Narva Jews came to his funeral. According to the Jewish law, the defunct cannot be brought in the synagogue with the exception of the prophets. The Narva Jewish community, which was rather large, made grandfather equal to the prophet, and brought him in the synagogue. They say it was very rare. Then they carried his coffin in hands for about 5 or 7 kilometers to the grave. It was a big honor for my grandfather for his living like a saint and helping people, taking care of those who needed support. Nobody helped the orphaned family. Grandmother remained by herself with five children. She did not have any profession, and she started working as a seamstress. There was not enough money and soon family turned into very poor. The family starved, had no money for the rent. They had lived for three years without paying for the rent. The Estonian landlord helped them a lot. He had not asked them to pay for accommodation. The eldest sister Esfir was the first to leave for Tallinn. Soon the whole family went there. Children started working and save money. One day they came in Narva and paid off the debt to the landlord. He told them: «Children took after their father ».

Mother had worked since childhood. First she helped grandmother about the house. When she grew up a little bit she sold the berries and fruit in the resort area of Narva. Mother went to dachas and offered berries for sale. Once, mother came to one dacha and the hostess wanted to buy the whole punnet from her. Mother honestly warned her that the berries on the top were nice and a little bit stamped at the bottom. The hostess, a very sweet lady, praised my mother for honesty and said to revert to her when she needed work later on in Tallinn and gave her address. When the family moved to Tallinn, mother came up to her and that lady helped her get a job of the manicurist apprentice. Nobody trained her, mother was just a maid. She cleaned the workshop and at home, was a baby-sitter for her children. When mother cleaned in the salon, she watched how the manicurist worked and gradually she learned this profession so well that the hostess offered her a job as a manicurist. With time, mother became one of the best manicurists in the city.

My parents did not date for a long time before father proposed to her. At that time father decided that his children should be the Jews, but he was baptized himself. Father went through giur and took Judaism along with circumcision. When father told his kin that he was going to marry, they were strongly against it. Mother was a poor uneducated Jewish girl. Grandmother did not think her to be the perfect match. Grandmother even offered my mom money for her to turn down father’s proposal. Of course, mother took no money. Father’s younger brother was a member of Estonian fascist party. When he found out that father turned to Jewry, he started instigating grandparent even more, but my father had always been mulish and persistent. Then there were incessant scandals at home, he just left the house without taking nothing home.

My parents got married in 1930. The wedding was very modest, but in accordance with the Jewish right. Then father borrowed some money and had the ad printed in the paper that Max Schiff was married Rebecca Seviov. He did it because his brother spread the rumor in town that my mother was not the wife, but the lover of my father. Thus father decided to do away with that. After wedding the parents rented apartment Tallinn’s suburb Nőmme, as they did not have enough money to rent the apartment in Tallinn.

Growing up

At that time it was customary in Jewish families for women to be housewives. Husbands were supposed to be bread-winners. After getting married, mother decided to keep working. It was the right choice. Being one of the best manicurists in town, she had good clientele. Besides, she considered that lady should be independent in anyway. If she had no money, nor profession she was dependent. She did not want to be dependent of father. Of course, she did not work for some time after I was born. My grandmother Gita later started taking care of me and mother came back to work in the salon. I was born on 27 July 1931. I was named Morris after the brother of my paternal grandmother, the last agnate Jew. I do not know what father did for a living when he was single. When married, he became a traveling salesman. She was not a born salesman, but strange as it might be he did well. The merchants are businesslike people and they liked dealing with an honest man, whose word had weight. My father was the man for whom honor was dearer than life. But his character was very complicated. He was a dictator. It was easier to respect him than love. I do not know why, but father lost his job in a while. Fortunately, mother made pretty good money, which helped our family get buy. Father found a job only in a year.

Father did not keep in touch with his brother. In four weeks after getting married father had a heart attack, and grandmother besought grandpa to call on him and forgive me. After that parents’ relationship got better, but brother could not forgive father.

Probably, father loved me in a special way. He did not show it to me. He was very strict, even cruel at times- he never play with me, did not take me for a walk. He was very rigid even when I was a small child. He never repeated his instruction twice. If I failed to do what I was told the first time, I would get slapped in the best case. There were times, when father took a throng and beat me for 25 times in spite of the cries and tears of mother. After such chastisement I could not sit for couple of days. Usually we talked couple of minutes a day. Father put me in front of himself and told me to look in his eyes. He repeated once and the same the whole day: father said that I should remember that I was Jew and the second : his brother was no my uncle: then added that I should be interested in many things, study history, politics, but no joining any party.

We did not observe Jewish very strictly. Of course, on Sabbath mother lit candles and made a festive dinner. Jewish holidays were also marked in accordance with all traditions. Parents went to the synagogue on holidays. While we were in Nőmme, father did not take me with him. There was a synagogue in Tallinn, and parents thought it was too long of a trip to me. As soon as we moved in Tallinn in 1940 I began going to the synagogue with father. At times grandmother took me there. On holidays mother cooked traditional Jewish dishes. She had Pascal dishes, which were used once a year. In other times we did not observe kashrut. Of course, we did not eat pork, but we did not. have separate dishes for milk and meat. Mother said that rabbi came in our place one. He even did not want to have a cup of tea when he saw that mother did not have kosher dishes. She had to treat him to the cake that he brought to us as he refused from eating anything else.

When I reached school age, mother wanted me to go to the Jewish school. There was no such school in Nomme and we had to move to Tallinn. Father decided that I had to study in a state school, Estonian. Mother was not willing to argue with dad, and I went to Estonian school. I was fluent in Estonian and had no problem with that. I had another issue. I was a feeble child, which is apparently the reason for my small height. There were boys in my class, who teased, pushed me and hurt me when they had a chance. Other than that, I was treated fairly. The teachers liked me. I had two teachers- one taught compulsory subjects the other one –Bible. Being a Jew, I was not supposed to attend the latter. If it was the last class, I went home. If it was in the middle of the day, I gladly attended it. The things taught in that class I remember like engrossing fairy-tales.

I cannot say that there was anti-Semitism in Estonia. There were Jewish schools and lyceum. There were no restrictions for young Jewish people to enter educational institutions. The government gave Jews the cultural autonomy 10, which guaranteed their rights and liberties. There were practically no restrictions in the profession- trading, craftsmanship, medicine,law. There were equal ownership rights for Estonian and Jews. But there were prejudices. Officially there were no bans for the military officers, but actually were was not a single Jewish army officer. There was a top –secret instruction not to let the Jews become the officers. There were not only Estonians among the officers of the Estonian army − there were Russians, Germans, but no Jews. It was also hard for a Jew to serve the state. Thus, there was no full equality in Estonian republic. There was an interesting story. One Jew wanted to marry the officer of Estonian army. The government could not ban it. If for example the officer married a fallen woman, the marriage could not be banned, but he was dismissed. If he married a Jew, who would be baptized, he could stay in the army. If she remained a Jews, he would be dismissed. Probably it was almost like marrying a fallen woman. So, one lady married Estonian officer and got baptized. After baptism other Jews looked at her like at a traitor. So, she had no ties with Jewish community. They had a son. Then during occupation, her husband was the officer of German army and she had to hide in his parent’s house with her son. As a result, she stayed with her son, but her husband perished.

There was anti-Semitism in everyday situations. I was teased by the boys : «small green kike is running on the rope ». Yes, I was tiny, but why green. I had a green suit. I could not understand those words. Those who teased me probably, could not understand that either. Well, children! Where could they hear that- they could not have come up with that! I also remember one case when I was playing with my friend, Estonian girl, in the yard of our house. The neighboring yard was fenced. A young guy jumped over than fence with a pole. He was a sportsman. I was standing with my back turned to the fence and the girl cried out : watch out! I turned back and felt a prod in my back. That guy did it. I could hardly stand on my feet, and then the sportsman told me with spite «bloody Jew!». I was looking at him and could not get what my fault was. I will always remember how I was hurt. From that moment I had identified myself as a Jew.

The Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

In 1939 soviet military bases were constructed in Estonia 11. It is accounted for the fact that Germany was getting ready for war, and the bases were needed for defense. Then the bases were all over the country. But it did not affect the life of our family as well as the lives of other people in Estonia. In 1940 when Estonia was annexed to Soviet Union, the life of Estonian population was changed considerably. I do not agree with those who call this annexation occupation − as Estonian citizens had equal rights with Russians. Estonians held the main posts in the country, classes were taught in Estonian at schools and universities – what kind of occupants would have allowed that?! As usual, the occupants do not provided the same rights to the people of the country they occupy. The difference is huge. Of course, soviet people started to bring the same rules in Estonia as anywhere else in the Soviet Union. People were arrested, the property of the rich was seized, and people were evicted from their own houses. Then there was deportation of Estonian population 12 − on 14 June 1941 before the outbreak of war, Several thousands of Estonian and Jewish people were deported. Men were sent to barb-wired camp Gulag 13, where the lethal rate was very high. There were very few survivors. I do not have exact information, without which the estimate is very superficial. The families of Gulag prisoners were exiled. Some of them also died, but there were not as many deaths as in the camp. Probably the actions would have taken place further on and the attack of Germany on USSR on 22 July 1941 14 frustrated Stalin’s plans. He did not think of deportation at that moment. At that time we moved to from Nőmme and rented an apartment. Our family was lucky- we were rather well-off, but not rich as we had neither own house nor enterprise. Nobody was arrested nor exiled. They just took the money from paternal grandmother’s bank account. Maybe it was influenced by the fact that my uncle Lazar, mother’s brother, was the member of the banned communistic party in Estonian time. He was deputy commander of NKVD 15 of Estonia, the commander was Jakobson, also a Jew.

The family of mother’s elder sister Esfir also suffered from soviet regime. She was married to Abram Frank, whose family moved to Estonia from Latvia a long time ago. Fran’s eldest brother was wealthy. He owned textile factory in Tallinn. Two more brothers were very well-off. They had their own houses, only Abram worked hard to earn his bread and butter. He was a shoe-maker. He had his own workshop, so the family lived comfortably. Then he acted foolishly: moved to another district and lost his clients, and could get the new customers. The equipment and materials were purchased from loan. He failed to payoff the loan and went bust soon. He started working at a shoe factory and had to give his entire salary to the bank to payoff the loan, but still he could get out of that situation and early 1939 he managed to payoff all the debts and purchase workshop. Soon, the soviet regime cam to power and his workshop was sequestrated. He was lucky not to be sent in the camp. He went to work to the shoe factory.

My father was a traveling salesman- all commercial enterprises were owned by state, therefore his profession was not needed. He was offered a position of the director of store. Father had never dealt with such work, but he cope wit than. Then he was in charge of two stores. Tallinn denizens worked there in good faith. They did not steal in contrast to soviet people. So, father got along with them.

My uncle Lazar, mother’s brother, was a big cheese during soviet time. In 1936 entered communist party, which was banned in Estonia at that time. My uncle was an ardent communist, who were rare. When Estonia became soviet, he was promoted very swiftly, first in the party, then in trade. At that time in hard post soviet times, uncle never took advantage of his position. He also demanded that his subordinates were honest and decent.

There were few changes in my life. I went to state Estonian school. Though, during soviet regime the Bible classes were canceled and the history of USSR was added. I went to the 3rd grade, and we did not have that subject yet. Once the teacher came in the class and said that all children would be enrolled in Young Oktobrist 16. I remembered that father told me not to join any party and I decided to refuse flatly. I did not know what that young oktobrist was. When I grew up, I understood in what trouble my parents could get with such a refusal. Fortunately, our consent was not needed. The next day the teacher came in and said that our class joined young oktobrist.

During the war

My father, who was fluent in German, closely followed the events in Germany from the moment when Hitler came to power. Of course, he was informed in a much better way than most Estonian Jews. I remember that he turned the radio on and listened in Hitler’s speech. I remember it vividly as I could not sleep because of that. Only due to the father we were evacuated. Mother understood nothing in politics. In Estonia local Germans had a good attitude towards Jews. Mother said, when she was a child, once a rich German, bought her a pair of boots, having noticed that her old ones were falling apart. Mother thought Germans to be kind people. She did not fear fascists at all. Most Estonian Jews were not going to leave thinking that the war would be put to an end soon. They thought that Germans would bring better life as the one after annexation. Our Tallinn rabbi doctor Aba Gomer 17 is to be blamed for some many deaths of Jewish people in concentration camps, who decided to stay in Tallinn. He was from Germany, where he was taught for rabbi. When he got educated, he came in Tallinn. He was a very good and decent man, so Jews people took his opinion into account. He helped many people. I remember, when mother’s younger sister Ida, was getting married in 1938, her wedding party was in rabbi’s house. When the war was unleashed, Aba Gomer addressed to the Jews in the synagogue and said that for Jews life was hard in any time, and with Germans it probably would not be that easy. But Germans would not kill the Jews?! He advised Jews to stay in Estonia, and he also stayed there with his family. I was told that Germans arrested him on the first day of German occupation of Tallinn. They teased him, walked him on the rope in the street. and killed him finally. The entire rabbi’s family perished. I think that Doctor Gomer is guilty. He had the right to make the decision for his family, but he oughtn’t give any advice to the others to stay in the city.

My mother, was against evacuation, like most of Jews. Why leaving the place, going for inconveniences, if even rabbi advised to stay? Moreover, things were rather calm during the first day of the war. My father did not have the right to leave as he was supposed to be drafted in the lines. He persuaded mother not to linger with evacuation. Mother would not agree and father knew if mom was so much against something, it was really hard to convince her. Father managed to talk her into leaving. Mother said she could not get why Germans should persecute her. Father objected that she could persecuted for her brother. Lazar was the second deputy minister of commerce and in 1940 he took part in the nationalization of Estonian banks. Besides, he was a communist. Father assured mother that having such a brother would not be come unnoticed and she should leave. Finally, mother agreed and taked into her other relatives to leave. Grandmother Gita, mother’s sister Esfir with her children and Ida. Both mother’s brothers went to the front as volunteers. Lazar was refused as he did not go through medical examination commission by the military enlistment office: he was a very sick man. He had stomach ulcer, and renal calculi. To boot, he had a head trauma in adolescence and he was semi-deaf and had poor eye-sight. In general, the army did not need anybody like that. Lazar was persistent saying that his place was in the lines until Estonia was liberated and he happened to be in the lines. He went through the war and was wounded, but he came home alive. А younger brother Abram perished in 1941 in the battle for Tallinn.

When we were leaving Tallinn, it was still calm in the city, no shooting. Evacuation was well organized, the echelons were at the stations. I remember that the train was moving very slowly as there were long stops at the stations. Besides, there were unplanned stops. During evacuation each person was allowed to carry 15 kilos of luggage. We had not got used to the Soviet union style and to break the rules without being punished. Mother weighed the luggage very scrupulously when packing our things, but in actually we could take more as long as we could carry it. Those, who took more things, lived more or less comfortably as compared with us. They could sell their things or exchange them for products, but we had to starve a bit. We came in Nizhnyaya Uvelka not far from Krasnoyarsk [Russia, about 3000 km from Moscow], where most of Estonian citizens were evacuated. I do not remember exactly how long it took us to get there, but it was definitely more than a month. Nizhnyaya Uvelka was a settlement in Taiga, consisting of one long street. We were temporarily housed in the building of local school. In a while, all evacuees were housed in with the locals. We got some food cards 18, but it was impossible to get by with that ration. Grandmother and other ladies went to the forest to pickup mushrooms, berries and some roots. Mother worked in the field. I had to go to school. I finished 3 classes of Estonian school but I had to go to the first grade of Russian school in Nizhnyaya Uvelka. I was about 11 years old. Children always easily learn foreign language and by the time I started school. Mother and grandmother spoke better Russian than Estonian as they used to live in Narva, which was a Russian spoken town.

Soon mother’s elder brother Isaac accidentally found us. He left Russia for Tashkent before revolution of 1917. One of all USSR papers Izvestia [one of the most popular communistic papers in the USSR, issued in the period of 1917- 1980s, with the circulation exceeding eight million copies] the article about Lazar was published along with his picture. Isaac saw that paper and wrote to the publisher. In their reply to him it turned out that it really went about his brother. Isaac managed to find us via inquiry bureau for evacuees. He sent us the letter and asked to come. Mother’s sisters decided to leave later, but mother, grandmother and I headed there. It was a long way. There were no trains available at that time, only locomotives. We had to sleep on our suitcases. Then grandmother’s suitcase was stolen. Isaac met us in Tashkent. Mother was very little when he left, so it was as if they got acquainted once again. Isaac turned out to be a very good person. We moved in his place. He found a job for mother, and helped us with anything he could. Apart from money and food card mother was also fed at the canteen, which was very handy for us at that time. I cannоt say that we had enough food to eat, but we were not starving as hard as most evacuated people. Soon, mother stopped working there as the person in charge of the canteen started demanding that mother should become his lover. Mother turned him down and he fired her right away. Our family started having really hard times.  Mother found a job, but it was not enough for us to get by. Mother and grandmother were practically starving trying to give extra piece of food to me. Isaac was drafted in the army at that time and the three of us stayed together. Then,
mother’s sister came. Eldest son of Esfir was drafted in the lines, when he was in Nizhnyaya Uvelka.. Esfir and Ida found lodging not far from our place.

We had eaten mostly pomice, sunflower seed cake, for couple of month. Pomace was the cheapest product and mother often bought it on the market. Now I cannot imagine eating it, but at the time it was the only food we could get. I had chafed tongue due to eating sunseed hull, which was the major component of sunflower seed cake. It was easier for us when they started to hand out bread and cereal by food cards. It still we were starving. People died like flies. They did not die by hunger, but because of having feeble organism, not being able to resist disease and famine. There was another adversity- lice. Soap was such a great luxury. If someone could get a small bar of soap one the market, it was used very economically. Water was also a luxury item. We had to walk for once kilometer to get to the water pump. There was another trouble in winter time- fire wood. There was a round iron stove in the middle of our. We had to buy fire wood in the wintertime to heat the room. A small bundle cost a lot of money. So, we were constantly freezing in wintertime. All of us understood what war was like. We were not the only ones, whose life was difficult. There were people who were in much worse conditions than we were. A lot of evacuees came in Tashkent and not everybody could find a place to live. Some people had to stay straight at the train station, and died there in lice and rags.

When we came in Tashkent, mother put our clothes and footwear aside. We put local ‘rags’ on. It we were really starving, mother took some of our clothes and sold on the market, to buy some food with that money. There were a lot of paupers by the market. Nobody gave them arms, some people even teased them. I saw somebody putting a stone in the box of the blind lady. There was only one time when I saw people give somebody to the pauper. It was an amazing case. When I was on my way to the market, I saw a person without two legs who was at the patched mat. There were a lot of cripples during the war, and people remained indifferent. The pauper was with his back turned to the passersby and it was amazing, but in that position one could tell that he was a decent man, whose life made him ask for alms. There was a hat by his mat and people came up and put money there. The pauper did not even take it right away. The hat happened to be full of money. I saw that pauper only once.

There was another case in Tashkent, which I will always remember. I was on my water to the water pump and saw a four-wheeler (something like we had in Tallinn, though it was covered with the yellowing Tashkent dust. I stopped and started looking. The horse looked terrible it was so meager that its bones were protruding like spears. That ‘skeleton with the skin’ was hardly moving. The top of the four-wheeler was open and there was a lady there with her arms flung open. It was sultry and the son was shining directly at her. The coachman was sleeping. The horse reached water pump and stopped. The coachman woke up, took the bucket and gave water to the horse. I think water was all that horse could get. Having been watered, the horse moved on. I looked at it with my mouth open. The horsy reached the next water pump  and stopped, the coachman watered it once again. I asked passersby what it was and I was explained that it was the “ambulance” !

I had to go to the 1st grade once again in Tashkent. I was short, though I was the oldest in the class. I was not a very good student, taking no interest in studies. All I cared was to be transferred in the next grade. When I was in the 3rd, we were to join pioneers 19. It was not the same way as it was with the young octobrists, each candidate for pioneers was to be discussed by the whole class. Having remembered father’s words, I refused from joining pioneers. First, my teacher and pioneer leader had a talk with me. Then the principal of the school taked to me. Thus, three adults again one boy. They called me on the carpet, trying to convince and threaten me. I was adamant and had not agreed to become a pioneer. If my dad told me not to join any party, I should obey him.

My father and I wrote letters to each other. Father was mobilized in the army after our departure for evacuation, but Stalin’s government did not trust the inhabitants of Estonia, recently annexed to USSR, and all mobilized in the army were sent in the labor camps 20. There the mobilized were in the position of the camp prisoners. They were given skimpy food for them just to stand on their feet. They were exhausted with physical labor. Many guys, even the young ones died by hunger, beriberi. Father was made to work with cement-mixer. I do not know how he managed to survive. In 1942 Estonian corps was established 21 in Red Army and saved those Estonians who had to trudge in labor camps. Father was also drafted there as a supply officer. He had great organizational skills. He was supposed to receive the freight in the rear and accompany them to the front. Fathers’ rank was the captain of Red Army. Once father managed to come to Nizhnyaya Uvelka, but we were gone. He found out from mother’s sister Ida that we had moved in Tashkent. He visited us there when he got a chance. It was a very short visit, he was just passing by. The second time father came in Tashkent was in 1944 when we had already left for Tallinn. That visit was doomed for father. He caught typhus fever there and died in the hospital on 19 December 1944. There was a typhus fever epidemic in Tashkent and people were buried in common graves. We even do not know where father was buried.

All of us had suffered from hunger, but it was the hardest on grandmother. She was very pious and had observed kashrut for a long time, even during the war. Even if she was to die by hunger, she would not touch non-kosher food. As the rest, they did not think of kosher or non-kosher- the only thing that mattered was how to survive. I was very feeble, got sick very often, so mother and grandmother gave some of their food. Life was also hard on mother, but she was young and healthy, but grandmother got feeble because of hunger and practically did not get out of bed. She died in 1943. I think she died by hunger. She was buried in Jewish cemetery in Tashkent, to be more exact it was Jewish section of the city cemetery 22. There were quite a few Jews, including the local ones. There were minian, and rabbi, who did things in accordance with the rite. We came to the cemetery in two days, but could not find her grave. There were so many people buried daily that they could put nameboards on time.

Only shortly before our departure from Tashkent, mother found a well-paid job. We had a feast on the day, when mother got her monthly salary: we bought potatoes and mother make the so-called stew from unpeeled potatoes. She boiled potatoes, added fried onion and some flour at the end. It was so delicious that I still remember that taste. It was very rare though. Usually life was very hard,.but nobody complained as we understood that it was the war. Notification on somebody’s death was worst than famine. When the mailman appeared, everybody was standing still, hoping that the news was not for them. We got those notifications twice. At the very begging of war mother’s brother Abram died in the battle near Tallinn. He was less than thirty. In the fall of 1943 mother’s elder brother Isaac died during Stalingrad battle 23.

We were constantly following the news from the front. When three were battles in Estonia, we listened to every roundup. We were so agog to come back home. As soon as the troops of Estonian corps liberated Estonia, mother and I started planning our return home. We only were the first to go. Mother’s sisters had to stay in Tashkent. We had been on the road for two months. We crossed Estonian border at night, when the train arrived in Narva, native city of my mother. We stayed there until dawn. When I looked out of the window, there was nothing I could see but the ruins. There was not a single building left in Narva. During the battles in Narva artillery was shooting incessantly from both sides and local people left the city. Very few people came back, therefore postwar Narva population consisted mostly of new-comers. Later when I was in Narva, I went to Jewish cemetery, where my grandfather Iosif Seviov was buried, but I could not find his grave. All of them were upturned by tomb raiders, who were seeking gold. I do not know if they found anything, but there was no grandfather’s grave.

After the war

We came in Tallinn. The house, where we used to live before the war, was still there. It was a wooden house in the center of city. Before war we rented an apartment there, but during soviet regime it was nationalized. We used to occupy three rooms, all of them were passage ones. That apartment was for one family only, but when we came back the apartment was turned into communal one 24 where three families wee living: one room was taken by mother and I, the second one by mother’s younger sister Ida and her husband, the third one by some Estonian family. It was very hard for everybody- we had to walk though somebody else’s room. Before evacuation Ida lived in the house of her husband’s father. When they were going in evacuation, her father-in-law, was against leaving. He said that he was sick old man and Germans would not touch him. He stayed in his place. When Germans came in for a search, he was in hiding and came back when Germans left. Once Germans came and did not find anybody. When they were about to leave, the neighbor ran after them and said that an old Jew was hiding next door. He was found and executed. When Ida and her husband came back and found out about it, they could not settle there, and decided to live with us.

Upon our return mother went to the place where my paternal grandmother used to live. Grandmother’s neighbor told that granny’s and father’s brother had died. My father’s brother perished in 1944 in the battles for Narva. He was a German officer during the war. He also was a member fascist party. He even managed to get some certificate saying that he was pure-blooded Aryan. Probably there were some rumors about my father having giur and his brother was to prove all the time that he was not only a good officer, fascist, but that he was the best to beyond suspicion. Probably that was the reason why he faced bullets. He was killed when the soviet troops were on their way back having liberated Narva. Grandmother also died because father became a Jew. She was very old and sick. Her legs were so swollen, but she could not walk. She was also as deaf as a doorpost. The neighbors said that a group of Estonian guys came to get grandmother. They cried out «Bloody Jew!», beat her, threw her from stairs and then demanded that she should go with them. She could not walk and they shot her straight in the yard. It happened in September 1941. Thus probably God does not forgive treason …

Mother started working as a manicurist in the salon and I went to school. I had completely forgotten Estonian during the years of evacuation, so I had to go to Russian school. I was down-in-the-mouth for being the eldest child in the class, though Tallinn. I was lice-ridden. We had tried to fight them in evacuation for three years without any result. Then I started having normal food in у Tallinn, they vanished. Then I was told, that lice did not like sated people, they breed on feeble and hungry people. Probably I got sick because of them. I was lucky that it happened in Tallinn. I would have died in Tashkent. I barely survived in Tallinn hospital being unconscious for 10 days. Then mother took me home and gave me good food. I missed almost two months of school. It was hard for me to study. Frankly speaking I was also rather lazy. Languages were the hardest for me. I spoke good Russian as I learnt it in evacuation, but my writing was poor. The teacher was surprised to see my mistakes as they were so untypical. As for Estonian, both oral and written were literate, but I did not have a very good vocabulary stock. My handwriting was poor. I was pretty good with humanitarian sciences, where I could retell things, but I it was hard for me to remember names and dates. It was also hard for me to learn poems by heart. I was bad at drawing. I had no ear for music. Before the war the music teacher in Estonian school told me to sit quiet and keep my mouth shut. Alas, I had no capabilities. Finally, I started cutting lessons.  Mother knew nothing about it of course. Only by the end of the fifth grade, she found out that I had poor marks in 5 subjects, and she went after me. When I came back home from school,, mother gave me some food, and had me study right away. She sat next to me and checked my homework. Though, I was not a gifted student, but such diligence was fruitful: I had good marks in almost all exams. I did not want to study when I was in the 6th grade. I told mother that I wanted to learn some profession. In 1947 I became apprentice of clock mender. It became my profession for the lifetime.

In 1946 mother got married. Her second husband Arthur Kartner was Estonian. I do not know how they met. All I know is that Arthur’s first wife was also a Jew,who perished during the war. He was a dictator, a very obstinate man, but faithful. He was really reliable and honest. Arthur never prevaricated. He was the officer in Estonian republic, lieutenant colonel of Estonian army. During the war for Estonian independence he fought against Bolsheviks 25, and was awarded with a Cross. When the Soviets came to power, he got notification form the military enlistment office. He indicated his name and the fact that he fought against Russians. He was given the title of sergeant in the army. Arthur was perturbed and filed a report: if his previous rank- lieutenant colonel - was not confirmed, that he was ready to be rank and file soldier rather than having the rank of his sergeant. Finally the commanders decided that he almost beyond draftees’ age and decide to that it was easier to decommission him from the army than solve the issue with the ranks. During the war Arthur was appointed representative of Estonia 26 in some city,where Estonians were evacuated. I saw how Genz, the representative of Estonia, lived in Tashkent – as if there was no war. His family had everything they need. The representatives of Estonia distributed humanitarian aids, which came from other countries and lived pretty comfortably. Arthur was an honest man. He could have died by hunger having the bags of food next to him. This is how maximalistic he was! He was so famished in evacuation and after war he had to be treated from dystrophy. He was very decent man, but there were very few women who could live with him. He even washed dishes himself as it seemed to him that mother did it worse. He liked to put things in order in mother’s purse.

After war Arthur worked as a joiner. He was obviously very hard-working. He could not make money though. While most people worked to live, Arthur lived to work. He was a very interesting man with his positive and negative traits. When mother’s got married, we moved to Arthur. When I became independent having started working in the clock workshop, I decided to return in our apartment. Arthur treated me very well, but he wanted me to be his copy. It was very hard for me. When I moved, we still were keeping in touch. Arthur took care of me, helped me with all he could. I know he treated me like his own son, though Arthur had never talked about it. In general, he did not like rant. He even did not say the words of love to mother. When mother got sick, there was nobody who would take better care than Arthur. He was a very kind man. He liked and understood animals, and they treated him likewise. Though, he did not get along with very well.

In 1948 when cosmopolite processes started 27, anti-Semitism became state politics. At that time Jews were dismissed from leading positions and assigned Russians. Anti-Semitism became particularly strong during doctors’ plot 28. Though, it was not as common with Estonians, as most of them hated Stalin, and soviet regime as a whole. Estonians even said: «who could not those doctors assassinate Stalin, if they wanted it?». Soviet regime was blatantly anti-Semitic. They fired Jews. People with Jewish appearance could be insulted in the street. My uncle Lazar, mother’s brother, gladly welcome soviet regime starting from the fist days. He was a convinced communist. The party enrolled uncle for 2-year party courses, upon completion of which he could get higher education in commerce required for management positions. We had studied in Leningrad for two years, and also managed to obtain diploma in economy apart from those courses. When he came back in Tallinn, he held different posts in commerce. When doctors’ plot was took place Lazar was in charge of trade department by the ministry of commerce. He always worked for three people and was very strict with his subordinates. When the doctors’ plot started, his subordinates stopped listening to him as they understood that he would be dismissed soon, but he was not dismissed. It was his decision to resign. Even the minister did not want to let him go. Finally, he was talked into staying. He was not touched after Stalin’s death. As far as I understand, it was not so dangerous for uncle Lazar to lose his job, he feared expulsion from the party. It did not happen. Uncle was happy as at that time many Jews were fired. 

Mother and I did not understand how dangerous it was for us, but Arthur understood it clearly. I remember him saying once: «I would never leave you ». Then I got what he was talking about, when mother showed me two packed bags. Arthur got them ready in advance in case Jews would be exiled in Siberia. There were rumors like that, and there were grounds for them. I remember,
Arthur went to the train station every day to see if the trains were ready for deportation. He understood that it was realistic. I am sure he would never let mother go by herself, and would join her in exile. Luckily in March 1953 Stalin and we signed with relief. It happened on the day of Purim. I still regret not getting drunk on the day when we were exempt from that felon- not a mythical Amman, but real person. Tallinn people took Stalin’s death differently. Aboriginal population of Estonia did not mourn, as they had reasons for it, but new-comers from USSR did, as if they actually lost a close person. I remember once a Russian lady came in the clock shop, where I was working, and brought watch to be repaired. While her watch was being repaired, she was sitting and crying over Stalin as if he was her son. It was very funny for me, but I could not laugh. I turned my back to her and put my hand to the mouth until she left. I took Stalin’s death as a holiday. At first, I did not know anything about things happening in USSR in late 1930s, about mass repressions 29, executions. Late on, during the cosmopolite processes I started reading on the history of USSR. Then I understood that Stalin was a murderer. I cannot understand how people living in USSR, and witnessing all those crimes, could not get that Stalin was a murderer. How did I understand it? It was simple. All military leaders did not spare their life for their country and were killed by Stalin: Tukhachevskiy 30, Yakir 31, Bluher 32 etc. All Lenin’s33 brothers-in-arms, with who he made revolution− Trotskiy 34, Kamenev35, Zinoviev 36 and many other people were executed as per Stalin’s order. All people who were outstanding during Lenin’s time, being famous party activists, turned out to be traitors and peoples‘ enemies. How can one believe in that? There is no logic! Then I started to understand that he was a murdered. Then I started reading about collectivization 37, kulaks [kulaks] 38, mass exile of peasants in Siberia, famine of 1932-33s 39. I was getting more and more information and was appalled with that. That was the power of fraud. Hitler was always called a villain. Yes, he treated other nations much worse than Stalin did. But Stalin treated his people much worse than Hitler did. The thing built by Bolsheviks did not resemble socialism. It was a dictatorship, extermination of everybody who had his own opinion, and even ability to think.

In 1964 Arthur Kastner died. In 1966 mother got married once again. Her husband was a Jew Ruvim Rubinstein.. Mother was 60. Ruvim as almost 15 years older than she, but he looked good- tall, slender and brisk, with thick grey hair. He was a very handsome man with a good posture. Women liked him when he was old. Ruvim was very well educated and tolerant. My mother was his third wife. He got divorced twice. My mother was against divorces considering that a lady was entitled to get married only being a widow. She considered divorces to be even. This is the way she was brought up in her family.

Ruvim was born in Warsaw, Poland. His father was a very rich dealer. When he was conferred with the title of the merchant of the first guild 40, the family moved to Russia, Saint Petersburg. There were a lot of children in the family and all of them got a good education. Ruvim went to private lyceum, where the children of famous Russian people were studying. When Ruvim finished lyceum and wanted to continue studying at the university, he was not admitted. At that time there was admission quota for the Jews in higher educational institutions – 5% out of the total number of students 41. Ruvim went to Belgium and graduated from legal department of the university. He came back in Russia in 1917. Ruvim told that when the cabman took him hope, they were stopped by policemen and told to take a bypass road from Nevskiy avenue. Ruvim asked the policemen what happened that he replied that there was some revolt. But it was October revolution ! Ruvim lived at home for a bit, and then understood that he would not survive the new regime and left for Estonia. His family refused to immigrate from Russia. Ruvim did not know what happened to them. He began working as a lawyer in Tallinn. He did so well, that soon Ruvim purchased a large house in the center of Tallinn jointly with his companion. When soviet regime came to power, their house was seized. The funniest thing was that even after sequestration they still had to pay the house tax. Ruvim was not exiled. Maybe they merely did not have time. He was in evacuation during the war, and then he came back in Tallinn. After war soviet regime did not have any claims against him. He worked as a legal counsel until retirement. Of course, mother and Ruvim differed a lot, both from the point of upbringing, education and character, but sill they were happy together. Ruvim observed Jewish traditions and mother started lighting candles on Sabbath, mark Jewish holidays at home. On holidays mother and Ruvim went to the synagogue together and I also joined them for festive dinner.

I was very small and feeble and was not supposed to be drafted in the army. When I turned thirty, I was told to go to the military enlistment office. It was the first and the last time I went there. My military career did not last long. During one month I cleaned the gun following the instruction of the officer. I was not allowed to shoot even once. Then I saw a tank, even looked in the hatch, but I was not willing to get in there. Then, I was given the military card, where it was written that I was an expert in tank electric equipment. Though, all I can do with electrics is to change a light bulb. Other soldiers treated me well. I had two nicknames in the army: «brave soldier Schweig», and the second – «professor», maybe because I was the only one wearing glasses. All of them were educated, but I dropped studies in the 5th grade. For some reason, all of them came up to me with questions, asking me to tell them something. Often they even suggested doing something instead of me so that I would tell them a story in the evening.  Officers did not hurt me. On my first day I was straightforward enough to say that I would not become the defender of motherland and added that I was not interested in military science. Other thing if I were the war with Germany, when Htler’s troops attacked Soviet Union. In general, I did not have any patriotic feelings and was no going to defend that regime. Though many Jew, especially the Russian ones, sincerely considered themselves to be patriots, but not me. Estonia was my motherland, not Soviet Union. I served in the vicinity of Kiev, and once when I had absence without leave to see the city. My military service passed by very quickly and I came back in Tallinn. There I regained work of the clock mender.

Russians were not friendly treated by Estonians. There were strange things happening: Russians were called occupants, but they had to do all dirty and hard work. During the true occupation such jobs are done by local populations, while the occupants command. Here it was vice versa. Our workshop was in the corner of Tallinn department store. The building was large and there were several crews of` the janitors. There were hardly any Estonians among them. There were mostly Russians and Ukrainians. Estonian ladies were not willing to do that dirty work. There was a large construction company n Tallinn,where the workers were mostly Russians, and the managers were Estonians. In general all hard jobs were taken mostly by Russians. As for ideology, Estonians always wanted to empathize that they were not accepting soviet ideology. I noticed it in 1967 when Israel was having a six-day war 42. One Estonian worked with me, who was a terrible anti-Semitist, but when there was a six day war in Israel, she was worried for Israeli troops and followed the events. She was very happy when Israeli militaries defeated Arabs, «soviet clients» in her words. Many Estonians rejoiced Israeli victory.

I never was a religious man, but after my return from the army I ordered kipah for myself. There was a hatter in Tallinn, an old Jew, who knew my grandfather Iosif. I ordered it from him. I showed him grandfather’s picture, where he was wearing a black kipah and asked him to make the same for me. I still have it. I am atheist, but still I go to synagogue really. I put kipah on there. I never concealed that I was a Jew, moreover I spoke about it openly. In spite of having Jewish appearance, some people took me for Estonian. I those cases I always said that I was a Jew and behaved accordingly.

I had never been married. Ladies did not pay attention to me. I was very bashful when I was young and I did not know how to get acquainted with the ladies. Then I became a convinced bachelor. I am used to that. I am OK with that. My wife probably would be irritated by my arguments. I do not regret being alone. I am fine with my loneliness.

In 1991 I retired before the breakup of USSR. I felt as if my life was only beginning. I had my own lodging, pension, bank account. My aunt Ida, mother’s younger sister was childless and demised me about 20 000 rubles, which was huge for that time. Monthly interest was like the second pension to me. I was foretasting calm and happy life, thinking that I could do what I wished- read and communicate with my friends. I was hardly interested in politics. I could not even picture breakup of USSR. I hoped that it would happen one day, but not in my lifetime. It happened. I was born in independent Estonia, and was lucky to live in independent Estonia 43 in my old age. I cannot say that my life was unbearable for that time. I just lived. There were things that upset me. I disapproved of dictatorship of the Soviet Union, political persecution of the people who had their own option, persecution of writers, artists, whose works were not in line with the party course. I did not like the idea of peasants being forced to join kolkhoz 44. All those things did not affect me personally.

Probably it was good for USSR to collapse, but I personally do not care. I am living gat my place. I have no reasons for being a Russian patriot. I am not an Estonian patriot either. I cannot identify myself as Jewish patriot either, though I am ready to give my life for my peoples. If I knew that if I had to explode a car with myself and it would be good for my peoples, I could do that.

I am the citizen of Estonia, and my passport is Estonian. When I was exchanging it, I asked for a copy. There was no nationality line in Estonian passport. I wanted to have that copy where it would be documented which nation I belong to. I think if they start destroying Jews, they will find me without that line in the passport.

Our Jewish community was founded during perestroika 45, in 1988. We did not have a rabbi, and those people who knew Jewish traditions were supplying for him. My mother died in 1993. She was buried Jewish cemetery in accordance with the traditions thanks to the community They made minian like it was supposed. Now we have a true rabbi. I am unreligious. I cannot understand how people can believe in God after holocaust. I cannot deceive myself, I take interest in religion and traditions as without that religion Jewish people would stop existing. Jewish customs and traditions are interlaced with the belief and cannot be classified. I cannot believe in the deity. The issue is in my opinion belief petrifies, but the life goes on. Religion cannot keep abreast with the times. I do not see it possible for our belief to be closer to the modern life. Now there is such a trend as progressive Judaism and I think that it is a fake, a surrogate. It is too simplified and adapted. I do not like orthodox Judaism either as it is another extremity. I like many customs, but not all of them. I do not think it makes sense to observe kashrut nowadays. In due time it was to be observed at least from point of hygiene, but now it sis obsolete. And again the ban to use transport on Saturday, take money in hands. It was rational when the towns were small, when people could walk from home to home, from home to synagogue and now we have such distances that this ban is even harmful. As for ban to work on Saturday, I agree it is better not to work and to devote this day to God and oneself. What is work? Now some people even believe that opening a fridge and switch the light I also a job. These are extremities, there is a limit to dogmas! In general there are too many bans. I think that the word you cannot is the main one in Jewish religion. There should be some way to make our belief more adapt to modern life, but I do no know this way. It is very complicated … there are a lot of things I like in Jewish traditions. E.g., the rite to plant trees on Bi Shvat. I had never done that, and I do not have garden or a land plot. I like this rite anyway, and I think all people should follow it. Not only because there would be more trees, as the team of gardeners would do it quicker and faster, but if a person planted a tree, grew it, he of XVII-XIX centuries they did not find it necessary to wash hands before meal and they ate with dirty hands. As for Jews, washing hands was always a cult. They could pray only after having washed hands. Recently we were given torah in the community. I started reading it and was so absorbed that I could not notice that I spent half a night reading it. I liked it so much!

As compared to Soviet times there is hardly any anti-Semitism in Estonia. There is a different classification –citizens and non-citizens. I think that a certain share of anti-Semitism is useful. I think if there was not a notion like that, we, the Jews, would not survive. There would be no incentive to study better as every Jew understood that to get a job he should be a better expert than non- Jew. Of course there were as lot of victims of anti-Semitism, probably there are much more perished Jews than survivors, but still anti-Semitism was impetus, stimulus for survival and improvement of Jews, and it disappears we would probably stop existing as the nation. Though frankly speaking I do not consider Jews to be peoples, but the group of propinquity people. E.g., if comparing me and Moroccan Jews, the difference would be so vast, that we would not be reckoned as the representatives of one peoples. Our history is very complicated. Jewish history is a half of world history. Now there is a real threat of extinction of Jews, not because of physical destruction, but due to assimilation. The more there are mixed marriages, the quicker Jews disappear as the peoples. In my opinion, the Jew is not the person with Jewish blood, but the one who identifies himself as a Jew. Those whose father, mother, grandparents are Jews, but they are not trying to be the Jews, are they Jews? I do not think that we are any better than other people, but I cannot say that we worse than anybody else and should be exterminated. That is why I cannot accept holocaust and belief in God who allowed it. I do not think we deserved it.

Jewish community of Estonia means a lot to me. Of course, they do a lot of kind deeds- provide food, medicine, care etc., but still it is not the most important for me. Jewish community helps preserve the remaining representatives of Jewish peoples and this is the most essential for me. I want the Jewish peoples to exist and I am ready to do my best in that.

Glossary:

1 Jewish community of Estonia – on the 30th of March 1988 the meeting of Jews of Estonia consisting of 100 people, convened by David Slomka, made a resolution to establish community of Jewish Culture of Estonia (KJCE) and in May 1988 the community was registered in Tallinn municipal Ispolkom

KJCE was the first independent Jewish cultural organization in USSR to be officially registered by the Soviet authorities. In 1989 first Ivrit courses were opened up, although the study of Ivrit was equaled to Zionist propaganda and was considered to be anti-Soviet activity. The contacts with Jewish organizations of other countries were made. KJCE was the part of Peoples’ Front of Estonia, struggling for state independence. In December 1989 the first issue of KJCE paper Kashachar (Dawn) was released in Estonian and Russian languages. In 1991 the first radio program about Jewish culture and activity of KJCE ‘Sholom Aleichem’ came out in Estonia. In 1991 Jewish religious community and KJCE had a joined meeting, where it was decided to found Jewish Community of Estonia.

2 Estonian War of Liberation (1918-1920)

The Estonian Republic fought on its own territory against Soviet Russia whose troops were advancing from the east. On Latvian territory the Estonian People's Army fought against the Baltic Landswer's army formed of German volunteers. The War of Liberation ended by the signing of the Tartu Peace Treaty on February 2, 1920, when Soviet Russia recognized Estonia as an independent state.

3 First Estonian Republic

Until 1917 Estonia was part of the Russian Empire. Due to the revolutionary events in Russia, the political situation in Estonia was extremely unstable in 1917. Various political parties sprang up; the Bolshevik party was particularly strong. National forces became active, too. In February 1918, they succeeded in forming the provisional government of the First Estonian Republic and in proclaiming Estonia an independent state on February 24, 1918.

4 Nikolai’s army

Soldier of the tsarist army during the reign of Nicholas I when the draft lasted for 25 years.

5 Crimean war

1853-1856, in many respects the first modern war in History. The Russian Empire with aspirations concerning the Balkans occupied the Ottoman principalities of Moldova and Walachia in July 1853. The great powers fearing from a Russian advance in the region and wanting to preserve the European equilibrium sided with the Ottoman Empire in the conflict: Great Britain and France declared war on Russia in March 1854. Although the Habsburg Empire remained neutral its threats to enter the war forced the Russians to evacuate the two Ottoman principalities and they were occupied by the Austrians. In September 1854 allied troops landed on the Crimea in order to capture Sevastopol, the major Russian Black Sea port. The Russians defended the city heroically for 11 months under the command of V. Kornilov and P. Nakhimov. Allied commanders were Lord Raglan for the British and Marshal Saint-Arnaud, succeeded later by Marshal Canrobert, for the French. Military operations, which were marked on both sides by great stubbornness, gallantry, and disregard for casualties, remained localized. Famous episodes were the battles of Balaklava and Inkerman (1854) and the allied capture (1855) of Malakhov and Redan, which preceded the fall of Sevastopol. The accession (1855) of Tsar Alexander II and the capture of Sevastopol led to peace negotiations that resulted in the Treaty of Paris (February 1856). The Crimean war stopped Russian aspirations towards the Balkans and the Straits for another 22 years and rescued the position of the Ottoman Empire as a great power. It also resulted in spoiling the previously very good Habsburg-Russian relation.

6 St

George Cross: Established in Russia in 1769 for distinguished military merits of officers and generals, and, from 1807, of soldiers and corporals. Until 1913 it was officially referred to as Distinction Military Order, from 1913 as St. George Cross. Servicemen awarded with St. George Crosses of all four degrees were called St. George Cavaliers.

7 Jewish Pale of Settlement

Certain provinces in the Russian Empire were designated for permanent Jewish residence and the Jewish population was only allowed to live in these areas. The Pale was first established by a decree by Catherine II in 1791. The regulation was in force until the Russian Revolution of 1917, although the limits of the Pale were modified several times. The Pale stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, and 94% of the total Jewish population of Russia, almost 5 million people, lived there. The overwhelming majority of the Jews lived in the towns and shtetls of the Pale. Certain privileged groups of Jews, such as certain merchants, university graduates and craftsmen working in certain branches, were granted to live outside the borders of the Pale of Settlement permanently.

8 Russian Revolution of 1917

Revolution in which the tsarist regime was overthrown in the Russian Empire and, under Lenin, was replaced by the Bolshevik rule. The two phases of the Revolution were: February Revolution, which came about due to food and fuel shortages during World War I, and during which the tsar abdicated and a provisional government took over. The second phase took place in the form of a coup led by Lenin in October/November (October Revolution) and saw the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.

9 Keep in touch with relatives abroad

The authorities could arrest an individual corresponding with his/her relatives abroad and charge him/her with espionage, send them to concentration camp or even sentence them to death.

10 Jewish Cultural Autonomy

Cultural autonomy, which was proclaimed in Estonia in 1926, allowing the Jewish community to promote national values (education, culture, religion).

11 Estonia in 1939-1940

on September 24, 1939, Moscow demanded that Estonia make available military bases for the Red Army units. On June 16, Moscow issued an ultimatum insisting on the change of government and the right of occupation of Estonia. On June 17, Estonia accepted the provisions and ceased to exist de facto, becoming Estonian Soviet Republic within USSR.

12 Deportations from the Baltics (1940-1953)

After the Soviet Union occupied the three Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) in June 1940 as a part of establishing the Soviet system, mass deportation of the local population began. The victims of these were mainly but not exclusively those unwanted by the regime: the local bourgeoisie and the previously politically active strata. Deportations to remote parts of the Soviet Union continued up until the death of Stalin. The first major wave of deportation took place between 11th and 14th June 1941, when 36,000, mostly politically active people were deported. Deportations were reintroduced after the Soviet Army recaptured the three countries from Nazi Germany in 1944. Partisan fights against the Soviet occupiers were going on all up to 1956, when the last squad was eliminated. Between June 1948 and January 1950, in accordance with a Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR under the pretext of ‘grossly dodged from labor activity in the agricultural field and led anti-social and parasitic mode of life’ from Latvia 52,541, from Lithuania 118,599 and from Estonai 32,450 people were deported. The total number of deportees from the three republics amounted to 203,590. Among them were entire Lithuanian families of different social strata (peasants, workers, intelligentsia), everybody who was able to reject or deemed capable to reject the regime. Most of the exiled died in the foreign land. Besides, about 100,000 people were killed in action and in fusillade for being members of partisan squads and some other 100,000 were sentenced to 25 years in camps.

13 Gulag

The Soviet system of forced labor camps in the remote regions of Siberia and the Far North, which was first established in 1919. However, it was not until the early 1930s that there was a significant number of inmates in the camps. By 1934 the Gulag, or the Main Directorate for Corrective Labor Camps, then under the Cheka's successor organization the NKVD, had several million inmates. The prisoners included murderers, thieves, and other common criminals, along with political and religious dissenters. The Gulag camps made significant contributions to the Soviet economy during the rule of Stalin. Conditions in the camps were extremely harsh. After Stalin died in 1953, the population of the camps was reduced significantly, and conditions for the inmates improved somewhat.

14 Great Patriotic War

On 22nd June 1941 at 5 o’clock in the morning Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union without declaring war. This was the beginning of the so-called Great Patriotic War. The German blitzkrieg, known as Operation Barbarossa, nearly succeeded in breaking the Soviet Union in the months that followed. Caught unprepared, the Soviet forces lost whole armies and vast quantities of equipment to the German onslaught in the first weeks of the war. By November 1941 the German army had seized the Ukrainian Republic, besieged Leningrad, the Soviet Union's second largest city, and threatened Moscow itself. The war ended for the Soviet Union on 9th May 1945.

15 NKVD

People’s Committee of Internal Affairs; it took over from the GPU, the state security agency, in 1934.

16 Young Octobrist

In Russian Oktyabrenok, or ‘pre-pioneer’, designates Soviet children of seven years or over preparing for entry into the pioneer organization.

17 Aba Gomer (?-1941)

born in Belostok, Poland, and graduated from the Department of Philosophy of Bonn University. He lived in Tallinn from 1927 and was the chief rabbi of Estonia. In 1941, he was determined not to go into Soviet back areas and remained on the German-occupied territory. He was killed by Nazis in the fall of 1941.

18 Card system

The food card system regulating the distribution of food and industrial products was introduced in the USSR in 1929 due to extreme deficit of consumer goods and food. The system was cancelled in 1931. In 1941, food cards were reintroduced to keep records, distribute and regulate food supplies to the population. The card system covered main food products such as bread, meat, oil, sugar, salt, cereals, etc. The rations varied depending on which social group one belonged to, and what kind of work one did. Workers in the heavy industry and defense enterprises received a daily ration of 800 g (miners - 1 kg) of bread per person; workers in other industries 600 g. Non-manual workers received 400 or 500 g based on the significance of their enterprise, and children 400 g. However, the card system only covered industrial workers and residents of towns while villagers never had any provisions of this kind. The card system was cancelled in 1947.

19 All-Union pioneer organization

a communist organization for teenagers between 10 and 15 years old (cf: boy-/ girlscouts in the US). The organization aimed at educating the young generation in accordance with the communist ideals, preparing pioneers to become members of the Komsomol and later the Communist Party. In the Soviet Union, all teenagers were pioneers.

20 Labor army

it was made up of men of call-up age not trusted to carry firearms by the Soviet authorities. Such people were those living on the territories annexed by the USSR in 1940 (Eastern Poland, the Baltic States, parts of Karelia, Bessarabia and northern Bukovina) as well as ethnic Germans living in the Soviet Union proper. The labor army was employed for carrying out tough work, in the woods or in mines. During the first winter of the war, 30 percent of those drafted into the labor army died of starvation and hard work. The number of people in the labor army decreased sharply when the larger part of its contingent was transferred to the national Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian Corps, created at the beginning of 1942. The remaining labor detachments were maintained up until the end of the war.

21 Estonian Rifle Corps

military unit established in late 1941 as a part of the Soviet Army. The Corps was made up of two rifle divisions. Those signed up for the Estonian Corps by military enlistment offices were ethnic Estonians regardless of their residence within the Soviet Union as well as men of call-up age residing in Estonia before the Soviet occupation (1940). The Corps took part in the bloody battle of Velikiye Luki (December 1942 - January 1943), where it suffered great losses and was sent to the back areas for re-formation and training. In the summer of 1944, the Corps took part in the liberation of Estonia and in March 1945 in the actions on Latvian territory. In 1946, the Corps was disbanded.

22 Jewish section of cemetery

In the USSR city cemeteries were territorially divided into different sectors. They often included common plots, children’s plots, titled militaries’ plots, Jewish plots, political leaders’ plots, etc. In some Soviet cities the separate Jewish cemeteries continued to be maintained and in others they were closed, usually with the excuse that it was due to some technical reason. The family could decide upon the burial of the deceased; Jewish military could for instance be buried either in the military or the Jewish section. Such a division of cemeteries still continues to exist in many parts of the former Soviet Union.

23 Stalingrad Battle (17 July 1942- 2 February1943) The Stalingrad, South-Western and Donskoy Fronts stopped the advance of German armies in the vicinity of Stalingrad

On 19-20 November 1942 the soviet troops undertook an offensive and encircled 22 German divisions (330 thousand people) in the vicinity of Stalingrad. The Soviet troops eliminated this German grouping. On 31 January 1943 the remains of the 6th German army headed by General Field Marshal Paulus surrendered (91 thousand people). The victory in the Stalingrad battle was of huge political, strategic and international significance.

24 Communal apartment

The Soviet power wanted to improve housing conditions by requisitioning ‘excess’ living space of wealthy families after the Revolution of 1917. Apartments were shared by several families with each family occupying one room and sharing the kitchen, toilet and bathroom with other tenants. Because of the chronic shortage of dwelling space in towns communal or shared apartments continued to exist for decades. Despite state programs for the construction of more houses and the liquidation of communal apartments, which began in the 1960s, shared apartments still exist today.

25 Bolsheviks

Members of the movement led by Lenin. The name ‘Bolshevik’ was coined in 1903 and denoted the group that emerged in elections to the key bodies in the Social Democratic Party (SDPRR) considering itself in the majority (Rus. bolshynstvo) within the party. It dubbed its opponents the minority (Rus. menshynstvo, the Mensheviks). Until 1906 the two groups formed one party. The Bolsheviks first gained popularity and support in society during the 1905-07 Revolution. During the February Revolution in 1917 the Bolsheviks were initially in the opposition to the Menshevik and SR (‘Sotsialrevolyutsionyery’, Socialist Revolutionaries) delegates who controlled the Soviets (councils). When Lenin returned from emigration (16 April) they proclaimed his program of action (the April theses) and under the slogan ‘All power to the Soviets’ began to Bolshevize the Soviets and prepare for a proletariat revolution. Agitation proceeded on a vast scale, especially in the army. The Bolsheviks set about creating their own armed forces, the Red Guard. Having overthrown the Provisional Government, they created a government with the support of the II Congress of Soviets (the October Revolution), to which they admitted some left-wing SRs in order to gain the support of the peasantry. In 1952 the Bolshevik party was renamed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

26 Estonian Government in Evacuation

Both, the Government of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Central Committee of the Estonian Communist Party were created in 1940 and were evacuated to Moscow as the war started. Their task was to provide for Estonian residents who had been evacuated or drafted into the labor army. They succeeded in restoring life and work conditions of many evacuees. Former leaders of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic took active part in the formation of the Estonian Rifle Corps assisting the transfer of former Estonian citizens from the labor army into the Corps. At the beginning of 1944, top authority institutions of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic were moved to Leningrad, and the permanent Estonian representation office remained in Moscow. In September 1944, Estonia was re-established as part of the USSR and the Estonian government moved to Tallinn.

27 Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’

The campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’, i.e. Jews, was initiated in articles in the central organs of the Communist Party in 1949. The campaign was directed primarily at the Jewish intelligentsia and it was the first public attack on Soviet Jews as Jews. ‘Cosmopolitans’ writers were accused of hating the Russian people, of supporting Zionism, etc. Many Yiddish writers as well as the leaders of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested in November 1948 on charges that they maintained ties with Zionism and with American ‘imperialism’. They were executed secretly in 1952. The anti-Semitic Doctors’ Plot was launched in January 1953. A wave of anti-Semitism spread through the USSR. Jews were removed from their positions, and rumors of an imminent mass deportation of Jews to the eastern part of the USSR began to spread. Stalin’s death in March 1953 put an end to the campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’.

28 Doctors’ Plot

The Doctors’ Plot was an alleged conspiracy of a group of Moscow doctors to murder leading government and party officials. In January 1953, the Soviet press reported that nine doctors, six of whom were Jewish, had been arrested and confessed their guilt. As Stalin died in March 1953, the trial never took place. The official paper of the Party, the Pravda, later announced that the charges against the doctors were false and their confessions obtained by torture. This case was one of the worst anti-Semitic incidents during Stalin’s reign. In his secret speech at the Twentieth Party Congress in 1956 Khrushchev stated that Stalin wanted to use the Plot to purge the top Soviet leadership.

29 Great Terror (1934-1938)

During the Great Terror, or Great Purges, which included the notorious show trials of Stalin's former Bolshevik opponents in 1936-1938 and reached its peak in 1937 and 1938, millions of innocent Soviet citizens were sent off to labor camps or killed in prison. The major targets of the Great Terror were communists. Over half of the people who were arrested were members of the party at the time of their arrest. The armed forces, the Communist Party, and the government in general were purged of all allegedly dissident persons; the victims were generally sentenced to death or to long terms of hard labor. Much of the purge was carried out in secret, and only a few cases were tried in public ‘show trials’. By the time the terror subsided in 1939, Stalin had managed to bring both the Party and the public to a state of complete submission to his rule. Soviet society was so atomized and the people so fearful of reprisals that mass arrests were no longer necessary. Stalin ruled as absolute dictator of the Soviet Union until his death in March 1953.

30 Tukhachevskiy, Mikhail Nikolayevich (1893-1937)

an ardent revolutionary, Soviet military leader, marshal of the Soviet Union. During the Civil War he was the commander of a number of armies in the South, the Urals, Siberia; troops of the Caucasian and Western front. In 1921 he took part in the suppression of anti-revolutionary uprising. He was commander of the troops, which put down a rebellion of the peasants in Tambov and Voronezh provinces. Since 1931 deputy minister of the army and navy, since 1934 deputy minister of defense, since 1936 1st deputy of defense minister of the USSR. In 1937 he was commander of the troops of Volga Military District. Tukhachevskiy’s works had an impact on the development of Soviet military science and military practice. He was repressed and shot in 1937 on the grounds of treason against the motherland; in 1956 he was posthumously exonerated.

31 Yakir

One of the founders of the Communist Party in Ukraine. In 1938 he was arrested and executed.

32 Blyukher, Vasiliy Konstantinovich (1890-1938)

Soviet commander, marshal of the Soviet Union, hero of the Civil War, the first to be awarded the Order of the Red Banner; in 1921-22 Minister of Defense, chief commander of the People’s Revolutionary Army of Dalnevostochnaya Republic. In 1929-38 commander of the Special Dalnevostochnaya Army. Arrested and executed by Stalin.

33 Lenin (1870-1924)

Pseudonym of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, the Russian Communist leader. A profound student of Marxism, and a revolutionary in the 1890s. He became the leader of the Bolshevik faction of the Social Democratic Party, whom he led to power in the coup d’état of 25th October 1917. Lenin became head of the Soviet state and retained this post until his death.

34 Trotsky, Lev Davidovich (born Bronshtein) (1879-1940)

Russian revolutionary, one of the leaders of the October Revolution of 1917, an outstanding figure of the communist movement and a theorist of Marxism. Trotsky participated in the social-democratic movement from 1894 and supported the idea of the unification of Bolsheviks and Mensheviks from 1906. In 1905 he developed the idea of the ‘permanent revolution’. He was one of the leaders of the October Revolution and a founder of the Red Army. He widely applied repressive measures to support the discipline and ‘bring everything into revolutionary order’ at the front and the home front. The intense struggle with Stalin for the leadership ended with Trotsky's defeat. In 1924 his views were declared petty-bourgeois deviation. In 1927 he was expelled from the Communist Party, and exiled to Kazakhstan, and in 1929 abroad. He lived in Turkey, Norway and then Mexico. He excoriated Stalin's regime as a bureaucratic degeneration of the proletarian power. He was murdered in Mexico by an agent of Soviet special services on Stalin’s order.

35 Kamenev, Lev Borisovich (1883-1936)

Soviet communist leader, member of the first Politburo of the Communist Party after the Revolution of 1917. After Lenin's death in 1924, Zinoviev, Kamenev, and Stalin formed a ruling triumvirate and excluded Trotsky from the Party. In 1925 Stalin, in an effort to consolidate his own power, turned against Zinoviev and Kamenev, who then joined Trotsky’s opposition. Kamenev was expelled from the Party in 1927, but he recanted, was readmitted, and held minor offices. He was arrested in 1934 accused of complicity in the murder of Kirov and was imprisoned. In 1936 he, Zinoviev, and 13 old Bolsheviks were tried for treason in the first big public purge trial. They confessed and were executed.

36 Zinoviev, Grigory Evseyevich (1883-1936)

Soviet communist leader, head of the Comintern (1919-26) and member of the Communist Party Politburo (1921-26). After Lenin's death in 1924, Zinoviev, Kamenev, and Stalin formed a ruling triumvirate and excluded Trotsky from the Party. In 1925 Stalin, in an effort to consolidate his own power, turned against Zinoviev and Kamenev, who then joined Trotsky’s opposition. Zinoviev was removed from his party posts in 1926 and expelled from the Party in 1927. He recanted and was readmitted in 1928 but wielded little influence. In 1936, he, Kamenev, and 13 old Bolsheviks were tried for treason in the first big public purge trial. They confessed and were executed.

37 Collectivization in the USSR

In the late 1920s - early 1930s private farms were liquidated and collective farms established by force on a mass scale in the USSR. Many peasants were arrested during this process. As a result of the collectivization, the number of farmers and the amount of agricultural production was greatly reduced and famine struck in the Ukraine, the Northern Caucasus, the Volga and other regions in 1932-33.

38 Kulaks

In the Soviet Union the majority of wealthy peasants that refused to join collective farms and give their grain and property to Soviet power were called kulaks, declared enemies of the people and exterminated in the 1930s.

39 Famine in Ukraine

In 1920 a deliberate famine was introduced in the Ukraine causing the death of millions of people. It was arranged in order to suppress those protesting peasants who did not want to join the collective farms. There was another dreadful deliberate famine in 1930-1934 in the Ukraine. The authorities took away the last food products from the peasants. People were dying in the streets, whole villages became deserted. The authorities arranged this specifically to suppress the rebellious peasants who did not want to accept Soviet power and join collective farms.

40 Guild I

In tsarist Russia merchants belonged to Guild I, II or III. Merchants of Guild I were allowed to trade with foreign merchants, while the others were allowed to trade only within Russia.

41 Percent of Jews admitted to higher educational institutions

In tsarist Russia the number of Jews in higher educational institutions could not exceed 5% of the total number of students.

42 - Six-Day-War

The first strikes of the Six-Day-War happened on 5th June 1967 by the Israeli Air Force. The entire war only lasted 132 hours and 30 minutes. The fighting on the Egyptian side only lasted four days, while fighting on the Jordanian side lasted three. Despite the short length of the war, this was one of the most dramatic and devastating wars ever fought between Israel and all of the Arab nations. This war resulted in a depression that lasted for many years after it ended. The Six-Day-War increased tension between the Arab nations and the Western World because of the change in mentalities and political orientations of the Arab nations.

43 Reestablishment of the Estonian Republic

According to the referendum conducted in the Baltic Republics in March 1991, 77.8 percent of participating Estonian residents supported the restoration of Estonian state independence. On 20th August 1991, at the time of the coup attempt in Moscow, the Estonian Republic’s Supreme Council issued the Decree of Estonian Independence. On 6th September 1991, the USSR’s State Council recognized full independence of Estonia, and the country was accepted into the UN on 17th September 1991.

44 Collective farm (in Russian kolkhoz)

In the Soviet Union the policy of gradual and voluntary collectivization of agriculture was adopted in 1927 to encourage food production while freeing labor and capital for industrial development. In 1929, with only 4% of farms in kolkhozes, Stalin ordered the confiscation of peasants' land, tools, and animals; the kolkhoz replaced the family farm.

45 Perestroika (Russian for restructuring)

Soviet economic and social policy of the late 1980s, associated with the name of Soviet politician Mikhail Gorbachev. The term designated the attempts to transform the stagnant, inefficient command economy of the Soviet Union into a decentralized, market-oriented economy. Industrial managers and local government and party officials were granted greater autonomy, and open elections were introduced in an attempt to democratize the Communist Party organization. By 1991, perestroika was declining and was soon eclipsed by the dissolution of the USSR.
 

Heinz Menachem Mayer

Menachem Mayer
Jerusalem
Israel
Tanja Eckstein
03.09.2017

Im September 2017 flog ich nach Israel zu Menachem Meier, der in Jerusalem, nahe dem Herzlberg und nahe der größten Holocaust Gedenkstätte Yad Vashem in einem wunderschönen Pensionistenheim eine Zweizimmerwohnung bewohnt. Er empfing mich sehr freundlich und erzählte mir an drei Tagen, je vier Stunden lang, seine Geschichte. Es fiel ihm nicht leicht. Viele Ereignisse hat Menachems Gehirn als Schutz ausgeblendet, denn er musste sich nach dem Krieg ganz allein, ohne Familie, ein neues Leben aufbauen. Manches erzählte ihm sein Bruder Fred, der drei Jahre älter war als Menachem, zum Zeitpunkt unserer Begegnung aber nicht mehr lebte. Ende Oktober besuchte ich Menachem mit seiner Geschichte im Gepäck, hier ist sie.

Anmerkung: Menachem Mayer nennt seinen Bruder Fred Raymes, der 2013 starb, in seiner Biografie bis 1945 Manfred, danach Fred. 

Klicken Sie hier, um das Filmscript anzuschauen

Meine Vorfahren lebten seit Jahrhunderten in Baden (Anm.: Baden-Württemberg). 

Mein mütterlicher Großvater, mit Namen Meir Wertheimer, wohnte in einem Dorf, nicht weit von Hoffenheim, mit Namen Neidenstein. Er war Schuhhändler und besaß ein Schuhgeschäft. Meine biologische Großmutter hieß Hannah. Meine Mutter Mathilde, Hilde wurde sie genannt, war ihr einziges Kind. Sie ist 1898 in Neidenstein geboren. Die Großmutter starb 1902, da war meine Mutter gerade vier Jahre alt. Der Großvater heiratete ein zweites Mal eine Frau Mina (Wilhelmina), geborene Kaufmann, die ich als meine Großmutter kannte. Sie war eine sehr gute Großmutter! Ihr Sohn Emanuel, der Stiefbruder meiner Mutter, wurde 1903 geboren. Meine Mutter und Emanuel wuchsen sicher wie Geschwister auf. Der Großvater starb, glaube ich, 1920. 

Der Onkel Emanuel war nicht verheiratet, höherer Beamter in einer Ofenfabrik und finanziell besser gestellt als wir. Manchmal kaufte er meinem Bruder und mir neue Kleidung. Außerdem besaß er ein Auto. Wie es im Judentum üblich ist, besuchten wir jedes Jahr vor den hohen Feiertagen die Gräber unserer Verwandten auf dem Friedhof im nahe gelegenen Waibstadt. Kinder dürfen zu Lebzeiten ihrer Eltern den Friedhof nicht betreten, und so warteten Manfredund ich im Auto, und wir fürchteten uns immer ein wenig vor dem dunklen und geheimnisvollen Wald. 1974 kehrte ich, nach ungefähr 40 Jahren, das erste Mal dorthin zurück. 

Meine Großmutter Mina und der Onkel Emanuel wurden mit uns am 22. Oktober 1940 nach Gurs in Frankreich deportiert. Großmutter Mina ist in Gurs umgekommen, Onkel Emanuel ist in Auschwitz ermordet worden. 

Meine väterlichen Großeltern wohnten in Hoffenheim, ein kleines Dorf damals, seit 1972 ein Teil von Sinsheim. Heute hat Hoffenheim eine berühmte Fußballmannschaft. Aber damals war es ein kleines Dorf inBaden. Gegen Ende des 19. Jahrhundert lebten 48 jüdische Familien in Hoffenheim. Das waren Kaufleute, Händler, Ladenbesitzer und Viehhändler, wie mein Vater. Die Großmutter Klara, geborene Heumann, starb 1926, ich konnte sie nicht mehr kennenlernen. 

Mein Vater, Karl Mayer, ist 1894 in Frankfurt am Main geboren. Warum in Frankfurt, weiß ich nicht, denn sein Vater, Albert Mayer, er war von Beruf Maßschneider, war aus Poppelsdorf, einem Ort, der 1904 in die Stadt Bonn eingemeindet wurde. Warum die Familie dann, als mein Vater zwei Jahre alt war, nach Hoffenheim kam, weiß ich nicht. Aber vielleicht dadurch, weil die Frau meines Großvaters eine geborene Heumann war und Heumanns, Onkel und Tante meines Vaters, mit ihren Kindern in Hoffenheim lebten. Ich weiß nicht, welche Schulbildung mein Vater hatte, aber er wurde Lehrling in der koscheren Metzgerei seines Onkels Hermann Heumann in Hoffenheim. 

Als mein Vater 20 Jahre alt war, begann der 1. Weltkrieg. Er hat es bis zum Unteroffizier gebracht, war bei den Engländern in Gefangenschaft, und am Ende des Krieges bekam er das Eiserne Kreuz als Auszeichnung.

Mein Vater hatte einen Bruder, der hieß Moritz und eine Schwester, die hieß Elsa. Moritz Frau war die Tante Alma. Sie hatten eine Tochter, die Ingrid, Inge genannt, hieß. Inge wurde, wie mein Bruder und ich, auch aus Gurs gerettet und von der französischenFamilie Eisenreich, die katholisch war, versteckt. Nach dem Krieg wurde sie von ihren Tanten gefunden und in die USA geholt. Die Familie Eisenreich wurde 1995 von Yad Vashem für die Rettung meiner Cousine als „Gerechte unter den Völkern“ geehrt. 

Tante Elsa, die Schwester meines Vaters, war Näherin und nicht verheiratet. Und da war Helmut,ein Junge,der auf einem der Fotos zu sehen ist. Geboren wurde er 1920, er war wie unser Bruder. Die Tante Elsa schaffte es, als Hausangestellte, 1939 nach England zu flüchten. Während sie in London war, hielt sie so lange es möglich war, brieflich den Kontakt zu ihrer Familie und unterstützte uns auch finanziell ein wenig. Ich fragte sie viele Jahre nach dem Krieg: Wer war Helmut? Sie sagte mir, dass Helmut der Sohn von einer Verwandten war, den sie angenommen und aufgezogen hatte, weil etwas in dessen Familie nicht in Ordnung gewesen wäre. Sie schämte sich, die Wahrheit zu sagen. Aber später habe ich es herausgefunden: Helmut war ihr unehelicher Sohn von einem nichtjüdischen Nachbarn. Die erste Zeit nach ihrer Flucht nach England hatte sie noch brieflich Kontakt zu ihm und wusste, wo er sich aufhielt. Ich habe einmal im Internet die ausgefüllten Gedenkblätter von Yad Vashem durchgeblättert. Da habe ich seinen Namen gefunden. Ich hatte auch ein Gedenkblatt ausgefüllt für ihn, aber jemand anders hatte ebenfalls ein Gedenkblatt für ihn ausgefüllt. Dadurch habe ich erfahren, dass er Mitglied war in ein Kibutz. Das waren junge Leute, die vorhatten nach Palästina zu gehen, und sie waren in einem Vorbereitungslager, auf Hachschara nennt man das. Aber 1941 wurden diese Initiativen aufgelöst, und er wurden von Paderborn 1943 nach Ausschwitz deportiert. Die jungen Männer wurden nicht sofort vergast, sie kamen in ein Außenlager des KZ Auschwitz, um dort zu arbeiten. Eine Woche vor Ende des Krieges ist Helmut gestorben. Er wurde nur 25 Jahre alt. Ich glaube, dass seine Mutter, meine Tante, das nie so genau gewusst hat. Das habe ich erst viel, viel später erfahren. Meine Tante Elsa ist ungefähr 1975 gestorben. 

Meine Eltern haben 1927 in Neidenstein geheiratet. Ich weiß nicht, wie und wo mein Vater meine Mutter kennengelernt hat. Sie war ja vom Dorf nebenan, aus Neidenstein, acht Kilometer von Hoffenheim entfernt. Mein Vater war Viehhändler, er hat wahrscheinlich mit den Heumanns zusammen gearbeitet, solange er noch seinen Beruf ausführen konnte. 

Soweit ich mich erinnern kann, waren meine Eltern nicht sehr religiös, aber sie waren traditionell. Vielleicht war meine Mutter religiöser als mein Vater, denn sie kam aus einem etwas mehr religiösen Haus. Mein Vater hat auch als Hilfskantor in der Synagoge gearbeitet. Pfarrer Ludwig Streib, mit dem ich befreundet bin, welcher auch aus Hoffenheim stammt, hat 1989 eine Seminararbeitüber die „Israelitische Gemeinde in Hoffenheim von 1914 bis 1945“ geschrieben. Und er erzählte mir, dass sein Großvater gegenüber der Synagoge gewohnt hat. Und falls kein Minjan zusammenkam am Schabbat, während der Woche war sicher keiner, hat man seinen Großvater gerufen, um den Minjan vollständig zu machen. Also, es war eine sehr gute Beziehung bis zur Hitlerzeit zwischen einem Teil der Bevölkerung und den Juden. Der andere Teil war immer antisemitisch. Ich bin 1932 in den Antisemitismus reingeboren. Mein Bruder Manfred war drei Jahre älter. 

Ich bedaure es sehr, aber was meine Kindheit betrifft, habe ich eine schwarze Wand vor meinen Augen. Ich kann mich an fast nichts erinnern. Oft weiß ich nicht, ob das, was ich weiß, persönliche Erinnerungen sind oder ob das Sachen sind, welche mir mein Bruder Manfred erzählt hat oder andere Leute mir erzählt haben. Ich möchte deshalb auch die Ereignisse schildern, die ich von meinem Bruder weiß. Ich kann mich an Wanderungen durch den Wald erinnern. Mein Bruder erzählte, dass wir an Samstagen, am Shabbat, unsere Großmutter Mina in Neidenstein besuchten und alle vier die ungefähr acht Kilometer von Hoffenheim nach Neidenstein durch den Wald gingen. Ich erinnere mich an Gerüche, und ich habe mich damals im Wald vor Geistern sehr gefürchtet.

Ich erinnere mich, dass ich Spinat nicht gern hatte und dass meine Mutter mir nachgelaufen ist mit dem Spinat. Ich kann mich erinnern an einen Feiertag, an dem man in der Synagoge den Kindern eine Tüte mit Süßigkeiten gegeben hat. Wahrscheinlich war es zu Simchat Tora. Aber woher die Leute kamen um mitzumachen an diesem Gottesdienst, ich habe keine Idee. In Hoffenheim selber wohnten noch in der zweiten Hälfte von 1938 sechs oder sieben jüdische Familien. Wir wohnten in der Dienstwohnung der Synagoge nahe dem Ortszentrum, in der Neuen Strasse 2A. Tante Else wohnte mit uns zusammen. Ich erinnere mich, dass ich bei meinem Vater auf dem Schoß saß am Schabbat und er Geschichten erzählte. 

Zuerst wohnten wir in einem Haus gegenüber der Synagoge. Tante Elsa bewohnte die Hausmeisterwohnung, die an die Synagoge angrenzte. Später zogen wir zu Tante Elsa in ihre Wohnung. 

An die Beziehung zu meinem Bruder in dieser Zeit kann ich mich eigentlich auch nicht erinnern. Es gibt einige kleine Geschichten, und an diese Ereignisse konnten wir uns beide erinnern. Aber wie es genau war, weiß ich nicht, denn seine Geschichten sind ein wenig anders als meine, den die Erinnerung ist eine Verwandte der Warheit. Zum Beispiel, als ich drei Jahre alt war und mein Bruder war sechs Jahre alt, hat er mich zum Friseur genommen und mir eine Glatze schneiden lassen. Wahrscheinlich weil er neidisch auf meine sehr schönen blonden Locken war. Und ich erinnere mich, dass es meine Initiative gewesen ist, dass ich zum Friseur wollte. Oder eine andere kleine Geschichte: ungefähr im selben Alter bin ich eine Treppe heraufgeklettert, vor mir stand ein Hund, und ich habe ihn am Schwanz gezogen. Und der Hund hat sich umgedreht und mich ins Gesicht gebissen. Und mein Bruder meint, er hätte den Hund am Schwanz gezogen. An solche Kleinigkeiten, an die nicht wichtigen Sachen kann ich mich erinnern. Ich erinnere mich, dass ich mit meiner Mutter vor dem kleinen Schaufenster einer Bäckerei stand, und vor mir lag ein Mohrenkopf,so nannte man damals ein Gebäck, das mit Schokolade überzogen war, und dieses Gebäck wollte ich so gerne haben, und meine Mutter konnte es mir nicht kaufen. Ich kann mich aber auch an Zeiten erinnern, als mein Vater uns, wenn wir die Großmutter in Neidenstein besuchten, jedem eine Bretzel kaufte.

Aber ich kann mich nicht erinnern, dass wir zu Hause mit unseren Eltern zusammen sitzen an einem Tisch. Dass wir zusammen essen, uns unterhalten; alles ist verlöscht. Es war eine liebende Familie, und als Kind habe ich nicht gemerkt und sicher nicht verstanden, was passiert. Und niemand konnte sich vorstellen, was sich da entwickeln wird.

Im Frühjahr 1935 wurde mein Bruder als einzig jüdisches Kind zusammen mit allen sechsjährigen nichtjüdischen Kindern in die Grundschule des Dorfes eingeschult. Der Schulweg war für ihn schrecklich. Viele Kinder wurden gegen Juden aufgehetzt. Sie sollten auch nicht mehr mit den jüdischen Kindern spielen. Manfred wurde oft schikaniert und verprügelt. Er lief weg, musste den nach ihm geworfenen Steinen ausweichen und sich verstecken. Es gab zu dieser Zeit nur noch Nazis-Lehrer, die anderen waren aus dem Schuldienst entfernt worden. Freds Lehrer, das habe ich herausgefunden, war ein  Nazi. Nach dem Krieg saß er deshalb im Gefängnis. Die Erwachsenen haben den jüdischen Kindern nicht geholfen, sie kamen Ihnen nicht zu Hilfe. Wir hatten gute Beziehungen zu mehreren Nachbarn, bis es zu gefährlich für sie wurde, mit uns Umgang zu haben.

Eines Nachts, im  Jahre 1935, sind Heinrich Bender, der NSDAP-Ortsgruppenleiter von Hoffenheim, Ratsschreiber Karl Wilhelm Gilbert und Emil Hopp, Lehrer und Truppführer der örtlichen SA, in die Synagoge eingebrochen. Unser Vater hörte den Lärm und ging hinaus, um nach dem Rechten zu sehen. Es kam zu einem Handgemenge, und Vaters Nasenbein wurde dabei gebrochen. Uns erzählte er, das Nasenbein sei gebrochen, weil er von einem Wagen gefallen sei. Tante Else, die mit uns lebte, flüchtete in den Garten, von wo aus sie sich im Keller versteckte. Ich erinnere mich noch an den Garten, wo Tante Elsa sich versteckt hatte. Es war ein wunderbarer Garten mit Obstbäumen, in dem auch Gemüse angebaut wurde. 

An heißen Tagen paddelten wir oft und gern im kühlen Wasser der Elsenz, das ist ein kleiner Fluss, der durch Hoffenheim fließt.Wenn „unsere Feinde“ uns entdecken, griffen sie uns an und schrien: Ersäuft die Judenbuben! Sie drückten meinem  Bruder einmal den Kopf unter Wasser ließen ihn erst im letzten Augenblick los. Seit diese Zeit hatte er Angst vor tiefem Wasser, obwohl er schwimmen konnte. Einmal schaffte ich es nicht ihnen zu entkommen, sie verprügelten mich und stießen mich in einen Brennnesselbusch, der am Ufer stand.

Es gab immer mehr Gesetze gegen Juden. Nach und nach wurden ihnen alle Bürgerrechte genommen. Auch ihre Berufe durften sie nicht mehr ausüben. Jüdische Geschäfte wurden geschlossen und mussten zu Schleuderpreisen an Nichtjuden verkauft werden. Mein Vater, der Viehhändler war, damals gab es viele jüdische Viehhändler in dieser Gegend, wurde arbeitslos. Er und die anderen männlichen Juden wurden zur Zwangsarbeit verpflichtet und mussten Steine für den Straßenbau in der Umgebung klopfen. Die obere Schießmauerstraße in Hoffenheim war eine dieser Straßen, an denen die Juden arbeiten mussten. Für die schwere Arbeit erhielten sie einen Hungerlohn, der an der Grenze zum Existenzminimum lag. Nach und nach hat sich die Situation für Juden immer mehr verschlechtert. Ab 1. Januar 1939 wurden alle jüdischen Geschäfte geschlossen, dadurch hatte niemand mehr Arbeit. Die Führerscheine wurden ihnen weggenommen, sie durften keine Wertpapiere, keinen Schmuck und keine Kunstgegenstände besitzen. Es gab eine Ausgangssperre, im Sommer 21 Uhr, im Winter 20 Uhr. Die Rundfunkgeräte mussten abgegeben werden.

Alle wollten das Land verlassen, auch unsere Eltern. Sie stellten einen Antrag für ein Visum in die USA, um zu unserem Verwandten, Adolph Heumann, zu ziehen. Die Einwanderungspolitik der USA war zu jener Zeit außerordentlich restriktiv. Für jedes Land gab es eine bestimmte Quote. Unser Antrag hatte eine Nummer im Bereich von 1 600.000. Zum Zeitpunkt unserer Deportation hatte das amerikanische Konsulat die Nummer 900.000 aufgerufen. 

Seit dem September 1935 war der Ausschluss der jüdischen Schüler vom Unterricht an deutschen Schulen vorbereitet worden. Das Reichsministerium für Wissenschaft, Erziehung und Volksbildung gab ein Rundschreiben (Anm.: entnommen der Seminararbeit von Ludwig Streib „Israelitische Gemeinde in Hoffenheim 1918 bis 1945) heraus, in dem es hieß: 

Eine Hauptvoraussetzung für jede gedeihliche Erziehungsarbeit ist die rassische Übereinstimmung von Lehrer und Schüler. Kinder jüdischer Abstammung bilden für die Einheitlichkeit der Klassengemeinschaft und die ungestörte Durchführung der nationalsozialistischen Jugenderziehung auf den allgemeinen öffentlichen Schulen ein starkes Hindernis. Die Herstellung nationalsozialistischer Klassengemeinschaften als Grundlage einer auf dem deutschen Volkstumsgedanken beruhenden Jugenderziehung ist nur möglich, wenn eine klare Scheidung nach Rassenzugehörigkeit der Kinder vorgenommen wird. Ich beabsichtige daher, vom Schuljahr 1936 ab für die reichsangehörigen Schüler alle Schularten eine möglichst vollständige Rassentrennung durchzuführen.

Manfred besuchte die Schule in Hoffenheim zwei Jahre, dann wechselte er in die jüdische Schule nach Heidelberg. Er fuhr jeden Tag mit dem Zug eine Stunde nach Heidelberg und eine Stunde nach dem Unterricht zurück. Der Weg dorthin war ungefähr 25 km. Im März 1938 wurde ich 6 Jahre alt, und am 20. April kam ich in die Volksschule in Hoffenheim. Da war ich bis zum 10. November. Damals wurden die Kinder in Deutschland im April eingeschult. An diese insgesamt ungefähr drei Monate in der Schule in Hoffenheim kann ich mich leider nicht mehr erinnern. 

Endlich lieferte das Attentat von Herschel Grynszpan auf den Legationssekretär der deutschen Botschaft in Paris am 7. November 1938 dem Reichsministerium für Wissenschaft, Erziehung und Volksbildung den entscheidenden Handlungsvorwand dafür, jüdische Kinder von staatlichen Schulen auszuschließen. Sein Erlass vom Schulunterricht an Juden von 15. November 1938 befand: Nach der ruchlosen Mordtat von Paris kann es keinem deutschen Lehrer mehr zugemutet werden, an jüdische Kinder Unterricht zu erteilen. Auch versteht es sich von selbst, dass ist für deutsche Schüler unerträglich ist, mit Juden in einem Klassenraum zu sitzen. Die Rassentrennung im Schulwesen ist zwar in den letzten Jahren im Allgemeinen bereits durchgeführt, doch ist ein Restbestand jüdischer Schüler auf den deutschen Schulen übrig geblieben. Ich ordne daher mit sofortiger Wirkung an: Juden ist der Besuch deutscher Schulen nicht gestattet. Sie dürfen nur jüdische Schulen besuchen. Diese Regelung erstreckt sich auf alle mir unterstellten Schulen einschließlich der Pflichtschulen (Anm.: entnommen der Seminararbeit von Ludwig Streib „Israelitische Gemeinde in Hoffenheim 1918 bis 1945)

(Anm.: Am 7. November 1938 hatte ein jüdischer Student polnischer Nationalität, der 1921 in Deutschland geborene 17jährige Herschel Grynszpan, den deutschen Diplomaten Ernst vom Rath, in Paris erschossen. Grynszpans Eltern, die seit 1914 in Deutschland gelebt hatten, waren zusammen mit weiteren 50.000 polnischen Juden in das Niemandsland zwischen Deutschland und Polen ausgewiesen worden. Die Polen weigerten sich, die Menschen ins Land zu lassen, während die Deutschen sie an der Rückkehr hinderten. Es gab weder Unterkünfte noch Verpflegung, die Lebensbedingungen waren entsetzlich, und die Menschen befanden sich in einem furchtbaren Zustand. Als Grynszpan, der aus Deutschland zum Studium nach Paris gegangen war, davon erfuhr, ging er zur Botschaft, um sich für die diese Menschen einzusetzen. Als sein Antrag abgelehnt wurde, zog er eine Handfeuerwaffe und erschoss vom Rath. Dieses Ereignis nahmen die Deutschen zum Vorwand für ihre folgenden Handlungen). 

Am Morgen des 10. November 1938 ging Fred wie immer zur Schule, aber als er dort ankam, sagten die Lehrer, er solle sofort nach Hause zu gehen. Als er vom Bahnhof in Hoffenheim nach Hause kam, sah er unsere Mutter mit einem mit Kleidern und Bettzeug beladenen Karren, den sie vor sich herschob. Sie erzählte ihm, dass die Synagoge und unsere angrenzende Wohnung gerade zerstört werden. Möbel und Haushaltsgegenstände lagen auf der Straße. Unsere Mutter war auf dem Weg zum Haus unserer Verwandten, der Familie Heumann. Fred rannte zu dem Platz, auf dem unser Haus stand und die Synagoge. Viele Leute waren dort. Einige Nazis aus dem Ort, darunter auch jene, die mit meinem Vater zur Schule gegangen waren, seine Waffenbrüder während des Ersten Weltkriegs, standen oben auf dem Dach, dass sie mit großem Enthusiasmus abdeckten. Es war für unseren Vater schmerzlich anzusehen, mit welchem Vergnügen sie das taten. Nach einigen Stunden war von der 1750 erbauten Synagoge nur noch ein Haufen Schutt übrig. Zehn Jahre später wurde der örtliche SA- Truppführer zusammen mit dem örtlichen Parteiführer und mit dem Obersturmbannführer, der die Zerstörung der Synagoge angeordnet hatte, vor Gericht gestellt. Ich stieß auf die Prozessunterlagen in Yad Vashem: 

Am Donnerstag, den 10. November 1938 um 7:00 Uhr wies Eugen Laule, Bürgermeister von Waibstadt und SA- Obersturmbannführer, den örtlichen SA- Truppführer Lehrer Emil Hopp und fünf oder sechs weitere SA-Männer aus dem Ort an, sich in Uniform zur Synagoge zu begeben, wo unser Vater mit ihnen zusammentraf. Die Nazis befahlen ihm, unsere Wohnung zu verlassen, da sie jetzt die Synagoge zerstören würden. Sie konnte nicht niedergebrannt werden, da die Gefahr bestand, dass das Feuer auf benachbarte Häuser übergreifen würde. Die Nazis warfen Möbelstücke aus dem Fenster im ersten Stock. Ein SA- Mann wollte uns beim Heraustragen unsere persönlichen Habe helfen, wurde aber von seinem Vorgesetzten daran gehindert, der sagte: Kerl, dir trete ich in den Arsch, wenn du den Juden hilfst auszuziehen! Und zu einem anderen: Jetzt können Sie zeigen, ob Sie nationalsozialistisch sind oder nicht. Dann drangen die Uniformträger, unterstützt von Dorfbewohnern, in die Synagoge ein und begannen, sie systematisch zu zerstören. Der große Kronleuchter krachte zu Boden, Thorarollen und heilige Bücher wurden zerrissen, und das Dach des Gebäudes wurde zerstört. Nachdem alles kurz und klein geschlagen war, wurden die Überreste auf einen Wagen geladen und auf ein offenes Feld Richtung Sinsheim gebracht, wo sie verbrannt wurden. 

Meine Familie und andere Juden des Ortes standen weinend vor ihrer Synagoge, die Kinder der Familien waren aus dem Bett gerissen worden und standen im Schlafanzug auf der Straße. Die Frage einer verärgerten Nachbarin an die Übeltäter, ob sie sich nicht schämen, wurde mit der Drohung einer Verhaftung beantwortet. Am Ende dieses Tages voller Ausschreitungen wurde Vater abgeführt und einen Monat lang im KZ Dachau gefangen gehalten. Bei der Ankunft wurde den Häftlingen der Kopf rasiert, und sie wurden in Gefängniskleidung gesteckt. Um die 300 Männer wurden in Baracken gezwängt, die für 40 Menschen vorgesehen waren. Gequält und gedemütigt waren sie den Launen der SS ausgeliefert. Vor nicht allzu langer Zeit haben wir in Yad Vashem den Bericht von Vaters Einlieferung ins KZ Dachau entdeckt. Er wurde aufgrund von Konzessionen gegenüber deutschen Veteranen aus dem Ersten Weltkrieg früher als andere entlassen.

Nachdem ich, ich war gerade mal 6 1/2 Jahre als, Zeuge der Zerstörung der Synagoge geworden war, wohnten wir bei den Heumanns, Kirchstraße 10. Das Haus stand neben der Evangelischen Kirche. Unsere Mutter, die einen mit unserer Habe hochbeladenen Karren vor sich her schob, ging voraus, und wir zogen noch am selben Tag bei Ihnen ein. Wir schliefen alle in demselben Zimmer, Mutter und wir Kinder. Vater kam am 8. Dezember aus Dachau zurück. Er war in einem furchtbaren Zustand, er trug nur einen Schuh, und am Bein einen Verband. Er erzählte uns nicht viel über seine Erlebnisse der vergangenen Wochen. Er war damals 44 Jahre alt. 

Mein KinderfreundPaul Gehrigkonnte sich sogar daran erinnern, wie meine Mutter angezogen war am 10. November 1938 bei der Zerstörung der Synagoge. Ich habe nur ein Bild vor meinen Augen, wie man unsere Möbel vom zweiten Stock heraus geworfen hat auf einen Misthaufen. Noch heute befindet sich eine Kommode meiner Eltern im Haus der Nachkommen der damaligen Nachbarn, und sie sind nicht bereit, sie herzugeben oder sie mir zu verkaufen.

Die zwei letzten Jahre vor unserer Deportation haben wir zusammen mit Hermann und Ida Heumann in ihrem kleinen Haus in der Kirchstrasse 10 gewohnt. Wir lebten sehr eng beieinander, die Heumanns, unsere Mutter, Tante Elsa und wir Kinder. Dann kamen noch mein Onkel Moritz, der Bruder meines Vaters und seine Frau Alma mit ihrer Tochter Inge, die ein Baby war, aus Saarbrücken zu uns. Sie hatten ihr Haus an der französischen Grenze verlassen müssen. Beheizt wurde das Haus der Heumanns mit einem Holzofen, im Winter war der wärmste Ort die Küche. Einmal verbrannte sich Manfred ganz schrecklich mit heißer Suppe. Ich werde niemals den deutschen Arzt vergessen, der uns schon früher, vor dem Kontaktverbot behandelte. Er riskierte sein Leben, als er heimlich bei Nacht und Nebel kam, um Manfreds Verletzungen zu untersuchen. Zu diesem Zeitpunkt war es deutschen nichtjüdischen Ärzten bereits verboten, Juden zu behandeln.

Aber ich war glücklich. Man hat alles von mir ferngehalten. Die Heumanns hatten Kinder, die nach Amerika und Argentinien ausgewandert waren. Eine Urenkelin von diesen Heumanns, wurde auf der Universität in den USA gefragt, ob sie weiß, warum ihre Urgroßeltern nicht zu ihren Kindern nach Amerika gekommen sind. Also ich habe keine persönlichen Erinnerungen, aber mein Bruder erzählte mir, dass Hermann Heumann Epileptiker war. Er litt unter epileptischen Anfällen. . Deshalb bekam er keine Einreisegenehmigung für die USA. Deswegen wurden sie ermordet. 

Nach dem 10. November sind mein Bruder und ich jeden Tag zusammen mit dem Zug in die jüdische Schule nach Heidelberg gefahren, in die Kinder aus Heidelberg und verschiedenen Ortschaften der Gegend kamen. Erinnern kann ich mich aber weder an die Zugfahrt noch an die Schule. Bis zur Deportation am 22 Oktober1940 war ich mit meinem Bruder in dieser Schule. 

Noch eine Erinnerung von zu Hause: Am Morgen der Deportation kamen zu uns zwei Männer von der Gestapo oder von der Polizei oder der eine so und der andere so in Uniformen mit dem Befehl, dass wir in zwei Stunden reisebereit sein sollen. Da hat mein Vater eine Schublade aufgemacht und das Eiserne Kreuz heraus genommen, das er als Auszeichnung im Ersten Weltkrieg bekommen hatte. Er hat es auf den Boden geworfen und hat geschrien: dafür habe ich während des Krieges gekämpft!

Jeder Erwachsene durfte 50 Kilo und jedes Kind durfte 30 Kilo Gepäck mitnehmen. An die Fahrt nach Gurs kann ich mich erinnern. Ich erinnere mich nicht an die Fahrt in einem Lastwagen von Hoffenheim nach Heidelberg. Ich erinnere mich, dass wir in einem Zug waren, und wir wussten nicht, wohin der Zug fahren wird. Und ich erinnere mich sehr gut an das Schreien von SS- Leuten, dass man nicht den Kopf aus dem Fenster des Zuges stecken darf, wer das macht, wird erschossen! Ich war damals acht Jahre alt, ich war klein, und ich lag im Gepäcknetz. 

Pfarrer Ludwig Streib beschreibt die Deportation wie folgt: 

Am Nachmittag mussten sich die letzten 18 Mitglieder einer einst viel größeren Gemeinde im Saal des Rathauses versammeln. Die meisten von ihnen wussten wohl, was auf sie zukommen sollte (Anm.: Menachem Mayer sagt, sie wussten es nicht!) ebenso gewusst hat es wohl auch Hermann Heumann. Eine Frau, die im begegnete, als er und seine Frau mit ihren Koffern auf das Rathaus gingen, erzählte folgendes: “Ich habe zu ihnen gesagt: auf Wiedersehen, Frau Heumann! Auf Wiedersehen, Hermann!” Mit ihm war ich per Du, weil ich ihn schon als kleines Kind kannte. Darauf sagte er, und seine Frau heulte, und ich heulte auch: “Verrecken sollen sie, alle auf einem Haufen!” Worauf Frau Heumann meinte: “Hermann, sei doch still, du kannst doch nichts ändern.” “Das ist mir ganz egal, wir gehen ja doch nichts Gutem entgegen”, erwiderte Hermann darauf. Nur wenige Nachbarn begleiteten die Juden zum Rathaus. Die LKWs kamen und Uniformierte schoben und stießen die Juden hinauf. Ein Hoffenheimer, der dabei stand, sagte zu einem Nazi: “Geht hinaus in den Krieg, dort könnt ihr dies machen! Aber die hier haben euch doch nichts getan!” Der Uniformträger antwortete: “Recht haben Sie, aber wenn Sie nicht ruhig sind, dann kommen sie nach Dachau.” Sonst ist nichts weiter über die Reaktion der Einwohner bekannt. Pfarrer Streib fährt fort: die Hoffenheimer jüdischen Einwohner wurden zusammen mit weiteren Juden aus dem Nachbarorten nach Heidelberg gefahren, wo sie in den bereitgestellten Sonderzug gesperrt wurden. Von Heidelberg ging der Transport am selben Abend über mehrere badische Städte ins französische Mühlhausen; dort wurden die 100 RM in Franc umgetauscht, doch zuvor wurden die Juden durch SS-Männer aufgefordert, falls Sie mehr Geld hätten, dies abzuliefern, anderenfalls würden sie erschossen. Auch wer den Zug verließ, sollte erschossen werden. 

Nach mehreren Tagen Fahrt in den insgesamt neun Sonderzügen ohne viel Wasser mit geringer Verpflegung und in eine ungewisse Zukunft, kamen die Züge in Gurs, in der Nähe der Pyrenäen, an. Der Gauleiter von Hoffenheim war ein fanatischer Nazi. Sein Entschluss, die Juden so schnell wie möglich zu deportieren, rettete uns sogar das Leben, weil wir statt in den Osten nach Westen geschickt wurden. Zwei Jahre später wurden alle anderen Verwandten nach Ausschwitz transportiert und dort umgebracht. Nur wir überlebten wie durch ein Wunder.

Abends oder Nachts kamen wir in Gurs an. Ich erinnere mich an den ersten Tag und den tiefen Schlamm. Es gab keine Gehsteige, kein Pflaster, keine Vegetation. Wir haben in einer Baracke mit unserer Mutter gewohnt. Die Männer waren getrennt von den Frauen in verschiedenen Blocks. Ilots (Anm.: franz. kleine Inseln: Das Lager war eingeteilt in diese Ilots, die jeweils 25 Baracken mit je 60 Schlafplätzen umfassten. Jedes Ilot war mit Stacheldraht umzäumt. Zuerst gab es nur den nackten Boden zum Schlafen, dann bekamen die Gefangenen einen Sack, in den sie Stroh füllen konnten)hießen die. Ich erinnere mich an die sogenannten Toiletten. Die kleinen Kinder und die alten Leute saßen die ganze Zeit einfach nur da, sie warteten und weinten. Nach einigen Tagen begannen die Erwachsenen zu begreifen, in welch ausweglose Situation sie geraten waren. Der Winter war außerordentlich streng, an manchen Tagen -20°. Es kam häufig zum Ausbruch von Diphtherie, Durchfällen und anderen ansteckenden Krankheiten. Eines Morgens stand ich neben dem Zaun, sah einen Pferdewagen, der die Toten, über die Decken gebreitet waren, aus dem Lager fuhr. Ich sehe noch die Beine vor mir, die herausschauten. 

Die Essensrationen waren minimal, völlig unzureichend. Wir hatten immer Hunger. Unser Vater bemühte sich um eine Arbeit und durfte in der Küche arbeiten. Die Küche war ein Provisorium, ein paar Pfosten mit einem Blechdach darüber. Bei unseren heimlichen Besuchen schnitt Vater uns von einem runden Brotlaib eine dicke Scheibe ab, röstete sie über der offenen Flamme und bestrich sie mit einer dicken Schicht Fett. Dann gab er braunen Zucker darauf. Er hätte seinen Söhnen kein schöneres Geschenk machen können. Diese Ergänzung, die wir durch unseren Vater bekamen, half uns zu überleben. 

Wir verbrachten den ganzen Tag damit, auf dem Gelände umher zu streifen. Ich erinnere mich, wie ich hinter einer Baracke Zigarettenkippen rauchte, die ich aus dem Matsch aufgelesen hatte. Wir erforschen auch das Gebiet außerhalb des Lagers. Wir kamen bis zu dem nahe liegenden Dorf. Die französischen Polizisten hielten uns nie an, sie wussten, dass wir zurückkommen werden. Es waren französische Polizisten, die das Lager Gurs bewacht haben. Und wenn es nötig war, konnten auch die Erwachsenen aus dem Lager heraus: zum Doktor, zum Einkaufen oder etwas ähnliches. Es war ja kein Vernichtungslager, es gab Möglichkeiten zu flüchten, aber wo hätten meine Eltern hingehen sollen? Wo konnten sie hin, was konnten sie machen? Meine Eltern sprachen kein Wort Französisch, hatten kein Geld, und Niemand hat sich in dieser Zeit vorstellen können, was passieren wird. Wenn sie das gewusst hätten, wären sie alle wie die Hasen verschwunden. So vermute ich! Aber niemand wusste es! Was haben sie gedacht: Wir sind jetzt hier, aber in ein paar Monaten werden wir wieder zurück nach Hause kommen. 

Ich hatte einen guten Freund, mit dem ich viele Jahre zusammen war. Das war Alfred Stein. Alfred habe ich im Lager in Gurs kennen gelernt. Er war zusammen mit seiner Mutter mit den Juden aus Baden und der Saarpfalzdeportiert worden. Sie kamen aus Schwetzingen, glaube ich. Alfreds Vater war kein Jude. Das wusste ich damals nicht. Der Vater hatte sich getrennt von seiner Frau und seinem Kind. Das bedeutete, dass sie nicht mehr geschützt waren. Alfreds Mutter ist, wie meine Familie, nach Ausschwitz deportiert und dort ermordet worden. 

Alfred war die vielen Jahre in allen Heimen mit mir zusammen. Auch er ist nach Israel eingewandert, schon 1947. Ich bin hierhergekommen 1948,  habe ihn gesucht und nicht gefunden. Vor ungefähr 15 Jahren erzählte mir Pfarrer Lohrbächer, einer meiner Freunde in Deutschland, dass Alfred Stein gestorben ist. Und er erzählte mir, dass es Alfreds Wille war, dass man ihn verbrennt: so wie man seine Mutter verbrannt hat in Auschwitz.

Wir waren vier Monate in dem Lager, mein Bruder und ich, von Ende Oktober 1940 bis Februar 1941. Dann haben unsere Eltern beschlossen, als das Angebot bestand, uns in ein Waisenhaus zu geben, damit wir in besseren Verhältnissen existieren können. Die meisten Eltern waren nicht bereit dazu, ihre Kinder weg zu geben. Unsere Eltern waren ja bereit, und deshalb kann ich heute diese Geschichte erzählen. Denn die Eltern, die nicht bereit waren sich von ihren  Kindern zu trennen, wurden mit ihren Kindern 1942 nach Ausschwitz deportiert und ermordet. 

Wenn ich an die Abreise aus Gurs denke, habe ich zwei Bilder von mir. Wahrscheinlich wurde den Eltern gesagt, sie sollen ihre Kinder an einen Platz auf der Hauptstraße des Lagers bringen um eine bestimmte Zeit. Mein Vater war da, und er hat mich auf den Lastwagen heraufgehoben. Das einzige Bild was ich von ihm habe, sind seine blau-grauen Augen, sehr traurige Augen. Traurige große blaue Augen! Das ist das einzige, woran ich mich an seinem Gesicht erinnere. Es war das letzte Mal, dass ich ihn sah. Von meiner Mutter habe ich mich nicht verabschiedet, sie war nicht dabei. Das Lastauto ist abgefahren von dieser Hauptstraße, welche durch das ganze Lager ging. An einem Platz war eine Holzbrücke, und als das Auto über die Brücke gefahren ist, stand meine Mutter auf der Brücke und hat irgendwelche Zeichen mit ihren Händen gemacht. Entweder sie hat gewinkt oder war erschrocken, ich weiß nicht, was es war. Das war das letzte Mal, dass ich sie gesehen habe. Wir sind mit dem Lastauto zu einer Zugstation gefahren und von da aus vielleicht noch mit dem Zug 100 km. Wir kamen in ein Heim in Aspet, das war ein Waisenhaus von französischen Kindern. Zuerst waren wir nicht versteckt, weil jeder wusste, dass wir da sind. 

Unsere Gruppe bestand aus 48 Kindern, welche aus Gurs herauskamen. Ein kleiner Teil der Kinder wurde in die USA geschickt ,und wir sollten auch dabei sein. Das habe ich später aber erst erfahren, damals nicht. Wir sollten auch zu unserer Tante Elsa nach England, aber auch das hat nicht geklappt. 

Ich weiß, dasswir hungerten, nicht genug zu essen hatten, aber wir waren nicht die Einzigen, auch alle Anderen hungerten. Ich habe angefangen Essbares zu stehlen. Und ich war sehr geschickt dabei. 

Ich erinnere mich nicht, dass ich damals, in Aspet, viel mit meinem Bruder zusammen gewesen wäre. Mein Bruder hatte seine Freunde, und ich hatte meine Freunde. Das war für mich wahrscheinlich genug.

Nur zwei Wochen, nachdem wir uns von unseren Eltern getrennt hatten, wurden sie in das Lager Rivesaltes, nahe Perpignan, gebracht (Anm.: auch dieses Lager befand sich in der „freien Zone“, unter dem Vichy-Regime. Ab November 1942 wurde aus Rivesaltes ungefähr 2300 Juden, unter ihnen auch die Eltern von Menachem und Fred, in das Sammellager Drancy bei Paris gebracht und von dort nach Auschwitz deportiert und ermordet). 

Viele Jahre später, es war 1959, bekam ich eines Tages ein Paket mit Briefen, die mir mein Bruder Fred aus Amerika nach Israel schickte. Er schrieb mir: Ich ziehe jetzt um und habe diese Briefe die ganzen Jahre bei mir behalten. Jetzt schicke ich sie dir, mach mit den Briefen, was du willst. 

Zu diesem Zeitpunkt wusste ich erst, dass es überhaupt Briefe gab. Mein Bruder hatte sein Deutsch aus seinem Gedächtnis gestrichen, er hat die Briefe nicht mehr lesen können. Damals habe ich diese Briefe nicht aufgemacht. Ich habe sie in eine Schublade gelegt.

Erst Mitte der 1970er Jahre habe ich begonnen, sie zu lesen. Ich musste so lange warten, bis ich psychisch in der Lage war, um in die Vergangenheit hereinzuschauen. So erkläre ich mir das. Ich habe mich die ganzen Jahre vorher nicht für meine Kindheit interessiert. Ich habe auch nicht nachgeforscht, nicht gesucht. Ich war beschäftigt damit, meine Zukunft aufzubauen und wahrscheinlich nicht reif genug für die Vergangenheit. Heute habe ich sehr wenige Erinnerungen, jetzt möchte ich mich erinnern, aber alles ist verdrängt. Vielleicht ist es besser so, ich weiß nicht! 

Meine Kinder wollten wissen, was in den Briefen steht. Das erste Mal kam ich 1972 nach Hoffenheim und etwas später habe ich dann die Briefe aufgemacht. 

Camp de Gurs, den 1. März 1941

Meine lieben Kinder! 

Mit Euren Zeilen haben wir uns sehr gefreut, besonders, dass es euch gut gefällt. Der Transport von hier nach Rivesaltes wurde verschoben auf 10. März; ob wir da mitkommen, wissen wir noch nicht, da nur Leute mit Kindern in Frage kommen. Da habt ihr aber gute Sachen bekommen. Was bekommt ihr zu essen, und wie ist es sonst bei Euch? Hattet Ihr mich eigentlich noch gesehen? Als Euer Auto vorbei fuhr, stand ich gerade auf der Holzbrücke und winkte. Es ging aber sehr schnell ab bei euch. Die liebe Inge ist im Krankenhaus wegen ihrem Keuchhusten. Oma ist noch in der Internen. Seid herzlich gegrüßt und geküsst, Eure euch Liebende Mutter.

Lieber Manfred und Heinz, mit Euren Zeilen haben wir uns sehr gefreut, besonders dass ihr gesund seid und so schön aufgehoben seid. Wann wir hier wegkommen, weiß ich nicht. Hoffentlich schreibt ihr bald einen großen, ausführlichen Brief. Lieber Manfred und Heinz, seid recht brav, dass die Schwester sagt, ihr seid brave Jungens und passt gut auf in der Schule, dass ihr etwas lernt. Sonst weiß ich nichts. Seid recht herzlich gegrüßt und geküsst von 

Euren Vater.

Liebe Kinder, 

mit Deinen lieben Brief freuen wir uns sehr. Inge ist noch im Hospital, aber bedeutend besser. Bin froh, dass es euch gut geht und gefällt. Bleibt weiter gesund und gebt bald wieder gute Nachricht. Grüße und Küsse von Tante, Onkel, Alma, Inge, Moritz

Rivesaltes, den 14.3.1941

Meine lieben Kinder, 

Ihr werdet erstaunt sein, dass wir nicht mehr in Gurs sind. Wir sind seit 11. März hier. Oma und Onkel Emanuel ist nicht dort. Lieber Manfred und Heinz, habt Ihr schon Schule gehabt? Sicher ist es bei Euch auch sehr schön, seid froh, dass ihr dort seid und Euch eingewöhnt. Lieber Manfred, grüße auch Heinz, auf dass er etwas lernt, denn Du bist älter wie Heinz, horcht dem Lehrer, dass ihr was lernt und brave Jungens gebt. 

Seid gegrüßt und geküsst von euren Vater

Rivesaltes, den 30.6.1941

Meine innig geliebten Kinder! 

Eure beiden Briefe haben wir erhalten und uns damit gefreut. Ich war der Meinung, wir hätten euch Antwort geschrieben - vor lauter Arbeit scheinbar vergessen. Denn ich war vorige Woche noch in der Küche und machte zweimal in der Woche Nachtwache in der Infermerie (Anm.: Krankenstation). Da bekomme ich 1/2 l Milch und ein Achtel Brot dafür. Von abends 8:00 Uhr bis morgens 8:00 Uhr, dann wasche ich, um etwas zu verdienen. Vater ist bei den Pferden zum Füttern. Diese braucht man für die Abfälle fortzuführen usw. Nun ist es hier auch sehr heiß. Nachmittags in den Baracken sehr, trotzdem sie aus Stein sind. Was machen die anderen Jungs? Dachte, ihr schickt ein Bild von Euch? Würde euch gerne etwas Geld zur Aufnahme senden. Warum hat Heinz nicht den letzten Brief geschrieben? Theo ist Nummer 99, Hof B. Die Männer und Frauen sind in einem Ilod. Bleibt gesund und der liebe Gott sei bei Euch und schütze Euch. Vertraut ihm nur betet zu ihm, dass er Euch gesund lässt, denn das ist die Hauptsache. 

Seid für heute herzlich gegrüßt und geküsst, Eure Euch liebende Mutter

Mein lieber Manfred und Heinz! 

Warum haben wir von Euch diese Woche keinen Brief erhalten? Hoffentlich hat es keinen Grund und Ihr seid gesund, denn wir machen uns Gedanken darüber, weil Ihr jede Woche geschrieben habt. Hoffentlich seid Ihr gesund, was für von uns auch mitteilen können. Mutter hat Euch geschrieben, dass ich woanders arbeite, bei den Pferden. Ich bin froh, dass es Euch gut gefällt. Wenn Ihr auf das Feld geht, setzt ja etwas auf den Kopf. Sonst weiß ich nichts neues. Heinz soll im nächsten Brief auch etwas schreiben. Lieber Manfred, Du musst den Briefbogen so nehmen wie wir. Nochmals Grüße und Küsse, Euer Vater

Rivesaltes, den 8. November 1941 

Meine lieben Kinder! 

Euren Brief haben wir gestern erhalten und daraus ersehen, dass Ihr, Gott sei Dank, gesund seid. Gibt nur acht bei der Kälte und zieht euch warm an. Habt ihr auch noch warme Strümpfe und Heinz seinen Pullover noch? Das dunkelblau – und -rote Anzügle wird zu klein sein. Und warum schreibt Heinz immer, er musste daheim bleiben, da er keine Schuhe hatte. Habe ihm doch drei Paar Stiefel, Halb - und Gummischuhe mitgegeben. Wo sind sie denn alle? Schade, dass keine Wolle habe, sonst hätte ich Strümpfe gestrickt. Hätten wir nur die warmen Strümpfe von zu Hause mitgenommen, die langen. Bekommt ihr warme Strümpfe und Pantoffeln und warme Pullover? Soll ich Euch den blauen Wintermantel schicken; ein Schloss für Heinz haben wir gekauft. Zu deiner Frage, Manfred, weiß ich auch nicht, was ich dir raten soll bezüglich Heinz. Frage, ob du Deinen Bruder mitnehmen darfst. Ich meine, beisammen bleiben ist besser als das eine da, das andere dort. Von der OSE höre, dass bald jemand wegen der Amerika -Sache nach Aspet käme. Auch Frau Salomon , die eben hier ist, hätte gesagt, sie fahre bald nach Aspet. Hätte euch schon gerne etwas gesandt. Aber es geht ein solch starker, eiskalter Sturm schon einige Tage, dass man noch nicht zur Post konnte, welche in einem anderen Ilot weit weg ist. Ich hatte ein geschwollenes Gesicht. Auf der einen Seite hatte Eiter im Zahn. Er muss gezogen werden. Immer etwas anderes. Muss mich sehr in Acht nehmen, sonst habe sofort Durchfall. Tante Else hatten wir Post vom 15. August. Sie schrieb, sie hatte von uns im August einen Brief erhalten. Hatten noch einige andere geschrieben. Theo ist weg von hier und Kurt Altstädter, weiß nicht, ob im Heim oder so zur Erholung. Theo ist in einem Restaurant. Vater arbeitet auch im Militärcamp mit dem Clo-Auto. Die beiden bekommen etwas mehr Brot und mehr Suppe. Von Gurs hatte Onkel Emanuel Eure Impfscheine geschickt. Habt ihr Ofen und Feuer? Bei uns sind keine da. Eine sehr große Baracke, und 90-100 Personen reingehen. Hatte das letzte Mal Marken reingelegt. Waren sie noch drin? Manfred, meinst Du, dort (Anm.: Amerika) ist es besser? Vielleicht kannst Du Heinz mitnehmen. Es wird besser sein, wenn ihr beisammen bleibt. Man muss die Kennkartennummer auf unseren Brief schreiben: 5273. 

Alles Gute, Küsse von Eurer Mutter.

Ein Brief meines Onkel Emanuel:

Gurs, den 12. März 1942

Hallo lieber Manfred und Heinz! 

Deinen so schönen und lieben Brief, lieber Manfred, habe ich erhalten und danke Dir bestens dafür. Leider konnte die liebe Oma solchen ich nicht mehr lesen. Denke dir, die liebe Oma ist nicht mehr bei uns. Ich habe in den letzten Wochen Furchtbares durchgemacht und erleben müssen. Aus diesem Grunde konnte ich Euch, meine lieben Buben, auch nicht schreiben. Wie hätten wir uns mit Deinen Eltern gefreut, wenn wir Dein Fest desBar -Mizwa hätten erleben können beziehungsweise zusammen hätten feiern können. Ich gratuliere Dir nachträglich besonders herzlich und wünsche Dir alles erdenklich Gute, und lass uns Freude mit dir erleben, besonders, dass Deine lieben Eltern an dir

 Stütze haben. Schreibe mir bitte bald wieder, denn du kannst dir denken, dass mir nicht so sehr ums Schreiben ist. Aber Post möchte ich doch gerne haben. Ich bin ja jetzt so alleine hier. Sage an Heinz auch besonders herzliche Grüße, und er soll mir auch schreiben. Für heute nun viele herzliche 

Grüße und Küsse, Euer Onkel Emanuel 

Rivesaltes, den 19. Mai 1942

Meine geliebten Kinder! 

Hoffentlich seid ihr gesund, was bei uns soweit auch der Fall ist. War ganz erstaunt über das Paketchen, welches heute erhielten. Wir freuten uns sehr damit und können die Sachen gut gebrauchen. Es waren darin: zwei Schächtelchen Käse. Das eine war beinahe leer und offen, etwas Kullererbsen, fünf harte Eier, hätten sie auch roh schicken können. Frau Levy, die neben mir liegt, bekommt oft, die Frau von Levy, der bei Vater in Küche war, ist die. Neben ihr liegt Frau Kayem, die Mutter von Irene, und neben dieser Irmie Hermann. Diese drei Frauen bekommen wöchentlich sehr viele Pakete, aber gaben nie etwas davon her, haben aber das Glück auf der guten Seite. Neben mir liegt Frau Kahn mit Irene aus der Baraque 20 in Gurs. Essen in Essbaracke, und dort servieren Spanierinnen. Es gibt Dienstag, Mittwoch, Donnerstag und Sonntag etwas Fleisch und dann eine Lusche (Anm.: Kochlöffel) Suppe, 1/8 Brot, manchmal ein Stückchen Käse und manchmal etwas Wein. Auch haben wir in letzter Zeit etwas Schokolade oder Kirschen bekommen. Morgens bekomme von der Secours Suisse (Anm.: Wohlfahrtsorganisation) zwei Luschen Erbsmehlsuppe, da ich nur 86 Pfund wiege. Vater bekommt auch eine Lusche dort. Er wiegt 102 Pfund noch. So schlägt man sich durch. Die zwei weißen Pferde, mit denen Vater fährt, sind sehr wild. Habe immer Angst, dass ihm nichts passiert. Haben von Elsa einen Brief erhalten. Nun kamen gestern einige 100 Francs durch die Quäker hier an. Fragt mal bitte Herrn Wildström, ob er mir, wenn ich ihm etwas Geld einschicke, etwas senden könnte. Aber sendet die Eier dann roh. Da kann ich eine Einlaufsuppe oder sonst etwas davon machen. Habe schon zweimal an Ludwig nach Les Milles (Anm.: ein anderes Lager) geschrieben, aber keine Antwort bekommen. Auch Herr Levy (Toulouse) gibt mir keine Antwort mehr. Will nochmal schreiben. Hat einmal 50 Fr geschickt. Was macht Heinz? Bin froh, dass es ihm in der Schule gut gefällt. Vater ist jetzt nicht da. Der Brief soll fort. Herzlich küsst Euch Eure Euch liebende Mutter

Der letzte Brief:

Rivaltes, den 10. August 1942

 Meine lieben Kinder! 

Will Euch schnell vor der Abreise einige Zeilen schreiben. Habe gestern Abend den großen Schließkorb mit viel Wäsche an euch abgesandt, da wir jetzt abreisen und dürfen nur Handgepäck mitnehmen. Wenn ihr nach Amerika kommt, so seht zu, dass ihr was mitnehmt davon. Vielleicht kommen wir mit Gottes Hilfe auch noch nach dort. Grüßt Tante Elsa, wenn ihr an sie schreibt. Weiß nicht, ob wir Euch schreiben können, vielleicht durchs Rote Kreuz. Bleib brav und gesund, Eure Euch liebende Mutter 

Meine lieben Kinder, 

ich will noch vor der Abfahrt einige Zeilen schreiben, weiß nicht, wo wir hinkommen. Wir haben euch gern zurückgelassen. Ihr seid besser aufgehoben. Ihr hört vielleicht alles. Bleibt gesund und seid herzlich gegrüßt und geküsst von Euerer Mutter (Anm.: Er wollte schreiben: Euerer Vater)

Vertragt Euch, Manfred und Heinz, das sind meine Sorgen.

Frankreich war ja geteilt in den nördlichen und südlichen Teil. Der nördliche Teil war beherrscht von den Deutschen und der südliche Teil von Frankreich durch die Vichy Regierung. Gurs, Aspet und Rivesaltes befanden sich unter der Vichy Regierung im südlichen Teil von Frankreich. Am 11. November 1942 haben die Deutschen auch den südlichen Teil besetzt, und da wurde es dann langsam gefährlich für uns, denn es war den Behörden bekannt, wo wir uns aufhielten. Die OSE (Anm.: jüdisches Kinderhilfswerk) beschloss, uns woanders zu verstecken. Im Februar 1943 wurden wir von den Quäkern an andere Plätze in Frankreich gebracht. Wir waren 48 Kinder aus dem Waisenhaus in Aspet und 5 000 Kinder aus anderen Waisenhäusern, die zerstreut auf verschiedenen Plätzen untergebracht wurden. Fred und ich kamen mit anderen Kindern aus Aspet in ein spanisches Waisenhaus in Toulouse, das sich in einem Schloss befand und umgeben war von Feldern und Bäumen. Dieses Kinderheim gehörte der katholischen Kirche. Es war ein Kinderheim für Kinder, die aus Spanien nach dem Bürgerkrieg oder während des Bürgerkriegs nach Frankreich geflüchtet waren. Auch Alfred, mein Freund, war mit mir in Toulouse, von Februar 1942 bis Mai 1944. 

Nach einem Monat wurde Manfred wegen seines Alters, er war 14 Jahre alt, nach Moissac, zuerst in ein Heim für Jugendliche gebracht, das von den jüdisch-französischen Pfadfindern betrieben wurde. Nach einigen Monaten suchten die Behörden nach jüdischen Kindern und Fred musste mit den anderen Kindern in den Untergrund. Er bekam einen französischen Namen, besuchte eine Schule und wurde in den Sommerferien in den Bergen von Zentralfrankreich bei Bauern untergebracht. Er hat mit den Bauern gearbeitet und ist mit ihnen zusammen sonntags in die Kirche gegangen. Was sie den Nachbarn erzählt haben, ob er ein Neffe ist, das weiß ich nicht. 

Wir Aspet-Kinder sind in Toulouse schon am nächsten Tag in die Schule gegangen. Die Schule war in der Nähe des Kinderheims. Ich war ein guter Schüler, bin gern in die Schule gegangen. Ich wurde auch viel gelobt, und das war für meine spätere Entwicklung sehr wichtig. Lob ist immer viel wichtiger als Tadel. Mein offizieller Name in Toulouse war Henry. Ich wusste auch, wie ich aus dem Schloss fliehen konnte, wenn die Gestapo oder die französische Miliz erscheinen sollte. 

Vor 15 Jahren bin ich mal in die Schule gefahren und habe erzählt, dass ich da einmal Schüler war. Sie haben eine Dokumentation von damals und da stand: Heinz Mayer! Das ist komisch, und ich verstehe das nicht! Sie haben unsere Identität in den Dokumenten preisgegeben. Die Lehrer wussten, wer wir sind. Also, wir waren versteckt da, andererseits waren wir eingeschrieben in die Schule mit unseren deutschen Namen. 

Eines Nachts, im Mai 1944, wurde ich aus dem Bett geholt, und man hat mich in die Schweiz geschmuggelt. Wir waren 15 Kinder. Wir sind mit dem Zug bis Lyongefahren, und dann fuhren wir mit dem Autobus oder mit einem Lastauto weiter. Ich weiß es nicht genau. Dann sind wir durch einen Wald gelaufen. Irgendwann wusste ich, dass ich angekommen bin in der Schweiz. Später hat sich herausgestellt, dass die Gestapo, da habe ich eine Dokumentation gefunden, auf unsere Spuren war. Die Vichy-Regierung wusste von dem Versteck der jüdischen Kinder. Das wurde den Leuten, die für uns verantwortlich waren, mitgeteilt.Und dann war alles Zufall; wo ich hingekommen bin und wo die anderen hingekommen sind. Nur Alfred blieb immer bei mir. 

Ich war 12 Jahre alt. Man fragte mich, ich habe das Protokoll davon, das sind nicht nur Erinnerungen, ob ich zu einem religiösen Platz will oder nicht. Ich habe geantwortet: Das ist gleichgültig, das ist egal! Ich sprach damals französisch, ich hatte überhaupt nicht die Frage verstanden. Es war mir ganz egal. Und dann bin ich in orthodox religiöse Hände gefallen. Ich war in der Schweiz vier Jahre, bis ich weggelaufen bin. Ich bin weggelaufen, die Schweizer suchen mich bis heute! 

Während der vier Jahre, bis September 1948, war ich in zehn verschiedenen Kinderheimen. Es gab eine jüdische Organisationen, welche die finanzielle Hilfe gab. Ich fühlte mich allein, aber ich war schon lange daran gewöhnt, allein zu sein. Das war nicht neu für mich. Ich war seit dem Lager Gurs allein. Mein Freund Alfred war aber die ganze Zeit bei mir. Einer von diesen Erziehern sagte zu mir: Alfred hat einen schlechten Einfluss auf dich! Ich meine, es wäre gut, wenn ich Alfred woanders hinschicke. Aber was du entscheidest, werde ich machen. Ich sagte ihm: Lass ihn hier! 

Alfred hatte einen sehr negativen Charakter. Ich war ein Lausbub, er war ein sehr großer Lausbub! Nach der Erziehung, die wir hatten, wäre mir nie eingefallen, wieder in Deutschland zu leben, obwohl ich die Möglichkeit gehabt hätte. Alfred ging zurück nach Deutschland, er ist verhältnismäßig jung gestorben. Aber man darf niemanden beurteilen. Er hat in Deutschland etwas Technisches gearbeitet, genau weiß ich es nicht. Alfred war seit Gurs immer mit mir, in Aspet, Toulouse und allen zehn religiösen Heimen. Aber 1947 sah ich ihn das letzte Mal. 

Ich erinnere mich sehr gut daran, wie mein Bruder in die Schweiz kam, das war in Engelberg, einer Kurstadt, ein Platz an dem ich relativ lang war. Manfred blieb ungefähr eine Woche da, und dann ist er wieder weg. Ungefähr einen Monat später ist er nach Amerika ausgewandert. Das ist die Tatsache! Also er sagte, dass er kam, um mich zu überzeugen, dass ich mit ihm nach Amerika komme. Und er sagte, dass ich nicht dazu bereit war. An was ich mich erinnere ist, dass er nicht kam, um mich zu überzeugen, sondern er wollte sehen, dass ich untergebracht bin und dass er frei sein kann mit seinen eigenen Flügeln. Wir waren bereits drei Jahre getrennt, und das war damals eine lange Zeit. Ich kann mich nicht erinnern, dass ich das Gefühl hatte, mein Bruder wäre meine Familie. Woran ich mich erinnere, ich war 14 Jahre alt und streng religiös.  Ich war nicht Deutsch, ich war nicht Jekkesch, ich trug Pejes und eine Glatze, war also richtig Chassidisch. Und ich betete dreimal am Tag. Es kam die Gebetszeit, wo man nicht allein, sondern zusammen mit allen betet, und ich schlug ihm vor, dass er mit mir zum Gebet kommt. Er sagte mir, nein er betet nicht, er will mir nichts vormachen, er glaubt nicht, er betet nicht und er wird meinetwegen auch nicht so tun. Ich war sehr beschämt, dass ich so einen Bruder habe, daran erinnere ich mich. Und nachdem mein Bruder weg war, um sein Leben in Amerika aufzubauen, war ich aber auch erleichtert. In Yad Vashem sagte eine Frau, zwei Brüder nach dem Holocaust sollten alles getan haben, um zusammen zu bleiben: Und ihr habt euch getrennt. Viele Jahre später, die letzten 15 Jahre seines Lebens, haben wir eine gute Beziehung aufgebaut. 

Nachdem Manfred mich besucht hatte, war ich noch zwei Jahre in der Schweiz in verschiedenen anderen Heimen. Unter anderem in einer Jeschiwa, in einer Thora-Hochschule. Das war das einzige Mal, während meines Aufenthalts in der Schweiz, dass ich etwas studierte. Ich wurde nie zur Schule geschickt. Ich habe keine Erklärung dafür, ob das die Schweizer waren oder diese Organisationen, ich weiß es nicht. Vier Jahre lang bin ich nicht zur Schule gegangen. Oh, es war ganz angenehm nicht in die Schule zu gehen. Ich glaube nicht, dass ich mal nachgefragt habe. Ich war das gewöhnt, vier Jahre lang, bis zum Alter von 16 Jahren, als ich die Schweiz verlassen habe, hatte ich eigentlich nur dreieinhalb Jahre gelernt. Und das in verschiedenen Ländern, in verschiedenen Kulturen. In Deutschland einige Monate in Hoffenheim, dann ungefähr zwei Jahre in der jüdischen Schule in Heidelberg, dann in Frankreich, in Französisch natürlich. Ich habe gerne gelernt! Und war auch ein sehr guter Schüler. Es steht sogar im Zeugnis in Toulouse, dass ich begabt bin. Aber das war meine offizielle Erziehung, dreieinhalb Jahre. 

Nach Engelberg kamen während des Krieges in die Hotels keine Touristen, deswegen waren dort Flüchtlinge untergebracht. Nach dem Krieg kamen 16/17jährige, welche KZs überlebt hatten, und die erzählten Geschichten und zeigten Bilder. So konnte ich ahnen: Was da passiert war, war auch meinen Eltern passiert. Aber offiziell habe ich damals nichts gehört. Viel später habe ich Dokumente bekommen über die Deportation meiner Eltern. Damals wusste ich noch nichts! 

Israel wurde im Mai 1948 gegründet und ich kam im September 1948. Damals war noch der Unabhängigkeitskrieg. Warum ich unbedingt nach Israel wollte, diese Frage werde ich oft gefragt. Ich werde auch gefragt, warum bist du nicht mit deinem Bruder gegangen? Warum ist dein Bruder nach Amerika gegangen und du nach Israel? Ich werde eine Geschichte erzählen über Brüder. Da ich besser über die Bibel Bescheid weiß, als über die griechische Mythologie werde ich über die Bibel erzählen: Die ersten Menschen nach der Bibel waren Adam und Eva. Sie hatten zwei Söhne Kain und Abel. Wie werden sie beschrieben in der Bibel: Der eine war ein Gerechter und der andere wurde ein Mörder. Sie sind im selben Haus aufgewachsen. Gehen wir weiter zu Abraham. Abraham hatte unter anderem zwei Söhne Isaak und Ismael. Der eine war so und der andere war so. Isaak hatte zwei Söhne, Jakob und Esau. Die waren sogar Zwillinge! Jeder hatte einen ganz anderen Charakter. Dann gehen wir weiter in der Geschichte: Jakob hatte zwölf Kinder unter anderem Josef, den die Brüder verkauft haben. Man kann immer fragen, warum der eine so und der andere so ist, und es gibt keine Antwort. Mein Bruder Manfred hat mir viel, viel später erzählt: Als ich nach Amerika gefahren bin, war ich 16 Jahre alt. Als ich erfahren habe, was passiert ist in den KZs, habe ich gesagt: Gott ist tot! Ich glaube nicht an Gott, es ist unmöglich, dass Gott soetwas erlaubt hätte. Er sagte mir auch, dass es gefährlich sei ein Jude zu sein, und er wollte weg von dem allen. Er hat sich entfernt. Nicht nur vom Judentum, auch von Europa. Er hat sich ein neues Leben in Amerika aufgebaut. Und er wurde Weltraumingenieur, und ich sage auch, dass er das ausgewählt hat, um sich von unserer Welt zu entfernen. Das ist etwas für Freud (Anm.: Psychoanalytiker Sigmund Freud). Manfreds erste Frau war eine Jüdin, Zufall oder nicht, das weiß ich nicht. Er hat sie in einem Klub für jüdische Studenten kennen gelernt. Also war es nicht ganz Zufall. Viel später, als wir wieder Kontakt aufgenommen haben, hat er wieder versucht, sich dem Jüdischen zu nähern. Er gehörte zu einer Jüdisch Humanistischen Gesellschaft. Das sind Juden, die die jüdische Kultur anerkennen und die jüdische Geschichte, aber ohne religiöse Vorschriften. Sie heiraten auch gemischt. Sie fühlen sich aber als Juden. Manfreds zweite Frau war keine Jüdin, seine Kinder haben nichtjüdische Ehepartnergeheiratet.

Drei Jahre nachdem Manfred nach Amerika ausgewandert ist, ich war auch 16 Jahre alt, ging ich aus der Schweiz nach Israel.

Am 14. Mai 1948, nach der Unabhängigkeitserklärung des Staates Israel, wurde dieser einen Tag später von Ägypten, Syrien, Libanon, Jordanien und dem Irak überfallen. Noch während dieses Krieges, habe ich mich sehr interessiert, was da vor sich geht, und ich fühlte damals das erste Mal, dass ich genug habe von diesen Heimen, und dass ich selbstständig sein will. Ich vermute, es gab verschiedene Eindrücke, die ich unbewusst in meinem Kopf hatte. Das eine war ein zionistisches Lied, 

Dort, wo die Zeder schlank die Wolke küßt,

Dort, wo die schnelle Jordanwelle fließt,

Dort, wo die Asche meiner Väter ruht,

Das Feld getränkt hat Makkabäerblut:

Dieses schöne Lied am blauen Meeresstrand,

Es ist mein liebes Vaterland

das mir durch den Kopf ging. Ich glaube, das habe ich in der Zeit in Hoffenheim, als wir bei der Familie Heumann wohnten, gehört. Und ich erinnere mich an eine blau-weiße Keren Kajemet- Büchse, die dort auf irgend einer Kommode stand. Ob das damit zu tun hat oder nicht, weiß ich nicht. Meine Eltern, wollten nach Amerika auszuwandern, nicht nach Palästina. Also sie waren keine Zionisten. Ich glaube, viele von den Jekkes, die her kamen, kamen nicht weil sie Zionisten waren. Es war das einzige Land, in welches sie herein konnten. Deshalb sind doch einige nach dem Krieg wieder zurück, nicht viele, aber doch einige. Sie hatten eine stärkere Beziehung zu ihren Heimatländern als ich. Sie waren älter als ich, sie waren dort aufgewachsen. Ich war also sehr interessiert an dem Krieg und verfolgte, was da passiert. Ich wollte ein Teil sein von etwas Neuem, es mit aufbauen, und ich wollte weglaufen aus den Heimen, in denen ich die ganzen Jahre war. Und eines Tages war es soweit, und ich bin illegal aus der Schweiz nach Frankreich geflüchtet, ganz allein. Ich hatte einen Schweizer Flüchtlingspass, und sonst keine Papiere. Der Flüchtlingspass sah von außen dem Schweizer Pass sehr ähnlich. Vorher hatte ich meine Pejes abgeschnitten, ich wollte meine Vergangenheit abschneiden. Die Glatze war immer noch da, die Haare wuchsen erst langsam wieder. Ich habe niemandem Bescheid gesagt und bin weg. Die Schweizer waren ja froh, die Flüchtlinge los zu werden. Also bin ich über die Grenze nach Frankreich, und bin nach Paris gefahren. Woher hatte ich Geld? Ich glaube, meine Tante Elsa aus London hatte mir Taschengeld geschickt. Und ich hatte das gespart. Ich konnte mir also eine Zugfahrkarte kaufen. Ich hatte allerdings die ganze Zeit das Gefühl, dass die Polizei mich sucht. Immerhin sprach ich Französisch, aber ich sah aus wie ein Flüchtling! Ich weiß nicht mehr, woher ich die Adresse in Paris hatte von der Jewish Agency. Das ist eine schöne Geschichte: Viele, viele Jahre später, 1985, war ich in demselben Büro der Direktor dort. Vonder Jewish Agency wurde ich nach Marseille geschickt, da war Israel schon fünf Monate alt. Ich kam 1948 am Tag nach Rosch Hashanah mit dem Schiff „Azma’ut“ an. Dieses Schiff, „Pan Crescent“, hatte illegale Emigranten nach Israel gebracht. Am 14. Mai 1948 war sie umbenannt worden, sie bekam den Namen „Azma’ut“, das bedeutet Unabhängigkeit. Ich habe noch auf dem Schiff alle meine Papiere zerrissen, um mich ganz von der Vergangenheit zu trennen und ihn ins Meer geworfen. Ich wollte ein neues Leben anzufangen. So bin ich im Hafen von Haifa angekommen mit 16 Jahren und ganz allein. 

Ich hatte keinen einzigen Verwandten, es gab niemanden. Zumindest weiß ich nichts davon. Vielleicht gibt es Verwandte, aber ich habe nie etwas über sie gewusst. Ich hatte also niemanden. Zuerst war ich in Tel Aviv und habe Arbeit gesucht. Ich wohnte bei einer Familie, Familie Bar Or ( Breuer) in Jaffa, welche mir vermittelt wurde durch eine Organisation und arbeitete in dem Reisebüro Petra in der Nahalat-Binyamin-Straße als Botenjunge. Ich sprach Französisch, Deutsch und, ich sprach Hebräisch hier. Ob mein Hebräisch gut war oder schlecht, weiß ich nicht. Es gab so viele Neueinwanderer damals, die die Sprache nicht konnten. Nach ungefähr einem Jahr habe ich mich einer Gruppe junger Leute angeschlossen, welche sich vorgenommen hatten, einen neuen Kibbutz aufzubauen und in die Armeezu gehen. Zuerst waren wir auf Hachschara. Wir wohnten in einer Abpackhalle und arbeiteten auf den Obstplantagen. Als der Winter kam, zogen wir in Zelte in Herzlya in einer verlassenen Abpackanlage, halfen den Bauern und pflastertenmit Beton die Küstenstrasse bei Herzlya. Im Sommer 1950 sind wir zusammen in die Armee gegangen. Ich war Sergeant, wurde zum Kommandanten ausgebildet und war Kommandant von einer Einheit von 30 Soldaten, Frauen und Mädchen, die später auch einen Kibbutz gegründet haben. Wir waren stationiert in einem Kibbutz im Süden. Wir haben in den Feldern gearbeitet, und wenn es nötig war, wurden wir angerufen und mussten militärisch eingreifen.  

Nach zwei Jahren in der Armee, zu dieser Zeit waren es zwei Jahre, haben wir einen neuen Kibbutz gegründet, der sich an der Grenze des Niemandslandes, im Ayalon-Tal bei Latrun, am Weg nach Tel Aviv, befand. Heute ist dort keine Grenze mehr. Ich habe für unsere Kibbutz -Zeitung damals einen kurzen Artikel geschrieben über das Dilemma, wie man sich verhalten muss, wenn man in die Situation kommt, dass wir angegriffen werden. Ich habe diesen Artikel nach fünfzig Jahren gefunden, und heute frage ich mich: wie ist es möglich, dass ich als 22jähriger Neukömmling im Land, nach vier Jahren, so prinzipielle Fragen gestellt habe. 

Ich war in dieser Gruppe junger Leute, aber ich fühlte mich die ganze Zeit allein. Auch im Kibbutz fühlte ich mich ziemlich allein, trotzdem ich Freunde hatte. Wenn ich überlege, ich habe zu Niemandem von denen noch eine Beziehung. Ich war immer einsam. Ich habe damals auch Tagebuch geschrieben, wenn ich das heute lese, dann verstehe ich überhaupt nicht, wie ich das schreiben konnte. Ich weiß nicht, ob ich traurig war, aber ich war allein, ohne Familie. Während ich in Jaffa / Tel Aviv war, wohnte ich bei der Familie Breuer. Und zu denen hatte ich ein wenig ein familiäres Verhältnis. An manchen Wochenenden bin ich zu ihnen gefahren. Aber eigentlich hatte ich niemanden. Mein Bruder und ich schrieben uns manchmal. Nicht oft, vielleicht einmal im halben Jahr. Jeder wusste, wo der andere ist, aber nicht mehr als das. Und dann, 1955, kamen am Wochenende junge Leute, um im Kibbutz mitzuhelfen für eine Woche oder zwei Wochen, und unter anderen war Chava dabei. So habe ich meine Frau Chava kennen gelernt. Wir haben nach einem Jahr geheiratet. Chava Van Cleef ist 1936 in Köln geboren. Die Familie ihres Vaters emigrierte 1496 aus Portugal nach Holland, zuerst nach Amsterdam und später kamen sie nach Emden. Ihr Vater wurde dort geboren, aber die Großeltern sind umgezogen nach Köln. Sie waren sehr reiche Leute, sie  haben mit Eisen gehandelt. 1939, vor dem Krieg, ist es ihnen allen, gemeinsam mit den Großeltern, gelungen, nach England zu flüchten. Bis 1950 waren sie in England und gingen dann als Zionisten nach Israel. Am Anfang hatten sie ist sehr schwer. 

Der Kibbutz, den ich mitgegründet habe, heißt Kibbutz Shal’avim. Wir wollten uns im Kibbutz eine Schafherde anschaffen. Nach meiner Grundausbildung über Schafzucht im nahe gelegenen Kibbutz Gezer, kauften wir 200 Schafe. Ich wurde Experte für Schafzucht, ich hütete die Herde und kannte viele Schafe mit ihrem Namen. Ende 1955 absolvierte ich neun Monate eine Ausbildung im Fach Agrarverwaltung. Endlich lernte ich wieder. Ich beobachtete das Verhalten der Schafe und hatte Erfolg, sie vermehrten sich. Ich war ein guter Schafhirte und wurde Experte für Schafzucht. Ich kannte viele Schafe mit Namen oder nach der Nummer, die in ihre Ohren tätowiert war. Jedes Tier hatte seine eigene Persönlichkeit. Das wichtigste an den Schafen war die Milch, durch Kreuzungen vermehrte sich die Milchproduktion beträchtlich. Natürlich wurden sie auch geschoren. Zuerst haben wir die Schafe noch mit der Hand gemolken, dann hatte unser Kibbutz aber die zweite Melkmaschine Israels. 

In diesem Kibbutz ist 1957 Jonathan, unser erster Sohn, geboren. Damals war es noch üblich in den Kibbutzim, dass die Kinder in Kinderhäusern untergebracht wurden. Das hat mich sehr gestört, denn ich wollte nicht, dass mein Kind ohne Eltern in einem Kinderheim aufwächst, so wie ich aufwachsen musste. Ich wollte, dass er ein richtiges zu Hause hat. Darum haben wir den Kibbutz verlassen. Ich hatte eigentlich keinen richtigen Beruf. 

Nachdem wir den Kibbutz verlassen hatten, fand ich Arbeit in Yemin Orde, einem Kinderheim auf dem Carmel. Es war ein sehr schöner Platz in einer wunderschönen Umgebung. Wir bekamen eine Wohnung, mussten nicht dafür bezahlen, denn wir waren beide dort angestellt, bekamen Gehalt und so haben wir langsam unser Leben aufgebaut. Ich wurde Lehrer in diesem Kinderheim, bekam eine offizielle Ausbildung. Damals gab es einen großen Mangel an Lehrern, darum hat man auch Leute angestellt, die offiziell noch keine Lehrer waren. Die Kinder die dort wohnten, waren ohne Eltern nach Israel gekommen oder waren nicht gut in ihren Familien aufgehoben. Neben meiner täglichen Routine Arbeit studierte ich mehrere Jahre lang. Zweimal wöchentlich besuchte ich Kurse an der Akademie für Biologie in Haifa. Ich marschierte fünf Kilometer bergab bis zur alten Straße nach Haifa, wo ich in einen Bus zur Akademie stieg. Spät in der Nacht ging es dann auf dem gleichen Weg wieder zurück. Arbeiten und studieren habe ich deshalb geschafft, weil das Bedürfnis etwas zu lernen so groß war. Ich erwarb das Diplom als Lehrer für Naturwissenschaften.

1959 wurde unsere Tochter Michal geboren. 

Als 1963 Chavas Vater in Jerusalem gestorben ist, sind wir, damit ihre Mutter nicht so allein ist, nach Jerusalem gezogen. Ich bekam Arbeit in einer guten Schule und gleichzeitig, nach einem Jahr, wurde ich, auch ohne Abitur, von der Hebräischen Universität angenommen als Student. Das Lernen hat mir großen Spaß gemacht, und ich habe dann 13 Jahre studiert und immer gleichzeitig auch gearbeitet. Zuerst habe ich meinen Bachelor in Erziehung und Zoologie gemacht. 

1965 haben wir unsere Sohn Zvi bekommen. 

Dann, 1967, war der Sechstagekrieg. Ich war in der Reservearmee der Jerusalem Brigade. Diese Brigade war auch vor dem Krieg für die Bewachung an der Jerusalem-Grenze zuständig. Ägyptische Panzer und Soldaten bedrohten gemeinsam mit Jordanien und Syrien die Existenz Israels. Als der Krieg ausbrach, war mein Regiment positioniert im Süden von Jerusalem, am Herzl Berg, in Ramat Rachel. Die jordanische Armee beschoss die Häuser im Westen von Jerusalem. Ich verteidigte in diesem Krieg mein eigenes Haus und meine Familie. Wir konnten die Dächer unserer Häuser sehen. Wenn die Granaten einschlugen wussten wir nicht, ob unser Haus getroffen war. Nach sechs Tagen war der Krieg vorbei. Wir hörten im Radio, dass die Altstadt eingenommen worden war. Das erste Mal konnten wir zur Klagemauer. Das war ein besonderer Moment. Da stand einmal der jüdische Tempel vor Tausenden Jahren, das war die Hauptstadt des jüdischen Staates. Es war eine große Freude, dass sich alles geändert hat. Mein Bruder schrieb mir: Das erste Mal bin ich stolz, ein Jude zu sein, und er erwog ernsthaft, nach Israel zu ziehen. Dass er das dann doch nicht realisiert hat, hatte andere Gründe. Es hat sich wirklich alles geändert, zum Guten und zum Schlechten. Es hat sich entwickelt zu den Problemen, welche wir heute haben. Aber wir müssen damit leben, und keiner kann wissen, wie es weitergeht, wie sich die Sachen entwickeln. Wir hoffen das Beste, wir hoffen, dass wir Frieden haben werden mit unseren Nachbarn.

1972 besuchte mich mein Bruder das erste Mal in Israel. Wir hatten uns 26 Jahre nicht gesehen. Ich hatte ein wenig Angst vor der Begegnung, aber wir verstanden uns sehr gut, waren uns in unseren Ansichten und Interessen ähnlich.

Der Yom Kippur-Krieg war mein letzter Krieg, mein Gehör wurde durch Detonationen beschädigt, und ich absolvierte dann meinen Reservedienst beim militärischen Nachrichtendienst. Nach 35 Jahren schied ich aus.  

1974 erwarb ich an der Hebräischen Universität von Jerusalem den Master of Science mit Auszeichnung für das Lehrfach Naturwissenschaften. Ich erarbeitete Lehrpläne, verfasste ein Lehrbuch und erhielt einen Preis des Weizmann-Instituts.  Vier Jahre später machte ich meinen Doktor(PhD) an der Hebräischen Universität. Ich besuchte Abendkurse und studierte an der Universität. Es hat mir immer Spaß gemacht zu lernen, aber es fiel mir manchmal nicht leicht. Meine Frau Chava hat mich immer unterstützt. 

1981 wurde ich Superintendent für naturwissenschaftliche Fächer an allen Schulen in Jerusalem und Umgebung. Ab 1985 war ich einige Jahre, als Gesandter der Jewish Agency, Leiter der Abteilung für jüdische Erziehung in jüdischen Gemeinden in Frankreich, Belgien und der Schweiz. Da saß ich dann genau in dem Büro, in das ich als 16jähriger, aus der Schweiz geflüchteter Flüchtling, um Hilfe bat. 

Meine Frau Chava war mit mir, unsere Kinder waren schon groß. Zwei waren verheiratet und Zvi, der Jüngere, kam gerade aus der Armee. Sie haben uns besucht, das war für sie eine gute Gelegenheit Frankreich kennen zu lernen. Für meinen Beitrag zur Förderung der französischen Kultur verlieh mir die französische Regierung 1996 die Auszeichnung Chevalier dans l’ Ordre des Palmes Academiques (Träger der Auszeichnung für Verdienste um das Bildungswesen). Was für Gedanken und Gefühle hatte ich bei dieser Auszeichnung? Ich dachte, dass mehr als fünfzig Jahre zuvor meine Familie gefangen war in diesem Land. 

Aus Frankreich zurückgekehrt, wurde ich in die Leitung des Erziehungsministeriums als Spezial Abgeordneter berufen, wo ich verschiedene Tätigkeiten ausübte. Unter anderem war ich zweimal Abgeordneter bei der UNESCO. Und so habensich meine beruflichen Tätigkeiten immer geändert. Der Schwerpunkt während meines Studiums war die Biologie und die Pädagogik. Ich habe auch Bücher geschrieben für den Unterricht der Naturwissenschaften. Aber immer, nach einer bestimmten Periode, das waren ungefähr sieben Jahre, habe ich meine Arbeit gewechselt, damit ich mich nicht wiederhole.

Ich habe auch als Zeitzeuge ab und zu in Schulen meine Geschichte erzählt, heute immer weniger, aber ich gehe noch. Ich sage zu den Lehrern: Gebt den Kindern eine Chance, vertraut den Kindern! Wenn man sich mir gegenüber genau nach den Vorschriften benommen hätte, wäre ich vielleicht im Gefängnis gelandet. 

Meine Kinder haben mich immer wieder nach meiner Lebensgeschichte gefragt. Besonders Michal, meine Tochter, wollte alles wissen, aber ich habe ihnen nichts erzählen wollen, habe das immer abgewendet: nicht heute, ein andermal! Ich war noch in der Verdrängungsperiode. Ich wollte vergessen und mein eigenes Leben aufbauen. Als meine ersten Enkel ungefähr sieben oder acht Jahre alt waren und in der Wohnung herum getobt sind, ist mir plötzlich eingefallen: genauso alt war ich, als mein Leben zerstört wurde. Und ich bin das erste Mal wieder zurück in die Kindheit gegangen, und da habe ich begonnen zu suchen in Archiven, in Paris, in der Schule in Toulouse, in der Schweiz. Ich habe an die Schweizer Polizei geschrieben, weil ich gehört hatte, dass es Akten über die Flüchtlinge gab und dass diese Akten auch heute noch in den Archiven lagern. Da habe ich nachgefragt. Ganz langsam habe ich eine Dokumentation zusammen gesammelt.

Zurück in Hoffenheim

Ich kann mich noch gut daran erinnern, wie das alte Hoffenheim aussah. Ich weiß, wo die Mitte des Dorfes war, wie die Straßen ausgesehen haben, wo wir wohnten. Es gab viele Obstbäume, es gab die Weinberge, ich denke an Beeren: Stachelbeeren, Johannesbeeren und Himbeeren. Ich kann meine Gefühle aber nicht teilen zwischen dem Bild der Natur, das ich in meinem Kopf von Hoffenheim habe und der Beziehung zu den Menschen. 

Das erste Mal war ich 1974 wieder in Hoffenheim. Ich war in einer Gruppe von israelischen Erziehern, welche von der deutschen Regierung eingeladen worden waren. Die deutsche Regierung damals war interessiert daran, mehr Kontakt zu dem Land Israel zu haben. Ich hatte mit mir gerungen zu fahren oder nicht zu fahren, ich wollte eigentlich nie wieder nach Deutschland. Die Entscheidung zu fahren war schwer, aber ich habe mich dann entschlossen: Ich fahre mit! Wir haben uns die Aktivitäten verschiedener Schulen angesehen in Baden-Württemberg und in Hessen. Und an einem Tag habe ich mich von der Gruppe getrennt und bin mit dem Zug von Heidelberg nach Hoffenheim gefahren. Im Zug fragte ich den Schaffner: Wann gibt es wieder einen Zug zurück von Hoffenheim nach Heidelberg? Da hat er ein Heft heraus genommen, einen Kopierstift angeleckt und auf einen Zettel geschrieben: der Zug fährt weg um 7:00 Uhr, kommt an um 8:00 Uhr. Fährt weg um 8:00 Uhr kommt an um 9:00 Uhr, der Zug fährt weg um 9:00 Uhr kommt an um 10:00 Uhr. Ich habe zu ihm gesagt: Es genügt mir nur am Nachmittag. Da hat er die Hacken zusammen geschlagen und gesagt: Sie haben mir einen Befehl gegeben. Er war ein älterer Mann. Das war eine der ersten Begegnungen. Dann stand ich in Hoffenheim, ich war aufgeregt! Ich ging durch die Straßen, ging zum Wald, durch den ich mit meinen Eltern und meinem Bruder so

oft gegangen war, um die Großmutter Minain Neidenstein zu besuchen, ich erkannte die Gerüche und Farben und sehnte mich nach dieser zerstörten Welt. Sehnte mich nach meiner Kindheit. Ich bin zu dem Platz gegangen, wo damals die Synagoge stand. Statt der Synagoge stand da eine Scheune. In einem Hof gegenüber war eine Frau. Ich fragte sie, ob sie eine Familie Mayer gekannt hat. Ja, ja! Da habe ich gesagt: Das war eine jüdische Familie. Nein, sagte sie, die habe sie nicht gekannt. Das war meine erste Begegnung! Ich sprach eine jüngere Frau an, sie war vielleicht Fünfzig, sie muss damals ein kleines Kind gewesen sein. Als ich gesagt habe, wer ich bin, hat sie angefangen zu weinen und sagte: Ja, ich erinnere mich ganz gut, wie ihr die Koffer geschleppt habt und weg musstet. Danach bin ich zur Kirchstraße gegangen, wo wir die zwei Jahre vor der Deportation nach Gurs im Haus der Heumanns gewohnt hatten. Auf der anderen Seite des Hauses war ein Geschäft, da bin ich reingegangen. Eine junge Frau, die dort arbeitete, hat ihren Vater gerufen. Der Mann sagte mir: Ja, natürlich, ich erinnere mich ganz gut. Er wusste nicht, ob ich der Manfred bin oder der Heinz, aber er erinnerte sich an unsere Familie. Ich fragte ihn, ob es möglich wäre in dieses Haus gegenüber zu gehen. Er sagte: Ja, warum nicht! Da bin ich rüber gegangen, habe an die Tür geklopft und eine ältere Frau hat aufgemacht. Ich habe ihr gesagt, wer ich bin. Das erste, was sie mir gesagt hat, war, dass sie viel Geld in das Haus gesteckt haben, um es zu verbessern. Ich habe einige Schritte hinein gemacht, dann ist die Haustür aufgegangen, da standen zwei große Männer. Sie haben mich nur angesehen. Ich habe Angst bekommen und bin raus- und weggegangen. Ich vermute, dass der Mann in dem Geschäft, den ich fragte, ob ich das Haus besichtigen kann, jemanden angerufen hatte. Das war meine erste Begegnung mit Hoffenheim. Ich habe gedacht, ich werde nie wieder dahin zurückkommen. Danach bin ich aber noch einige Male nach Hoffenheim gefahren, und jedes Mal sagte ich mir, das ist das letzte Mal! 

Das zweite Mal war ich mit meiner Frau Chava in Hoffenheim. Inzwischen hatte ich den Pfarrer Albrecht Lohrbächer kennengelernt. Albrecht Lohrbächer kommt jedes Jahr mindestens zweimal nach Israel. Ich glaube er war schon über achtzig Mal in Israel. Er wurde 2017 mit dem Ehrenbürgerrecht von Ramat Gan ausgezeichnet.  

Und in den letzten Jahren bringt er einmal im Jahr eine Gruppe von Journalisten nach Israel, um ihnen das Land, das er kennt und liebt, zu zeigen. Einen Abend kommen sie dann immer zu mir. Wir sehen zusammen den Film über meinen Bruder und mich und haben danach ein Gespräch mit den Journalisten. Das ist sehr wichtig, aber je älter ich werde, umso mehr bin ich danach ganz zerstört.

Albrechts Frau Ulrike suchte damals Bücher, um Hebräischzu lernen. Ich habe ihr geholfen, ich war damals noch im  Erziehungsministerium. Heute spricht sie sehr gut Hebräisch. Wir wurden Freunde! Die beiden wohnen in Weinheim. Das ist im Norden von Heidelberg. Und Albrechterzählte mir, dass es in Hoffenheim einen jungen Pfarrer gibt mit dem Namen Matthias Uhlig und dass dieser Pfarrer einen anderen Pfarrer erwähnt habe, einen Ludwig Streib, welcher über die jüdische Gemeinde in Hoffenheim eine Dokumentation schreibt. Ob ich ihm helfen will? Zu dieser Zeit war ich in Paris. Ich fragte, ob er zu mir kommen könnte nach Paris. Viele Erinnerungen hatte ich nicht, und damals war das Buch, das ich später mit meinem Bruder zusammen schrieb,  noch weit entfernt, nicht mal die Idee dazu war geboren. Pfarrer Streib schätzte es sehr, was ich ihm erzählte, und ich gab ihm einen Teil der Briefe meiner Eltern. Und so ist der Kontakt entstanden. 

Seit meinem ersten Besuchs in Hoffenheim, zieht es mich immer wieder an. Ich möchte da sein, aber dann wieder weg. Ich bin einmal mit Chava mit dem Auto von Paris hingefahren, und als wir da waren am Nachmittag habe ich zu Chava gesagt: Ich muss von hier weg, ich muss über die Grenze, um mich zu waschen. Etwas ganz Emotionales! Also heute frage ich nicht mehr nach einer Dusche. Hoffenheim gehört zu meinem Leben, es hat mit meiner Kindheit zu tun, andererseits wurde dort meine Kindheit zerstört. Und es gibt ein großes Loch in meinem Bewusstsein, ein schwarzes großes Loch. Und es fehlen die einfachsten und wichtigsten Erinnerungen: ich kann mich nicht an einen Kuss von meinen Eltern erinnern oder eine Umarmung, wie haben wir gewohnt, was haben wir gegessen? Wenn ich die Briefe lese, weiß ich, dass meine Eltern uns liebten, aber ich habe alles verdrängt, wahrscheinlich um zu überleben. 

Auschwitz

Eigentlich wollte ich nicht nach Auschwitz, aber Fred hat mich 1990 aus Amerika angerufen und gesagt, dass er von seiner Gesellschaft geschäftlich nach Warschau geschickt wird, das war nach dem Fall der Mauer. Und er sagte mir, er möchte nach Auschwitz,aber nur, wenn ich mitkomme. Ich selber wäre bis heute nicht nach Auschwitz gefahren, ich habe es nicht nötig für Erinnerungen, Erziehung oder so etwas. Für Fred habe ich das gemacht! Wir haben uns in Warschau getroffen und sind zusammen nach Krakau gefahren. Ich war aufgeregt, ich weiß, ich konnte nicht gut schlafen. Ich versuche immer eine Wand um mich zu bauen. Von Krakau sind wir  mit einem Taxi nach Auschwitz gefahren. Zusammen nebeneinander und jeder für sich.

Eigentlich sind wir nur auf den Schienen gegangen zum Krematorium, wir haben auch einige Baracken gesehen. Aber das war alles. Nicht die Ausstellung und die grausamen Filme, diees da gibt.

Als ich im Ruhestand war, habe ich beschlossen, meine Geschichte aufzuschreiben. Bis dahin hatte ich eine große Sammlung von Dokumenten, und nun wollte ich das bearbeiten. Das war in der zweiten Hälfte der 1990er Jahre. Ich traf damals meinen Bruder in Kanada, wir haben einen gemeinsamen Spaziergang gemacht, und ich erzählte ihm darüber, und er sagte, er hätte auch vor, seine Geschichte aufzuschreiben. Da habe ich ihmvorgeschlagen, dass ich glaube, dass es eine große Ehre für unsere Eltern ist, wenn wir jetzt etwas Gemeinsames machen würden. Er war einverstanden, da haben wir beschlossen, gemeinsam eine Biografie zu schreiben. Was sehr schwer war, er sprach und schrieb kein einziges Wort in Hebräisch. Also habe ich meine Texte Hebräisch geschrieben, er hat mir seine Texte in Englisch geschickt, und ich habe die Texte ins Hebräische übersetzt. Es gibt gemeinsame Texte,und es gibt seine Kapitel und meine Kapitel. Was ich geschrieben habe, habe ich ihm in Englisch geschickt, und so haben wir das zusammen aufgeschrieben und nicht an Publikation gedacht. Es war gedacht für unsere Enkelkinder, aber ein Freund, der das gelesen hat, sagte, das wäre sehr gut auch für das allgemeine Publikum. Da ging ich nach Yad Vashem, und man hat es sofort genommen. Und das Buch wurde auf Hebräisch gedruckt. Das war die 1. Ausgabe im Jahre 2001. Ein Jahr später wurde das Buch ins Englische übersetzt, und es kam die englische Edition. Damals kam Fred hierher für die Buchpräsentation.

Der damalige evangelische Pfarrer in Hoffenheim war Matthias Uhlig. Ich kannte und schätzte ihn schon viele Jahre und habe ihm nach Erscheinen der englischen Ausgabe ein Buch geschickt. Er hat das Buch sofort gelesen und sagte, dass es sehr wichtig sei, das Buch in deutscher Sprache herauszugeben. Einige Monate später hatte er eine Übersetzerin gefunden und die Familie Hopp als Sponsor. Der Name Hopp war Fred und mir bekannt. Emil Hopp, SA-Führer, Lehrer in Hoffenheim und beteiligt an der Zerstörung der Synagoge, hatte drei Kinder, Karola, Rüdiger und Dietmar. Dann bekam ich eineMail der Geschwister Hopp, in dersie schrieben: Wir haben das Buch gelesen, wir wussten nicht, dass es noch Überlebende von Hoffenheim gibt. Es ist furchtbar, was damals passiert ist. Unser Vater war ein Nazi, und man muss alles dafür tun, um zu verhindern, dass so etwas wieder passieren kann. Sie fragten, ob wir bereit wären, dass sie die deutsche Übersetzung des Buches finanzieren. Und unter anderem schrieben sie, ob es möglich wäre, den Namen ihres Vaters in der deutschen Übersetzung nicht zu erwähnen. Wir haben überlegt, und ich habe ihm geschrieben: Nein, wir sind nicht bereit, wir möchten das Buch so lassen, wie es ist: denn so wie die Opfer Namen haben, so haben auch die Täter Namen. Sie antworteten: Wir verstehen das, und wir sind trotzdem daran interessiert. So kam der Kontakt mit den Geschwistern Hopp zu Stande. 2005, vor zwölf Jahren, erschien die deutsche Übersetzung, und sie haben beschlossen, eine große Zeremonie zu machen und haben uns alle einzuladen, uns, unsere Kinder, unsere Enkel und unsere Urenkel und auch andere Überlebende von Hoffenheim, nicht nur unsere Familie. Es gab noch zwei Kinder, die noch leben. So hat sich langsam die  Freundschaft entwickelt, die Freundschaft zwischen den Geschwistern Hopp und uns. Danach haben sie uns wieder eingeladen, und ich habe sie hierher eingeladen. Sie waren zweimal hier. Das erste Mal war Dr. Rüdiger Hoppmit seiner Frau hier und das nächste Mal waren alle hier, die ganze Familie. Ich habe Ihnen das Land gezeigt, wir sind wirkliche Freunde. Auch Fred hatte sich in Florida mit den Brüdern Hopp getroffen und sie zu sich eingeladen. 

An der inneren Mauer des Friedhofs in Hoffenheim, dort, wo niemand hinkommt, gibt es eine Gedenktafel. Auf der Tafel sind einige Kreuze und eine Menorah. Zum Andenken an die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus steht auf dieser Tafel. Da habe ich den Pfarrer Uhlig gefragt: Was ist das, wer kommt hierher, wer sieht das? Und was soll die Mischung zwischen den Kreuzen und der Menorah? Und warum eine Menorah und nicht ein Davidstern? Wer kennt denn eine Menorah? Niemand! So kann man nicht erziehen! Das ist nicht die Wahrheit, das ist ein viertel Wahrheit! Ein Kreuz für die Zigeuner, ein Kreuz für die Homosexuellen, eines für die Katholiken und so weiter. Das war die Erklärung damals. Und ich habe ihm gesagt, so kann man Kinder nicht erziehen. Und er fragte mich, ob ich bereit wäre, in die Schule in Hoffenheim zu gehen. Ich habe gesagt, wenn das nicht geändert wird, komme ich nicht in die Schule. Das war 1990. Er hat diese Geschichte den Brüdern Hopp erzählt, und da haben sie sich entschlossen, eine neue Tafel am Eingang vom Rathaus von Hoffenheim mit den Namen aller Deportierten anzubringen. Auch das war ihre Initiative. Das ist die zweite Tafel. 

Bei der Einweihungsfeier der Gedenktafel in Hoffenheim und der Präsentation der deutschen Übersetzung unseres Buches

-“Aus Hoffenheim deportiert Menachem und Fred“ der Weg zweier jüdischer Brüder-, kam zu mir eine Frau, sie war Mitte Fünfzig, mit Tränen in den Augen und fragte mich, ob ich bereit wäre etwas von ihr zu annehmen. Ich habe nicht verstanden, worüber sie spricht. Dann sagte sie: Wir haben zu Hause eine Kommode, und da gibt es eine Schublade, die niemand öffnen wollte, als ob sie verzaubert wäre. Darin ist eine Gabel. Als ihr von der Synagoge weg musstet, fuhr deine Mutter mit einer Schubkarre, in welcher Kleider waren und verschiedene Sachen. Da ist diese Gabel auf den Boden gefallen. Und einer meiner Geschwister hat die Gabel nach Hause gebracht. Möchtest du sie haben? Und ich habe gesagt, ja, natürlich! Ich war sehr überrascht und aufgeregt. Sie hat mir das Besteck geschickt und sagte, als sie die Schublade aufgemacht hat, war nicht nur eine Gabel darin sondern ein ganzes Besteck. Und sie schrieb mir: Besteck, welches zu uns mit Unrecht kam. Ein Messer, ein Löffel und eine Gabel.

Heute gibt es fünf verschiedene Mahnmale in Hoffenheim. Es gibt auch den Menachem und Fred - Wanderweg, der 2012 zwischen Hoffenheim und Neidenstein zum Gedenken an unsere Familie eingeweiht wurde. 

Ich erkenne den guten Willen all dieser Leute an, weil man durch diese Initiativen über die Geschichte der jüdischen Gemeinde erfährt, darüber erfährt, was passiert ist, und dass es überhaupt Juden gab. Aber alle die Gedenktafeln sind durch private Initiative entstanden, nie von der Stadt, nie von der Stadtverwaltung. Das erste Mahnmal auf dem Friedhof war von Werner Zuber, der mich auch treffen wollte, aber wir sind uns nie begegnet. Die Gedenktafel am Rathaus, auf dem die Namen aller Deportierten aus Hoffenheim stehen, war 2005 auf Initiative der Geschwister Hopp entstanden, der Wanderweg ist 2012 unter anderem durch den Sinsheimer Lehrer Michael Heitz, Jugendspielern der TSG 1899 Hoffenheim und dem Verein Jüdisches Leben Kraichgau e.V. entstanden. Sie haben sich alle mit der jüdischen Geschichte intensiv beschäftigt. Da gibt es seit 2010 einen großen Stein als Mahnmal der Deportation der Juden aus Baden nach Gurs, gemacht und behauen von Schülern der Albert-Schweitzer-Schule Sinsheim. Und es gibt seit 2012 eine Gedenktafel am Platz wo die Synagoge war, eine Initiative von Werner Rudisile aus Hoffenheim.

Eine Befriedigung ist das für mich nicht, ich kann nicht befriedigt sein, denn man kann die Vergangenheit nicht ändern. Aber es gibt Menschen, die sich darum kümmern, dass diese Vergangenheit nicht vergessen wird.

Vor einigen Jahren hat mich Rüdiger Hopp mit dem Auto in die schöne Umgebung von Hoffenheim geführt. Die Bäume, die Wälder, alles ist grün, die Blumen sind wunderschön, wirklich es ist wunderbar. Und er sagte zu mir, Menachem, manchmal sagt er zu mir auch Heinz: Bist du nicht begeistert, ist es hier nicht schön? Da habe ich gesagt: Ja, ich weiß, dass es schön ist, aber du sprichst mit einer rationalen objektiven Sprache, ich antworte mit einer emotionalen Sprache, und ich kann mich nicht gut fühlen in dieser Schönheit. Und ich verstehe nicht das Benehmen von Menschen in so einer ästhetischen Schönheit, die das Benehmen von wilden Tieren hatten. Nicht einmal Tiere benehmen sich so, wie sich diese Leute benommen haben. Und deshalb fühle ich mich sehr unwohl.

Während der Buchpräsentation der englischen Ausgabe in Jerusalem im Jahre 2002 begegneten wir einer Regisseurin. Sie sagte uns, dass sie einen Film machen möchte über unsere Geschichte. Da waren wir einverstanden. Viele Jahre haben wir nichts gehört, dann sagte sie, dass sie eine Finanzierung gefunden hat und der Film wurde eine israelische/deutsche Koproduktion. Und drei Jahre später war der Film fertig, das war im Jahre 2008. Ein Jahr später wurde der Film „Menachem & Fred“ ausgezeichned von Cinema for Peace (Anm.: Berlinale) als: the Most Inspirational Movie of the Year.

Nach der Premiere gab es eine Vorführung in Heidelberg, an der mein Bruder und ich teilnahmen. Währen des Gesprächs mit dem Publikum wurde ich gefragt, ob ich die Deutschen hasse? Meine Antwort war, dass das Gefühl von Hass mir fremd ist, dass ich aber differenziere zwischen der älteren Generation, die es kaum noch gibt und der jüngeren Generationen, welche die Vergangenheit anerkennen und die Verantwortung für die Zukunft übernehmen will. Eine Frau aus demPublikum stand auf mit Tränen in den Augen und sagte zu mir:

Vergeben Sie mir bitte!  

Ich antwortete ihr: Ich kenne Sie nicht und habe Ihnen nichts zu vergeben. Sie wiederholte das noch zweimal.

Nach dem dritten Mal sagte ich zu ihr: Wenn Sie mich bitten, dass ich etwas vergeben soll, was Ihr Großvater oder Ihre Eltern getanhaben, dann kann ich nur sagen, meine ermordeten Eltern in Auschwitz haben michnicht dazubevollmächtigt, ihren Mördernzu vergeben. Daraufhin war es ganz still im Kino.

Im Jahre 2012 erschien die französische Übersetzung unseres Buches. Aber wer liest das Buch? Das ist doch kein Harry Potter, weit weit weg davon. Ich weiß, es ist wichtig und deshalb haben wir das auch gemacht.

Es gibt einen jungen israelischen Fußballspieler, Ilay Elmkies der für die U19 der TSG 1899 Hoffenheim spielt. Er besucht in Sinsheim die Albert-Schweitzer-Schule. Ich habe mich mit ihm unterhalten, ich habe ihm meine Geschichte erzählt, und er hat auch meinen Film gesehen. Was möchte ich Ilay und jungen Leuten auf den Weg geben?Das ist eine schwere Frage. Meine Antwort ist: Man darf sich auf niemanden verlassen. Es tut mir leid, das ist die Tatsache. Das jüdische Volk besteht aus Erinnerung. Wenn wir unsere Identität behalten wollen, funktioniert das nur über die Erinnerung. Alle unsere Feiertage beruhen auf Erinnerung, und wenn ich jetzt in Bezug auf den Holocaust spreche, muss alles dafür getan werden, um nicht zu vergessen. Damals hat man vielleicht den anderen Völkern vertraut. Niemand kam zu Hilfe, Niemand! Ich spreche nicht von einigen persönlichen Helfern, es gab solche! Ich meine Völker, Regierungen. Niemand wollte die Juden aufnehmen. Man darf sich auf Niemanden verlassen! Verträge sind das Papier nicht wert, auf das sie geschrieben sind. Zum Beispiel der Vertrag zwischen Ribbentrop und den Russen oder später der Vertrag zwischen Vichy und der deutschen Regierung. Wir dürfen uns nur auf uns selber verlassen. Es tut mir leid, das ich so pessimistisch bin, aber andererseits glaube ich, dass ein Teil der jüngeren Generation in Deutschland oder in Österreich die Verantwortung erkennt und übernimmt und sich dafür engagiert, damit so etwas nie wieder passiert. Solchen Menschen soll man positiv gegenüber treten. Aber wer verspricht mir, dass morgen nicht das gleiche passieren kann? 

Ich vermute, dass ich wieder nach Hoffenheim fahre, es zieht mich immer wieder an und ich gehe wieder in den Wald, der um Hoffenheim herum ist, und ich hole mir die Gerüche meiner Kindheit zurück. Und immer suche ich, unter einem Stein, vielleicht werde ich etwas finden und mir meine Kindheit irgendwie zurückholen. Ich weiß, dass das Unsinn ist, aber so ist der Mensch.

Eine besondere Erinnerung an das Leben und Schicksal der Familie Mayer ist der 2012 eröffnete Menachem & Fred – Wanderweg.

Dieser führt auf rund acht Kilometern von Hoffenheim über Zuzenhäuser und Eschelbronner Gemarkung nach Neidenstein und ist Fred und Menachem gewidmet. 

Den Menachem & Fred – Wanderweg sind beide in ihrer Kindheit regelmäßig mit ihren Eltern gegangen, als sie ihre Verwandtschaft in Neidenstein besuchten. 

Sowohl Fred als auch Menachem sind diese Wanderungen in bleibender Erinnerung geblieben und noch viele Jahre später erinnerten sie sich an Details, wie z.B. an die Stimmen der Vögel im Wald, die Vieherden auf den Wiesen oder die auf der Wegtrecke verzehrte Brezel.

Drei Tafeln, am Anfang, in der Mitte und am Ende der Wanderstrecke, informieren den Nutzer über das Leben von Fred und Menachem, die jüdische Geschichte von Hoffenheim und Neidenstein sowie über regionale Besonderheiten der an der Wegstrecke liegenden Orte.

Der Wanderweg ist darüberhinaus mit Geocaching-Stationen ausgestattet, die den Nutzer ebenfalls über die Lebensgeschichte von Fred und Menachem, die jüdische Geschichte und Besonderheiten der Umgebung informiert.

Der Impuls des Wanderweges ging von Werner Diefenbacher aus Neidenstein aus. 

Bei der Umsetzung waren neben Anpfiff-ins-Leben e.V. und den Heimatvereinen aus Hoffenheim und Neidenstein, der Verein Jüdisches Leben Kraichgau e.V., der Odenwaldclub e.V., die Agentur für Jüdische Kulturvermittlung Altenburg&Graf und das Erlebniszentrum Mühle Kolb beteiligt.

Die Jugendspieler der damaligen U14, U15 und U16 der TSG 1899 Hoffenheim führten mit ihren Trainern und Betreuern von Anpfiff-ins-Leben e.V. die umfangreichen Markierungsarbeiten der Wanderstrecke sowie die Ausstattung des Wanderweges mit Geocaching durch.

Die Jugendspieler wurden zuvor in Workshops von Manja Altenburg, Dr. Esther Graf, Michael Heitz und Michael Winter über das ehemalige jüdische Leben in Deutschland und der Region Kraichgau im Besonderen informiert und erarbeiteten gemeinsam mit ihnen die Inhalte der Geocaching-Stationen. 

Die offizielle Einweihung des Wanderweges erfolgte am 12. Juli 2012 unter Beisein von Fred und Menachem sowie den beteiligten Jugendspielern der TSG 1899 Hoffenheim und stieß auf großes öffentliches Interesse.

Im Fernsehen (SWR) sowie der regionalen und überregionalen Presse wurde umfangreich über dieses besondere Ereignis berichtet. 

Quelle: Heitz, Johanna: Fred Raymes und Dr. Menachem Mayer. In: Heitz, Michael; Röcker, Bernd (Hrsg.): Jüdische Persönlichkeiten im Kraichgau. Verlag Regionalkultur Heidelberg, 2013. S. 199ff.

Blanka Dvorska

Blanka Dvorska
Bratislava
Slovak Republic
Interviewer: Zuzana Slobodnikova
Date of interview: March - July 2006

Mrs. Blanka Dvorska experienced many things during her lifetime, both good and bad. She however always remained true to her principles and opinions. She never judged people for their origin, skin color or religion. She tried to help people when she could. She and her loved ones were very much marked by the years of World War II, and later the Slansky trials 1. She has lived through a lot, and lost a lot. However, nothing ever broke her faith in people and in life.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

The National Slovak Uprising

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My paternal grandparents were named the Friedmanns. My grandfather was named Aron, and my grandmother Hilda. Alas, I don't remember her maiden name anymore. Neither do I know where they were from, and when they were born. But the important thing is how I recall them, and how they've remained in my memory. I know that they lived in Stropkov. My grandmother was a housewife, and my grandfather had a small store with textiles. I remember them very well, because as a little girl I spent every summer vacation with them in Stropkov.

I also remember that Grandpa Friedmann's father, so my great-grandfather, was a very important citizen of Stropkov. Today I don't know what his name was anymore. From what my grandparents told me though, I remember that this great-grandpa of mine was the advisor of some district administrator, which is why everyone respected him, and he belonged among the town's elite.

But let's return to my Grandpa and Grandma Friedmann. I loved them very much, and above all I respected them. They treated me like their own daughter. I didn't get along very well with my mother, and so Grandma Hilda had me over at their place every summer vacation. I lived with my parents and siblings in Presov. At the beginning of the summer my grandma would come for me on a carriage, and take me to Stropkov, which was 50 kilometers away. I'd then spend the entire summer there with my grandparents. Grandma and Grandpa spoke Yiddish to each other. But they also spoke German and of course Saris [Saris dialect: one of the Slovak dialects, used in the Saris region. The center of the region is the city of Presov – Editor's note]. Since his father had such an important position, my grandpa was definitely originally from around Stropkov, but where my grandmother was from, I don't know.

My grandfather was an Orthodox Jew 2. He wore payes and never went anywhere without a hat. As I still remember well, he wore a caftan, but I also used to see him in a regular suit. For her part, my grandmother always wore a scarf on her head. I know that she didn't wear a wig, but her daughters-in-law – my aunts and also my mother, did 3. In that they were strictly Orthodox, and my grandparents of course had a kosher household 4. For example, they'd buy a large duck or hen at the marketplace. If my grandmother didn't like the looks of it, she'd go see the rabbi, so he could tell her whether it was kosher or not. My grandma was very strict about that. They also had separate dishes for dairy, and then there were dishes for meat. For example, Easter [Passover] dishes were completely different. They were never used during the entire year. They were only used during the Easter holidays.

As I've already mentioned, my grandparents lived in Stropkov. Stropkov was this smaller town with a relatively large Jewish community [In 1940, about 2000 Jews lived in Stropkov and its immediate vicinity. In Stropkov itself there were about 1500 of them. Stropkov was a town of Hasidic Jews, to whom belonged both synagogues in the town – Editor's note]. I daren't guess at the ratio between Jews and Christians, all I know is that there were more Christians in Stropkov. Well, I've got to say that Christians and Jews mixed very well there, and got along well with each other. Jews didn't have any separate part of town. They lived in the town center, on the main square, and then in various parts on the outskirts. I know that Stropkov had a synagogue, and that there was a mikveh [mikveh: a ritual bath – Editor's note] there too.

My grandparents' house was next door to a Catholic monastery. I know that there were monks living there, but what order, that I don't remember any more. The space between my grandparents' house and this monastery measured about a half meter. They were really built quite close to each other. The house where my grandparents lived faced a common courtyard that had another four residences around it. I don't know exactly who lived there anymore. All I know is that they were most likely some relatives of ours, and that they were Jews. The house where my grandpa and grandma lived had two rooms and a kitchen. They even had a washroom there. I don't know if every family had their own, but I know that in those days it wasn't usual to have a washroom, and they already had one. The two rooms were furnished on the whole normally. There were two beds in the bedroom, which were right next to each other, but during menstruation they'd be separated by a night table [according to Jewish laws, a woman has to notify her husband that she had begun menstruating. From this moment on, he is not allowed to touch her. Even the touch of one single finger is forbidden. This edict lasts until menstruation ends and the woman's subsequent ritual cleansing – Editor's note]. Plus there was a wardrobe there, and so on. My grandparents' house was simply and tastefully furnished.

Because my grandfather was a merchant, my grandparents used to come into contact with both Jews and also Christians. But when they were already home, their neighbors were exclusively Jews. So they also had Jews as friends, and had very good relations amongst themselves. But have to say that my grandparents, and later also my father, were very open and obliging people. They didn't have any prejudices and behaved very nicely and decently to everyone, no matter whether he was a Jew, Christian or Gypsy. You know, in those days there were also quite a few Gypsies living in Stropkov. I myself worked there in the 1930s after graduating from teaching school, and this one incident with Gypsies happened to me: Once some Gypsies played for me for free. Because my father might have been around 18 or so, when he saved a Gypsy child that had fallen into the well in the town square. Well, and suddenly there was a big commotion. As I've already mentioned, my grandfather had a store on the square, across from the well. And what happened? When he saw that, my father lowered himself down into the well and saved that little Gypsy kid that had fallen into the water. He just saved him, because that's what they were like, the Friedmanns. And I, as a teacher, you'd think that it was already so many years later, I went into a pub somewhere around there, and when they saw me they said: "That's Jozko's daughter!" And quiet. They came over to me: "Young lady, what should we play for you?" "And why should you play?" "After all, you're Jozko's girl, so for you we play for free." Years after my father pulled their child out of the well, they rewarded me for a change, for that good deed of his.

I don't know the circumstances leading up to my grandparents getting married. I don't even know where and when they were married. The only thing that's certain is that the wedding was certainly Jewish, and that in the course of their marriage my grandma Hilda brought six children into the world. Five sons: Jozef, Herman, Natan, Ignac and Filip and one daughter, Manci [Malvina]. Jozef was my father. But today I know more only about my father's brothers Natan, Filip and Ignac. Today I don't remember various dates and their personal details anymore.

Of my father's siblings, I remember Uncle Natan well. Probably because he lived in Stropkov together with my grandparents. At first he lived in the same courtyard as they did. But later, when he got married, he opened his own clothing shop on the square, and not far from the shop he built a little house. The only other thing I know is that he and his wife didn't have any children, and the two of them lived alone. For some time I also lived with Uncle Herman in Giraltovce, but that was during the war, and those were very troubled times.

Another of my father's brothers whom I recall from stories I heard, even though I never met him, is Icik, Ignac. My grandparents were forcing him to marry some older woman. I think that she was some rich widow. But he didn't want to marry her at all. Probably he didn't like her. And so it happened that during the wedding ceremony, as he and the bride were standing together under the chuppah [Chuppah: a canopy under which the pair stands during the wedding ceremony – Editor's note], he suddenly jumped up and ran away, right in front of the rabbi, bride, and the entire wedding party. No one from our family ever saw him again after that. But I've always wondered why no one ever went to look for him. The cause was likely the fact that he'd disappointed the family by not marrying the woman they'd picked for him, and that he ran away so "shamefully" from under the chuppah, and thus brought shame not only on the bride, but also on his loved ones.

My father's third brother Filip lived in France. He lived right in the capital, Paris. He was single and childless. Of my siblings, my one-year-older brother, Bernat, had the fondest memories of Uncle Filip. This was because Bernat lived with him in France from 1932 to 1938.

My knowledge of my mother's family starts with my great-grandmother Weil from Jaslo in Poland, who died in 1936, at the age of 105! We always heard a lot about her. She ran a farm by herself. And that she managed to do it and had enough strength for it was helped by the fact that she married at the age of 15 or 16, and her husband died when she was around 30. Due to the fact that she was married for such a short time and her husband didn't vex her, she had enough strength to tend to the farm. And also thanks to this, she in the end lived to such a beautiful age.

I don't know much about my grandparents, the Weils. I didn't know my grandmother at all. All I know is that they had a restaurant. They had three daughters and one son together. In the end, I know only relatively little about my mother's family.

My mother was born in Jaslo, Poland in 1886, and her maiden name was Dorota Weil. My father was born in 1884 in Stropkov. My mother and father were married in 1910. I don't know how my parents came to be married. The fact remains, though, that it must have been an arranged marriage. For my mother it was a hard life, coming as she did from a family that wasn't all that Orthodox. My mother was raised in an almost bourgeois fashion, and certainly in a more modern fashion than my father. My parents were married under a chuppah. But whether they were married in Stropkov or in Presov, that I don't know. All I know is that already in 1910 their first child was born, my oldest sister Lujza.

My mother's native tongue was Polish. But she had a big talent for languages. She spoke excellent German and Yiddish, and very quickly learned Saris. For two years my parents lived in Velke Kapusany, where during that short time my mother learned fluent Hungarian. During the time when we children were already attending school, she knew Slovak grammar so well that she used to check our homework. She had a talent for languages. My father also knew several languages, but didn't speak even one of them so well that you could say he was excellent at it. His mother tongue was Saris, and he could get by in Saris, German, and when necessary, also Hungarian.

During the first years of their marriage, my parents lived in Stropkov, later in Velke Kapusany, and finally they settled in Presov. I was born in 1916, and at that time my parents were living in Stropkov. I was born at my grandparents' house. I was the fourth child, and after me another four were born. So there were eight of us children. But I'll say more about my siblings later.

My clearest memories are from when my parents were already living in Presov. They lived there from 1917 until they were deported. In those times Presov might have had a population of around 24,000 [according to census figures, in 1940 Presov had a population of 24,394 – Editor's note]. There was a relatively large Jewish community there. I do know that the city had two synagogues, a Neolog one and an Orthodox one. There was also a mikveh in Presov. The town baths had a part that was reserved just for Jews, and that was the mikveh. I also remember that the town also had a cheder [Cheder: religious primary school for teaching the Torah and Judaism – Editor's note], which my one-year-older brother Bernat attended. He attended it from around the age of three, and studied there. I know that when my brother was around five or six, a bocher [bocher: student – Editor's note] used to come to our apartment and study there with my brother.

In Presov Jews of course had their rabbi. He was a very wise man. Everyone respected him. One interesting thing was that this rabbi was a friend with the Catholic papal prelate. They used to meet around three or four times a week. They used to walk around town together. During the week it wasn't anything unusual to see the prelate coming out of Levocska Street, and part of the way the rabbi would walk by his side. They'd meet and walk like that up and down, along that main street, and debate about things. You know, I'll never forget that. Never. Before the war people got along so well, and I simply can't forget that.

Even today I still remember how on Mondays and Fridays a market would take place in Presov. We never had money to spare, and so everything that was necessary for the household was arranged by my father. At our house it was very simple. So for example on Friday we'd take the shoulet to the baker's, and on Saturday we'd bring it home. Otherwise food wasn't arranged in advance in any special way. There simply wasn't any to do that with. I know that my mom used to put some meat in that shoulet, but goose we had only when once a year some aunt from Giraltovce would send us one, nicely fattened up. I know that she used to raise that goose especially for us. She used to feed her by sitting on her and stuffing corn into her beak, and squeezing it down the goose's neck. That's how she nicely fattened up that goose for us. My mom would then make an excellent shoulet with goose meat.

I remember when T.G. Masaryk 5 died. He died in 1937, and we wept profusely. Then Benes 6 took his place. But the era of Masaryk's government was characterized by the creation of the First Republic 7. And it was a republic where there weren't only Czechs and Slovaks. During the First Republic, many teachers came to Slovakia, but also other civil servants too [after the creation of the 1st Czecho-Slovak Republic, the local government didn't have enough educated and loyal civil servants. This is why Czech immigrants streamed into Slovakia. Among the first were postmen, teachers, technicians, civil servants, doctors and theater workers – Editor's note]. People united and helped each other in order to help something along. And not for reasons like it was at the end of the First Czecho-Slovak Republic. At that time certain groups began uniting in order to harm others. Individual differences in religion, origin and so on increased. That's where that enmity against Jews began. Well, but now I'm getting ahead of things...

I'll return to my parents. I know that before I was born, my father was in the tobacco business, and his partners took advantage of him or tricked him in some way. So my father lost even the little that he had. But I'd prefer to talk about what I remember from my own experiences. When I was about three, my father owned a grocery store. This store was on the main street. My mother worked in the store too. On the one hand, she was a housewife that was fully employed by a numerous family, and on top of this she also sold in the store. But I have to say that that store was more like a general store, and not just one with groceries. I remember that at one time we were for example selling folding beds there. My parents latched onto whatever they could. They would've perhaps sold anything there. There my mother sold excellent, home-baked bread, or homemade soap that my father used to make in a cellar by the millstream.

I remember that when I was attending school, it happened more than once that I had to help out in the store. That little store of ours was so pitiful, that it would also happen that a customer would come for a kilo of sugar, for example, and we wouldn't have it. So I'd quickly run out of the store and run across the main street to the grocery wholesaler's. There I'd buy that kilo of sugar and run with it back to our store. There I'd sell the sugar for some five or ten hellers more [In 1929 it was decreed by law that one Czechoslovak crown (Kc) 1 Kc – 100 hellers, was equal in value to 44.58 mg of gold – Editor's note]. So that is truly how we did business.

Because my parents were Orthodox, we observed all rules at home. We were a strictly kosher household. My mother kept a strict eye on it. We observed all the holidays. My father regularly used to go pray at the synagogue, along with his brother. My mother made sure that everything in the household was as it should be according to the rules.

Our Presov apartment was very modest. The whole family, which is two adults and eight children, lived in two rooms plus a kitchen. The apartment wasn't ours, but we rented it from Professor Frantisek Guttmann. The apartment was also downtown, near the store. We had one room, then there was a very small kitchen, and a second room. The one room might have been bout five meters by three. It had two iron beds, between which there was a large steamer trunk. The trunk for one thing separated the beds from each other, for another it was used to store bedclothes, and it also served as a place to sit. Then in that room there was a large, I'd guess about two-meter table, at which we used to eat. We'd study at it and do our homework. Around the table there were of course some chairs that we'd sit on. That was all the furniture there was in the room.

From that room you went into the kitchen. There in the kitchen there was a brick oven in which we baked and cooked. Beside it there was this narrow space for cooking, some sort of workbench or small table. That stretched along the wall, from the oven all the way to the door. There was also a stove there. This little room is where food was prepared. It was too small for us to also eat there. It might have been just over a meter wide, and wasn't all that much longer either. We ate in the room, at the table. From this little kitchen you could for one go into the other room, but you could also go down a ladder into the cellar. From the kitchen you went into the other room. This room was a little smaller than the first one. It might have been around 3.5 by 3.5 meters. It was also, as one would say, a room for all of us. My parents didn't have anything like a bedroom. There were many of us, and so everyone slept where he could. In beds, on mattresses, even on the table. But something more about the second room. It had two beds, like in that first room. Then there were two wardrobes.

Our apartment had running water as well as electricity, which wasn't completely common for that time. We had cheap electricity. And so that we'd be able to pay for it, we had only two lights. For example, at the door between the kitchen and the room there was a light, movable of course. It was a bulb attached to a movable wire. When needed, we used the light in the kitchen, and then when it was needed in the room, we moved it along on the wire, and lit up the room. The second light was again at the door between the kitchen and the other room, and could be moved in a similar fashion as the first. These light bulbs didn't give off a lot of light. But in any case, they served us well.

I remember that when I was still quite small, a little girl of only two or three, we had a helper in our apartment in Presov. She was a maidservant, and was named Mariska. She was like a member of our family. But she had to leave us after some time, because we couldn't afford to pay her. Working for us for free wasn't practical for her. Then I was already older, and along with my older sisters, I helped out at home. We did all the housework, and also worked in the store.

We didn't have any animals at home. There wasn't any room or food for them. But what I am proud of is our library. Even though we lived in very poor conditions, we bought books. When they were already employed, my older sisters, Lujza and Annuska [Anna], bought various literature. Not just I, but all members of our family liked to read. But we also used to go to the Presov town library to borrow books. And we also used to buy newspapers. I think that at that time it was Azet and Kassai újság.

My parents' first-born was my sister Lujza. She must have been conceived shortly after the wedding, as it was still 1910 when she was born, so the same year my parents got married. She finished business school. She was a very clever and talented girl. Alas, she died during the Holocaust.

The next to be born was Anna. That might've been in 1911. I unfortunately don't know it exactly. Annuska, as we called her at home, was also talented, and wrote so beautifully that when she was still in council school, they sent some of her composition work and various literary works to President Masaryk. Alas, she wasn't able to keep on studying, as we simply couldn't afford it. She was only about 14 or 15 when she went to work at a law office, for the lawyer Fuchs. She was very clever, and so she very quickly found her footing at the law office. After a certain time my sister had such a good name in Presov, that when she for example went to the bank for money, she didn't need any extra papers. All they'd say was: "Annuska, if you say so, we believe you." She didn't make all that much there. If I still remember correctly, it was probably 400 crowns [In 1929 it was decreed by law that one Czechoslovak crown (Kc) 1 Kc – 100 hellers, was equal in value to 44.58 mg of gold – Editor's note] a month. Annuska also had perfect musical hearing. She attended music school, where excellent Czech professors took her under their tutelage, and she learned to play the piano and violin very well. Besides this, she also inherited our mother's talent for languages. Like the rest of us she spoke Slovak, Yiddish, German and Hungarian. Bus she also learned French and English through private lessons. She was really an all-round gifted person, and amazingly talented.

When in the second half of the 1930s Professor Frantisek Guttmann evicted us from our apartment, my older sisters Lujza and Anna made sure that we didn't end up on the street. They gave us money, and found us a new place to live. By intervening in this way, Annuska gained the right to marry according to her wishes. She got married in 1936, and had one son with her husband, whose name I unfortunately don't know anymore. The child was splendid in all respects. Alas, Annuska perished along with her young family during the time of the Nazi rampage in one of the concentration camps.

I also had one older brother. He was not quite a year older than I. He was born in 1915. His name was Bernat. As a young boy and teenager, he was very strongly religiously oriented. His upbringing of course played a part in this, especially from our father. Later, my brother lived several years with our father's brother – our Uncle Filip in France. If I'm not mistaken, he lived there from 1932 to 1938. When he then returned home, he was unrecognizable. He returned as a young, open-minded and world-wise participant in the Interbrigade in Spain 6. After returning home, Bernat was involved in organizing the resistance. He was one of the founders of the Capajev partisan group [Capajev partisan group: created in August 1943 in the forest by Matiaska. Later this group grew into a partisan alliance that played an important role in armed anti-Fascist activity in eastern Slovakia – Editor's note] and was also a member of an illegal regional committee of the KSS [Communist Party of Slovakia] in eastern Slovakia. His life was very interesting, and marked by many events, political but also personal ones. After the war, my brother changed his name to Stefan Kubik. He managed to survive the hardships of the years 1938 to 1945, but even after these tough tribulations, his life didn't stagnate. On 19th January 1945, he returned to Presov along with the Red Army. The post-war government took advantage of his abundant experience. They made him the regional director of the StB [State Security] in Presov. Later he was sent to the embassy in France several times. Paradoxically, his reward for these services was jail in Ruzyne, which lasted for 33 months. He was jailed in 1951, and they released him on 24th May 1954. After his release from jail, he was of course rehabilitated, and all trumped-up charges against him were dropped. My brother got married after the war. He and his wife had two sons.

Growing up

I was the next to be born. That was in 1916, not even a year after my brother was born, and my parents named me Blanka. I was born in my grandparents' house in Stropkov. You know, on the one hand my father was very strongly religious, but again on the other hand, already earlier, when I was an adult, I wondered about how it was possible that there was such a small age difference between my brother and me? Well, so my father probably didn't observe some regulations to the letter [because of the small age difference, the interviewee most likely was wondering about the fact that her conception took place during the six-week post-natal time period called the lochia, which is characterized by bleeding as the lining of the womb is discharged. This would have been in contravention with the Jewish regulations regarding the prohibition of intercourse during menstruation – Editor's note]. If I'm to be honest, my mother wasn't thrilled by my conception and birth either. It's logical that she didn't want to have another child so quickly after my brother. I felt it, and alas to this day can't forget it. I loved my parents above all, and respected them. Thus it saddens me all the more, when I think of how I used to spend summer vacations separated from my family, with my grandparents in Stropkov, or when I recall many details that happened, and that bother me to this day.

In 1921 my sister Malvina was born, my parents' fifth child. She was born in Presov. After her was the sixth, my brother Henrik, I know that it was in Presov but I don't remember the exact year anymore. After him was my sister Matilda, in Presov in 1924, plus after her Alzbeta. Malvinka, Henrik and Alzbeta perished during the Holocaust.

Matilda survived three and a half years in Auschwitz. After returning home she was very marked by it – most likely the same as everyone else. Those that survived the camps are marked by it for the rest of their lives. Today my relationship with my sister isn't very active, though we live in the same town. But I'll talk about our childhood. When she was two, my sister was made a ward of mine. I was supposed to take care of her. But she was a very active child, and would often fall on her nose. I didn't know how to keep an eye on her, for which my parents quite often punished me. Due to these countless falls, my sister had a bent and deformed nose. My father thought that precisely this would protect her from deportation. But in the end they deported her too, and as I've already said, she survived for three and a half years in the Auschwitz concentration camp.

I know that I'm getting ahead of myself, but from this it's clear that in the end only my brother and I weren't deported to one of the concentration camps. Of the entire family, only Bernat, Matilda and I managed to survive.

I've already talked about my grandparents, parents and siblings. It's time to say something more about myself. As I've mentioned, my name is Blanka Friedmannova, and I was born as the fourth child, in 1916 in Stropkov. During the first years of my childhood I was in the care of my mother and older siblings. I was raised in a strongly Orthodox spirit, and one could say that I was the one that the religion and knowledge of Judaism stuck to the most.

As I've already mentioned, we had a kosher household. That means separate dishes for meat, and separate dishes for dairy products. For example, the Easter dishes [meaning Passover dishes] were completely different. They weren't used at all during the normal year, but just for Easter [Passover: commemorates the departure of the Israelites from Egyptian captivity and is characterized by many regulations and customs. The foremost is the prohibition of consuming anything containing yeast – Editor’s note]. That was an extra-special holiday for Jews. Everything had to be completely and absolutely organized and clean. Mainly there couldn't be any breadcrumbs, nothing. After the cleaning my father would then walk around the room, like he was going to go burn even bread dust [meaning chametz, or leavened dough, which is forbidden to be used during Passover. Based on this is the obligation to make one's home kosher le-pesach (proper for Passover). After a major cleaning, chametz is collected from the entire household and burned – Editor's note]. During Easter the custom at our house was also that my father didn't eat matzot in his soup. The matzot wasn't even dipped in it [strictly religious families don't put matzot into soup because after coming into contacts with water it would swell up. In their minds this meant leavening – Editor's note]. We wouldn't be allowed to put matzot into the soup until the last day.

If I'm to be honest, I never really looked forward to the holidays that much. We were very poor, and at our house the holidays also had very modest and simple dimensions. There were eight of us children, and when there wasn't anything material, we tried to at least dress up the holidays by having fun and spreading good cheer amongst each other. We'd joke around and have fun.

In 1922 I began attending a Neolog people's school in Presov. It was right beside the Neolog synagogue. I remember that the school also had a big courtyard where we played as children. The school also had this one large hall that was used for prayers on Friday and Saturday. People prayed there on the stairs, and not in the Neolog synagogue. But back to the school. It was a school with three classrooms. First Grade was separate. Grades 2 and 3 were together, and so were Grades 4 and 5.

Already back in people's school I met some girls with whom I was later very good friends. As I was attending a Jewish people's school, they were of course Jewish girls. We'd get together whenever we could, and spent our free time together. We'd always meet on Saturday afternoon, and talk about all sorts of things. About three or four of us would get together, and we'd discuss anything that came along. This habit lasted even after the war, even though only a few of us survived.

After finishing Neolog people's school, I started attending state council school 9, also in Presov. I wasn't able to attend high school, as there you had to pay. When I started attending council school, my sister Annuska had just finished it. She was an excellent student, and the principal assumed that with me it would be similar. He wasn't wrong. I liked school a lot. I did well there, and liked to study. I did well, and the principal and I were discussing my transferring to high school, as I was excellent at math. I also liked Slovak, and recited a lot. I also had a talent for singing. In signing class I sang everything from soprano to third voice. Wherever they needed someone to help out in singing class, or to sing something, my teacher put me there.

But one semester in council school it happened that all the girls got a B in behavior. You see, I attended a girls-only class at council school. And all of us got a B because the teacher hadn't shown up for class and we were talking. We weren't making noise. But when she entered the classroom, one of our classmates was imitating her, and we were laughing. Our classmate was pretending she was the teacher: "Students, stand up!" She was trying her best to imitate her, and we were all cracking up. Well, and right then the door opened and the teacher walked in. She saw that we were making fun of her and laughing at her, because she had a really strange voice and visage too. She of course became angry and so we all had a B in behavior on our Grade 5 mid-year report.

After finishing council school I very much wanted to go to Prague to study health care. I also spoke to the principal about it, but it was very difficult, as there was never any money at home. Back then I thought that I might be able to for example educate those classmates of mine that were from very poor families. Those that lived in even worse conditions, almost like Gypsies. They lived in terrible poverty. In these little houses. It's true that they were clean and all, but were very poor. And also thanks to this, many of them then became women of low morals and made a living by selling their bodies. Well, I wanted to improve this situation. I wanted better conditions for them. But when I confided in the principal and told him about my desire to go study in Prague, all he told me was: "So, Blanka. What'll we do? Your Dad's got no money." All that happened was that in the end I didn't go to Prague to study because: Dad didn't have any money.

Around when I was in kvarta [fourth of eight years in the secondary school system. The equivalent of Grade 8 – Translator's note], my father found me some students to tutor. I tutored them in math. They paid me 90 crowns a month for it, but the money didn't go to me, but my father. This was because he'd found the work and the students. Well, and I was left with nothing to do but silently accept it. We were living from hand to mouth, and we older ones had to contribute something to the family budget.

In my last year at council school, one more unpleasant thing happened to me. As I've already mentioned, we were an all-girls class. Well, I was sick for about a week, and so wasn't at school. There were around 36 of us girls, of that 12 were Jews, and we sat scattered about in various places in the classroom. When I returned to school after a week's sickness, the seating arrangement was different. I looked around the classroom, and all the Jewish girls were sitting together in the desks by the stove. I said to them, as I was used to: "Hey there! Did you leave a spot for me?" Well, because I was the shortest, they'd left me a place in the front desk. And I said to them: "What's up? Why did you sit here? Who sat you here? After all, we were sitting completely differently!" To that one of the girls answered me that one of our classmates, named XY, said that Jews stink, so all the Jewish girls had moved. I said: "Who? XY? All right!" I sat in the place that had been designated for me, and didn't say anything. Then came math. I was sitting in the front row, and who did the principal call out [to the blackboard] to answer a math question? XY! The classroom was quite small, and so was the space in front of the blackboard. I saw that XY had math formulas written out on her hand. At first I didn't say anything. I just watched her. But then I did something I'd never in my life done before. I yelled out to the entire class that she's got stuff written on her hands, and that she's cheating! All I remember now is that the principal took it relatively well, and perhaps even praised me. But I closed the whole thing off by us Jewish girls staying put there where we were, together. I told them: "No one's going to sit anywhere else. We'll sit here! We'll see who stinks!"

In the end, after finishing council school I decided to register at teaching academy. This academy was also in Presov, and had an excellent teaching staff. But getting into teaching academy was very hard. You had to have connections. Because this school had an excellent reputation, it was attended by students from all over Slovakia and also Czechia. Really. I even had classmates from Prague.

The problem was also in that my father didn't want me to continue studying. He wanted me to find work and start making money. During my last month of school, when I was finishing council school, he took me out of school. He put me to work for the Schnitzers, as a bookkeeper. He didn't want me to go take the entrance exams for teaching academy at all. But in the end, due to many coincidences and circumstances, things ended up so that I did go take the teaching academy entrance exams. You see, my council school principal stood very much behind me. He believed in my abilities and knowledge, and supported me in my studies. The entrance exams took place on Saturday, but I couldn't be there that day, as I'd already started doing the accounting work. So the principal helped me again. He asked some inspector, and the lady principal of the teaching academy, whether I couldn't take the exams on Monday. I was supposed to pretend that I couldn't be there on Saturday because there was something wrong with my hand. When I arrived on Monday at the teaching institute, I had a bandaged hand, and when the principal of the academy came in, she asked me right away: "Friedmannova, your hand doesn't hurt anymore?" Even today I recall the feeling that washed over me then. Well, it was truly quite unpleasant. The exams themselves ended up well. I entered teaching academy in 1932, and finished it in 1936. It was a four-year school.

So I finished school at the age of 20. After that I was very rarely at home. Because as a teacher, the teaching inspectorate was moving me around to substitute and teach in various places. But I visited home during the holidays, but that was already during the time when various nationalist tendencies began to make themselves known in Presov as well. It for example happened that our former classmates would chase us off the Korzo [promenade]. For example, Christian boys, who before used to take us to cafés, would now chase us away off the Korzo, and forbid us to be there.

But back to my work. So in 1936, after finishing teaching academy, I got my first temporary position. The Presov council school was short of teachers, and the inspector asked me to go teach there. So I of course agreed. After all, why not? I was glad that I had work. The inspector already knew me, which is probably one of the reasons he asked me. But of course, at first this caused a commotion. The council school was state-run, and the classes I was supposed to teach were Catholic. So it bothered some people that a Jewish teacher would be teaching there. This quickly spread all over Presov. After all, almost the whole town knew Blanka Friedmannova. We lived downtown, on the main street. Children on the street were saying: "Friedmannova is going to be teaching us!" So I really did also start there. There was no rumpus or any problems in my class. In two weeks there, I built up respect. There was peace and quiet in my class. I didn't achieve it by yelling or something. At first I let them be, I let them talk, and then told them: "Imagine that you'd be standing here like this, in front of a class full of students. Just imagine that you'd be standing here." That's how I went at them. They of course got it, and treated me with respect. The second problem was the teachers at the council school. Those that before had taught me were now to be my colleagues. The very first day, when they were welcoming me, as I was standing there, I said to myself: "My dear fellow teachers. If I ever angered or upset you, please forgive me everything. I would never have done anything like that if I'd experienced what the behavior of students means to a teacher." Then they came up to me one after another, and told me that I hadn't been such a bad student, after all. But one teacher came over to me and jokingly said: "But Blanka, I never pulled you by the ear. So I'll do it now." He came over to me and pretended to pull my ear a bit. So I've got on the whole nice memories of my first workplace. Even though I'm convinced that not everyone there was all that fond of me. But it was only a temporary position. I worked there for only a few weeks.

Then I started working at a Slovak people's school in Uzhorod [a town in Subcarpathian Ruthenia, see 10 – Editor's note], later in Somotor, and so on. They transferred us from place to place, wherever they needed us at the moment. When I taught in these various villages and small towns, I lived with my aunt and my Uncle Herman. She used to tell me about my mother and our family. Once on Saturday there was a day off. Her husband was working, and then went to church. To a Jewish one, of course. Well, and so my aunt says to me: "Blanka, come here. Here to the bed. We'll talk a bit." She began telling me about my mother. It's said that when my mother came from Poland, she was very beautiful. For two years she didn't wear a wig at all. She didn't even have one, as she wasn't used to anything like that from home. Her parents weren't as Orthodox as that, and didn't bring her up that way. And that apparently my mother had beautiful skin. She had a very pretty face and skin, and that it's said people used to come look and marvel at her. They wanted to know what she did to have such a pretty face. The apartment next door shared a bathroom with the apartment where my mother lived, and the neighbors used to come watch my mother comb her hair, and to see what she was putting on her face. Finally she began wearing a wig, I don't even know why. In the end my mother was the most religious of us all.

Let me add a little more information. From 1936, when I finished at the teaching academy and started in my first position at the Presov council school, I taught, as I've already mentioned, in Uzhorod, Somotor, and many other schools. They were schools where the teaching language was Slovak, but also Hungarian. I taught in Lemesany, and finally in 1939 I found myself in Giraltovce. But there that wasn't a school anymore, not in the proper sense. The school inspector placed me there, because he knew who and what I was [meaning he knew that she was Jewish – Editor's note]. He wanted to help me by doing this. So I started working there and taught Jewish children in a one-room schoolhouse.

During the war

When the big witch-hunt for Jews started, and the first refugees from Poland started arriving, my Uncle Herman, whom I lived with, was hiding them. That's why I moved out of his place. All my expenses and expenditures were being paid by my cousin at the time, but back then I didn't know that yet. I'm very grateful to him for that. I'm just sorry that to this day I haven't been able to repay him. With the help of the Jewish Center 11 he obtained false papers for me. I've got them stored away to this day. My cousin helped me get all that. Otherwise, he was a dentist. I unfortunately can't remember his name. In any case, I've still got the papers, on the basis of which I was named a teacher in Giraltovce. They state that: On that basis of submitted ballots, approved by appropriate authority, it is proclaimed that I was elected as a regular teacher at the stated school. As a temporary employee. At the same time, I am notified that I am to commence work on 9th May 1939. And another document is from 1942, and contains this: For the teacher Blanka Friedmannova. To Giraltovce. Jewish people's schoolteacher in Giraltovce has been eliminated from Slovak scholastic life. This decision is valid until repealed. Well, and this and all the other documents I have from that time are false. My cousin helped me get them. He helped me and many others get various papers and documents. In this fashion I got through almost the whole war in Giraltovce under the protection of Uncle Herman, my cousin and one could say they school inspector too, who I've already mentioned. Because he knew who I was and where I was, and despite that protected me and didn't inform on me.

I didn't leave Giraltovce until 1st May 1944. I was already in great danger, and my life was at stake. One document that I have from that time confirms this. The sender of the document is the Jewish Center, and is dated 11th May 1944. On the basis of a personal order of the Minister of the Interior, Section 14, we confirm that Friedmannova, Blanka born 17th May 1916, the last resident of Giraltovce, fulfilled the mandatory registration ordered by the Minister of the Interior, and registered in the registry of Jews evacuated from the Saris-Zemplin district, currently residing in Bratislava. So I really do have all necessary palpable facts stored away for these reminiscences of mine.

But even before that, I received one document dated 9th May 1944. It was issued by the scholastic and cultural department of the Jewish Center in Bratislava. It stated that: We take due note of the forced departure of the Jewish population of the Saris-Zemplin district, and based on this, as a public Jewish people's school teacher in Giraltovce, your temporary job location has been chosen to be the people's school in Hlohovec. The Vranov nad Toplou School Board. So this came from the inspectorate. The inspector there helped me quire a bit too. He for example came to Giraltovce for an inspection, and said: "Tell that Jewish teacher to come see me." I went to see him, and he began talking to me normally about everything. He talked to me as an equal. There was no innuendo, and all the while everyone thought how devoted he was to the regime of the time.

The National Slovak Uprising

In any case, I'll only add that I never started as a teacher in Hlohovec, but just registered there. I was afraid to stay there, because there was one policeman there who'd been in Giraltovce before. They'd transferred him there shortly before my arrival. I thought that he could recognize me and cause me problems. But as I later found out, it was precisely that policeman who was supposed to protect me. He was a reliable person. But how was I supposed to know that, when no one told me? So I played it safe and left Hlohovec. I arrived in Bratislava in May 1944, and then joined the Slovak National Uprising 12.

There were also other events that preceded my joining the Slovak National Uprising. While I was still living in Giraltovce, I was in touch with my brother Bernat. Upon returning from France, he'd become an active member of the Communist Party. I knew about it of course, but at first I myself didn't participate in the uprising or the party. It was only later that various small tasks came, that needed to be performed. To deliver something someplace, make contact with someone, and similar activities. I had nothing against it. I knew that I had to join this party. There were laborers and similar people there, and these people were sympathetic to me. At some point during that time my brother also changed his name from Bernat Friedmann to Stefan Kubik. It was for one because of false papers, but also for other reasons. After the war he didn't change his name back anymore.

Before I got to Banska Bystrica and joined the uprising there, I had to absolve the dangerous journey from Bratislava to there. Trains in those days were running irregularly, so it was very hard. I got lucky and traveled together with one friend, who later became the president of the Central Union of Jewish Religious Communities of Czechoslovakia. I got money for the trip from partisans. It was 150 crowns, and a certain man from Piestany brought it to me. So that friend of mine and I set out for Banska Bystrica. As I've already mentioned, trains were already by then not running, or if they were, then only sporadically. So we took one train to at least Zlate Moravce. We got off at the station there, and were thinking about what to do next. We didn't know anyone in the region; we had no one to contact. So we went to a hotel and pretended we were going to a wedding. We of course each asked for our own room for the night. The next morning the chambermaid came up to me and said to me: "But you didn't sleep here, the two of you slept together, right?" They thought we'd slept together, and I didn't want to have to explain anything, so I just told her: "Yes, but don't tell anyone." Back then there really was no point in explaining to some strange woman how and what. From Zlate Moravce we eventually got to Zvolen, and from there to Banska Bystrica.

In Banska Bystrica I went right away to report to the Central Committee of the Communist Party. I didn't know anyone there yet, but they knew about me and were expecting me. When I arrived there, Smidke [Smidke, Karol (1897 – 1952): Communist politician. One of the main figures in the Slovak National Uprising – Editor's note], Bacilek [Bacilek, Karol (1896 – 1974): Communist politician. Bore a significant amount of responsibility for the repressions at the beginning of the 1950s (see 1) – Editor's note] were there, plus one more. I've unfortunately since forgotten his name, but I do know that he was a professor. They asked me whether I'd come to see Husak 13. But I didn't know him, neither before nor after that, and really, I don't regret it. He was an anti-Semite, who had an appalling attitude towards Jews. But enough about that. Smidke and the other two told me that I was late, because the connection going to eastern Slovakia had left about a quarter hour earlier, and so I had to stay in Banska Bystrica. You see, I had hoped to be able to get all the way to Giraltovce.

So there was nothing I could do. I didn't know what to do now, and they told me: "Don't worry. You'll go identify yourself, and after confirmation you'll go work somewhere." So I went out onto the street, and suddenly I hear: "Friedmannova!" and I turn around had say: "My God, Oskar Jelen!" It was a teacher from our teaching academy. He hated me! His sister, she worshipped me. But at that moment he was so glad to see me that he was almost beside himself. I told him: "But I don't have any proof it's me." [meaning that she didn't have her papers, and thus couldn't identify herself – Editor's note]. At that time he was a major functionary, so he gave me confirmation that he knew me personally, and that I was a teacher. Right away they also gave me ID papers, and sent me to go work at the Education Commission, despite the fact that I was a teacher. I worked at that commission in Banska Bystrica until 28th October 1944. At that time the Slovak National Uprising was crushed, and we had to go hide in the mountains.

There were three of us that went together. A girlfriend of mine originally from Bardejov, my cousin Hersi [Hersl (Herschel)] and I. No one else. At first we hid out in a hayloft up above Selce for six days. From there we set out for a nearby village, Nemce. Not directly for the village, but up above the village there was this shelter built by shepherds, and that's where we stayed. Well, and I had with me my own ID for one, and my Party ID for another. I thought that it would be best to get rid of them, which is also what I did. I said to myself: "Where am I, what am I? I don't know. So I'd rather not have any papers." Finally we went down to the village. We were already sure that there were no Germans or Hungarians there. I stayed there with the Kabanov family up until 25th March 1945, when Banska Bystrica was liberated by Soviet and Romanian soldiers.

After the war

When the soldiers arrived in Nemce, they wanted food. But people didn't want to give too much of what little they had. These soldiers put me in charge of finding them food. So I went from house to house and asked for potatoes. Really, to some of them I had to emphatically say: "All right, you've got two possibilities, either you'll give them the potatoes, or we'll do it another way and call the Germans back." But in the end they gave as much as they could. It's true that some of these soldiers weren't all good either. One, I don't even know his name anymore, once began to make advances to me. So I quickly told him that if he wants to eat, he'd better keep his hands as far as he can from me. And he really did leave me be. I was talking with him some more after that, and he says to me: "You're Jewish, aren't you?" And to this I said to him: "Well, yes. We're Jews." Then I said to him: "But listen, the way you talk, did you study German?" To this he says to me that: "Yes. Ich spreche ein bischen deutsch." I say: "Know what? I'll tell you something my dear boy, you're a Jew." I based it on the fact that he spoke German. Russians didn't usually speak this language. He looked at me oddly, and said to me: "I was in Hungary, as many women as I wanted, I had. You're the first who told me that if I wanted to eat I should keep my hands off. So I said to myself that only a Jewess that stayed alive could have this kind of courage." Yes, I had even this kind of encounter. By then the end of the war was approaching, and I set out for the east, for home.

On my way, I met some girls in the Tatras who were returning home from the Polish prison camps. It was already evening, and we laid down to sleep. Suddenly someone says to me: "You're Blanka Friedmannova." I said: "All right, but who're you?" She said to me: "I'm a girl from Bratislava who they banished, and Jews from Bratislava were banished to the East. At that time when they banished me to the East, they allocated someone to each family. I was with your family. You were there once too, and that's how me met." We'd been together for such a short time, that it really couldn't occur to me who it was. Right away she told me that my father had died of natural causes before they managed to deport him. I can't even describe how much we wept that night, and how awful we felt. The next day I kept going, because I was curious who had survived, and was hoping to find at least Bernat in Presov. I knew that all my sisters had been in camps, and didn't have much hope anymore. During the whole way I didn't meet any soldiers. Everywhere I just read: Beware of mines and grenades!

Finally I got to Presov. I knew that Bernat was there too, because on the way I'd already met a couple of people who'd come out of their hiding places and told me. A bit before Presov, I stopped a military vehicle and the soldiers took me to town. They let me off in the street and didn't give hoot what would be with me. I found myself on the main street, and suddenly the manager of one store walked out and said to me: "Blanka!" It was already dark, as it was late in the evening, and then he said: "Jesus, is your brother going to be glad." He told me where I'd find Bernat, though at that time he was already named Kubik. Finally he told me that my brother was at a café, and that he'd rather go get him. He brought Bernat, and I can't even describe how glad we were to see each other. We wept. We wept horribly, horribly, over the loss of our family, but at the same time we were glad that we had at least each other. My brother then took me with him, because he already had a place to live. He took me to a place where partisans and returnees from the camps or the front were staying, and that's where we slept.

After a couple of weeks, my brother managed to find an apartment, where we then lived together. After some time our sister Matilda got in touch with us. She wrote us a letter that she was alive and was coming home. She didn't know if any of us were alive. Finally she returned home in September 1945. It was a beautiful reunion. What had happened with my sister was that she was the only one whom my father hadn't hidden from the deportations, because he thought that they wouldn't take her because of her broken nose. That was a mistake. In the end she was the first one to be deported. Our father blamed himself for it and couldn't come to terms with it. In the end my sister survived three and a half years of hell in the Auschwitz concentrations camp. After returning home she also changed her name, to Kubikova. Her plan was to emigrate as soon as possible.

I had in the meantime married Miroslav Dvorsky, on 11th September 1945. My husband's original name was Moric Moskovic. Like me, he was also a Jew. He was two years older than I, and was born in 1914. He was from Brezovice, near Sabinov. We had a civil wedding. Neither my husband nor I were interested in a clerical wedding, and we didn't observe any Jewish traditions in our household.

As I've already hinted with regards to my sister, she had decided to go to Yugoslavia. But first she finished school and wrote her high school exams, because back in 1939, the same as other Jews, they'd expelled her from school 14. But to be able to leave she needed a certain amount of money. So my husband and I gave her a certain sum, along with various things for the household, so that she'd have everything she'd need. But in the end what happened was that they stole it from her at the station in Prague. Ultimately she stayed in Prague and even studied there for a while, but didn't finish the school. After that I didn't keep close tabs on her life. My sister married her friend of long years, from back in the days of the Hashomer 15. He was an excellent chemist. But the both of them having experienced the horrors of the Holocaust and camps firsthand scarred their marriage. My sister to this day lives in the same town as I do, but we don't have a very close relationship.

Now back to my family, which I started with Miroslav Dvorsky. You see, I had originally not wanted to get married at all. Around me I saw many marriages that hadn't ended well. Be it before the war or after it. But when we knew that my sister was alive and returning home, we wanted her to have a home. My husband and I had met back when he was still a student at a Protestant high school. He wasn't my type at all. He'd been in love with this one girl in school. She wasn't Jewish, but a Christian, though that wasn't the reason why there weren't together. She got married. Then came the war, my husband was a soldier.

In any case, my husband and I lived in Presov in our apartment. In 1946 our first son was born, and we named him Peter. Three years later, our second son, Juraj, was born. Also in Presov. We didn't raise our sons in a Jewish spirit at all. We didn't observe any holidays, neither Jewish nor Christian ones. I said to myself: "Religion is a private matter. It's my thing, and it's not anyone's business." But one evening, it was shortly after the end of the war, a few of us that were Jewish met at a friend's apartment, and celebrated Passover. We asked my brother to lead it. We didn't invite any Christians, and were all only Jews there. We made seder supper [Seder: a term for home religious services and the prescribed ritual for the first night of Passover – Editor's note]. We weren't even halfway through the celebration, when the chairman of the regional national committee and the party chairman showed up and told us: "So, you're having fun here like this, and outside there are Banderites 16" Those were these Russians deserters and soldiers who were causing trouble in Presov. They were such swine that for example right during the first Easter after the war, they killed two young Jewish girls in Presov. These swine got fed by Jews, and then went to beat them.

Shortly after arriving in Presov, I went to work for the Party. I had already officially joined the Communist Party back in Banska Bystrica. Then I worked for the party, and became the chairman of the Women's Union. I did this until I left for Bratislava, which was in 1950. While I was still in Presov, I had two small children and I worked, well, simply put I had quite a lot of responsibilities. But in that union we accomplished a lot, especially with village women. We taught them to express themselves correctly, when to act a certain way, what to say on which occasion. Yes, we were a good bunch, and accomplished a lot.

My husband also had a lot to do. In 1949 they transferred him, and he worked in Bratislava as the director of a meatpacking plant. He was in charge of the nationalization of meatpacking plants 17. That took place in August 1949. But my husband came home to Presov every week. This was because we had to stay there for the time being, as we had no place to live in Bratislava. But after some time my husband managed to arrange a beautiful apartment in Malinovskeho St. So then in 1950 we all moved in there together.

Our good fortune didn't last long. That is, in 1951 they put my husband in jail. They made up various accusations and put him in jail for eleven months. This was because they didn't have anything to prove him guilty. The same fate met my brother as well. However, he was in jail for a lot longer. He was jailed from 1951 until 1954. The did his time in the prison in Ruzyne [in Prague]. Then he was released, the false charges were dropped, and he was rehabilitated. Really, that Jewish witch-hunt and the whole affair with the Slansky trials 1 changed my outlook on things. When my husband and brother were in jail, I tried as best I could, and was arranging various things. I wanted them to be home from jail as soon as possible. On top of that it was very hard, because I had to cover the whole household and all expenses with my one teacher's salary.

In Bratislava I at first worked for the Industry Commission [in post-war Czechoslovakia, starting in 1948, ministries were created in the Czech portion. Their equivalents in Slovakia were commissions – Editor's note]. Originally they'd wanted to employ me as the head secretary of the Bratislava Women's Union, but I refused the job. So in the end I began working for the Industry Commission. I liked the work there a lot; the work there really went well. But then, when they threw my husband in jail, I had to leave this job.

I started working at Zdroj [Zdroj: a retail grocery store chain – Editor's note]. First I wrote various memos and letters for inspectors that made the rounds to check up on things. But after a short while they realized that it was a shame to waste me on that kind of work, that I was capable of more. So the director himself pushed me through and arranged for me to take care of accounts. But by then it was already 1951, my husband had already been in jail for several months, and I'd already been notified that he was supposed to be released. So I went to the Central Committee of the Party. I went there to see someone I knew from back in Banska Bystrica, but today I don't remember his name anymore. So he told me: "All right, you know what? You'll go and teach at school. You'll go to the Ministry of Education and arrange it there. There's a certain XY there, you'll tell him that I sent you, and he'll give you some sort of position." It took a while, but in the end they found a teaching job for me.

In 1951 I began working at the Red Army elementary school as a math teacher. It was an eight-year elementary school, and I then taught there until retirement. Right the first year I was teaching children math, I began to prepare them for the math Olympics. I prepared them so well, that they placed very well, as excellent solvers of math problems. As soon as that happened, I got a good name in the school. I always knew how to deal with children, and they didn't give me any problems. They respected me and I got along with them excellently.

As far as my colleagues at work go, right at the beginning I made it clear who I was and what I was, to avoid any unnecessary misunderstandings. I think that they took it relatively well. Later they told me: "You were the only one where we always knew you were Jewish." And to this I told them: "All right." And they continued: "Because when you first introduced yourself, you said – I'm hereby notifying you that I'm of Jewish origin." I taught there until I was supposed to retire. I'd been working there for almost thirty years, 27 to be exact, and I could leave for a well-deserved rest. I retired in 1978.

My husband finally returned from jail after 11 months. They didn't have any evidence against him, so they had to let him go. It was hard. Alone with two kids. I didn't have even a crown to spare. I lived from paycheck to advance, and many times I also had to borrow money from someone. After returning home, my husband had to undergo re-education as a laborer, and then worked as a common laborer. After a certain time the political situation settled down. It was found that they'd blackened and accused him of things that he'd never done, and transferred him to a different location. He began working for Hydrostav [Hydrostav: in the past one of the largest construction companies in Slovakia – Editor's note]. His job there was better than as just a laborer.

My husband didn't live to be able to retire. He became ill and before he could enjoy a bit of peace and quiet, he died. That took place in 1971. He's buried in Bratislava. After my husband's death, I moved from the apartment in Malinovskeho St. to the apartment I live in now. This apartment is just right for me. It has two rooms, but that's enough for me, because I'm here alone. I've got a kitchen, a room for when company comes over, so a living room, and a bedroom. The furniture is according to my own tastes, and I feel good here.

Both my sons graduated successfully from university. The older, Peter, graduated from electrical engineering in Bratislava, and the younger, Juraj, from architecture. Also in Bratislava. Both of them are very clever and like every mother, I'm proud of my children. After finishing school, both sons got married and started their own families.

Glossary:


1 Slansky trial: In the years 1948-1949 the Czechoslovak government together with the Soviet Union strongly supported the idea of the founding of a new state, Israel. Despite all efforts, Stalin’s politics never found fertile ground in Israel; therefore the Arab states became objects of his interest. In the first place the Communists had to allay suspicions that they had supplied the Jewish state with arms. The Soviet leadership announced that arms shipments to Israel had been arranged by Zionists in Czechoslovakia. The times required that every Jew in Czechoslovakia be automatically considered a Zionist and cosmopolitan. In 1951 on the basis of a show trial, 14 defendants (eleven of them were Jews) with Rudolf Slansky, First Secretary of the Communist Party at the head were convicted. Eleven of the accused got the death penalty; three were sentenced to life imprisonment. The executions were carried out on 3rd December 1952. The Communist Party later finally admitted its mistakes in carrying out the trial and all those sentenced were socially and legally rehabilitated in 1963.

2 Orthodox communities

The traditionalist Jewish communities founded their own Orthodox organizations after the Universal Meeting in 1868-1869.They organized their life according to Judaist principles and opposed to assimilative aspirations. The community leaders were the rabbis. The statute of their communities was sanctioned by the king in 1871. In the western part of Hungary the communities of the German and Slovakian immigrants’ descendants were formed according to the Western Orthodox principles. At the same time in the East, among the Jews of Galician origins the ‘eastern’ type of Orthodoxy was formed; there the Hassidism prevailed. In time the Western Orthodoxy also spread over to the eastern part of Hungary.

3 Orthodox Jewish dress

Main characteristics of observant Jewish appearance and dresses: men wear a cap or hat while women wear a shawl (the latter is obligatory in case of married women only). The most peculiar skull-cap is called kippah (other name: yarmulkah) (kapedli in Yiddish), worn by men when they leave the house, reminding them of the presence of God and thus providing spiritual protection and safety. Orthodox Jewish women had their hair shaved and wore a wig. In addition, Orthodox Jewish men wear a tallit (Hebrew term) (talles in Yiddish) [prayer shawl] and its accessories all day long under their clothes but not directly on their body. Wearing payes (Yiddish term) (payot in Hebrew) [long sideburns] is linked with the relevant prohibition in the Torah [shaving or trimming the beard as well as the hair around the head was forbidden]. The above habits originate from the Torah and the Shulchan Arukh. Other pieces of dresses, the kaftan [Russian, later Polish wear] among others, thought to be typical, are an imitation. According to non-Jews these characterize the Jews while they are not compulsory for the Jews.

4 Kashrut in eating habits

kashrut means ritual behavior. A term indicating the religious validity of some object or article according to Jewish law, mainly in the case of foodstuffs. Biblical law dictates which living creatures are allowed to be eaten. The use of blood is strictly forbidden. The method of slaughter is prescribed, the so-called shechitah. The main rule of kashrut is the prohibition of eating dairy and meat products at the same time, even when they weren’t cooked together. The time interval between eating foods differs. On the territory of Slovakia six hours must pass between the eating of a meat and dairy product. In the opposite case, when a dairy product is eaten first and then a meat product, the time interval is different. In some Jewish communities it is sufficient to wash out one’s mouth with water. The longest time interval was three hours – for example in Orthodox communities in Southwestern Slovakia.

5 Masaryk, Tomas Garrigue (1850-1937)

Czechoslovak political leader and philosopher and chief founder of the First Czechoslovak Republic. He founded the Czech People’s Party in 1900, which strove for Czech independence within the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, for the protection of minorities and the unity of Czechs and Slovaks. After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1918, Masaryk became the first president of Czechoslovakia. He was reelected in 1920, 1927, and 1934. Among the first acts of his government was an extensive land reform. He steered a moderate course on such sensitive issues as the status of minorities, especially the Slovaks and Germans, and the relations between the church and the state. Masaryk resigned in 1935 and Edvard Benes, his former foreign minister, succeeded him.

6 Benes, Edvard (1884-1948)

Czechoslovak politician and president from 1935-38 and 1946-48. He was a follower of T. G. Masaryk, the first president of Czechoslovakia, and the idea of Czechoslovakism, and later Masaryk’s right-hand man. After World War I he represented Czechoslovakia at the Paris Peace Conference. He was Foreign Minister (1918-1935) and Prime Minister (1921-1922) of the new Czechoslovak state and became president after Masaryk retired in 1935. The Czechoslovak alliance with France and the creation of the Little.

7 First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938)

The First Czechoslovak Republic was created after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy following World War I. The union of the Czech lands and Slovakia was officially proclaimed in Prague in 1918, and formally recognized by the Treaty of St. Germain in 1919. Ruthenia was added by the Treaty of Trianon in 1920. Czechoslovakia inherited the greater part of the industries of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the new government carried out an extensive land reform, as a result of which the living conditions of the peasantry increasingly improved. However, the constitution of 1920 set up a highly centralized state and failed to take into account the issue of national minorities, and thus internal political life was dominated by the struggle of national minorities (especially the Hungarians and the Germans) against Czech rule. In foreign policy Czechoslovakia kept close contacts with France and initiated the foundation of the Little Entente in 1921.

8 Spanish Civil War (1936-39)

A civil war in Spain, which lasted from July 1936 to April 1939, between rebels known as Nacionales and the Spanish Republican government and its supporters. The leftist government of the Spanish Republic was besieged by nationalist forces headed by General Franco, who was backed by Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. Though it had Spanish nationalist ideals as the central cause, the war was closely watched around the world mainly as the first major military contest between left-wing forces and the increasingly powerful and heavily armed fascists. The number of people killed in the war has been long disputed ranging between 500,000 and a million.

9 People’s and Public schools in Czechoslovakia

In the 18th century the state intervened in the evolution of schools – in 1877 Empress Maria Theresa issued the Ratio Educationis decree, which reformed all levels of education. After the passing of a law regarding six years of compulsory school attendance in 1868, people’s schools were fundamentally changed, and could now also be secular. During the First Czechoslovak Republic, the Small School Law of 1922 increased compulsory school attendance to eight years. The lower grades of people’s schools were public schools (four years) and the higher grades were council schools. A council school was a general education school for youth between the ages of 10 and 15. Council schools were created in the last quarter of the 19th century as having 4 years, and were usually state-run. Their curriculum was dominated by natural sciences with a practical orientation towards trade and business. During the First Czechoslovak Republic they became 3-year with a 1-year course. After 1945 their curriculum was merged with that of lower gymnasium. After 1948 they disappeared, because all schools were nationalized.

10 Subcarpathian Ruthenia

is found in the region where the Carpathian Mountains meet the Central Dnieper Lowlands. Its larger towns are Beregovo, Mukacevo and Hust. Up until the First World War the region belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, but in the year 1919, according to the St. Germain peace treaty, was made a part of Czechoslovakia. Exact statistics regarding ethnic and linguistic composition of the population aren’t available. Between the two World Wars Ruthenia’s inhabitants included Hungarians, Ruthenians, Russians, Ukrainians, Czechs and Slovaks, plus numerous Jewish and Gypsy communities. The first Viennese Arbitration (1938) gave Hungary that part of Ruthenia inhabited by Hungarians. The remainder of the region gained autonomy within Czechoslovakia, and was occupied by Hungarian troops. In 1944 the Soviet Army and local resistance units took power in Ruthenia. According to an agreement dated June 29, 1945, Czechoslovakia ceded the region to the Soviet Union. Up until 1991 it was a part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. After Ukraine declared its independence, it became one of the country’s administrative regions.

11 Jewish Center

its creation was closely tied to Dieter Wisliceny, German advisor for resolution of Jewish affairs, a close colleague of Eichmann. Wisliceny arguments for the creation of a Jewish Center were that it will act as a partner in negotiation regarding the eviction of Jews, that for those that due to Aryanization will be removed from their current positions, it will secure re-schooling for other occupations. The Jewish Center’s jurisdiction was determined by the scope and regulations of the particular instance it fell under. This fact fundamentally influenced the center’s operation. It limited the freedom of activity of individual clerks. The center’s personnel was made up of three categories of people. From bureaucrats, who in their approach to the obeying of orders did more harm than good (second head clerk of the Jewish Center A. Sebestyen), further of those that saw the purpose of their activities foremost in the selfless helping of people who were the most afflicted by the persecutions (G. Fleischmannova), and finally of soulless executors of orders, who were really capable of doing everything (K. Hochberg). Besides the Jewish Center there was also the Work Group, led by the Orthodox rabbi M. Weissmandel, but whose real leader was the Zionist G. Fleischmannova. Though Weissmandel wasn’t a member of the Jewish Center, he was such a respected personage that it would be difficult to imagine rescue missions being carried out without him. The main activity of the Work Group was to save as many Jews as possible from deportation. Of those in the Work Group, O. Neumann, A. Steiner and Rabbi Weissmandel and Neumann survived. In the last phase of activity of this underground group Neumann, who also became the chairman of the Jewish Center, lived in Israel. Steiner and Rabbi Weissmandel emigrated to Canada and the USA. Weissmandel and Neumann wrote their memoirs, in which they quite justifiably asked the question if the Jewish Center and especially the Work Group hadn’t remained indebted towards Jewish citizens.

12 Slovak Uprising

At Christmas 1943 the Slovak National Council was formed, consisting of various oppositional groups (communists, social democrats, agrarians etc.). Their aim was to fight the Slovak fascist state. The uprising broke out in Banska Bystrica, central Slovakia, on 20th August 1944. On 18th October the Germans launched an offensive. A large part of the regular Slovak army joined the uprising and the Soviet Army also joined in. Nevertheless the Germans put down the riot and occupied Banska Bystrica on 27th October, but weren’t able to stop the partisan activities. As the Soviet army was drawing closer many of the Slovak partisans joined them in Eastern Slovakia under either Soviet or Slovak command.

13 Husak, Gustav (1913–1991)

entered into politics already in the 1930s as a member of the Communist Party. Drew attention to himself in 1944, during preparations for and course of the Slovak National Uprising. After the war he filled numerous party positions, but of special importance was his chairmanship of the Executive Committee during the years 1946 to 1950. His activities in this area were aimed against the Democratic Party, the most influential force in Slovakia. In 1951 he was arrested, convicted of bourgeois nationalism and in April 1954 sentenced to life imprisonment. Long years of imprisonment, during which he acted courageously and which didn’t end until 1960, neither broke Husak’s belief in Communism, nor his desire to excel. He used the relaxing of conditions at the beginning of 1968 for a vigorous return to political life. Because he had gained great confidence and support in Slovakia, on the wishes of Moscow he replaced Alexander Dubcek in the function of First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party. More and more he gave way to Soviet pressure and approved mass purges in the Communist Party. When he was elected president on 29th May 1975, the situation in the country was seemingly calm. The Communist Party leaders were under the impression that given material sufficiency, people will reconcile themselves with a lack of political and intellectual freedom and a worsening environment. In the second half of the 1980s social crises deepened, multiplied by developments in the Soviet Union. Husak had likely imagined the end of his political career differently. In December 1987 he resigned from his position as General Secretary of the Communist Party, and on 10th December 1989 as a result of the revolutionary events also abdicated from the presidency. Symbolically, this happened on Human Rights Day, and immediately after he was forced to appoint a government of ‘national reconciliation.’ The foundering of his political career quickened his physical end. Right before his death he reconciled himself with the Catholic Church. He died on 18th February 1991 in Bratislava.

14 Jewish Codex

Order no. 198 of the Slovakian government, issued in September 1941, on the legal status of the Jews, went down in history as Jewish Codex. Based on the Nuremberg Laws, it was one of the most stringent and inhuman anti-Jewish laws all over Europe. It paraphrased the Jewish issue on a racial basis, religious considerations were fading into the background; categories of Jew, Half Jew, moreover 'Mixture' were specified by it. The majority of the 270 paragraphs dealt with the transfer of Jewish property (so-called Aryanizing; replacing Jews by non-Jews) and the exclusion of Jews from economic, political and public life.

15 Hashomer Hatzair in Slovakia

the Hashomer Hatzair movement came into being in Slovakia after WWI. It was Jewish youths from Poland, who on their way to Palestine crossed through Slovakia and here helped to found a Zionist youth movement, that took upon itself to educate young people via scouting methods, and called itself Hashomer (guard). It joined with the Kadima (forward) movement in Ruthenia. The combined movement was called Hashomer Kadima. Within the membership there were several ideologues that created a dogma that was binding for the rest of the members. The ideology was based on Borchov’s theory that the Jewish nation must also become a nation just like all the others. That’s why the social pyramid of the Jewish nation had to be turned upside down. He claimed that the base must be formed by those doing manual labor, especially in agriculture – that is why young people should be raised for life in kibbutzim, in Palestine. During its time of activity it organized six kibbutzim: Shaar Hagolan, Dfar Masaryk, Maanit, Haogen, Somrat and Lehavot Chaviva, whose members settled in Palestine. From 1928 the movement was called Hashomer Hatzair (Young Guard). From 1938 Nazi influence dominated in Slovakia. Zionist youth movements became homes for Jewish youth after their expulsion from high schools and universities. Hashomer Hatzair organized high school courses, re-schooling centers for youth, summer and winter camps. Hashomer Hatzair members were active in underground movements in labor camps, and when the Slovak National Uprising broke out, they joined the rebel army and partisan units. After liberation the movement renewed its activities, created youth homes in which lived mainly children who returned from the camps without their parents, organized re-schooling centers and branches in towns. After the putsch in 1948 that ended the democratic regime, half of Slovak Jews left Slovakia. Among them were members of Hashomer Hatzair. In the year 1950 the movement ended its activity in Slovakia.

16 Banderites

members of Ukrainian military fascist units during World War II. Were active in the former Soviet Union, Poland and Czechoslovakia. Their name comes from the name of their leader, Stepan Bandera (1919 – 1959). Bandera units took advantage of the unstable postwar situation. They attacked, stole and murdered the local population until November 1947, when their activities were completely suppressed.

17 Nationalization in Czechoslovakia

The goal of nationalization was to put privately-owned means of production and private property into public control and into the hands of the Socialist state. The attempts to change property relations after WWI (1918-1921) were unsuccessful. Directly after WWII, already by May 1945, the heads of state took over possession of the collaborators’ (that is, Hungarian and German) property. In July 1945, members of the Communist Party before the National Front, openly called for the nationalization of banks, financial institutions, insurance companies and industrial enterprises, the execution of which fell to the Nationalization Central Committee. The first decree for nationalization was signed 11th August 1945 by the Republic President. This decree affected agricultural production, the film industry and foreign trade. Members of the Communist Party fought representatives of the National Socialist Party and the Democratic Party for further expansion of the process of nationalization, which resulted in the president signing four new decrees on 24th October, barely two months after taking office. These called for nationalization of the mining industry companies and industrial plants, the food industry plants, as well as joint-stock companies, banks and life insurance companies. The nationalization established the Czechoslovakia’s financial development, and shaped the ‘Socialist financial sphere’. Despite this, significantly valuable property disappeared from companies in public ownership into the private and foreign trade network. Because of this, the activist committee of the trade unions called for further nationalizations on 22nd February 1948. This process was stopped in Czechoslovakia by new laws of the National Assembly in April 1948, which were passed that December.

Sima Libman

Sima Libman

Tallinn

Estonia

Interviewer: Emma Gofman

Date of interview: March 2004

I first met Sima Libman in her small cozy two-room apartment. I saw a small old woman with bright eyes. I found her to be a friendly and talkative person with a good sense of humor. While Sima and I were talking her granddaughters called several times to discuss their problems with her. Later, I saw Sima among the people who attended the general assembly of the Estonian Jewish Community. From the outside I could see that she walked with difficulty but I never heard her complaining about her health, and the conversation we had was a pleasant and interesting one.

My family background

Growing up

The soviet invasion of the Balkans

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

I heard from my father, Elhanon Rogovski that my paternal great-grandfather had come from Poland, which was then part of the Russian Empire. My great-grandfather’s name was Zelik Rogovski. When he was twelve years old he became a Cantonist 1, and served in the tsarist army at the age of 18. After 25 years of service my great-grandfather had the status of Nikolayevsky soldier 2 and could therefore settle anywhere within the Russian Empire. He chose Estonia, which was outside the Jewish Pale of Settlement 3, as the place of his residence and in the early 1860s he settled in the small Estonian town of Rakvere. His children were born there. I don’t know how many children Zelik Rogovski had: I can only tell you about two of his sons. There was Meier Rogovski who was born in 1867. He lived in Tallinn and was a highly respected person. For many years he was the chief rabbi of the Tallinn Synagogue. 

Besides that, between the 1920s and 1940s, Meier Rogovski was a stock holder of the Jewish Bank in Estonia. I remember what he looked like: a tall grey-haired interesting-looking man. He always wore a top hat and carried a walking stick. When World War II began his two daughters and their families moved to the back areas, but Meier Rogovski, his wife Chase, and their son Aron remained in Tallinn. The fascists killed them in September 1941.The second son in my great-grandfather’s family was my paternal grandfather, Benyamin Rogovski. He was born in the mid-1860s. Unfortunately, I know very little about my grandfather as he died a few years after I was born: I don’t remember him at all. He was an artisan, perhaps, a shoemaker and lived in Rakvere his whole life. From his first marriage he had five children: three sons and two daughters. My father was the youngest in the family. My paternal grandmother’s name was Leah [nee Pats].

In the 19thcentury the large Pats family lived in Pskov [today Russia], then some of them moved to St. Petersburg [today Russia], and some to Estonia. My grandmother’s sister, Beile Chapkovski, lived in Tallinn with her husband. Her brother, Abram Pats, first lived in Rakvere and then in Tartu. He had three children: Yakov, Zelda, and Pesach. Their descendants now live in Estonia and Israel.

In 1903, Grandmother Leah fell ill, she was treated in a hospital in Tallinn, but the doctors couldn’t help her and she died. She was buried in Tallinn at the Jewish cemetery. My father was only five years old then and my grandmother’s sister, Beile Chapkovski, adopted him. She didn’t have any children of her own and her family brought up my father as their own son. After his wife’s death, Grandfather Benyamin still lived in Rakvere with the rest of his children. The family was poor and my grandfather couldn’t pay for his children to be well-educated. Yiddish was the language spoken in that family.

My father’s eldest sister’s name was Anna. She studied in a Russian gymnasium in Rakvere and finished eight or nine grades. Anna married Faivel Migdal, who was a real estate agent. They lived in Tallinn and were well-off. Aunt Anna considered herself an urban lady: she never spoke Yiddish, mainly Russian. Their son’s name was Gedalye Migdal. He went to a German school, but in 1933 when the fascists came to power in Germany, all Jewish students had to leave the school. Gedalye spent his last school year in a Jewish gymnasium. After that, he graduated from the Department of Chemistry of the Tallinn Polytechnic Institute. When World War II began, Gedalye worked as an engineer at a chemical factory in a small Estonian town called Kivioli [130 km east of Tallinn]. 

At the beginning of July 1941 it was rumored that German troops had landed in the woods somewhere near Kivioli. Local authorities quickly assembled a self-defense group and sent it to the woods to capture the invaders. Gedalye was in this group. He always dressed well and on that day he wore a leather coat and a pair of box calf boots. So the Red Army soldiers mistook him for a German spy and shot him dead. His parents found out about their son’s death only after the war as they had evacuated in early July 1941. After the war, Aunt Anna and her husband lived in Tallinn and died in the 1960s.

Sheina Mitzevendler [nee Rogovski] was my father’s second sister. She acquired little education; I believe she only finished elementary school. Her husband was a hat-maker, he had a workshop in Tallinn and made good money. He was particularly good at making uniform caps and galloons on army epaulettes. Aunt Sheina was a housewife. They had two daughters. One of the daughters, Ezia, married a Latvian in the 1930s and went to live somewhere in Europe. Later, she moved to the USA and lived there for a long time and died there. The other daughter, Zelda, now lives in the USA with her son’s family. Aunt Sheina died before World War II. My father also had a brother, Aro-Benye Rogovski. He didn’t have much education either: in fact, he didn’t have a vocation. He lived in Tallinn with his family, did various odd jobs and owned a trade business for some time. He had a wife, Esther, two daughters, Rachel and Sarah, and a son, Zelik. 

During the war, Uncle Aro-Benye was enlisted in the Labor Army 4 and died there. Zelik, his son, fought in the Estonian Rifle Corps 5 and died in combat action. Esther, Rachel, and Sarah were in evacuation in the Ural region [today Russia] and returned to Tallinn after the war. Sarah was one year older than me and we were close friends, she was a wonderful person. Unfortunately, she died at the age of 65 after a very serious illness. Rachel died at the beginning of 2004. She lived in Finland with her daughter’s family. 

Out of all of my father’s relatives, his brother Joseph Rogovski was my favorite person. He was very talented. When he was young he strove to get as much education as he could. My grandfather couldn’t afford to help him so Uncle Joseph had to make his own way. He studied, and worked, and then studied again. During the [Estonian] War of Liberation 6, Uncle Joseph volunteered to the Estonian Army, and wounded his leg. He limped for the rest of his life. In the late 1920s, he graduated from Tartu University and became a certified pharmacist. After that, he and his wife, Pesya, lived on the small Estonian island of Vormsi for two years where Uncle Joseph worked as a pharmacist. Later, they went back to Rakvere, and Uncle Joseph opened his own drugstore with Pesya’s father’s help. In 1931, they had a daughter, Leah, and in 1935, a son, Benyamin. In 1940, the drugstore was nationalized, and Uncle Joseph was appointed the sanitary inspector for Narva. During the war, Uncle Joseph was evacuated to Chuvashia [a region in central Russia, in the middle of Volga valley]. After the war they returned to Estonia and lived in Parnu where Uncle Joseph worked as a sanitary inspector until he retired. He died in the late 1970s. His son, Benyamin, now lives in Israel with his family, and his daughter, Leah, lives in Tallinn. She worked as an engineer at a large factory for many years and is now retired. Unfortunately, she is very ill now.

When all his children became independent, Grandfather Benyamin married a widow with a young child and they had a daughter, Rebecca, in 1917. She was a beautiful girl, adored by all the relatives and especially by my father. Rebecca graduated from a German gymnasium in Rakvere and went to live in Tallinn. By that time Grandfather Benyamin had died, but his brother, Meier Rogovski, helped Rebecca to get a job at the Jewish Bank. Since then, she has always worked in finances and was a very good accountant. Rebecca married in 1939 and had a daughter, Sheina, in April 1941. During the war, Rebecca and her daughter were evacuated to the Urals, and her husband fought in the Estonian Rifle Corps. After the war, they all returned to Tallinn, and in fall 1945, when Rebecca gave birth to another daughter, Yana, her husband suddenly died of meningitis. Later, she remarried and had a son, Boris Khalupovich. In 1987, Boris went to live in the USA and Rebecca, Sheina and Yana followed later with their families. Rebecca is still alive. I sometimes talk to her on the phone and write letters.

My father always recalled his aunt, Beile Chapkovski, and her husband who took the place of his parents with gratitude. They were deeply religious people: often attended the synagogue, didn’t work on Sabbath, and strictly ate only kosher food. They also celebrated Sabbath and all Jewish holidays according to the traditions of Judaism. The Chapkovski family spoke only Yiddish. Aunt Beile could speak little Russian and Estonian. Her husband was a kind person, but his life ended tragically. There was a small square in front of the Tallinn Synagogue 7 with several stalls which sold sweets, lemonade, and various trinkets. The Chapkovskis owned one of these stalls. One evening, just before closing time, two thieves entered the booth, killed Aunt Beile’s husband with an axe, and took the little money he had. This happened in 1925. Prior to that, everything was fine. The Chapkovskis helped my father to acquire a good vocation. Upon finishing nine years at a Russian gymnasium he studied under Rokhlin, an excellent old Tallinn dental mechanic. After he finished his studies, my father was tested by a special examining board and received a document which enabled him to work as a dental mechanic. Later, he worked with several dentists who treated patients in their offices and passed their orders to my father. He completed the orders at home where he had a small lab.

When my father was still a schoolboy he went to visit his mother’s relatives in St. Petersburg during his summer vacation. He had a lot of relatives in St. Petersburg, all of them members of the Pats family. While he was visiting a family of some of his distant relatives my father met a girl named Sofia Beilis. My father was 14 then and Sofia was just twelve. That’s when they fell in love. Every year my father went to spend at least a week in St. Petersburg in order to see Sofia. The last time he visited was in the summer of 1917. At that time they finally agreed to marry when my father started working independently, but due to circumstances they had to wait a further six years.

My mother, Sofia Beilis, was born in 1900 in Yamburg, Petersburg province [today Kingisepp, Leningrad region in Russia]. Her father, Joseph Beilis, was a good military tailor. He made uniforms and overcoats for top officials in the Russian army. In the mid-1900s, in regard to Joseph’s high qualification as a tailor and, therefore, his usefulness, he was given permission to settle in St. Petersburg along with his family. My grandfather rented a basement near the city center, engaged several workers, and opened a workshop. His family lived next to the workshop. My grandfather could have come from Ukraine because Mendel Beilis, whose name stirred entire Russia from 1911 to 1913 [see Beilis case] 8, was his distant relative. My mother recalled that they had a large photograph in their room with Mendel’s portrait in the center and his lawyers’ portraits on the sides.

My mother’s mother, Lyuba Beilis [nee Pats], was born in Pskov [today Russia], in 1880. After she married Joseph Beilis she lived in Yamburg. My grandmother had five children: my mother was the eldest. Next was another daughter, Panya [1902], then a son, Semyon [1905], and then Emma [1909] and Eugenia [1911]. They were all born in St. Petersburg. My grandparents spoke good Russian and Yiddish, but since their children went to a Russian school they used Russian in their family. However, my grandparents spoke only Yiddish to each other. Their family always observed the kashrut, Sabbath, and all Jewish holidays. My grandmother was a good housewife. She was good at preparing Jewish cuisine: she could cook traditional Jewish meals, and taught her daughters to do the same. She always made her own clothes: her children were always dressed well, and after my grandfather died, she earned a living by making clothes.

My grandmother was a determined person. When World War II began, Uncle Semyon and Aunt Emma’s husband went to the front, but the women and children stayed in Leningrad and didn’t know what to do. It was my grandmother who made the right decision then: she took all her children and grandchildren from Leningrad to Urzhum, Kirov region [today Russia], where her youngest daughter, Eugenia, lived. All of them returned to Leningrad after the war except my grandmother who died in Urzhum in 1943. Aunt Eugenia married twice before the war. From her first marriage she has a son, Joseph Turevski. He lives in Moldova now. Eugenia’s second husband, whose last name was Rosanov, was a professional army officer. Before the war he was appointed chief of the military school in Urzhum, but when the war began he went to the front and was killed. Eugenia and her children remained in Urzhum after the war. From her second marriage she has two children: her son, Mikhail Rosanov, who now lives in Israel, and her daughter, Tamara, who lives in Urzhum. 

Semyon, my mother’s brother, was a very interesting person. He was good-looking, cheerful, and very sociable: he could play the guitar and sing well. He always worked in sales: as a store clerk at first, and then as a manager. During the war, Uncle Semyon was in the army and fought at the Leningrad front. After the war, he returned to Leningrad to his family. Uncle Semyon used to say jokingly that his wife, Leah, gave him an expensive present every ten years: a new daughter. Two of his daughters, Inessa [born in 1928] and Lyubov [born in 1948], now live in St. Petersburg, and the third, Renata [born in 1938] died in 2003. Uncle Semyon was a very caring father. It so happened that his wife died when his youngest daughter was only seven years old. Uncle Semyon didn’t remarry. He brought up his daughter by himself and later lived with her family until his death. Their family was very hospitable: I loved staying with them when visiting Leningrad. Uncle Semyon died in the late 1960s.

Aunt Emma’s husband died in combat action. After the war she lived in Leningrad with her son and worked at a Leningrad chess club as a secretary. Aunt Emma died in the early 1980s: her son and his family moved to Israel in the early 1990s.

My mother’s third sister, Panya, lived in Leningrad, worked in a shop, and died in 1964.

In summer 1917, when my parents’ engagement took place, a number of very important events happened: The October Revolution [see Russian Revolution of 1917] 9 and the Civil War 10 in Russia, the Estonian War of Liberation, and Estonian Independence 11. My parents found themselves at opposite sides of the border. They wrote letters to each other and eagerly waited for a chance to meet. My mother forwarded several petitions to be allowed to visit her fiancé in Estonia but every request was denied. It was only in spring 1923 that she was permitted to visit her relatives in Estonia for a short period. My mother traveled to Tallinn and, naturally, didn’t return to the USSR. Later, in the 1930s, she really wanted to see her relatives in Leningrad but wasn’t allowed in. She did see her brother and sister after World War II, but her parents weren’t alive then. 

Growing up

My parents got married on 28thJune 1923. The wedding ceremony took place in the synagogue in Rakvere, where Grandfather Benyamin lived. At that time my father lived in Tallinn with Aunt Beile and her husband in a small apartment near the synagogue. It was the area where many Jewish families rented cheap apartments. The streets were narrow with mostly one-storied wooden buildings which were heated by stoves and had only electricity and running water facilities. Now these streets aren’t there any more: everything has been rebuilt. In 1923, my father brought his newlywed wife into Aunt Beile’s small apartment. I was born there in 1924. After my uncle died, we moved into a more spacious apartment in a different building, two-storied this time. We occupied the entire first floor, and our Estonian landlord lived on the second one. We had a large front room, a kitchen, a dining-room, a bedroom, and Aunt Beile’s room. She lived with us all the time, and I called her ‘grandma.’

When my mother arrived in Estonia she could only speak Russian. So Russian was my first language. As my mother talked to Grandmother Beile while at home, she was soon able to speak Yiddish: she had heard it spoken in her family from a young age. Later, she could understand and speak Estonian to servants and shop-keepers. I laughed when I heard her Estonian.

When I was four and a half years old, my parents hired a German governess for me so that I could learn German. This was the trend in Estonia at that time. She would come around noon and take me for a walk: we read books and played while speaking German only. At night she put me to bed and left. I forgot my Russian and started speaking German well: it’s always easier when you’re a child. Later, I studied German in school, and I can still speak, read, and write German. When I was five years old, I was sent to a Jewish kindergarten. I was there from 9am to 2pm when my governess would pick me up. During breakfast the children took turns helping in the dining-room by setting out the dishes and cleaning up afterwards. Our teacher, Madame Dubovski, who my parents became friends with later, used to recall how I would refuse to do the dining room duty and explained to everyone in German that I would have servants do this for me when I grew up. 

Yiddish was the language spoken in my kindergarten. There were Hebrew kindergartens as well, but my father acknowledged only Yiddish: he was a hard-line Yiddishist 12, but Joseph, his brother, held on to Zionist views. Whenever Uncle Joseph visited Tallinn he stayed at our place, and then my father and he would argue loudly discussing Jewish issues. They would chase each other around our large round table and shout. When my mother heard these shouts in the kitchen, she ran in, stamped her little foot, shook her ladle at them, and said sternly, ‘Enough!’ Then they would calm down. Fortunately, neither my father nor Uncle Joseph was a part of any political organization so they weren’t subsequently subjected to repressions.

I started going to school early, at the age of six and a half years: this was what I wanted. It happened in 1930. The Jewish school I went to was nearby. My class was small: we were taught all the subjects in Yiddish. Classes where subjects were taught in Hebrew were much more numerous. Base Schneeberg was the name of the teacher who taught us from first to fourth grade. From fifth grade onwards we studied languages: Estonian, German, and Hebrew. We were not too serious about Hebrew. We had a few lessons and we had no great desire to study it anyway. Influenced by our Yiddishist parents we considered Yiddish the true Jewish language. Students who were taught in Hebrew didn’t want to study Yiddish. Of course, there were families where both Russian and German were spoken. The school used a unified national curriculum, but our textbooks were in Yiddish. They were printed in Vilno in Poland [today Vilnius, Lithuania].

From a very young age, since my kindergarten years, I loved performing: I recited poems, sang, and acted in plays. There were plenty of chances to perform in school: end of school year, special parent nights, and various celebrations. The Jewish holidays which our school always celebrated were Purim and Chanukkah. For Purim we had fancy-dress balls, and for Chanukkah we did concerts, where I always performed. Other holidays were celebrated at home. Our school was secular. We knew all religious traditions, but there was no religious trend. The Hebrew classes had Tannakh lessons, but we didn’t. There was a cheder at the school. Some boys, who wanted to study the Torah, remained in school after lessons, and a rabbi conducted their lessons. There was no yeshivah in Estonia.

My parents weren’t too religious but they believed that Jewish families had to observe Jewish traditions. While Grandmother Beile was alive, our household observed the kashrut strictly: we bought only kosher meat, we had separate dishes for meat and dairy, even the towels which we used to wipe the dishes were separate. After Grandmother Beile died in 1936, a strict kosher household was no longer observed. My mother didn’t want to mess with the separate plates and towels, but still she never bought any pork. We always spent Sabbath at home. On Fridays, my mother thoroughly cleaned our apartment and cooked special meals for the next day, and Grandmother Beile baked challot. At night, when the entire family gathered at the table, my grandmother lit the candles and said the prayers. After my grandmother died, my mother carried on the tradition.

My father never prayed at home and never attended the synagogue on Saturdays. Only on holidays our whole family went to the synagogue together. Before the war we had a beautiful synagogue: just about all the Jews in Tallinn would go there for the festive prayers. In the synagogue there was an excellent male choir conducted by cantor Jossel Gurevitsch. Of all the holidays we celebrated at home, I do remember Pesach and seder. A special plate set, which was kept packed away in a box for the rest of the year, was finally put on the table. During seder, my father sat reclining among the cushions, posing as a free man. Aunt Anna and her family always came to our house for this celebration. Her family was secular: they didn’t celebrate Jewish holidays at home.

My parents were very sociable people: especially my father. He was a very witty and cheerful person. They both loved being around people, visited friends often, and their friends visited us. Our home was open to people. My father was a kind and caring person. He adored me and my sister. It was he, not our mother, who woke us up in the morning and sent us to school. If my sister and I had problems at school or out in the yard we ran to our father for help. My mother was much more severe. I remember one incident which occurred when I was seven or eight. My mother and I were invited to some friend’s house and it turned out that I had grown out of all my pretty summer dresses. So my mother took one of her dresses, which was beautiful but a bit old, and made it into a very pretty dress for me overnight. My father didn’t earn much in those days, and my mother had to make my dresses herself although she didn’t like doing it. The next morning, while my mother was getting dressed, I went outside in my nice new dress, climbed a fence, and tore it. I ran back to my mother crying. She didn’t say a word, but got hold of the collar and ripped the dress apart from top to bottom. She must have been very upset.

My mother knew how to dress inexpensively but fashionably and elegantly. She invented her own designs for dresses and suits. Sometimes she used her old clothes, combining them with new material. As a result she obtained some very elegant clothes, and her lady friends thought that she had bought them from an expensive tailor.

My mother was an energetic person, she loved being around people and participated in all kinds of events. While I was still in elementary school, my mother was always elected for the school’s governing committee where she worked very hard. In our school we had a small lunchroom, and during lunch break we could buy things like pastries, biscuits, or lemonade there. There was a long table in the hallway on the second floor where tea was sold from a samovar. Some ladies from the governing committee were always on duty in the lunchroom and kept order. My mother was often on duty. Both my parents were active members of the Byalik 13 Society: a Tallinn Jewish Society for Culture and Education. It was a secular organization: a kind of club. My father was a board member there.

The society rented a section of a large building, which isn’t in existence now. There were a number of hobby groups there: a drama group, a sports club, a choir, a youth group, etc. When my father was young he could act on stage. He was said to have been a talented actor. While still in secondary school and after his graduation, my father performed for the local Russian drama society and later for a Russian amateur theatre. He was part of the drama group in the Byalik Society and performed plays in Yiddish. One of the rooms rented by the Society was a large auditorium with a stage which was used for performances, concerts, and celebrations. The society had a good, nearly professional, large choir that sang at various events: it had actually been invited to sing for the Estonian Radio. Soloists from the Estonia Opera Theater would often visit the concerts to sing with the choir. The songs were either in Yiddish, Russian, or Estonian. Perhaps, they also sang in Ivrit, I don’t remember exactly. On one occasion my parents traveled to Riga [today Latvia] accompanying the choir on its concert tour: they were the choir’s constant admirers but didn’t sing themselves. There was also a Society library which contained many books in Yiddish, Russian, and Estonian. My parents read a lot, mainly in Russian. I borrowed Yiddish books from the library. We didn’t have a library of our own at home, and the papers my father subscribed to were in Russian and Estonian.

During holidays, the Byalik Society held dance parties. We had fancy-dress balls for Purim, there were always balls for Rosh Hashanah and for the general New Year. My mother prepared and organized these parties. Before the event she and some other lady members would visit owners of factories or workshops and ask them for donations to have a lottery or an auction. My mother was acquainted with the Jewish owners and they never said no to her. For instance, one of them, Ginovker, a chocolate factory owner, always donated boxes and packs of chocolates free of charge. Ratner, a fur workshop owner, donated some inexpensive fur items. Then my mother organized lotteries and auctions at the holiday events. Once she won a prize herself: a beautiful cushion made of fur and satin strips.

I didn’t participate in hobby groups at school, but I was a member of the Byalik Society youth group since I was twelve. I was part of the drama group where we staged children’s plays. I did gymnastics and played ping-pong. Once a week we would get together to have a discussion. The subjects were mostly cultural: on Jewish authors, artists, or musicians. We also discussed political events. I remember we discussed the Reichstag fire, persecution of Jews in Germany, fascism, and the invasion of Poland 14. We also discussed these things within our family: my parents, especially my father, were very worried. This is why later on, when the war began, we went into evacuation without any hesitation.

In 1929, my father spent a month in Austria going through an advanced training course for dental mechanics. Naturally, he paid all the expenses from his own funds. Our entire family went to the port to see him off and later to meet him: it was a big event for us. My father took a boat from Tallinn to Germany and then a train to Vienna. Later, in the mid 1930s, my parents spent several days in Helsinki [today Finland]. Apart from these trips, my parents never went abroad as they couldn’t afford it.

My younger sister was born in 1933. She was named Leah in memory of our father’s mother. According to Jewish tradition, the first daughter is named after her maternal grandmother, and the second one after her paternal grandmother. When I was born, my mother’s mother was still alive, and a child can’t be named after a living relative, so I was named after my mother’s grandmother. Her name was Simhe, but my name was recorded in a more modern manner: Sima. Leah was a happy and obedient child, and everyone in the family adored her. As an infant she had poor health, she had pneumonia several times and the doctors recommended that she spent summers away from the sea. So we rented a summer house in Hiiu, near Tallinn, for several summers. The house was in the middle of a pine forest: it was supposed to be good for her lungs. My sister, my mother, and I lived there, and my father came there every evening. Before that period, my mother and I went to the countryside every summer. 

To make it more fun, several Jewish families would get together, pick a nice spot at the seaside or lake shore, rent an inexpensive place and have a good time. My mother and I would usually spend two months there, and my father would manage a two or three week holiday and join us. Grandmother Beile remained in Tallinn to have her rest away from us. Our whole family spent two wonderful summers on Vormsi island when Uncle Joseph worked there as a pharmacist. That was in 1929 and 1930. There was a Swedish hotel on the island where we lived, but we visited Uncle Joseph and Aunt Pesya every day. There were amazing surroundings untouched by civilization, and beautiful forests full of mushrooms and berries.

My parents didn’t discuss the family’s financial matters in front me, but I think our economic situation began to improve from the mid-1930s. In 1938, we moved into a new comfortable apartment. It had central heating, an electric stove, and parquet flooring in every room. There were three rooms: a dining room, a bedroom, and a nursery. In the process of construction, the owner altered the apartment layout at my parents’ request, discarding the servant’s room and part of the kitchen to make space for my father’s study. We already had a servant at that time, but she came in the morning, helped my mother around the kitchen, and then left in the afternoon. We didn’t spend our summers in the country any more, but went to local resorts instead. We spent the summers of 1938 and 1939 in Haapsalu where my mother took mud-bath treatment for her legs, and in 1940 we went to Parnu. 

The soviet invasion of the Balkans

A few days after my sister was born, my mother and I went to Parnu. We received a telephone call from my father who sounded very anxious. ‘Come at once! We are being turned out of our apartment.’ We returned to Tallinn immediately and learned that Soviet troops had entered Estonia and our house would be occupied by the families of Soviet officers [see Estonia in 1939-1940] 15. We had three days to vacate our apartment. In panic, my parents searched for another apartment and found what we had always had before: a three-room apartment in a wooden building with stove heating. However, soon we were told that three rooms was too much space for us and a young couple was accommodated in one of the rooms. The man wore a civil suit, but the woman rarely came out of the room, which surprised my mother a lot. My father continued working. Our Jewish gymnasium was renamed ‘Secondary School #13.’ I was in my last year of school and intended to go on to study at the medical department of the University of Tartu. Classes which were taught in Yiddish and Ivrit were combined. The classes were taught only in Yiddish as Ivrit was outlawed. The Byalik Society and other Jewish organizations were closed.

During the war

The one year that we lived under Soviet government went by fast. On 7thJune 1941, I received my secondary school graduation diploma. The day before was my father’s birthday, so we had a double celebration at home. Two weeks later, I was going to submit my application to Tartu University but then the war began. German forces were quickly approaching Estonia’s southern borders and we realized that we had to go into Soviet back areas. When my father was young he had pulmonary tuberculosis, and although it was cured his lungs remained weak. That’s why my father wasn’t subject to military service. Still, it took him a lot of effort to obtain a permit to evacuate. We started packing up and I realized that my parents were very unpractical. I was just 17 years old but I knew better than my mother what things we had to take with us. If I hadn’t argued with my mother and had my own way we would have found ourselves in evacuation without bare necessities and with a bunch of useless things. Besides, everybody thought that the war wouldn’t last long and we would return in two or three months to find our apartments just as we had left them. That’s why my father didn’t take his dental tools and materials, my mother also left her sewing machine behind. After three years, when we returned to Tallinn, we couldn’t find any of our belongings. 

On 4thJuly 1941, our family left Tallinn and traveled east. We had been assigned to Ulyanovsk [today Russia]. We traveled in a goods wagon with other Jewish, Russian, and Estonian families. There were about 30 people in our wagon. We were lucky because a military store was being evacuated on the same train and we could buy our food from it. We never got to Ulyanovsk because our train was rerouted to go over the Urals. On one occasion I was almost left behind though at the last minute I managed to hop on the footboard of the last wagon. I had to stand there holding tight for hours until the train stopped again. That was when we were crossing the Urals range and the view was spectacular: the night, mountains, and extremely bright stars. The impression was so strong that years later when I was anesthetized and operated on I saw those mountains and stars again. 

We traveled for 15 days and finally arrived at the station of Dalmatovo [today Russia]. This is a small town in Kurgan region, 160 kilometers east of Sverdlovsk [today Yekaterinburg]. The food which was still left in the military store was given away to the evacuees. My mother got a large chunk of pickled lard. She didn’t know what to do with it, because we didn’t eat pork. For some reason, my mother didn’t dare to just give it to anyone but left it at the station, shoving it underneath some lumber. All who had been evacuated were assigned to kolkhozes 16. We went to the village of Ashurkovo [today Russia] and were given a vacant house. Apart from our family, two teachers from our Jewish school lived in this house. We all worked in the kolkhoz, out in the hayfields. Lunch was taken for everyone to the fields.

In September, I went to Sverdlovsk to study in a medical institute. I was accepted and given accommodation in the dorm. But my Russian wasn’t good enough and I understood very little at the lectures, especially in anatomy. I tried translating the lectures into Yiddish and Estonian: my anatomy teacher gave me a textbook in German. Still, I didn’t do well and was hopelessly behind in my class. Then we were sent to the country to help out with potato harvesting. I had no warm clothes and caught a bad cold. I wrote to my father telling him how miserable I was and he came for me at once. I returned to Ashurkovo but there was no work and no food. When cattle were butchered at the kolkhoz, kolkhozniks and evacuees were given the entrails and everyone was very happy with this. Nobody thought about kosher any more. I persuaded my parents to move to Dalmatovo. We rented a room there and survived by exchanging our things for food. Soon Israel Dubovski, a friend of our family who had arrived in Dalmatovo with his wife before us, introduced my father to his neighbor. His neighbor turned out to be a dental mechanic, too. He was an old Jew from Moscow [today Russia] who, unlike my father, had brought all his tools along with him. 

My father and he went to the local hospital and offered to open a dental surgery there using their own tools and materials. The hospital’s head physician liked the proposal and the surgery was soon opened. In this way, my father got work, a small salary, and most importantly, a worker’s ration card. Using it, he could get 400 grams of bread daily for himself and 250 grams more for each of us, non-workers. The hospital also provided us with a plot of land outside the town where we grew potatoes. Then I found a job. In Chelyabinsk [today Russia] there was a representation office of the Estonian Soviet Republic [see Estonian Government in Evacuation] 17 which dealt with affairs of evacuated Estonian residents. One of its representatives, an Estonian whose last name was Ilmatalu, worked in Dalmatovo. I was his secretary. I didn’t receive any salary, but I had a worker’s ration card. In fall 1942, Ilmatalu sent me to the village of Novoseltsevo, 40 kilometers away from Dalmatovo. A number of evacuated Estonian families lived in Novoseltsevo and the representation office opened an Estonian elementary school there. For the first three months an Estonian girl and I taught all the subjects in this school. 

Later, when the real teachers arrived, I returned to Dalmatovo. I walked 40 kilometers each way because there was no transportation. In Dalmatovo I had two friends of the same age as I: Jette Gleser and Sarah Rogovski, my cousin. We were young and tried to live interesting lives regardless of the hardships and disorder. All three of us often went to dance at a former monastery where officers’ refresher courses took place. There was no electricity in Dalmatovo: a homemade oil lamp was used to light the large monastery hall where we danced with young lieutenants to accordion music. Madame Dubovski, my former kindergarten teacher, and Israel Dubovski, her husband, were active people and spoke good Russian. They set up a drama club in Dalmatovo School, where Israel Dubovski taught mathematics. My sister Leah played the lead part in one of the club’s best productions, a fairy tale titled ‘Alenki tsvetochek’ [Scarlet Flower]. The club took this production to a festival of amateur theatricals in Kurgan [today Russia]. Jette Gleser and I also went to the festival with a beautiful dance, which we had prepared based on artistic gymnastics. Before the war, Jette and I did gymnastics for many years at the Maccabi 18 club. Both the fairy tale production and our dance were awarded festival diplomas.

In the middle of 1943, the Estonian representation sent me to Uglich [200 km from Moscow] to take a bankers’ training course. They were training specialists to work in the Baltic Soviet republics after the war. I was 19 then and I could speak much better Russian so I wasn’t scared of the 1,500 kilometer journey. After taking the course I returned to Dalmatovo and worked at a local branch of the State Bank. At the beginning of 1944, I received a call from the evacuated Estonian government. I was summoned to Moscow and sent to the offices of the USSR State Bank for a probation period. I stayed in a hotel, spent my days studying manuals and other financial documents, and in the evenings visited theaters and receptions at the Estonian representation office. A relative of mine, Zelda Pats, who worked for the Party, lived in Moscow at that time and we often met.

After the war

In May I was summoned to Leningrad. At that time, the Soviet Army had already entered Estonia, so the government of the Estonian Soviet Republic had been stationed nearby, in Leningrad. It occupied the large Oktyabrskaya hotel, where specialists for various government institutions of the future Soviet Estonia were staying. I was assigned to the Ministry of Finance, given a hotel room, and provided with food coupons and a scholarship. Until Tallinn was liberated I was to work in one of the branches of the Leningrad Bank. After I had some time to look around I went to a representative of the Ministry of Health and obtained an invitation letter for my father.

My parents were going through a very hard period at that time. My father didn’t have a job any more because his colleague had gone back to Moscow, taking his tools with him. In order to get a ration card, my mother went to work at a sewing cartel. My father’s lungs got worse. With great difficulty, having sold all they had, my mother managed to nurse him back to health.

In late August 1944, he came to Leningrad. Leah and my mother arrived a few weeks later. At my request they received a good room in our hotel and stayed there for a week. As soon as Tallinn was free, my parents and Leah went there. At that time, I had a job of putting archived documents in order, so I didn’t go to Tallinn until 4thNovember 1944. We had two rooms in a large apartment which was shared by two other families. My father began work as a dental mechanic in a state-owned dental laboratory, and I obtained the post of a credit inspector in the State Bank. Leah started her sixth year in the Russian school #19 19, and our mother stayed at home. My parents’ friends, the Dubovski family, also returned to Tallinn and lived in a communal apartment 20.

One of the families sharing their apartment was the Jewish Bahmat family. The head of the house, Isaac Bahmat, used to be an inspector in our Jewish gymnasium before the war, and prior to that he had been a school administrator in Valga. In fall 1945, the Dubovskis invited our family to their home. During our visit, Madame Bahmat peeked in and invited everyone to have some tea and home-made pie. Visiting them just at the same time was a very good-looking young man. He was Simon Libman, their friend from pre-war Valga. Later, I realized that this meeting didn’t happen by accident: it had been set up by Madame Dubovski and Madame Bahmat. Simon and I started seeing each other. It turned out he lived just across the street from us. Simon was twelve years older than me and I liked it. I didn’t like men of my own age, they all seemed too childish. Simon was born in Valga into a large and once very prosperous Jewish family. He finished a German elementary school in Valga, then an Estonian secondary school, and then he entered Tartu University in 1932 to study economics. Simon’s father used to own several houses and large shops in Valga but went bankrupt in the mid-1930s.

Simon’s two elder sisters, Rasse and Sofia, were already married by then, and his youngest sister, Martha, still lived with her parents. Simon and his younger brother, Abi, went to university at the same time. Abi studied Judaics. Being the elder brother, Simon decided to abandon his studies and started working so that his younger brother would have a chance to complete his education. Simon joined a lumber-trading company and worked as a manager until 1941. During this period, Abi Libman, who was a very clever person, graduated from university with a master’s degree.

The advent of Soviet power in 1940 went smoothly for the Libman family because they had nothing which could be taken away from them. As the war began, they managed to leave and go into evacuation but as they were traveling their father died. The train approached Yaroslavl [today Russia] and they all got off, found a Jewish cemetery and buried him according to Jewish traditions. Simon’s mother and sisters lived in Tajikistan during the war while Simon and Abi fought in the Estonian Rifle Corps participating in action near Velikiye Luki [today Russia]. Both of them were officers and they both joined the Communist Party when on the battle-front. After the war, Abi Libman taught the history of the Communist Party in the Party School 21 in Tallinn.

In 1952, when the anti-Semitic campaign was under way in the Soviet Union [see campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’] 22, Abi Libman was said to be a master of Judaics in bourgeois Estonia. Because of this he was expelled from the Party and discharged from work. For the next several years he worked at a furniture factory. Then Abi was reinstated in the Party and he continued teaching Party history and Marxist philosophy in colleges for many years. Abi Libman had the status of a professor and a doctorate in history.

My husband, Simon Libman, could speak Russian, German, and Estonian fluently and they often used him as an interpreter in the Estonian Rifle Corps. When the war was about to end he was assigned to work as a translator at an Army Prosecutor’s Office in Leningrad. After the war Simon served one more year in the Estonian Corps in Tallinn. In 1946, he was demobilized and assigned to the Department of Visas and Registration in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. When we met he was just getting his discharge from the Army. I dated Simon for several months, and then he went to my parents to ask for my hand. On my birthday party on 29thMarch 1946, with our relatives and friends present, I remember my father stood up and said, ‘I’d like to introduce my daughter Sima’s fiancé.’ Our wedding was to take place on 29thJune 1946, because my parents got married on the same day in 1923. At the beginning of May Simon and I went to Valga for a few days: he wanted to introduce me to his family. Living in Valga at that time were his mother and sister Sofia with her family. When we returned to Tallinn, we found out that my father had had a heart attack. He was lying in bed at home and Markovich, a very good physician, visited him daily. My father and he had been good friends since their youth. My father already began getting up again but then had two more heart attacks and died at the end of May. Naturally, Simon and I had no wedding. On 2ndJuly 1946, we simply had our marriage registered and I went to live with my husband.

My father’s death was a great loss to our whole family but especially for my mother. She became a widow at 46 with a young daughter in her care. Leah was just 13 then. My mother was a person completely unaccustomed to independent life. She had no work experience, apart from a few occasions she never had a job in her life. Naturally, Simon and I supported my mother and Leah. We helped her by purchasing a sewing machine and she started making clothes at home. She made blouses, bath robes, children’s clothes and sold them at the market. Later, she got a job at a sewing workshop. 

In November 1947, I had a son. At first we wanted to name him Elhanon, after my father, but it sounded outdated, and my mother thought of a beautiful name for our baby boy: Elkond. After a year I was going to send our son into daycare and return to work, just like all other Soviet women, but my husband protested. He believed that the child had to be brought up by his mother at home. We could afford this because Simon made good money. He kept on working at the Ministry of Internal Affairs where he was appreciated and given a raise regularly. Our housing was improved as well. In 1948, instead of a small room in a communal apartment, we were offered two nice big rooms in a comfortable six-room apartment. In this new apartment we had only one family sharing it with us, and they were very good and respectable people. A few years later, we redesigned the apartment where we separated two rooms and lived there until 1977.

When Elkond was three I decided that I had stayed home long enough and that I had to go to work. I didn’t want to work in a bank again. I was fed up with all those numbers. This wasn’t my type of job.

I took my son every summer to Parnu. This place has the warmest sea water along the Estonian coast. I always rented a room from the same landlady. Simon’s annual leave was always in winter so he could visit us only on Sundays. Just when I began to give serious thoughts to my returning to work I met Mirjam Kolomoitsev at the Parnu beach: she was a former student of our school.

She had a university degree, worked as a lawyer, and taught at the Tallinn School of Law. When she heard about my problem, Mirjam said, ‘You definitely have to study. You have a bright mind! You have to get good qualifications, or you will always get a small pay. Come and study at our School of Law. In two years you will get specialized secondary education and a lawyer’s diploma. You will get a monthly scholarship of 500 rubles.’ My salary at the bank had been 600 rubles. She also said, ‘You will have a two-month holiday every summer. And after you finish the school and start working, you will be able to study for a university degree by correspondence.’ I considered her suggestion carefully because a lawyer was my second profession after a doctor. I decided that it wasn’t a bad idea at all, but my husband didn’t like it. He told me, ‘Study in a medical school instead. You will be a nurse and it’s a great job for a woman. Didn’t you want to work in the area of medicine?’ But I wanted to be a doctor, not a nurse! I gave medicine up, which I regretted later. 

I submitted my application to the School of Law and was accepted. I managed to place my son in an Estonian kindergarten but it turned out that he wasn’t ready for it. Elkond was four at the time but he was too attached to home. At the kindergarten he never cried but stood by the window all day waiting to be taken home. We had to hire a babysitter so he could stay home for one more year. At the age of five he went to the same kindergarten with great pleasure. He actually went to school later than other children, almost at the age of eight, because my husband couldn’t bring himself to pull him out of the kindergarten. I proceeded with my studies at the School of Law, finished my first year and half of my second year. What was left was to do a course of practical work and pass the state examinations.

This was the beginning of 1953. Just before I had to start practical work, I was summoned by the school director and told that I wouldn’t be allowed to do it because I had hidden the fact that my husband’s brother had been expelled from the Party. I couldn’t understand what that had to do with me. My husband was fine: he had never been expelled from the Party. The application forms which I had filled didn’t contain any questions about my husband’s siblings. It was explained to me that the school wasn’t just any kind of school but a political and ideological one, and I had displayed my political immaturity. I wasn’t allowed to do any practical work and was expelled from the School of Law in February 1953. Later, I gained my end and was permitted to take state examinations. So I received my diploma without doing any practical work. But I couldn’t get any employment without an assignment from the School of Law.

One of the teachers who taught at the school was the Minister of Justice at that time. He knew me as a diligent student. I went to his office, explained the situation, and asked him to help me find a job. He refused to help me. I still have my lawyer’s diploma, but I have never worked as a lawyer. Two months after I was expelled from the School of Law, my husband was dismissed from office, which was totally unexpected. By then, Stalin had already died, but anti-Semitic policies in the country lived on, perhaps, mechanically. However, my husband was dismissed fairly: he was discharged from the Ministry of Internal Affairs on the grounds of staff reduction and was paid a large settlement.

In spring 1953 we were both unemployed. Soon after, some friends of mine helped me get a job as a translation secretary at the Ministry of Motor Transport because of my knowledge of Estonian, German, and Russian. I remember how long it took me to translate instructions on road construction from German to Russian, as the text was very difficult with a lot of technical terms. Then it turned out that nobody needed those instructions anyway. I stayed there for one year, then moved to a different organization and worked as a translation secretary again, then switched jobs one more time. I wanted to earn money but in every place I worked I was paid very little. In 1955 I decided to learn a trade and took a job at a hat-making establishment. I learned to make hats and worked as a hat-maker for 20 years.

The city’s Party organization directed my husband to work at the committee on measures and weights. Although he didn’t have any special qualifications he worked as a lab engineer. The people he worked with were young, happy, and friendly. Simon enjoyed his new job but his pay was very little: four times less than at his former job. We couldn’t survive on this kind of income. Simon spent six years working in the lab. During this time he took a half-year extension course in Leningrad and became a senior engineer but his pay changed very little. Finally, in 1960, Simon was transferred into the area of vocational education and was offered the position of director at a sewing vocational school. It took Simon some time to finally dare such a change in his career, as he didn’t have any qualifications in education. But he was told, ‘You have a wealth of experience in life, and you can certainly manage it!’ Indeed, Simon was able to fulfill his job. He was the director of this vocational school for some years and put things in good order there. He was then transferred to the State Committee on Vocational Education to work as the chief of the Supply and Construction Department. He worked in this position until he was 75 and then retired.

I worked as a hat-maker at a Lembitu consumer services center and retired at 55. But just one and a half years later, on my good friend’s reference, I got employment at a credit department of a large electronics store. This friend of mine and I worked together preparing paperwork for credit purchases. This work was easy and well-paid. After the Estonian independence was re-established in 1991, the entire commercial system was changed and when the credit department in our store was abolished, I retired for good.

Leah’s life didn’t turn out easy either. Her early childhood was happy. Leah was a pretty, happy, and kind girl, the youngest in the family. We all adored her, of course. When she was four years old, she went to the same kindergarten that I had gone to. In the kindergarten they spoke Yiddish, outside our house Leah played with Estonian children, and our mother spoke Russian to her at home. So, as a little girl Leah could speak Yiddish, Russian, and Estonian equally well. In 1939, she went to a Jewish gymnasium and studied in a Yiddish-language class. Leah had finished two years of school when the war began. That was when her happy childhood came to an end. The three hungry evacuation years followed.

In Dalmatovo, when our mother brought home bread which our family received from ration cards and started splitting it between us, Leah always sat opposite me. I remember her hungry eyes which she couldn’t pull away from the bread. She was still growing up and must have suffered from hunger more than we, adults, did. While in evacuation, Leah went to a Russian school and did her third, fourth, and fifth grades. She was a good student: just like me, she loved acting, reciting poems, and performing on stage. After our return to Tallinn, Leah went to the Russian secondary school #19 and graduated in 1950 with a silver medal. She was brought up in Russian culture, so after her graduation she went to Leningrad hoping to enter the university there and study history. Of course, she wasn’t successful. Because of large competition, she was offered a chance to take all the entrance exams and take part in the general competition, although, being a silver medalist, she was supposed to be accepted without any exams. Leah took offence and applied to the bibliography department of the Leningrad Institute of Culture instead and was accepted immediately. She studied there for four years.

In 1954, Leah called us from Leningrad. She was in tears and I struggled to understand what it was that had happened to her. It turned out that upon her graduation from the Institute she was being assigned to work [see mandatory job assignment in the USSR] 23 in Altai [today Russia], 4,000 kilometers from Tallinn. Simon managed to help her: he had many friends in Tallinn and Leah’s assignment was changed to Estonia. She returned to Tallinn and lived with our mother and worked as a bibliographer in the Central Library. Later, she taught at a college for librarians. After the college had been moved to the outskirts, Leah was appointed manager of the technical library. Her last work place in Tallinn was the library of the Estonian Academy of Sciences. Leah was an attractive girl: many young men were attracted to her but she didn’t like any of them. 

In 1964, she met Mr. Right. He was from Moscow, a qualified physicist holding a degree in Physics and Mathematics, and a convinced Zionist. His name was Ephraim Ulanovski. They loved each other intensely, but Ephraim was a married man with a ten-year-old son. He believed he had no moral right to leave his son fatherless. Thus, Leah and he agreed that they would get married and go to Israel after Ephraim’s son finished secondary school. They had to wait for eight years. During this entire time, Leah and Ephraim met frequently, exchanged telephone calls, went to visit each other, and always spent their holidays together somewhere at the Black Sea. My mother considered this situation not quite normal and was very concerned about Leah.

Leah and Ephraim got married in 1972. Leah went to live in Moscow and immediately they filed their paperwork for a permit to move to Israel. In spring 1973, their application was denied, and in July 1973, Leah had a son, Nahum. In October 1973, when the Yom Kippur War 24 was in progress in Israel, they suddenly received the permit on the condition that they leave within two weeks. Consequently, when the fact that they had a small baby was taken into account, this period was extended to one month. They flew to Israel on 15thNovember 1973. Leah and Ephraim lived 30 happy years together. They lived in Rehovot, where Ephraim worked at a military factory. Leah didn’t work but stayed at home with their son. He grew up to be a handsome young man. Nahum is a qualified physicist just like his father. He graduated from a university with a Doctor’s degree. Nahum served for several years in the Israeli Army. Hagit, his wife, is a third generation Israelite: her grandmother came to Palestine from Romania. Hagit is a biologist. She graduated from university and, according to Israeli laws, served in the army. Nahum and Hagit have a little daughter, Shahav. Ephraim died of a heart attack in 2002. Leah still lives in Rehovot. Nahum and his family went to the USA for three years where he is involved in an interesting scientific research project.

After kindergarten, in 1955, Elkond went to Russian school #32. He did very well in elementary school, then a little poorer, but he never had serious problems. Early on, Elkond loved sports: he did rowing and cycling. At the age of 13, he was part of a group of teenagers who did a cycling tour around Estonia.

Our family wasn’t religious, but we tried to observe Jewish traditions. At home we celebrated every Jewish holiday, and I often cooked Jewish food, not just on holidays. So our son was aware of his Jewish identity early on, and he never had a complex in this respect. Since my husband and I could both speak Yiddish, Russian, Estonian, and German, at home we used a bit of each language. As a result, Elkond can speak Russian and Estonian fluently and can also understand Yiddish. Elkond was interested in journalism, but Tartu University only educated Estonian journalists, so, upon his graduation from secondary school, he entered the university to study the Russian Language and Literature. His studies were interesting: at that time, a number of prominent scholars, such as Yuri Lotman and others, taught there.

Elkond did well in his studies but was suddenly expelled in his third year. It turned out that he had told the teacher of Marxism and Leninism that he could pass this key university subject without attending the seminars. In response the teacher refused to permit him to take the examination in order to prove the importance of Marxism and Leninism seminars. Immediately after his dismissal, he was drafted into the army. He served in missile forces in Siberia, and came back with much of his hair missing. He still believes he was right and has no regrets of the years lost in the army. After he came back from the army, he returned to university and finished his third year. He was 25 years old and it was time to think about getting a job. At that time, there was a new Russian-language newspaper in Tallinn entitled Vecherni Tallinn [The Evening Tallinn] and Elkond found employment as one of the editorial staff. He continued his university studies by correspondence and worked for this newspaper for quite a long time. He went through every step of the editorial ladder. Later, Elkond worked as a reporter for other Estonian papers and information agencies. At the moment, he is a reporter for the Delovye Vedomosti [Business News] newspaper.

He has been working in the area of journalism for over 30 years now. Elkond also does a lot of translation work, mainly from Estonian into Russian. Our son married late, at 38. He went on a business trip to Tver [today Russia] and met Elena, his future wife, there. She worked in an organization for the protection of ancient monuments and studied history part-time at university. They got married in 1985, had a daughter, Sofia, in 1986, and another daughter, Elizaveta, a year later. Elena never finished her university studies: she works as a proof-reader for a Russian-language newspaper.

My granddaughters spent their first school years at the Tallinn Jewish school. It is a secular school, and the language of instruction is Russian, but Jewish history and traditions are studied extensively and Jewish holidays are celebrated. So the girls know all these things. When Sofia was in her fourth and Elizaveta in her third year, Elkond put them in a Russian school where, he believed, the core subjects were taught better. They have kept many of their friends from the Jewish school and seen them often, and Sofia returned to the Jewish school in her eleventh year. She is going there now in her twelfth year, but Elizaveta still goes to the Russian school. Elena is a Russian Orthodox. Naturally, she wants her children to know Christian traditions, too. So their family celebrates both Jewish and Christian holidays. They all visit me for the Jewish holidays and celebrate the Christian ones at home.

During the Soviet times we had no Jewish social life in Estonia. The only thing was a synagogue which operated in a small old house on the outskirts of Tallinn. Mostly, elderly people attended it. My mother went there often after my father’s death. In the early 1960s, during Khrushchev’s 25 rule, there was a rumor circulating among Jews in Tallinn that Jewish amateur drama and vocal groups were already active in Moscow and authorities didn’t oppose to this. Then, a small enthusiastic group got together in Tallinn and decided that it was time to revive Jewish cultural life. Some of those enthusiasts were Meishe Sher, Boris Pasov, and Jakov Pats. They were all raised in a Jewish cultural environment and had taken active parts in Jewish cultural life before the war. I was invited, too, because I knew Yiddish and had taken part in Jewish drama before the war. To begin with, we decided to set up a drama club and produce performances in Yiddish. At that time, many Jewish families in Tallinn still spoke Yiddish and even the children knew it well. 

Meishe Sher handled all the organizational and legal part of the job. He was a lawyer and knew exactly which official channels had to be addressed in order to obtain a permit for a Jewish drama club to operate. The principal thing was to get the approval of the city’s Communist Party committee. I have no idea how Meishe Sher managed to do this but a few months later, we had an official permit for our activities and a room for rehearsals in the furniture factory club. We asked all our friends and relatives, and found people willing to be a part of our amateur theater. Some of them were Fanny Halbreich, Tsezar Malkin, and Beilinson. They came and were happy to help. For our first production we picked Sholem Aleichem’s 26 ‘Mazl Tov,’ a one-act play, and assigned the parts. However, after it barely started it all fell apart because Halbreich broke her leg, Beilinson got sick, and Malkin changed his mind. 

We needed a director urgently and found him. He was a young Jewish man from Tartu who had graduated from a drama college in Moscow and worked as a director and actor in the Estonian Drama Theater in Tallinn. His name was Ben Drui, he was a talented man with a true Jewish soul, and this may have been the reason why he agreed to help us immediately. Soon came the opening night of ‘Mazl Tov.’ I played the part of Beile the cook, and Joseph Shaikevich was my partner. He was born in Ukraine and spoke lovely Yiddish. In the production, he had the part of Rabbi Alter who was in love with Beile the cook. Berta Danzig had the part of the mistress, Avigal Fainstein was her housemaid, and Isaak Beilinson was the clerk who courted the housemaid. The small auditorium where we performed was full of people who wouldn’t let us leave the stage afterwards. Those who couldn’t be there on the first night demanded a second run. We had singers and musicians who joined us and soon they formed a Jewish women’s singing band. So, our second performance, which took place in the Russian Drama Theater of Tallinn, was made up of two parts: the ‘Mazl Tov’ production in the first part and the singing band in the second. The show was sold out.

Our performances awakened the Estonian Jews. Both young people and adults joined us: some wanted to perform and some just to help out. David Shur, a ballet dancer, set up a Jewish dancing group and Sima Shkop, an artist, drew the stage sets for performances. Everyone worked without pay but with incredible enthusiasm. Whenever we had problems with rooms we rehearsed at somebody’s home. And everyone still had their jobs or studies and families to attend to. My family understood what I was doing: my husband and son submitted to the idea that I was busy at the rehearsals in the evenings and on weekends. My mother helped me by making costumes and always cried when watching the performances, as she remembered my father performing in a Jewish theater.

Our theater was in existence for ten years, until 1972. The last several years we rehearsed and performed at the Jaan Toomp Club. We produced ‘Der Det’ [Divorce], Sholem Aleichem’s ‘A Doctor,’ and Gordin’s 27 two-act ‘Kreuzer Sonata or Across the Ocean’. Our most triumphal work was ‘Anne Frank’s Diary.’ We had to write our own scripts and translate it into Yiddish. The parts were played by both adults and children. Anne Frank’s part was played by Inna Gelb and Peter’s by Mark Shagal. They were just 14 or 15 years old. Tevje Majotes and I were the Dutch people who were hiding the Frank family. Some other people involved in the production were Lev Hasak, Isaak Beilinson, Julia Beilinson, Enn Krotschek, and Avigal Fainstein. Our theater took this production to Vilnius and Kaunas [today Lithuania]. We had very friendly connections with Jewish amateur groups in Lithuania: we often exchanged concerts and performances. I believe it was because of the work our theater group was doing that many Jews got acquainted with their culture and actually felt Jewish. Young people met each other and even married. In the early 1970s, during the big aliyah most of our actors moved to Israel. Many of our steady viewers left, too. Those actors who remained in Tallinn got together and talked and decided that our task had been completed and the theater should be closed. This decision must have made the Soviet security services very happy. Although we never felt much attention from their side I’m sure our activities were always closely monitored.

The revival of Jewish life in Estonia began in 1988 when the Jewish community was re-established. My mother wasn’t alive then: she had died in 1977, but my husband and I became active community members from the start. We attended all the events, meetings, and participated in holiday celebrations. However, soon after this Simon fell seriously ill and died in 1992. Now I still make every effort to attend interesting celebrations and events held by the community. Unfortunately, my health sometimes makes it impossible. Once every month, I always go to our Jewish school where we, former students of the pre-war Jewish gymnasium, have our re-unions. After such meetings I feel both happy and sad.

When my husband was still alive our son’s family and we switched apartments because ours was bigger. Now I live alone in a two-room apartment. My son, granddaughters, and daughter-in-law often visit or call me. I know they are always there to help.

Glossary

1  Cantonist

The cantonists were Jewish children who were conscripted to military institutions in tsarist Russia with the intention that the conditions in which they were placed would force them to adopt Christianity. Enlistment for the cantonist institutions was most rigorously enforced in the first half of the 19th century. It was abolished in 1856 under Alexander II. Compulsory military service for Jews was introduced in 1827. Jews between the age of 12 and 25 could be drafted and those under 18 were placed in the cantonist units. The Jewish communal authorities were obliged to furnish a certain quota of army recruits. The high quota that was demanded, the severe service conditions, and the knowledge that the conscript would not observe Jewish religious laws and would be cut off from his family, made those liable for conscription try to evade it. Thus, the communal leaders filled the quota from children of the poorest homes.

2 Nikolayevsky soldiers

Jews drafted into military service from 1827 to 1856. The first half of their 25-year term was spent in barracks, and then soldiers were allowed to marry and live in private lodgings while continuing the service. From 1856, the Jews who had served for 25 years were permitted to live anywhere in the Russian Empire instead of returning into the Pale of Settlement.

3 Jewish Pale of Settlement

Certain provinces in the Russian Empire were designated for permanent Jewish residence and the Jewish population was only allowed to live in these areas. The Pale was first established by a decree by Catherine II in 1791. The regulation was in force until the Russian Revolution of 1917, although the limits of the Pale were modified several times. The Pale stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, and 94% of the total Jewish population of Russia, almost 5 million people, lived there. The overwhelming majority of the Jews lived in the towns and shtetls of the Pale. Certain privileged groups of Jews, such as certain merchants, university graduates and craftsmen working in certain branches, were granted to live outside the borders of the Pale of Settlement permanently.

4 Labor army

it was made up of men of call-up age not trusted to carry firearms by the Soviet authorities. Such people were those living on the territories annexed by the USSR in 1940 (Eastern Poland, the Baltic States, parts of Karelia, Bessarabia and northern Bukovina) as well as ethnic Germans living in the Soviet Union proper. The labor army was employed for carrying out tough work, in the woods or in mines. During the first winter of the war, 30 percent of those drafted into the labor army died of starvation and hard work. The number of people in the labor army decreased sharply when the larger part of its contingent was transferred to the national Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian Corps, created at the beginning of 1942. The remaining labor detachments were maintained up until the end of the war.

5  Estonian Rifle Corps

military unit established in late 1941 as a part of the Soviet Army. The Corps was made up of two rifle divisions. Those signed up for the Estonian Corps by military enlistment offices were ethnic Estonians regardless of their residence within the Soviet Union as well as men of call-up age residing in Estonia before the Soviet occupation (1940). The Corps took part in the bloody battle of Velikiye Luki (December 1942 - January 1943), where it suffered great losses and was sent to the back areas for re-formation and training. In the summer of 1944, the Corps took part in the liberation of Estonia and in March 1945 in the actions on Latvian territory. In 1946, the Corps was disbanded.

6  Estonian War of Liberation (1918-1920)

The Estonian Republic fought on its own territory against Soviet Russia whose troops were advancing from the east. On Latvian territory the Estonian People’s Army fought against the Baltic Landswer’s army formed of German volunteers. The War of Liberation ended by the signing of the Tartu Peace Treaty on 2ndFebruary 1920, when Soviet Russia recognized Estonia as an independent state.

7 Tallinn Synagogue

built in 1883 and designed by architect Nikolai Tamm; burnt down completely in 1944. 

8  Beilis case

A Jew called M. Beilis was falsely accused of the ritual murder of a Russian boy in Kiev in 1913. This trial was arranged by the tsarist government and the Black Hundred. It provoked protest from all progressive people in Russia and abroad. The jury finally acquitted him.

9  Russian Revolution of 1917

Revolution in which the tsarist regime was overthrown in the Russian Empire and, under Lenin, was replaced by the Bolshevik rule. The two phases of the Revolution were: February Revolution, which came about due to food and fuel shortages during World War I, and during which the tsar abdicated and a provisional government took over. The second phase took place in the form of a coup led by Lenin in October/November (October Revolution) and saw the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.

10  Civil War (1918-1920)

The Civil War between the Reds (the Bolsheviks) and the Whites (the anti-Bolsheviks), which broke out in early 1918, ravaged Russia until 1920. The Whites represented all shades of anti-communist groups – Russian army units from World War I, led by anti-Bolshevik officers, by anti-Bolshevik volunteers and some Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries. Several of their leaders favored setting up a military dictatorship, but few were outspoken tsarists. Atrocities were committed throughout the Civil War by both sides. The Civil War ended with Bolshevik military victory, thanks to the lack of cooperation among the various White commanders and to the reorganization of the Red forces after Trotsky became commissar for war. It was won, however, only at the price of immense sacrifice; by 1920 Russia was ruined and devastated. In 1920 industrial production was reduced to 14% and agriculture to 50% as compared to 1913.

11  Estonian Independence

Estonia was under Russian rule since 1721, when Peter the Great defeated the Swedes and made the area officially a part of Russia. During World War I, after the collapse of the tsarist regime, Estonia was partly conquered by the German army. After the German capitulation (November 11, 1918) the Estonians succeeded in founding their own state, and on February 2, 1920 the Treaty of Tartu was concluded between independent Estonia and Russia. Estonia remained independent until 1940.

12 Yiddishists

They were Jewish intellectuals who repudiated Hebrew as a dead language and considered Yiddish the language of the Jewish people. They promoted Yiddish literature, Yiddish education and culture. 

13 Byalik, Haim Nahman(1873-1934) was a major Jewish author of poetry, fiction, and sociopolitical literature

He wrote in Ivrit and translated some of his works into Yiddish. He did Ivrit translations of Servantes’ and Schiller’s work. He lived and worked in Israel from 1924.

14 Invasion of Poland

The German attack of Poland on 1stSeptember 1939 is widely considered the date in the West for the start of World War II. After having gained both Austria and the Bohemian and Moravian parts of Czechoslovakia, Hitler was confident that he could acquire Poland without having to fight Britain and France. (To eliminate the possibility of the Soviet Union fighting if Poland were attacked, Hitler made a pact with the Soviet Union, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.) On the morning of 1stSeptember 1939, German troops entered Poland. The German air attack hit so quickly that most of Poland’s air force was destroyed while still on the ground. To hinder Polish mobilization, the Germans bombed bridges and roads. Groups of marching soldiers were machine-gunned from the air, and they also aimed at civilians. On 1stSeptember, the beginning of the attack, Great Britain and France sent Hitler an ultimatum - withdraw German forces from Poland or Great Britain and France would go to war against Germany. On 3rdSeptember, with Germany’s forces penetrating deeper into Poland, Great Britain and France both declared war on Germany. 

15 Estonia in 1939-1940

on September 24, 1939, Moscow demanded that Estonia make available military bases for the Red Army units. On June 16, Moscow issued an ultimatum insisting on the change of government and the right of occupation of Estonia. On June 17, Estonia accepted the provisions and ceased to exist de facto, becoming Estonian Soviet Republic within USSR.

16 Kolkhoz

In the Soviet Union the policy of gradual and voluntary collectivization of agriculture was adopted in 1927 to encourage food production while freeing labor and capital for industrial development. In 1929, with only 4% of farms in kolkhozes, Stalin ordered the confiscation of peasants' land, tools, and animals; the kolkhoz replaced the family farm.

17 Estonian Government in Evacuation

Both, the Government of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Central Committee of the Estonian Communist Party were created in 1940 and were evacuated to Moscow as the war started. Their task was to provide for Estonian residents who had been evacuated or drafted into the labor army. They succeeded in restoring life and work conditions of many evacuees. Former leaders of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic took active part in the formation of the Estonian Rifle Corps assisting the transfer of former Estonian citizens from the labor army into the Corps. At the beginning of 1944, top authority institutions of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic were moved to Leningrad, and the permanent Estonian representation office remained in Moscow. In September 1944, Estonia was re-established as part of the USSR and the Estonian government moved to Tallinn.

18 Maccabi World Union

International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19thcentury. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth. In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi. The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

19 School #

Schools had numbers and not names. It was part of the policy of the state. They were all state schools and were all supposed to be identical. 

20 Communal apartment

The Soviet power wanted to improve housing conditions by requisitioning ‘excess’ living space of wealthy families after the Revolution of 1917. Apartments were shared by several families with each family occupying one room and sharing the kitchen, toilet and bathroom with other tenants. Because of the chronic shortage of dwelling space in towns communal or shared apartments continued to exist for decades. Despite state programs for the construction of more houses and the liquidation of communal apartments, which began in the 1960s, shared apartments still exist today.

21 Party Schools

They were established after the Revolution of 1917, in different levels, with the purpose of training communist cadres and activists. Subjects such as ‘scientific socialism’ (Marxist-Leninist Philosophy) and ‘political economics’ besides various other political disciplines were taught there. 

22  Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’

 The campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’, i.e. Jews, was initiated in articles in the central organs of the Communist Party in 1949. The campaign was directed primarily at the Jewish intelligentsia and it was the first public attack on Soviet Jews as Jews. ‘Cosmopolitans’ writers were accused of hating the Russian people, of supporting Zionism, etc. Many Yiddish writers as well as the leaders of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested in November 1948 on charges that they maintained ties with Zionism and with American ‘imperialism’. They were executed secretly in 1952. The anti-Semitic Doctors’ Plot was launched in January 1953. A wave of anti-Semitism spread through the USSR. Jews were removed from their positions, and rumors of an imminent mass deportation of Jews to the eastern part of the USSR began to spread. Stalin’s death in March 1953 put an end to the campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’.

23 Mandatory job assignment in the USSR

Graduates of higher educational institutions had to complete a mandatory 2-year job assignment issued by the institution from which they graduated. After finishing this assignment young people were allowed to get employment at their discretion in any town or organization.

24 Yom Kippur War

The Arab-Israeli War of 1973, also known as the Yom Kippur War or the Ramadan War, was a war between Israel on one side and Egypt and Syria on the other side. It was the fourth major military confrontation between Israel and the Arab states. The war lasted for three weeks: it started on 6thOctober 1973 and ended on 22ndOctober on the Syrian front and on 26thOctober on the Egyptian front.

25 Khrushchev, Nikita (1894-1971)

Soviet communist leader. After Stalin’s death in 1953, he became first secretary of the Central Committee, in effect the head of the Communist Party of the USSR. In 1956, during the 20thParty Congress, Khrushchev took an unprecedented step and denounced Stalin and his methods. He was deposed as premier and party head in October 1964. In 1966 he was dropped from the Party's Central Committee.

26 Sholem Aleichem (pen name of Shalom Rabinovich (1859-1916)

Yiddish author and humorist, a prolific writer of novels, stories, feuilletons, critical reviews, and poem in Yiddish, Hebrew and Russian. He also contributed regularly to Yiddish dailies and weeklies. In his writings he described the life of Jews in Russia, creating a gallery of bright characters. His creative work is an alloy of humor and lyricism, accurate psychological and details of everyday life. He founded a literary Yiddish annual called Di Yidishe Folksbibliotek (The Popular Jewish Library), with which he wanted to raise the despised Yiddish literature from its mean status and at the same time to fight authors of trash literature, who dragged Yiddish literature to the lowest popular level. The first volume was a turning point in the history of modern Yiddish literature. Sholem Aleichem died in New York in 1916. His popularity increased beyond the Yiddish-speaking public after his death. Some of his writings have been translated into most European languages and his plays and dramatic versions of his stories have been performed in many countries. The dramatic version of Tevye the Dairymanbecame an international hit as a musical (Fiddler on the Roof) in the 1960s. 

27 Gordin, Yakov (1853-1909)

Ukrainian-born Yiddish author. He emigrated to the USA in 1891 and is the author of nearly 100 plays, among the most popular of which were The Jewish King Lear, Lithuanian Lurier Brothers, God Man and the Devil, Over the Ocean, etc. Yakov Gordin translated a number of European classical plays into Yiddish and had a great influence on New York’s Yiddish theater in its formation period.

Shahne Berznitskiy

Shahne Berznitskiy
Vilnius
Lithuania
Interviewer: Zhanna Litinskaya
Date of interview: June 2005

Shahne Berznitskiy is the eldest and the most honorable member of the Jewish community of Lithuania. It was not that easy to make an appointment with him – he was either rehearsing in the choir or performing some social work. Shahne lives in a modern three-room apartment. There is a mess in his room, which is characteristic of elderly people – a lot of journals and newspapers – but still the floor and furniture are clean and not dusty. Shahne is a short agile man with young-looking eyes. I cannot even say that he is an old man, as he looks at least twenty years younger than his age. He gladly started to tell me his story. Of course, a 93-year-old man cannot recall everything, but the details of his story about Jewish life turned out to be very interesting. There are a great many recollections from his long life.

My family background

Growing up

Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

All my ancestors are from a town called Veisiejai, located in the south of Lithuania, not far from the border, about 100 kilometers from Vilnius. The town was small. In the period of the 1920s-1930s, when I began perceiving the outside world, there were about a hundred Jewish families in Veisiejai, numbering a little less than a thousand people. All of them could fit in one large synagogue, where almost all Jews got together on Fridays, Saturdays and on holidays. The synagogue was on Synagogskaya Street. It was a rather large and spacious two-storied log-house of simple construction, like most buildings in Lithuania. It wasn’t spared by the fire in the middle of the 1920s. At that time more than half of the buildings burnt down to the ashes. Religious Jews put money together and built another synagogue.

There was a large Catholic cathedral in the heart of the town as most of the population of Veisiejai consisted of Poles. The town also had Lithuanian and Jewish inhabitants. There were stores, workshops and groceries not far from the cathedral in the central part of the town. They belonged to Jews, as most of them were craftsmen – tailors, cobblers, glaziers and retailers. Most of the stores in town were owned by Jews. There was also a Jewish intelligentsia – the dynasty of the doctors Kuklyanskiy, teachers of the Jewish school, insurance agents. There was no lawyer in town, but one of the town-people, a Jew called Levinson, had an unfinished juridical education and he helped writing letters or filing a claim when needed. Jews were in the trade business as well. The town stood on the bank of a big lake, where there was a lot of good fish.

My maternal grandfather, Velvl Fleisher, was a fisherman. He was born in 1846. In his adolescence Velvl was a very good fisherman. With time he became the manager of a large fishing cartel, consisting of over 50 people. He knew the behavior of fish, where it was in summer and where it hid in winter, and almost all the time he could determine the time and place for angling. My grandfather was probably the most experienced fisherman in Veisiejai, as two competitors – fishing enterprises – tried hard to hire him. He had a rather big boat, a solid wooden vessel, which was on the bank, near my grandfather’s house. Velvl lived in a small wooden house, which he had built when he was young. It consisted of three small rooms and a kitchen with a stove, which was used for heating and cooking. When I was a boy, only Grandfather and Grandmother Mihle Fleisher and their elder daughter Esther lived in the house. The rest of the children were scattered all over the world.

Mihle, who was about ten years younger than her husband, was practically illiterate. She was a housewife and took care of the children, which was customary for Jewish families back then. Both Velvl and Mihle belonged to the middle class, though not to the upper. They were religious. At that time all middle-class families, including the Fleishers were religious. Mihle didn’t appear in public without a wig and Velvl always wore a cap or a hat. Of course, he put on a kippah and tallit when he went to the synagogue. Without knowing how to read Mihle learnt all the prayers by heart and sometimes said a prayer holding the prayer book upside down. Grandfather wasn’t very literate either. He only went to cheder. He knew how to read, though he had no time for that. Grandfather had to work hard to earn bread and butter for the family. During the fire Velvl’s house burnt as well. Grandfather managed to reconstruct it once again in the same place. He didn’t live there for a long time. He died in 1928. Grandmother Mihle survived her husband by 13 years and lived to see the Great Patriotic War 1. She was murdered by fascists during one of the first actions in the town in summer 1941.

Velvl and Mihle raised their children in the Jewish tradition – the boys went to cheder and the girls were not pampered with education, as they were supposed to help about the house and it was much more important for them than being literate. Mother’s elder sister Esther [Berznitskaya, nee Fleisher], born in the 1880s, was married to my father’s brother. At that time it was customary for Jews to have pre-arranged marriages with brothers and sisters, as they believed that such type of families had double ties and were stronger. Esther’s husband, Mihl Berznitskiy, left for America to seek his fortune shortly after the wedding. Esther and her husband lived separately for ten years. Mihl went from one town to another, looking for a job. He managed to stash some money for his family. He was a smith in Veisiejai. He tried many professions in America and finally became a car mechanic. Esther and her son Sender were waiting for better times. They lived with Esther’s parents. Finally Mihl thought his nest-egg to be enough for Esther and their son to come to America. Probably Mihle and Velvl had other children, but I don’t know anything about them. Esther died after the Great Patriotic War, but I don’t remember when exactly.

Two of my mother’s sisters, Zlata and Reizl, also left for America when they were young and single. Zlata and Reizl embarked on their journey on their own. They got married in the USA and settled there. I don’t know their husband’s names. They were pretty well-off. They raised several children, but I never saw them. I cannot recall their names either. I remember that my mother also had two brothers, Alter and Noex. They also immigrated to America. That’s all I know about them. Thus, it turned out that out of all the siblings only my mother stayed in her native town in Lithuania.

My mother, Perl Berznitskaya, nee Fleisher, was born in Veisiejai in the 1880s. Mother finished a Jewish elementary school. She was literate and knew how to read and write. Before getting married she helped her mother about the house like most Jewish girls. I don’t know exactly how my parents met. More than a hundred years have passed since that time. It was mostly likely that all Jews in Veisiejai knew each other. They were religious, went to the same synagogue and met there on Sabbath and holidays.

My paternal grandfather, Aaron Berznitskiy, born in Veisiejai in the 1850s, was a smith. My paternal grandmother’s name was Haya-Sura. I didn’t know my grandfather, as he died before I was born. Haya-Sura lived in our house after Grandfather’s death. She was a true Jewish grandmother – a petite, neat old lady with a kerchief on her head. Grandmother was very religious. She prayed every day, observed all Jewish traditions. After my grandfather’s death the house was bequeathed to my father, who was the eldest and had his own family.

As I’ve already mentioned, my father’s brother Mihl married my mother’s sister Esther and left for America. Mihl made good money in America. He survived his wife Esther by many years. He celebrated his 100th birthday and died in the 1980s. Father had another brother, whose name I don’t remember. He also went to the USA, when he was young. He worked in the USA as a builder. He had a tragic fate. When he was working on the construction of a skyscraper, he fell from a high altitude and died. That’s all I know about him.

Apart from the three sons, Haya-Sura and Aaron had two daughters, Lyuba and Rohl. Lyuba, born in the 1890s, married a horse dealer. I cannot recall his name. Lyuba and her family lived not far from Veisiejai, in the small Lithuanian town of Lazdijai [100 km south of Vilnius], where her husband was from. Lyuba, like almost all Jewish women of that time, was a housewife. She gave birth to children and raised them. She had many of them: five daughters and three sons. Only two elder daughters survived, thanks to their beliefs. They were convinced Zionists 2 and left for Palestine in the 1930s. The boys, Meisher, Yankel and Velvl, started helping their father from a young age. They also became horse dealers. All of them, the three sons and three daughters with their families, and Lyuba and her husband, perished during the occupation. They were shot with the rest of the Jews of Lazdijai.

Rohl, who was two years younger than her sister, married a Jewish lad from Veisieja – Benjamin Ruth. Benjamin was a baker. He owned his own bakery in Veisiejai. Rohl and Benjamin had two sons and two daughters, Esther and Bella. All of them, but Bella – Rohl, Benjamin, the boys and Esther – remained here during the occupation and perished. Bella managed to leave Lazdijai and went into evacuation. She was the only one of Rohl’s family to survive. She became a doctor, came back to Vilnius after the war and worked as a doctor. Bella died in the 1980s. She remained single.

Grandfather Aaron was a religious man. As a matter of fact, all Jews from small towns at that time were religious. I should say that all my father’s siblings and their families were very religious people. They thought Jewish laws and traditions to be sacred. They observed the kashrut and holidays in accordance with the tradition. It was customary for the boys in Jewish families to acquire a rudimentary Jewish education. My father and his brothers started to go to cheder in their early childhood.

My father, Itshok Berznitskiy, was born in Veisiejai in 1880. He studied the Torah and the Talmud in cheder. He was also taught prayers in Hebrew. Apart from cheder, Father also went to the Jewish elementary school. It was common for Jewish people to get married at a young age. My parents got married in 1900, when they were twenty. I was never told about their wedding. It goes without saying that they had a traditional Jewish wedding – under a chuppah in the only synagogue of the town. The wedding party was arranged in the house of Grandfather Velvl, on the bank of the lake.

After the wedding, Perl and Itshok settled in the house of Grandfather Aaron. Father was a smith. He and Mihl were taught this craft by Aaron. Grandfather Aaron had an occupational smith’s disease. His lungs were filled with metal dust. He understood that he wouldn’t be able to live a long life and opened the secret of his skills to my father. Grandfather Aaron died in the 1900s. Father became the owner of the smithy.

Growing up

In 1901 my mother gave birth to a daughter and named her after my father’s sister Ester. In 1903 Yankel was born and in 1906 Sheina followed. In 1910 mother gave birth to a son, Isroel. I was born in 1913. The youngest child of the family, my brother Iosif, was born in 1918, when my mother was forty.

I was born in Veisiejai on 15th May 1913. I remember myself at the age of five or six. We lived in the house of Grandfather Aaron. Grandmother Haya-Sura changed places: either she stayed with us or at Rohl’s place. I remember our old house. It was a large log house. The logs grew dark with time. There were three or four rooms in the house. Our family was large, so three or four children slept in one room. The solid wooden furniture went with the style of the house. My father inherited it from Grandfather Aaron. Our house burnt down during the fire. It happened in the late 1920s during the time when the synagogue burnt down as well. Father built the house on the same place. It was smaller than the previous one, but it was made from brick.

Since my childhood I liked to visit my father in his smithy. There were more smiths in town – my father, Leizer, Shmuel Bolushanskiy and Leib Aenakh. Each smithy was at the corner of one street in the central part of the town. Smiths made good money as they had a lot of work, especially on market days: Tuesdays and Fridays. On those days a lot of people came into town from adjacent farmsteads. Lithuanians and Poles came to sell milk, curds, sour-cream, meat, vegetables and buy necessary goods. They also went to the smithy. Some of them had to order horse-shoes either for their own horse or for one on sale. In winter there were orders to fix sleighs and in summer for carts. In a word, there was a lot of work for the smiths. There was no rivalry among the smiths of the town. There was no adversity but friendship. Father often marked Sabbath and holidays with his fellow-smiths. They got together for lunch and went to the chestnut alley on the square, not far from the cathedral, and sang old Jewish and modern Bund 3 songs. I went there with my mother and brothers. Mother crooned with father and I listened. I still remember one of those songs [the interviewee is singing in Yiddish and translating into Russian]: ‘The smith is standing by the furnace, doing his work. The sparkles are flying around. He is thinking of a bright future. Life shall be good. He is gleaming with perspiration, but he does not feel sweat streaming down his forehead and eyes – he is singing a song about a bright life.’

At the age of six or seven I started helping my father with work: hold the horse’s leg or some bigger metal part. I enjoyed looking at the funny sparks, flying from the anvil. Father seemed to me like a warrior from a fairy-tale. My elder brother Yankel was father’s apprentice. I learnt how to speak Lithuanian in the smithy. I also understood Polish. Only Yiddish was spoken at home and many town Jews didn’t even know any other language. Lithuanians and Poles often came to my father, so I learnt the language rather swiftly while communicating with them. It helped me when I entered the Lithuanian lyceum.

Father worked hard, but his job was lucrative. He provided for the whole family of nine – himself, Mother, Grandmother and five children. We had a big husbandry. There was a pen in the yard, where mother kept a cow. When my brother and I were a little older, we were sometimes asked to shepherd the cow. We had our own dairy products and didn’t have to buy non-kosher milk and butter from peasants. There was a horse in a special pen behind the house. Father often harnessed it and went to other towns, mostly to Seirijai and sometimes to Lazdijai. There, Father purchased materials for his work: metal of different shapes. Father usually loaded the whole cart and took the materials to his smithy. When he ran out of them, he was on the road again.

Our family lived comfortably. There was enough money for food, clothes, even for the education of the children. The eldest daughter Ester went to the Lithuanian lyceum. Ester didn’t marry young. She got married in 1936. When she was single, she helped mother about the house. My sister Sheina finished only two or three grades of the Jewish elementary school. It seemed enough for a Jewish girl from a small town. Sheina also started helping Mother about the house. There was a lot of work: buy products, cook food for nine people, do the cleaning and laundry. The latter took most of the effort, as my father, and later on my elder brother Yankel, came back from the smithy in filthy, sooty clothes. There were a lot of clothes and linen. There was no running water in the house. The well, from where drinking water was taken, was rather far away. Usually the girls soaped the linen at home and then took heavy buckets with linen to the lake for rinsing.

Our family was traditionally Jewish. When Father was alive, all Jewish traditions were observed at home. Father was very religious. He prayed daily, though he didn’t have an opportunity to go to the synagogue every day. On Friday and Saturday he and Mother always dressed up and went to the synagogue. Starting early in the morning on Friday everybody in our house, especially the ladies – my mother and sisters – were getting ready for Sabbath. Kosher chicken was ready to be cooked. As a rule my elder brother took it to the shochet. Later on, I started doing that. The house was immaculately clean by Friday evening. There was no dust. The wooden floors were shining. A starched snow-white table-cloth and the silver candle-holder with the candles were placed on the table. For Friday my mother baked delicious challah from light white dough. The wine on the table was also home-made. In our vicinity some of the Lithuanians managed to grow grapes. They brought it to Father as a payment for his work and Father made wine himself. If Jews didn’t have their own wine, they bought it from a Jew who made it, as that kind of wine was considered kosher.

On Fridays and Saturdays my mother tried to put scrumptious dishes on the table. First of all, a fisherman’s daughter knew how to cook gefilte fish. There was always fish in our house. Grandfather Velvl brought it to us. On Saturday our table was adorned with beautiful pikes. As a rule Mother made broth from fatty chicken and boiled kneydlakh in it. For dessert we had imberlalkh – a dish from dried sweet carrots and ginger and all kinds of tsimes 4. Mother cooked carrot tsimes from potatoes and carrots and plum tsimes in fall. Plum tsimes was also cooked from potatoes and fresh plums, I think.

On Friday evening we got together at the table and waited for Father. He joined us, when he came back from the synagogue. Mother lit the candles when the first star appeared in the sky and Father said a prayer over the challah and wine and then we started our meal. The dishes cooked for Sabbath were taken by my mother to the Jewish bakery owned by Rohl’s husband. All neighbors took their pots with chulent there. Chulent is a traditional Sabbath dish made of meat and potatoes. All neighbors took their chulent to the bakery. In the warm ovens of the bakery the food stayed warm until Sabbath day. When Jews were on the way from the Sabbath service in the synagogue, they went to the bakery to take their chulent home. Father liked it when we, the boys, went to the synagogue with him. When I was a child, I often carried Father’s prayer book. After the Sabbath feast my parents went to the chestnut alley. Jewish families got together there to sing songs. They sang separately, but sometimes also in chorus. In summer we went boating. Those festive Sabbath days were light and joyful. I will always keep them in my heart.

When I turned 13, I had my bar mitzvah. I got ready for that in advance. Father hired a teacher for a couple of weeks who was teaching me how to properly put on the tefillin. He also taught me several prayers and a passage from the Torah. All relatives got together in the synagogue and I went through the ceremonious bar mitzvah ritual, marking my adulthood. Since that time I went to the synagogue with my tallit and tefillin like my dad. He made sure that we went to the synagogue. We were young and not always willing to go there, but the times were different. I cannot say I was truly religious. My brothers and I were just obedient sons. I wouldn’t have dared to disobey my father.

The kashrut was also observed at home. We couldn’t even think of pork. Mother made kosher meat, putting it on boards with special grooves wherefrom blood was trickling down. Poultry was butchered by a shochet. There were separate dishes for dairy and meat dishes, starting from silverware and up to cutting boards and large pots.

All Jewish holidays were marked at home. I will try to remember them. The first one was Rosh Hashanah. People got ready beforehand. The house was cleaned, the furniture was polished, and old things were thrown away. Stoves were whitewashed like before Pesach. My parents and I went to the synagogue in festive attire. People blew the shofar in the synagogue. Apart from common and festive dishes, apples and honey were on the table. Yom Kippur was to follow in a couple of days. I took a rooster and went to the synagogue on that day. The rabbi rotated the fowl over my head and read a prayer, performing the kapores ritual. On the eve of the holiday we had a substantial dinner. The next day adults and children fasted all day long.

Sukkot was after Yom Kippur. A sukkah was made in the yard of each Jewish house. Father made the stands for the sukkah, which were used every year. He brought fir-tree branches from the forest. For the whole week we had meals in the sukkah in spite of cold weather in those fall days. The most mirthful holiday was Simchat Torah. On that day Jews were through with the annual cycle of Torah readings and started a new one. That was a joyful holidays with songs and dancing. On that day Jews took the Torah scroll from the synagogue and carried it around the building in a mirthful procession. The Torah teacher from the cheder gave small Torah scrolls to the best student. He was lucky to get a tiny Torah scroll and take part in the holiday with the adults.

I also remember Channukah. It was a favorite holiday for all children. First, we didn’t have to go to school for eight days. We played with the spinning top, and ate scrumptious potato latkes. Secondly, adults gave us channukah money. On that day we went to see Grandfather Velvl and Grandmother Mihle and they gave us money. There was a chanukkiyah in our house. It was a special candle-holder, where a new candle was lit every evening. Those candle-holders were put on the window-sill. Chanukkiyahs lit the dark December nights in our small town. The next holiday, Purim, was marked by the entire town. On that day Mother baked more than usual, as it was customary to take presents, the so-called shelakhmones, to friends and pals. Presents were brought to us as well. On that day mother baked hamantashen – poppy pies of a triangle shape.

The most thorough preparation was for Pesach. The entire house was whitewashed, stoves were cleaned and whitewashed. Chairs and benches were taken out and scraped. Clean curtains were hung on the windows, table cloths were changed. Paschal dishes were stored in the garret. They were used only on Pesach. Copper dishes were taken to the smithy to make them kosher. Father did it for all dwellers of the town. Right before the holiday my father got rid of the so-called chametz, the remnants of leavened bread. A large hamper with matzah was brought from the synagogue. Matzah was eaten instead of bread for the entire eight-day Paschal period. On the day of the first seder my father, clad in festive tallit, was reclining on the pillows at the head of the table. Mother had a festive kerchief on her head. She and my sisters laid the table. Apart from the traditional dishes, indicated in the Haggadah, there was an abundance of scrumptious things: fish, fatty stew, chicken broth, fried chicken, tsimes, kneydlakh, cake from matzah flour. Either I or my younger brother Iosif asked the four traditional questions about the holiday and looked for the afikoman, a piece of matzah, hidden by Father in the pillows. The entire festive period was marked in our house. On one of those days, we went to Grandfather Velvl.

In summer, fifty days after Pesach, we celebrated the holiday Shavuot. On that day God gave the Jews the Torah. As a rule people eat dairy dishes and patties with curds on this holiday. Mother made curds pie and put something resembling a ladder from batter on top of the cake. Mother explained to me that it was the ladder to Heaven, to God.

I spent summer with my friends. I walked around the town barefoot. We went to the lake, to the forest. We picked berries: bramble and bilberries. There were a lot of those kinds of berries in the northern part. Then mushroom season came and we went to the forest with the punnets again. I had a lot of friends. Most of them were Jewish guys, but some of them were Lithuanians and Poles. We got along very well. Kids didn’t differentiate between nationalities, they merely kept friends.

At the age of six I went to the Jewish elementary school. The school was accommodated in two rooms of the synagogue. All subjects were taught in Hebrew: geography, biology, all kinds of songs and stories. We also studied the Lithuanian language. I did well at school and the four school years were easy for me. I wanted to go on with my education after finishing elementary school. By that time my eldest brother Yankel had finished school and was helping Father. The middle brother, Isroel, entered the Realschule 5 in Kaunas. There was no Jewish lyceum in Veisiejai, just a Jewish elementary school. I entered the Lithuanian pre-lyceum school. It was easier for me to study as compared to other Jewish guys, as I didn’t merely learn Lithuanian at school lessons, but also by means of communication. It was easy for me to enter pre-lyceum school and I did well there. My studies lasted four years. Having finished that school I went to Lazdijai, as there were no other institutions in Veisiejai. There I entered the Lithuanian lyceum. It was a state lyceum. I don’t think the tuition was high. Father regularly gave me money either personally or via other people from time to time. For the time of my studies I never felt a bad attitude towards me. There was no anti-Semitism, none whatsoever. During the theological class we also studied the rudiments of Jewish religion. I lived in the place of my aunt Lyuba. She treated me as her own child.

1930 was the year of tribulation. Since that time, I think, my childhood was over. Father got sick. He was afflicted with lung cancer: an occupational smith’s disease. There was no hospital in Veisiejai. Usually people went to have treatment in Alytus or Lazdijai. Mother took my father to Germany, to Konigsberg. Even now I cannot get how she, a simple Jewish woman, communicated with German doctors. Her knowing Yiddish was of big help. Father was operated on and Mother was told that he would live only a couple of weeks. She came back with Father to Veisiejai, where he died two weeks later. Mother didn’t want to hurt us by seeing our sick father. She wanted us to remember him young and beautiful. We, the kids, came back to our native town only to attend Father’s funeral. It was a real Jewish funeral. Father was on the floor covered with straw and all of us were sitting around him in shivah. Everybody’s collar was ripped. Father was taken to the cemetery on the boards. He was wrapped in a shroud. He was buried in that shroud.

After Father’s death my brother Yankel took up father’s business in the smithy. We had to keep going and so Mother opened a small, almost tiny grocery store. We, children, were all over Lithuania. By that time Isroel had finished Realschule and he was invited to teach there. Iosif also left for Kaunas and began studying in the Realschule again. Upon graduation Iosif was offered a job in Klaipeda.

I didn’t go back to the lyceum, as I had to work and help out my mother. My uncle Benjamin gave me a job in his bakery. I became a classy baker within a year and a half. I had a secure profession. I worked as a baker in different Lithuanian towns for several years. As a rule I went to work for a Jewish bakery, rented a room or a ‘couch’ in a Jewish family’s place and lived pretty comfortably. I worked in Alytus, Lazdijai and other towns. When Iosif was offered a job in Klaipeda, he invited me there. We found lodging for the two of us. I worked in Klaipeda for a couple of months. It was the year of 1934.

After Father’s death Jewish traditions were still observed in our family and holidays were marked. We, children, gradually digressed from Jewish traditions. We were attracted by a new life, new ideas and prospects. While Father was alive, we regularly went to the synagogue and prayed with him. After his death each of us started going his own way. At that time I had my own political views. Since my adolescence I was a member of the Zionist organization Maccabi 6. I decided to get ready for repatriation in Palestine. Back in that time many young Jewish people left for Palestine to build the Israeli state. My brother Isroel shared my beliefs. He and I joined Hashomer Hatzair 7, which prepared young people for repatriation. My brother and I went to a small town called Ionava. A Jewish kibbutz was founded there. We stayed there for a year and a half. We learnt how to till the land and grow different grains, work on the farm and other practical work. I liked the way of life in the kibbutz. It was a commune. We received no money, but we lived together and had similar clothes and felt like a stalwart team. In 1936 my training was over and I was ready to repatriate to Palestine. I didn’t manage to leave, as I was drafted into the Lithuanian army that year.

I went to Veisiejai to say goodbye to my mother and sisters before leaving for Marijampole. I served there for a year and a half. At that time my mother lived by herself. My elder brother Yankel left for Kaunas. He was invited there by Isroel, who continued working in the Realschule. There was an opening for a teacher specializing in blacksmith’s work and Yankel left for Kaunas, leasing his smithy to the neighbor. In a while Yankel got married. His fiancee Golda, a Jewish girl from Marijampole, moved to Kaunas. In a year Yankel and Golda had a daughter, Liza. That year, 1936, Ester got married as well. Her husband, Alter Aronovich, was a butcher in Veisiejai. Ester and her husband moved into the house of Grandmother Mihle. She gave birth to a daughter. Sheina was married to a guy from an adjacent small town. I don’t remember her husband’s name. Sheina and her husband also settled in Veisiejai. They had two children – a boy and a girl. I don’t remember their names. In the late 1930s Isroel also got married. I liked his wife, a Jewish girl named Charna, very much. Isroel lived in Kaunas with Charna. In 1941 Charna gave birth to a boy [Aaron].

My younger brother Iosif and I were still single. My service in the army was rather quiet. Anti-Semitism didn’t reign in the army at that time, though it was gradually emerging under the influence of fascist organizations in Lithuania. In the army I joined an underground communist organization. Like many people I was attracted by the ideas of all-in-all equality, brotherhood, liberty and welfare, preached by the communists. We were involved in propaganda, told about life in the USSR, building socialism, wherein all nations were equal. At that time I knew nothing of repressions, arrests and politics in the Soviet Union [see Great Terror] 8.

Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

In 1938 I was demobilized. I lived with my mother for a couple of weeks. Then I decided to move to a larger town. Jewish life in my native town seemed too insignificant for me. I went to work as a baker in Рrienai. At the same time I kept on being involved in my underground activity. My main task was agitation and propaganda of the Soviet way of life. That’s why when the Soviet regime was established in the Baltic countries in 1940, I joyfully welcomed it [see Occupation of the Baltic Republics] 9. As soon as the Soviets showed up, the Party wasn’t underground any more. I was elected the secretary of the party organization. Now I could openly carry out my party activity. Upon the arrival of the Red Army I dealt with supply for the army for a while. I organized the supply of products and bread to the militaries as well as their accommodation. When all those issued had been tackled I took up the organization of training for young Lithuanian communists. Out of all my brothers only Iosif and I were members of the Communist Party. When the Soviet regime was in power, he was offered a job with the KGB 10. He worked as a guard of important party activists and state officials.

During the war

The Great Patriotic War was like a bolt from the blue for us as well as Soviet citizens. I understood that Jews and communists were to leave for the rear as soon as possible, as it was well-known that fascists exterminated them in the first place. On the first day of war a party activist from Marijampole came to Рrienai and ordered everybody to stay in order to resist the enemy. Our party organization was at a loss. We went to the commandant’s office to find out how dangerous it was. The private of the Soviet army stood sentry. It turned out that he was guarding an empty building. The military commandant of the town had already left towards the East. We decided to escape. We had been walking for a long time, when we saw a train ready to depart in one of the stations. A crew of workers was repairing it. I saw a soldier, who had died from the fragment of a shell, by the train station premises. Soon the train was repaired. We took a locomotive that was eastbound. We were on the road for quite a long time. We were bombed on our way. We changed trains in Belarus and went further on. I knew nothing of my siblings, mother and grandmother Mihle.

We came to Gorky oblast, the town of Kulebaki [about 400 km from Moscow]. We got off the train in a rather organized manner. We were housed in a local dancing club. We were given a modest, but substantial meal: soup and porridge. They even gave us some products. Russian people received us very hospitably. They treated us with compassion. We didn’t stay in the club for a long time. We were given lodging in different apartments. I and three more Lithuanian guys were given lodging by one of the hosts, whose name I don’t remember. He, his wife and two daughters moved into a poky room and gave us four guys a big room. On the first night the hostess gave us food to eat. She took motherly care of us. We were working at the train station from dawn till night. Our work was hard. Sometimes we had to work night-shifts. We received workers’ cards [see card system] 11 for which we were given scarce food in the canteen. We were almost starving. If the hostess hadn’t given us food, it’s hard to imagine what would have happened to us. We went to the military enlistment office a couple of times asking to be drafted into the acting army. As soon as they found out that we were from Lithuania, they sent us away. At that time citizens from the territories annexed to the USSR, were not drafted into the army. In early 1942 we found out that the 16th Lithuanian division 12 was organized in the town of Balakhna, Gorky oblast.

We said goodbye to the hosts and left for Balakhna. The four of us were admitted to the division. Here I met many of my acquaintances from Kaunas and none of them knew anything about the fate of my kin. Our division was formed within a couple of months. The first battle I participated in was the Kursk battle 13. It was a dreadful battle. I was there as a private. Many soldiers were killed in action. There were many of my pals and friends. I was unscathed. After that battle I was promoted to the rank of sergeant. Shortly after the battle I was called to the commander of the unit. It turned out that they had found out from my records that I was a baker, and they sent me to the regiment bakery. Since that time I was baking bread for the soldiers. Of course, I didn’t take part in the battles on the leading edge, but my function was also difficult and hazardous. In spite of the weather, time of the day and vicinity of the enemy, we always had to install stoves, find firewood and bake bread for the soldiers on time. Sometimes it was raining cats and dogs, we were being bombed, but still we had to go on with work. Thus I remained a baker in the First Baltic Front 14 till the end of war. Here I joined the Party deliberately. At that time I believed in the ideals of communism and wanted to take part in the formation of the most impartial society in my country.

In fall 1943 I was informed at the headquarters, located five kilometers from the bakery, that my brother was awaiting me. I went there without knowing even who of my brothers had found me. It was my favorite younger brother, Iosif. He was still working with the KGB and came to the front as a security guard of the chairman of the Council of Ministers of Lithuania. He decided to visit the militaries of the Lithuanian division. My brother found me with the help of the documents of the division. I was overwhelmed with joy. We were talking for a couple of hours. I found out about the fate of my relatives: It turned out that on the first day of war the wives and children of NKVD 15 officers were sent to the rear. Iosif managed to make evacuation arrangements for the families of our brothers Isroel and Yankel – Golda with little Liza and Charna with little Aaron, who was only a couple of months old. My brothers were not let on the train, as there was an order for all able-bodied men to stay for the defense from the enemy. Fortunately, Mother was on a visit in Kaunas at that time. She was also evacuated. She was alive and healthy. She lived with Charna and the children in Kirov oblast. Golda, Yankel’s wife, died of typhus fever in the first year of war and Mother brought up her granddaughter Liza. Nothing was known about my brothers Yankel and Isroel, my sisters Sheine and Ester and their families, and my grandmother Mihle. In accordance with the data from the NKVD almost all the Jews on occupied territories underwent cruel tortures and were murdered.

I said goodbye to my brother and went to my military unit. It was dark and I got lost in the forest, without knowing which direction to walk. I fell into a ditch filled with water. I was drenched and freezing. Finally I saw lights. It didn’t take me long to decide to move towards the lights, as I had to get dry and warm. If those lights were coming from Germans, I would have to take it. Luckily these were our tank troops. They had me sit by the fire, gave me some food to eat and vodka to warm up. At dawn I saw my bakery. It wasn’t very far away. It turned out that I had been passing by it at night, but it was disguised with branches and I didn’t recognize it.

When the spring of 1945 came, our unit was in Latvia. On 5th May, when the Reichstag was captured and our country was the winner, one of the large German military units, positioned in Latvia, was not willing to give up. There were skirmishes, fights, battles. People died. Finally German truce envoys came to our headquarters and declared their capitulation. The commander of the rear, the Lithuanian colonel Mikutis, received them. He agreed meeting German representatives in the place where capitulation documents would be signed. Our interpreter was killed shortly before this event. Mikutis assigned me as an interpreter, as I was the only one in the regiment who could understand German, owing to Yiddish. So, we went to the Germans. All of a sudden, three German tanks arrived in front of us. We were still with fear. We thought we were to die at the very end of war. The tanks stopped in about ten meters in front of us. Tank operators opened up the hatches and got out. One of them took his white shirt off and tore it making a white flag out of it. After a while two officers came on bikes and escorted us to the German general. The driver and I stayed outside. Mikutis and another officer entered the German headquarters dug-out. After a couple of minutes the personal aide of the German general came out. It turned out that the German general had met our officers amicably. There was vodka in the glasses on the table. There was no food as they had been besieged for a long time. I took out two loaves of bread, which I had taken for our trip, and gave them to the Germans. The general and other officers, who so affably met the visitors, were taken captive. I don’t know what happened to them. Probably they were doomed for execution as most of the top-rank officers. Soon after that the long-awaited Victory Day 16 came.

When the war was over I served for another half year. Our unit was in Latvia for a while. Then we came to Vilnius, where we were quartered. I was demobilized in fall 1945. I had to look for a job, an apartment – in a word, start a new peaceful life. My brother Iosif was living in Vilnius. He came back there with the Lithuanian government. He got a nice apartment consisting of several rooms, in the center of the city. He accommodated there all our relatives who survived that terrible war. Mother, who came back from evacuation, where she raised Yankel’s daughter Liza, whose mother had died in evacuation, lived in this apartment as well as Charna, the widow of my brother Isroel, who perished in Kaunas ghetto 17, and her grown-up son Aaron, and I.

Iosif found out about my siblings from the sources of special departments. Isroel perished in Kaunas ghetto during its liquidation in 1944. Ester’s husband, Alter Aronovich, escaped from Veisieja at the very outset of war, having left Ester and the children with Grandmother Mihle. Ester couldn’t leave Granny as she was bedridden and would have died of hunger. Ester, her children and Grandmother Mihle as well as Sheina’s family were murdered during one of the actions in Veisiejai. They said Grandmother was taken to the execution in the blanket. My father’s sisters Lyuba and Rohl and their families perished during one of the actions in Veisiejai.

My eldest brother Yankel was the only survivor out of our entire kin. He was also in Kaunas ghetto. A couple of months before the end of the war he was taken to one of the concentration camps in Germany. Yankel managed to escape during the transfer from one camp to another. He jumped from the car in the darkness, landed in a pit filled with water and remained unnoticed. When there was no peril, he knocked on the door of a remote house on a farmstead. The hostess of that house was a German lady, whose husband was killed in action. She sheltered Yankel either out of pity or out of being aware that her action would do her good, when the approaching Soviet troops arrived. Upon the arrival of the Soviet troops Yankel was interrogated by the KGB for a couple of months. Strange as it may be, they believed him and let him go. He came to Vilnius in late 1945. After a while Yankel got married again. His second wife was a Jew from Poland. At that time our relatives in the USA, Uncle Mihl and Aunt Esther, started looking for our relatives who had survived the war. Mihl found Yankel, processed a visa for him, and soon Yankel and his wife left for the USA. His daughter Liza also joined him in the early 1950s. Yankel had another daughter in America. She was named Rohl. Yankel lived a long life and died in the 1980s. His daughters are still living in America.

After the war

I found a job with a state supply company, Gossnab, in Lithuania, where I worked all my life. I supplied the light and food industry with electric appliances and other materials. I liked my work. I took frequent trips all over the USSR. I visited many plants, met people and made friends. I got along with people. There were Lithuanians, Poles and Russians among my friends. I never felt any anti-Semitism. Even in the hardest times for Soviet Jews – the flagrant cosmopolite processes [see campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’] 18 and the Doctors’ Plot 19 in the late 1940s, early 1950s, only lazybones didn’t stigmatize Jews. Even in that period of time I didn’t suffer. Stalin’s death in 1953 was sorrowful for me as for almost all Soviet people. For a couple of hours I was in an honorable sentry by the leader’s portrait. Apart from my main job functions I was also involved in social and party work. For a couple of times I was elected secretary of the party organization of our department. I was involved in trade union work.

I had to think of my personal life as well. I liked some Jewish girls. I also had pals, with whom I spent time. None of my temporary girlfriends aroused such deep feelings or affections as I felt for Isroel’s widow, Charna. In the postwar years we lived in one apartment and Charna treated me like a brother. She also had suitors. I liked my nephew Aaron, Charna’s son. I didn’t want Charna and Aaron to leave our family, so I proposed to her. My action corresponded to Jewish traditions: the younger brother should marry the widow of the elder brother. Charna agreed and in the late 1940s our marriage was registered. Charna [nee Pressman] is two years younger than me. She is from the Lithuanian town of Moletai [60 km from Vilnius]. Charna’s parents, her brothers and sisters – I only know the name of her younger sister Nehama, as we keep her picture – perished during the occupation in Moletai.

After a while I got my own apartment. In 1952 our son Ilia was born. We had a happy life together. Charna was a true wife and friend. I didn’t differentiate between Ilia and the older Aaron. I loved them equally. I did pretty well at my job, while Charna was a housewife and raised the children. In 1956 there was a big sorrow in my family. Aaron had dreamt of a bicycle and I gave him a new shiny bike. The boy went outside with it and fell down. The trauma was very serious; his spine was injured. Aaron stayed in bed for three months, but all efforts by doctors were futile. Our son died three months later. I still cannot forgive myself for giving him that bike, as that present lead to my son’s death. Charna took his death very hard as she had exerted her every effort to save the boy during the war. Afterwards, she completely devoted herself to the upbringing of our son Ilia.

My mother, who lived with my younger brother Iosif after the war, also took that loss very hard. She was sick for a couple of months. She passed away in 1962. Though neither my brother nor I were religious and had stopped observing Jewish traditions a long time ago, Mother had a Jewish funeral. She was buried without a coffin, like my dad. The prayer was read at her funeral.

After the war Iosif was in charge of the administration department of the Council of Ministers of Lithuania. He took care of the premises, the car fleet. In a word, he was irreplaceable. He wasn’t affected by anti-Semitic campaigns either. My brother Iosif was married. He lived with his wife Gita for many years. In the late 1980s Iosif and Gita left for Israel. Gita died a couple of years ago. Iosif is still alive and kicking. His children, Yunona, born in the 1950s and Alexander, born about ten years after her, live in Vilnius and work for the Jewish community of Lithuania.

Charna and I had a wonderful life together. Charna was a housewife as my salary was enough for a moderate, but comfortable living. We had a lot of friends. We went to the theaters, the cinema. Usually the three of us went on vacation to Palanga. Sometimes we were given trade union trip vouchers to the South-Crimea or Caucasus. I was an ardent sportsman, played tennis, skied. In 1970 we got a plot of land. Since that time the orchard, planted by my wife and I, is a comfort and a hobby at the same time. Unfortunately, my Charna died in 2002. I cannot overcome such a loss.

My son Ilia was an excellent student. Since childhood his artistic talent was noticed. Having finished school Ilia pretty easily entered the Vilnius Construction Institute, the architecture department. Upon graduation Ilia worked in his specialty. Then he was carried away by an interesting project: animation cartoons. At present Ilia is a recognized master of animation. In 1980 he married a Jewish girl, Elene. In 1982 Ilia’s and Elena’s son Daniel was born. When Daniel turned 15, his mother decided to take him to Israel. Ilia wasn’t willing to go to Israel and for his wife to avoid complications, they got divorced. Daniel and his mother immigrated to Israel, where they are still living. My son and his ex-wife have their own lives, but they are still friends.

Ilia has dual citizenship. He lives in the USA and teaches animation at the New York Academy of Arts. Ilia is a professor. He has apartments in New York and in Vilnius. He often visits his native town. He has a lot of work here as well as creative plans. Ilia makes films in Lithuania. He has a lot of friends. My grandson Daniel, being a citizen of Israel, also came back to Vilnius. He followed in his father’s footsteps. He graduated from the Academy of Arts. Daniel does not have a job yet. I hope he will continue his father’s work.

I am old as the hills, but I’m still healthy, energetic and young in my soul. I’m a very active person and I’m not ready for eternal peace yet. Since the time when Lithuania became independent [see Reestablishment of the Lithuanian Republic] 20, we – having lost belief in communist ideas, a huge multinational socialist state and many other things – gained independence and the freedom of choice. The most important is that Jewish life revived in our country. Many people found themselves. During the postwar period, I, an active member of the Communist Party, couldn’t have thought of marking Sabbath, not working on Saturday, eat matzah on Pesach. I’m currently an active member of the Unified Jewish Community of Lithuania. I sing in the choir of the community. I dance in spite of my age. I take part in all events, mark Sabbath and all Jewish holidays. I’m constantly busy. Apart from social events, I take care of the orchard, planted by Charna and I. I have a lot of friends among the Jews of the community and non-Jews as well. I met a wonderful Russian woman, Kira, in a bus. She is also keen on horticulture. She and I go to the orchard, to the cemetery, to the graves of our close people. I plied Kira with love for the Jewry. She studies Judaism and celebrates Sabbath with us on Friday.

I visited my brother Iosif in Israel. He is the only person, connecting me with my childhood and the past. My brother and I are bonded. We keep in touch in spite of the great distance. I hope to be able to go to Israel over and over again to see my brother.

Glossary:

1 Great Patriotic War

On 22nd June 1941 at 5 o’clock in the morning Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union without declaring war. This was the beginning of the so-called Great Patriotic War. The German blitzkrieg, known as Operation Barbarossa, nearly succeeded in breaking the Soviet Union in the months that followed. Caught unprepared, the Soviet forces lost whole armies and vast quantities of equipment to the German onslaught in the first weeks of the war. By November 1941 the German army had seized the Ukrainian Republic, besieged Leningrad, the Soviet Union's second largest city, and threatened Moscow itself. The war ended for the Soviet Union on 9th May 1945.

2 Revisionist Zionism

The movement founded in 1925 and led by Vladimir Jabotinsky advocated the revision of the principles of Political Zionism developed by Theodor Herzl, the father of Zionism. The main goals of the Revisionists was to put pressure on Great Britain for a Jewish statehood on both banks of the Jordan River, a Jewish majority in Palestine, the reestablishment of the Jewish regiments, and military training for the youth. The Revisionist Zionists formed the core of what became the Herut (Freedom) Party after the Israeli independence. This party subsequently became the central component of the Likud Party, the largest right-wing Israeli party since the 1970s.

3 Bund

The short name of the General Jewish Union of Working People in Lithuania, Poland and Russia, Bund means Union in Yiddish). The Bund was a social democratic organization representing Jewish craftsmen from the WEsthern areas of the Russian Empire. It was founded in Vilnius in 1897. In 1906 it joined the autonomous fraction of the Russian Social Democratic Working Party and took up a Menshevist position. After the Revolution of 1917 the organization split: one part was anti-Soviet power, while the other remained in the Bolsheviks’ Russian Communist Party. In 1921 the Bund dissolved itself in the USSR, but continued to exist in other countries.

4 Tsimes

Stew made usually of carrots, parsnips, or plums with potatoes.

5 Realschule

Secondary school for boys. Students studied mathematics, physics, natural history, foreign languages and drawing. After finishing this school they could enter higher industrial and agricultural educational institutions.

6 Maccabi World Union

International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19th century. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth. In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi. The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

7 Hashomer Hatzair

‘The Young Watchman’; A Zionist-socialist pioneering movement founded in Eastern Europe, Hashomer Hatzair trained youth for kibbutz life and set up kibbutzim in Palestine. During World War II, members were sent to Nazi-occupied areas and became leaders in Jewish resistance groups. After the war, Hashomer Hatzair was active in ‘illegal’ immigration to Palestine.

8 Great Terror (1934-1938)

During the Great Terror, or Great Purges, which included the notorious show trials of Stalin's former Bolshevik opponents in 1936-1938 and reached its peak in 1937 and 1938, millions of innocent Soviet citizens were sent off to labor camps or killed in prison. The major targets of the Great Terror were communists. Over half of the people who were arrested were members of the party at the time of their arrest. The armed forces, the Communist Party, and the government in general were purged of all allegedly dissident persons; the victims were generally sentenced to death or to long terms of hard labor. Much of the purge was carried out in secret, and only a few cases were tried in public ‘show trials’. By the time the terror subsided in 1939, Stalin had managed to bring both the Party and the public to a state of complete submission to his rule. Soviet society was so atomized and the people so fearful of reprisals that mass arrests were no longer necessary. Stalin ruled as absolute dictator of the Soviet Union until his death in March 1953.

9 Occupation of the Baltic Republics (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania)

Although the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact regarded only Latvia and Estonia as parts of the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, according to a supplementary protocol (signed in 28th September 1939) most of Lithuania was also transferred under the Soviets. The three states were forced to sign the ‘Pact of Defense and Mutual Assistance’ with the USSR allowing it to station troops in their territories. In June 1940 Moscow issued an ultimatum demanding the change of governments and the occupation of the Baltic Republics. The three states were incorporated into the Soviet Union as the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics.

10 KGB

The KGB or Committee for State Security was the main Soviet external security and intelligence agency, as well as the main secret police agency from 1954 to 1991.

11 Card system

The food card system regulating the distribution of food and industrial products was introduced in the USSR in 1929 due to extreme deficit of consumer goods and food. The system was cancelled in 1931. In 1941, food cards were reintroduced to keep records, distribute and regulate food supplies to the population. The card system covered main food products such as bread, meat, oil, sugar, salt, cereals, etc. The rations varied depending on which social group one belonged to, and what kind of work one did. Workers in the heavy industry and defense enterprises received a daily ration of 800 g (miners - 1 kg) of bread per person; workers in other industries 600 g. Non-manual workers received 400 or 500 g based on the significance of their enterprise, and children 400 g. However, the card system only covered industrial workers and residents of towns while villagers never had any provisions of this kind. The card system was cancelled in 1947.

12 16th Lithuanian division

It was formed according to a Soviet resolution on 18th December 1941 and consisted of residents of the annexed former Lithuanian Republic. The Lithuanian division consisted of 10.000 people (34,2 percent of whom were Jewish), it was well equipped and was completed by 7th July 1942. In 1943 it took part in the Kursk battle, fought in Belarus and was a part of the Kalinin front. All together it liberated over 600 towns and villages and took 12.000 German soldiers as captives. In summer 1944 it took part in the liberation of Vilnius joining the 3rd Belarusian Front, fought in the Kurland and exterminated the besieged German troops in Memel (Klaipeda). After the victory its headquarters were relocated in Vilnius, in 1945-46 most veterans were demobilized but some officers stayed in the Soviet Army.

13 Kursk battle

The greatest tank battle in the history of World War II, which began on 5th July 1943 and ended eight days later. The biggest tank fight, involving almost 1,200 tanks and mobile cannon units on both sides, took place in Prokhorovka on 12th July and ended with the defeat of the German tank unit.

14 First Baltic Front

‘Front’ was the largest Soviet military formation during WWII; all together 52 ‘fronts’ were established, each bearing the name of a region, city, or another geographical term of their location. The First Baltic Front was established in October 1943 to support operations aimed at the liberation of the Baltic Republics and Belarus; it existed till March 1945.

15 NKVD

People’s Committee of Internal Affairs; it took over from the GPU, the state security agency, in 1934.

16 Victory Day in Russia (9th May)

National holiday to commemorate the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of World War II and honor the Soviets who died in the war.

17 Kaunas ghetto

On 24th June 1941 the Germans captured Kaunas. Two ghettoes were established in the city, a small and a big one, and 48,000 Jews were taken there. Within two and a half months the small ghetto was eliminated and during the ‘Grossaktion’ of 28th-29th October, thousands of the survivors were murdered, including children. The remaining 17,412 people in the big ghetto were mobilized to work. On 27th-28th March 1944 another 18,000 were killed and 4,000 were taken to different camps in July before the Soviet Army captured the city. The total number of people who perished in the Kaunas ghetto was 35,000.

18 Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’

The campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’, i.e. Jews, was initiated in articles in the central organs of the Communist Party in 1949. The campaign was directed primarily at the Jewish intelligentsia and it was the first public attack on Soviet Jews as Jews. ‘Cosmopolitans’ writers were accused of hating the Russian people, of supporting Zionism, etc. Many Yiddish writers as well as the leaders of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested in November 1948 on charges that they maintained ties with Zionism and with American ‘imperialism’. They were executed secretly in 1952. The anti-Semitic Doctors’ Plot was launched in January 1953. A wave of anti-Semitism spread through the USSR. Jews were removed from their positions, and rumors of an imminent mass deportation of Jews to the eastern part of the USSR began to spread. Stalin’s death in March 1953 put an end to the campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’.

19 Doctors’ Plot

The Doctors’ Plot was an alleged conspiracy of a group of Moscow doctors to murder leading government and party officials. In January 1953, the Soviet press reported that nine doctors, six of whom were Jewish, had been arrested and confessed their guilt. As Stalin died in March 1953, the trial never took place. The official paper of the Party, the Pravda, later announced that the charges against the doctors were false and their confessions obtained by torture. This case was one of the worst anti-Semitic incidents during Stalin’s reign. In his secret speech at the Twentieth Party Congress in 1956 Khrushchev stated that Stalin wanted to use the Plot to purge the top Soviet leadership.

20 Reestablishment of the Lithuanian Republic

On 11th March 1990 the Lithuanian State Assembly declared Lithuania an independent republic. The Soviet leadership in Moscow refused to acknowledge the independence of Lithuania and initiated an economic blockade on the country. At the referendum held in February 1991, over 90 percent of the participants (turn out was 84 percent) voted for independence. The wEsthern world finally recognized Lithuanian independence and so did the USSR on 6th September 1991. On 17th September 1991 Lithuania joined the United Nations.

Irene Shein

Irene Shein
Tallinn
Estonia
Interviewer: Ella Levitskaya
Date of the interview: June 2005


Irene Shein lives with her husband in a two-room apartment in a new district of Tallinn. Irene is of average height, plump, but agile. She is quick and I think she does everything very easily. She has bright and vivacious eyes. Her gray hair is cropped. Irene and her husband lived in Tashkent and its influence is noticeable in the style of the apartment. There are a lot knick-knacks, typical for Uzbekistan - bowls, pots with Uzbekistani pattern etc. Irene and her husband Efim are very hospitable and open for communication. I could feel that they are a friendly couple. Both of them had a hard living, but they still rejoice in every coming day, kindness and open-heartedness.

My family background

Growing up

The Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

The deportation of Estonian citizens

The Second World War

After the war

After the fall of the Iron Curtain

Glossary

My family background

Probably in the life of any human being there is a moment, when a person starts taking interest in his roots. In Parnu [120 km from Tallinn] archive a member of the local Jewish religious community named Efroim Shein was mentioned. The entry was made in 1872. He was a great-grandfather of my father. His full name was Haftole-Hertz Efroim. Haftole-Hertz Efroim Shein was buried in Tallinn’s Jewish cemetery. I put down the inscription from his tombstone and a rabbi translated it. The inscription in Ivrit says, word for word: ‘Here a great and wise man, a Torah-follower, is buried.’ He died on the 17th Adar, year 5657, i.e. in 1897 in common chronology. These are just scraps of information.

I know about my father’s family from my grandfather Sholom-Iosif Shein, who was born on 10th May 1866 in the Estonian town of Parnu, which belonged to the Russian empire at that time. I know that my grandfather had a brother named Hari-Moishe and a sister, Tsvirl [Tsviya]. Unfortunately there is hardly anything I know about that family.

My paternal grandmother; Khaya-Leya Shein, nee Teiman, was born on 15th October 1873 in the town of Panevezhis, Lithuania. My great-grandfather’s name was David Teiman. That is all I know about him. My grandparents got married on 2nd September 1892 and their marriage was registered by the rabbi of the town of Parnu. They apparently left the town as all their children were born in the Estonian town of Valga, on the border with Latvia [200 km from Tallinn].

There were six sons and three daughters. The eldest child, Rohe-Gitl, was born in 1893. She was called by the Russian name of Rosa 1. My father’s elder brother was called Efroim, and he was born in 1896. He was named after Great-grandfather. My father was born in 1898, shortly after his grandfather Naftole-Hertz Efroim Shein died. So Father was named Naftole-Hertz. In 1900 Ester was born and Ella followed in 1902. The next son, Leib, was born in 1903 and Abram in 1904. Then came Isroel in 1906 and the youngest, Pesach, was born in 1911.

When Grandfather Sholom-Iosif got married, he made a living on cattle breeding. Then he was involved in timbering. The elder sons, Efroim, my father and Leib did not get secular education, they went only to cheder. They were elder sons and had to work to help their father. They were hard-working. Our family was rather well-heeled, but it was gained by hard labor. The daughters and younger sons got both Jewish and secular education. Though father did not manage to go to lyceum, he knew how to count well, was knowledgeable about timber, graders of wood, measuring timber. He was well up in everything related to work.

The family was very religious. There was a synagogue and a prayer house in Valga. The prayer house was at my grandfather’s place. The kashrut was observed at home. The family followed Jewish traditions. All members of the family went to the synagogue on Sabbath and on Jewish holidays. Yiddish was spoken at home. Everybody spoke good German and Estonian.

At that time there was no anti-Semitism in Estonia. People were appraised by their moral traits and character. Other religions and traditions were respected. Even in the period when Estonia belonged to the Russian empire, there were no pogroms, which were customary for the entire territory of Russia.

All my father’s siblings were very different in their character, but all of them were decent and well-bred. There was no noise, no arguments. All of them grew up loving and respecting their parents, whose word was the law, even when the children reached adulthood. I think that all my aunts and uncles had pre-arranged marriages, which was customary for the Jews.

My father’s eldest sister, Rohe-Gitl, was married to a doctor, Moses Levitin. They had an only son Grigoriy, or Gersh. Rohe-Gitl died at a young age, in 1919. After the time of evacuation her husband moved to Leningrad and died there when he was as old as the hills. Rohe-Gitl’s son was also a doctor and was conferred the title of ‘honored doctor.’ He was single. We didn’t keep in touch with him, and I don’t know about his fate.

Efroim’s wife Roza, or Reize, was a dentist. They had an only daughter, Ronya, who was four years younger than me. Ester married Max Gladkovskiy, a doctor. Ester had two daughters. She and my father were the only ones in the entire family who survived the war. She died in 1985. Her daughters are still alive. Leib had a son, who was approximately of my age. I don’t remember the wives and children of my father’s other brothers. Having got married Father’s sisters were housewives, taking care of the household and children. Three brothers - my father, Efroim and Leib - worked with Grandfather, the rest of the brothers had their own business.

My maternal grandfather, Ilia Goldberg, was from Vitebsk 2. His Jewish name was Ele. My great-grandfather Meyer Goldberg was a Hasid 3. They say he was very handsome. Great-grandmother was petite. She had a strong Belarusian accent. I know about them only from my mother. Grandfather died a long time ago, in the 1910s. It was likely that great-grandmother moved to Riga to her son, my grandfather. She only spoke Yiddish. She knew neither Russian nor German. Her house was at Elizavetinskaya Street in Riga. She was a housekeeper. Mother said that she recognized all bills and receipts by color. Great-grandmother died in the early 1930s, before I was born.

My maternal grandfather was a merchant. He was educated. My maternal grandmother was from Sebezh [Pskov oblast, Russia, on the border of Latvia and Belarus, 500 km from Tallinn]. Her name was Rosa, Jewish name Tsipe-Roha. I don’t know her maiden name. Grandmother came from a rich family. Her father Yankle was a merchant of the 1st Guild 4. My mother’s family lived in Riga.

Grandfather had to take frequent business trips abroad and Grandmother always accompanied him. At customs the officers checked their passports, when they were crossing the border. They often were confused as two names were written in Grandfather’s passport - his secular and his Jewish one: Ilia Mironovich Goldberg, alias Ele Meerovich. His wife’s name also was written in his passport: Rosa Yakovlevna, alias Tsipe-Roha Yankelevna. Grandfather was irritated with that nagging and gave his children only secular names. The eldest daughter was Tatiana, the second son was Solomon. My mother Evgeniya was born in 1903.

Before the Revolution of 1917 5 the family was well-off. Mother and her siblings finished a Russian lyceum. Mother was fluent in Russian and German. She was also pretty good at English and read French books in the original.

Though my mother’s family was secular, Jewish traditions were strictly followed. The food was kosher, Sabbath and Jewish holidays were marked, and my grandparents went to the synagogue on holidays.

During the revolution they lost everything, though the Soviet regime was in Latvia only for a couple of months. The sequestrated property was not returned to the family. Mother’s elder sister Tatiana was a good milliner. After the revolution she left for Berlin and ran a fashion house there. When Hitler came to power 6, Tatiana came back to Riga and started living with Grandmother. She was single.

Mother’s brother Solomon also left for Berlin. He worked as an orderly in the hospital and studied at the medical department of Berlin University. My mother and her parents stayed in Riga. Solomon graduated from university and became a doctor. When the fascists came to power in Germany in 1933, Jews were persecuted and Solomon immigrated to Palestine. There he became a famous gynecologist. He got married to an immigrant from Moscow. Her parents immigrated from Russia after the revolution. She spent her adolescence in Paris. She learned how to play the grand piano. When the fascist dictatorship commenced she left for Israel.

Uncle Solomon’s wife is much younger than he. She was born in 1915. They had one son. When Solomon was alive, she corresponded with him and after his death she kept in touch with his wife. The correspondence was in English. Solomon’s wife is still alive. When her husband was in Israel in the 1990s, he found my aunt. Solomon died in Israel in the middle of the 1980s.

My maternal grandmother Rosa was an educated woman. Grandmother finished lyceum. She was taught French by a French governess. My mother also had a governess, but she was Lett. She raised my mother. When Mother got married, her governess, an elderly lady, stayed in their house with Grandmother.

Mother entered Riga conservatoire, the grand piano department. Of course, it was hard for the family, as they had become much poorer. I don’t know exactly when Grandfather passed away, but he was no longer alive by then. Mother was considerably assisted by Grandmother. She came from a rich family and had some valuable things. Grandmother sold them and paid for my mother’s tuition. Mother also tried to earn some money. She embroidered custom-made linen.

I never asked my parents how they met each other. All I know is that all father’s siblings had pre-arranged marriages. I think my parents also had a pre-arranged marriage. They got married on 2nd February 1930. I don’t know where their wedding took place.

Mother left Riga for the small town of Valga. My paternal grandfather gave them a house as a birthday present. It was located on the same street, where my grandparents’ house was. I spent my childhood in that house. Of course, the mode of life in a small town was different. There were patriarchal rules in the family, according to which the parents were revered. Mother had to call on her mother-in-law just to greet her and ask how she felt. Father was the bread-winner. He worked very hard to maintain the family. Mother was a housewife and practiced playing the piano.

Growing up

I was born on 17th August 1932. I was named Irene. I barely saw Father in my childhood. He left early in the morning and came back late at night, when I was sleeping. He didn’t have a car. He took the horse cart. Village roads were earthed roads and after rain they turned into bog. It was hard to ride on those roads. Father came home worn out. I remember there was a gadget to take off our boots. Rarely did Father have a day off and if so he was just lying on the couch almost all day long, trying to recoup.

He always visited his parents on days-off. Grandmother gave us a ring and asked how all of us were doing. When Father said that everything was OK, she asked him to come over. No matter how exhausted Father was, he went to his parents right away.

Before the wedding my mother had a recess in her studies at the conservatoire. She finished it when she lived in Valga. There was no grand piano at home, but there was a grand piano in a window case in a store. Mother went to that store and asked the owner if she could play that piano. Later, Father bought her a piano.

Though we were rather well-heeled, my parents raised me rather rigidly. I couldn’t choose dishes at the table. I was supposed to eat what was laid on the table. If I didn’t like it, I could choose not to eat and stay hungry. I remember when I was about two years old, I said that I ‘wanted’ some dish and Father told me to leave the table. I was supposed to say ‘I would like.’ I was not allowed to be finical.

Later, when I was in exile, I was grateful to my parents for raising me strictly and teaching me to eat what I was given. Rotten potatoes and soup from grass were a good meal for me in exile. Father had trouble with his stomach as he was often on the road and ate dry food. After getting married Mother always cooked oat gruel and made sure that he followed a diet.

My parents paid a lot of attention to my education. First, I had a baby-sitter, then they hired a governess. During my childhood, my parents and governess spoke only German with me. I easily learned German and Estonian, which was spoken by our maid, who was Estonian. That good woman was very kind and let me away with all kinds of pranks, which I wouldn’t have with my mother.

Later, Mother started speaking Russian with me for me to learn that language. I spoke broken Russian. It was hard for me to pronounce certain sounds. I had a Russian tutor who came to our house. Finally I had a good command of Russian. When I turned five, there was a ballet stand made and I was taught ballet dancing. Before I went to school, Mother took me to a French teacher.

I started reading pretty early. I enjoyed lying down on the couch and read a book. When my parents noticed that I was not merely looking at the pictures, they started buying me books. They ordered Russian books in the USSR. I was so anxious to get a new parcel with books. I could easily read in any of the languages I was taught.

I liked visiting my grandmother in Riga with my mother. When Grandmother left the house on Elizavetinskaya Street, it looked too spacious. They moved to another house and all books were taken. Grandmother had a large library. In Riga, Mother and Tatiana went out while I stayed with Grandmother. She took out her bands and ostrich feathers from the dancing parties of her youth and let me play with those things. I remember that Grandmother had a large table set of dishes with monograms. When we came over, it was on the table all the time.

Grandmother’s sister Sofia lived in Riga. Her husband was a military doctor and took part in World War I. Their son lived in Israel. Aunt Sofia had a fashionable house. She arranged receptions there and invited writers and actors. They were rich. They had a carriage with harnessed horses. I remember the cabman helped Aunt Sofia get off the carriage. Mother sometimes took me to Aunt Sofia’s place.

My parents went to the grandparents on all Jewish holidays. All siblings, who lived in Valga, got together there. It was a rule. They came to pray in the prayer house, which was also located in grandfather’s place. I still keep my father’s prayer book. Grandfather died in 1939. He was buried in accordance with the Jewish rite in the Jewish cemetery of Valga. After his death the holidays were marked in the house of Father’s elder brother Efroim. Grandmother died a year later, i.e., in 1940. She was buried next to Grandfather. They didn’t know at that time that in about a year there would be no serenity in the family.

The Soviet Invasion of the Baltics

Mother told me a story of her visit to a milliner in Riga before she got married. Mother’s dress was not ready to try on and the milliner suggested that my mother should go to the fortune-teller, who lived nearby, and meanwhile she would finish her work. Mother went there. The fortune-teller told her that she would be married soon, but would live with her husband only for ten years. Mother had been waiting for that term and finally it happened – the Soviet regime came to power.

My parents were strongly against the annexation of Estonia to the USSR [ 7. How could they perceive it differently? Mother said that either in 1917 or 1918 when the Soviet regime was established in Riga, products vanished from the stores – there was frozen cabbage instead. When the Soviets left, things changed. Mother remembered that and we had some products stored in our house. Then searches commenced. They came to us as well as and took all excess products that we had. We could have even been arrested. At that time God had mercy on us.

First they had some people move in our house. Then we were evicted and given another place to live. The house we moved into was in front of our former place. Families of NKVD officers 8 and the commandant of the town lived there. My parents didn’t communicate with them. The NKVD office was in our former house. There was a large basement for food storage, and the NKVD kept the people they arrested in that basement.

My father was also arrested. It was a real extortion: they put a pistol to my father’s head and had him write a note to Mother. The text of the note was dictated by NKVD officers. It was written there that my mother had to give them all the money and precious things we had. Mother didn’t have anything really precious. She had a wedding and an engagement ring, a mascot given to her by her parents and a small gold watch. There was sterling silverware - knives and forks. Mother gave all that to the NKVD, but father was not released.

Then Mother was arrested as well. One of my mother’s pals was in the house, when she was being arrested. That lady took me with her. I was really worried for my parents. I had boils all over my body as a result of all the stress. My skin was peeling off. I stayed with my mother’s pal for a while. Then my parents were released from prison.

In 1940 I entered a Russian school. I went to the 2nd grade right away. I vaguely remember that period of time. I only studied there for a year.

The deportation of Estonian citizens

I vividly remember the day of 13th June 1941. Mother went to the bathhouse with her friend. On their way they were passing our former house, where the premises of the NKVD were located at that time. NKVD officers in blue caps were crowding by the entrance. I remember Mother said that they would be really busy that night. Unfortunately she was right. The day of 14th June 1941 is remembered by all Estonians as the night of deportation of Estonian citizens 9.

They came to us early in the morning. NKVD officers informed us that our family was to be deported. We were blamed of being rich, ‘socially dangerous elements.’ We were given half an hour to pack our things. We were allowed to take only one suitcase and a blanket. Mother was at a loss and even forgot to take money with her. Father was taken away at once and we were not allowed to see him again.

Mother and I were told to get in the car with some people and we were taken to the train station. There were cattle trains. There were guards by the cars. We were squeezed in the car. There were double-tiered bunks along the walls of the car. There was no wash basin and toilet. There were only women with children and elderly people. Men were to take other cars, headed for the Gulag 10.

We met Rosa, Uncle Efroim’s wife, and her daughter Ronya. They told us about Uncle Efroim’s arrest. Then we found out that another one of my father’s brother, Isroel, was also sent to the Gulag. On our way we also met Father’s cousin, who was to go to the Gulag, too. There was a train car in front of us and we saw him. We were not allowed to leave the train. There was a convoy between the trains. Uncle asked the soldiers to give us some money. He stuck some banknotes on the bayonet and the soldier pushed them through our window.

There were Estonians, Jews and Russians among those people heading into exile. People were not selected by nationality, but by social origin and income. The lists were compiled beforehand by local communists. It was obvious that some people were included in the list for merely being in the black book of the people who made the lists.

It is hard for me to say how long we were on the road. It seemed forever. Then we got off the train and took a barge. We went down the river in an unknown direction. Deported Lithuanians were on the barge as well. Next to us there was a large family of Lithuanian Jews - husband, wife and their children, who were of different age. Father suggested to Mother and Aunt Rosa to stick together in exile as it would be easier for us. My mother and aunt refused hoping that their exile area would not be far from their husbands.

We arrived at a tiny settlement called Vavilovka, in Bakhchar district of Tomsk oblast [3300 km from Moscow]. It was the place of our exile. Aunt Rosa and her daughter were not far from us, in the adjacent settlement. We were housed with a family. We were given a small, unfurnished room. We slept on our suitcase. Mother was sent to work in the field. Back at home Mother had never been involved in any physical work. She was a pianist and she took good care of her hands. Here she had to work from dawn till night. Mother’s hands were chafed and grazed.

We were terribly starving. We barely ate bread in the first years of exile. Mother sold those few things that we had taken with us. When we had nothing left to sell, she sold half of her coat. She had a long coarse coat. She made a jacket out of it and sold the remainder to a peasant lady, who made a skirt from it. I could not go to school as I had nothing to put on and I had to stay in. I didn’t have any overcoat.

It was a settlement in Taiga. Vavilovka had existed for only ten years. It was mostly populated with Russians, exiled from the USSR during that time [the time of the Great Terror] 11. After 1941 a few Estonian families came there as well. Mother and I were the only Jews in the settlement. First, we were helped by one exiled Estonian lady. She gave me a chunk of bread a couple of times.

Then Mother and I gradually managed to settle. We followed the example of others exiled – we planted vegetables on a small plot of land. When I grew older I went to people to dig their kitchen gardens. I was fed for work and given a bucket of potatoes and a bowl of sauerkraut. Local people planted flax and span threads from that.

Mother and I learned how to knit jackets from those flaxen threads and took orders. We were paid for that. But still, we lived from hand to mouth. Mother didn’t throw away potato peelings. We ate them. In the summer she collected ‘orach,’ a type of grass. We boiled it, made gruel out of it and added it to one potato. Then we used the cooker and made fritters from that ‘orach.’

A commandant was in charge of the exiled in the settlement. Exiled Estonians didn’t know how to address him. Then they decided that if he was from the USSR, they should call him comrade. So some of the guys said ‘comrade commandant’ and he replied, ‘We are not comrades to you. Your comrades are the wolves in the forest.’

The work in the field was seasonal and when it was over, Mother and other Estonian ladies were sent to saw logs. Now tractors have diesel fuel, but at that time instead of fuel tanks there were tanks where small birch pieces were put. They burned and produced the heat which made the tractor work. There was a daily ration. Each woman was supposed to saw a certain number of boxes of birch pieces.

There were severe winters in Tomsk oblast and all women were in thin footwear, as they had left their homes in the summer, on 14th June. In another winter women dug wells. There were few men in the settlement. It was the time of the Great Patriotic War 12 and all of them were in the lines. Only the wounded or crippled came back from the front. One of these men dug wells in the settlement. He put dug clay in a bale, suspended to a winch. Women were rotating that winch, took out heave bale, emptied it and put it down. They were lucky if it was blue clay. It was used as soap, for washing, bleaching the walls.

Then I started working. From spring till fall I worked in the fields during the harvest season. When the season was over, I worked as a mailwoman. I had to collect the mail in the regional center of Bakhchar and distribute it to the houses in Vavilovka.

There were cases when Estonians escaped from exile. I was called to the commandant and he demanded that I should report on those who were on the point of escaping. I never reported on anything or anybody.

I didn’t go to school. Those who didn’t work, weren’t given bread and that meant – dying from hunger. Mother studied with me in accordance with school syllabus. Even when both of us worked, we didn’t have enough food to eat. We were rescued by Uncle Solomon. Mother remembered the address of her brother in Israel and wrote him a letter. She started getting parcels from him. Uncle could not send us parcels in his name. Nobody would ever have given them to us. There was some Jewish organization, which collected and distributed parcels. I don’t remember what it was called. We managed to survive only owing to those parcels.

There were boxes with power soup, grains, soap, threads, needles. Of course, those parcels were opened up and checked. I don’t know if it was done on purpose but the packages with soup were open and mixed with soap. We ate it all the same and it tasted good to us. We sold threads and needles and exchanged them for products.

There were even clothes in the last parcel. Some of the clothes had been stolen, but still we got something. Probably Mother was told by Solomon where Father was. She started corresponding with Dad. The letters were rare and short, but still we knew he was alive. It meant a lot to us. He served his term in the camp, located in Sos’va, Sverdlovsk oblast.

The Second World War

We knew about the war. We followed the events. There was a loud-speaker in the settlement. People clustered around it to listen to round-ups. There was even a local paper. We were looking forward to victory. All of us thought that we would be released from exile after the war was over, but nothing changed for us when the victory came on 9th May 1945 13.

Uncle told us about many of our family members who perished. My father’s brothers Leib, Abram and Pesach, their wives and children were shot in Estonia. Only Father’s sister Ester, who was in evacuation with her family, survived. The family of my father’s sister Ella was exterminated in Riga. Grandmother Rosa and Mother’s sister Tatiana and many relatives of Grandmother who lived in Riga, were also murdered. Who knows whether they were shot by Germans, or by Estonians and Letts who started exterminating Jews before the arrival of the Germans… Estonia was one the first among the occupied countries, reporting to Hitler that no Jews were left on its territory [cf. Judenfrei] 14.

I am sure if we hadn’t been deported on 14th June 1941, Estonians wouldn’t have helped the Germans and wouldn’t have accepted them as the liberators from the Soviet oppression. Many Estonians suffered during deportation and blindly hated the Soviets, being ready to fulfill any orders just to get rid of the Soviet regime. We should not forget about that either. And Jews probably wouldn’t have been appalled by the Soviet regime more than by fascists, and many of them would have left and survived. Things would have been vastly different … What can I say about that. Things happened the way they did.

After the war

My father’s other two brothers died in the Gulag. We only know the date when the eldest brother, Efroim died –14th June 1942. The circumstances are not known – emaciation, disease, accident or murder. We do not know anything about Isroel. All we know is that he didn’t survive the Gulag.

Men were sentenced for a certain term. Father was sentenced to six years of Gulag, without trial, and in 1947 his term was over. He was released from the Gulag camp and went to Estonia. In 1948 there was a decree of the Soviet government to exempt from exile those who were exiled being minors. I was also given an exemption. Only mother stayed in Siberia. She was on permanent exile and could only hope for a miracle.

I and another Estonian girl, Leya, who was six years older than I, went to Tomsk. We walked to Tomsk in deep snow, covering a distance of 250 kilometers. There was Taiga along the way. There was an old man with a sleigh in front of us. A wooden case with our clothes was on that sleigh. We couldn’t go on the sleigh all the time, as the horse was lean and it wouldn’t have been able to bear the extra load. From time to time, when we were too weary, he let us go on the sleigh.

Liya is still alive. We keep in touch via the phone. Her acquaintances lived in Tomsk. We stayed at their place for a couple of days and then went to Novosibirsk. It was easier to get home from there. When we were leaving, we left some money on the table for accommodation. But they found us at the train station and returned the money. So we reached Novosibirsk. The train station was huge, but there were throngs of people, and there was no space. Many people were coming back from evacuation. There were no tickets, but my fellow traveler managed to get some for us somehow. We reached Moscow by train and from there we went to Tallinn. This happened on 4th February 1948.

Father wasn’t allowed to live in Valga. He settled in the small town of Johvi. I knew the address and found him. He worked as a procurer of agricultural products. Estonians received him very well and helped him a lot. Estonian neighbors  from Valga gave Father a lot of family pictures. When we were liberated, the new hosts of our apartment threw our pictures on the garbage heap in the yard. Neighbors collected them and gave them to Father when he came back home.

I went to school, Father worked. Our distant relative Maria Sorkina, who lived in Tallinn, helped us a lot. She was not our consanguine; she was a relative of Rosa, the wife of Father’s elder brother Efroim. Maria and her husband didn’t have children and she was very attached to her niece Ronya and to me. When I was in exile, Aunt Maria sent letters to me and supported us the best way she could, though it could have done harm to her and her husband. We corresponded with Mother and sent her parcels. She wrote in her letters that she was an accounting clerk at dairy farm. We did not see an end to her exile.

In 1948 the campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’ started in the USSR 15. People were fired, arrested, exiled and sent to the Gulag. There were rumors that those who had come back from the Gulag, would be sent there once again. Once I went to Tallinn to see Aunt Maria. She told me that at night apartments would be searched and told me to spend the night in the place of pals of hers. Then we found out for sure: that night many apartments were searched by NKVD officers.

There was a Jewish family from Pervomaysk [Ukraine, 500 km south of Kiev], which lived in Johvi. Both spouses had lost families during the war and they got married. I don’t know how they came to Johvi. Of course, it was hard for them to live in a strange town, and Father helped them. He wasn’t a local, but he came from Estonia. They gave Father the address of their pals in Tashkent and he decided to go there to avoid further repressions. I think that decision saved us from another exile as many people were exiled again.

For a while we stayed at the place recommended by these people from Johvi. Then we had our own lodging. Father found a job at a timber storage facility. The person in charge of the timber storage facility was not knowledgeable about timber, but Father had practical knowledge, though he was not educated. He knew what he was doing. Father was very consistent and accurate.

Fortunately, Father had a common passport, without restrictions [cf. Passport 24] 16. I got my first passport in Tashkent. We didn’t tell even our closest friends about our past, our time in exile. We understood that it would be safer for us. My bosom friend told me many years later that she had guessed what kind of past I had, but asked me no questions. We kept writing to Mother, but we didn’t send the letters directly to her, but to some of the acquaintances, so as not to attract attention.

We lived with the family of a cashier in Tashkent. She told me that I could try working as an accountant assistant. Gradually I was well up in book-keeping and started working independently. Then I entered the evening department of Tashkent Financial College. Of course, it was hard to combine my studies with work. When I was going to enter the college, I was told at work that my studies should not interfere with my work. There was a lot of work and often I came home with a large case of documents in order to work at night.

I was too pressed for time and didn’t communicate with Father much. Sometimes I tried to ask him about the camp, but he didn’t tell me anything, avoiding the subject. That is why there is hardly anything I know about that period of his life. My cousin Ronya came over to us and often asked him about the camp. My father was the only uncle, who survived. She didn’t remember her father.

Ronya and her mother remained in exile. She was too small to leave the exile. Their life was very hard, but in spite of that she entered Tomsk Polytechnic Institute. She graduated from it and became a construction engineer. At that time Ronya didn’t return to Estonia, but stayed in Tomsk. She got married there, gave birth to a daughter, worked.

She didn’t know anything about her father and often asked about him when she came to us. Father was at a loss for words, but still told her something at times. Ronya asked if she could find her father’s tomb and my dad said that it was impossible.

I know that a doctor from Chernovtsi, Rozental, worked in Sos’evo as a nurse. That lady saved my father’s life. He had problems with his stomach. When he came to the camp, where even healthy people died of hunger and beriberi, he started getting sick. He was sent to the aid station, when he was in the severest condition. Rozental did her best for Father to convalesce. She even managed to get cod-liver oil for him. Father was lucky to get better.

I am still grateful to that wonderful lady. I still keep her in my heart. I understand that most likely she is not alive any longer, taking into account her age, but I would be happy if some of her kin or friends would write to me. I would be happy if that happened.

Stalin died in 1953. Many people cried at that time, mourned over him as if he was a relative. Both Father and I understood what a dreadful person he was. Stalin knew and approved of all things happening in the USSR. Of course, all things were done as per his order. Stalin’s death was not a sorrow for us. We didn’t think that Mother would be released after his death. We didn’t believe in a miracle.

In 1955 I went to see Mother. She lived in the district center Bakhchar, 250 kilometers away. I went there by plane. There was an old lady next to me who was constantly telling me how scared she was. I had to go to the regional prosecution office and get the permit to visit my mother. I remember entering through the thick metallic doors of that office. Suddenly I was frightened – I was not sure whether they would let me out again.

In the end, I was permitted to stay with Mother. She felt unwell, but tried not to show it. I went to see the commandant, who remembered me working there as a girl and carrying heavy bales of mail from Bakhchar. I said that Mother was alone, sick, and asked him to release her before her term was over. Mother was to go through medical examination and in 1956 she was declared as disabled and released from exile. Mother came to us in Tashkent. She lived with us and worked in a kindergarten.

Rehabilitations commenced 17 after the Twentieth Party Congress 18, when Nikita Khrushchev 19 held his speech. People found out about Stalin’ s trespassing and crimes, committed as per his order. Those who had been innocently convicted were exonerated. But at that time none of our family felt that. The pandemonium machine of the KGB 20 worked very well and all archives were kept.

Only in 1993 Mother and I received rehabilitation certificates. It was written in my certificate that I, Irene Shein, was exiled from the town of Valga, Estonia, without trial and was in special exile in Bakhchar district of Tomsk oblast in the period from 14th June 1941 till 25th January 1948. In accordance with the law of the Estonian SSR as of 7th December 1988 on extrajudicial mass repressions in the Soviet Union in the period of 1940 – 1950 I was fully exonerated.

The years in exile were considered in my labor experience – one year in exile was recognized as three years of experience. But nobody could return me the years of my childhood and adolescence…

I worked as a chief accountant for many years. My work was appreciated. I worked in the Central Design and Construction Bureau of the Fish Industry of the Uzbek SSR. Everybody treated me very well there. I was awarded with prizes and given bonuses. I felt no anti-Semitism, neither at work nor at home. Nobody paid attention to nationality. In general, the population of Tashkent treated Jews very well. They didn’t care what kind of nationality the person was, it was really important whether the person deserved to be respected. People were addressed like: sister, brother, father… There were all kinds of things at work, but nobody ever mentioned my nationality.

I had a pre-arranged marriage with my first husband, Moses Melamed. Moses was from the Moldavian town of Dubossary. He was born in 1927. We had a true Jewish wedding – with a rabbi and under the chuppah. People stuck to Jewish traditions in Tashkent. Synagogues were open. Boys were circumcised. There was a Jewish orchestra playing at Jewish weddings. The musicians were very good.

In 1960 our daughter Elena was born. My husband and I didn’t stay together for a long time. He had a hard character. He worked at the plant and was too fond of the bottle. After we got divorced, my daughter and I lived with my parents. I know that my first husband immigrated to Israel in the 1970s and died there.

My second husband was Efim Brener. We met at work. Efim was a very good person. Life was hard on him, but it did not make him embittered. Efim was born in the village of Zagnitkov, Vinnitsa oblast, in 1926. His father was called Semion Brener and his mother’s name was Elka. Efim was the eldest child. He had three younger sisters –Dora, Sarah and Raya.

Efim didn’t even manage to finish the 7th grade. When the war was unleashed, the Germans captured Vinnitsa oblast and then the military enlistment office told all the young guys who had not reached drafting age to get together and leave the place in order for them not to be captured by the Germans. They walked for 700 kilometers. They were trying to keep away from the Germans, outrunning German columns. They reached some station, where they were supposed to be taken to Middle Asia. Their train was bombed. Many guys perished and the team leaders couldn’t find them. They remained without documents as those had been taken by team leaders. Finally somebody told them to be on their own as their rescue was up them. Some of the guys came back home, others were killed by the Germans.

Efim decided to go to Kazakhstan, where his countrymen lived. In 1943, when he was 17, he left for the army as a volunteer. When Efim was to leave his village, his father saw him off and walked for 40 kilometers with him. The father wanted to get evacuated with the family. They agreed to meet in Tashkent at the place of their acquaintances. The family didn’t manage to get evacuated. It is not clear who killed them – Germans, Romanians or local people. All of Efim’s relatives perished.

Efim served in the army until 1948. He finished military school. He wanted to go on with his studies, but he was supposed to go to town for that. He didn’t have the opportunity to do that and so he requested to be demobilized from the army. He already knew that his family had perished. Efim was overwhelmed with grief and didn’t want to go back to the place, where his loved ones were killed. He left for Tashkent.

He didn’t have a place to live. He didn’t acquire any profession, so he was on odd jobs – apprentice in a shop of headwear production. Later he became the foreman and finally he was in charge of the shop. Then Efim was in the trade business as a supplier. Later he was in charge of the warehouse. He worked there for six years. It was hard for him to work in that field as there were a lot of abuses, so he went to work at a bakery plant. He worked there for 23 years and also retired from that job.

Efim got married after he had been in Tashkent for a year. He has two sons. Semion was born in 1949 and Edward in 1952. His elder son graduated from Tashkent University, the younger one from the Railroad Institute. Then they were drafted for compulsory service in the army and left for Israel afterwards. Efim’s wife died and he remained by himself. We got married in 1977. We are still together. My husband is a very close person to me. He is kind and reliable.

When people started immigrating to Israel, I was happy for those who were leaving, but I could not leave. My parents were old and unwell. I couldn’t leave them and they couldn’t go with me.

Having finished school my daughter entered Tashkent University, the Faculty of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics. During holidays Elena went to Tomsk to see my cousin Ronya, with whom we had kept in touch for many years. Ronya introduced Elena to her future husband, Boris Swarzman. Boris’s father had also been in exile. Boris was born in Tomsk in 1950. He graduated from the Faculty of Applied mathematics and Mechanics of Tomsk University. They got married after Elena graduated from the university, in 1983. Elena moved to her husband in Tomsk. In 1985 their daughter Irina, or Inna, was born.

When Father was alive, we observed all Jewish traditions and marked Jewish holidays. Each Pesach my father led the seder. When Efim and I got married, his sons with their families and our little grandson Efim joined us for seder. He remembers how my father was reading from an ancient book. After Father died we did not hold seder any longer. We always bought matzah, cooked Jewish dishes. Efim went to the synagogue.

My parents probably had a chance to come back to Estonia earlier, but Father didn’t even want to hear of it. He said that he had to leave his house twice in Estonia and he was not willing to do that again. When he was dying and losing his memory he said, ‘I want to go home.’ And where was that home? Maybe it was in Estonia. Father died on 12th May 1985. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Tashkent in accordance with the Jewish rite. An old sophisticated man carried out the ritual and he knew how things were to be done.

Mother survived Father by 14 years. Until the last moment of her life she had a clear mind and wonderful memory. Mother died on 12th February 1999. She was buried next to Father. She died on Friday evening, on Sabbath. It was hard to find Jews who would do everything in accordance with the ritual on that day. But still, she was buried according to the Jewish rite. They had a common tombstone.

After my parents’ death my husband went to the synagogue for a year and ordered Kaddish for them. My husband and I went to the synagogue on the day of the death of our parents. We brought vodka and honey cake for people to have a drink and commemorate the deceased after prayer. We marked holidays the way we did when they were alive.

After the fall of the Iron Curtain

After the breakup of the USSR [in 1991] our live in Tashkent was harder. We always had so many friends, but later there were less and less. Factories and plants were broke, the production was idle and people started leaving the place. We started losing friends and feared that we would be lonely. and the older you get, the harder it is to make new friends. It was hard physically and materially. It wasn’t an easy decision for us to move.

In 1999 our daughter and her family moved to Tallinn. In spite of the fact that she was born in Tashkent, she was the daughter of an exiled and was entitled to Estonian citizenship. My daughter and son-in-law work in Russian schools. They don’t know Estonian, and I don’t think it is right. Of course, it is hard, but you can’t succeed, if you don’t try.

My granddaughter had finished nine grades before they moved to Estonia. She had to go to the 8th grade in Tallinn, as she didn’t know Estonian, and final exams in school were in Estonian. She studied Estonian for a year, her score was good enough and she was transferred to the 9th grade. The 9th grade is the final one in Estonia. By the time she had finished school her score in Estonian was about 100, which was the highest. Of course she has an accent, as it is hard to get rid of it. Inna finished school with distinction and entered the IT department of Tallinn Polytechnic University. That year she was transferred to the second course as she did well.

My husband and I moved to Tallinn in 2000. We sold our house in Tashkent and bought an apartment in a new district of Tallinn. Of course, it was easier for us. The district, where we are living, has very good infrastructure. Everything is close by: the polyclinic, pharmacy, post-office and stores. We feel independent.

Life in Estonia is well organized. The Estonian government is very benevolent to my husband, who went to the motherland of his exiled wife. My husband had a high pension, but Estonia and Uzbekistan didn’t have any agreements, so his pension wasn’t considered here. But he was given a pension here, even a card for free medical treatment and discounts for medicine. It is really important at our age. My husband and I had to go through difficult operations here. Efim has a permanent residential permit, which is difficult to get here. The state is supporting us. None of us regrets leaving Tashkent.

Twice a week Efim goes to the synagogue, to the religious Jewish community 21. He prays and communicates with people. I rarely leave home and it is pretty hard for me. I always go to the synagogue on the commemoration day of my parents, it is sacred for me. Of course, it is hard for both of us that the graves of our loved ones remained in Tashkent. We will probably never have a chance to go there again. There is a memorable plaque in the synagogue. People can order a block there, where parents’ and relatives’ names are written. It is pretty expensive, 1000 krones [about USD80], but I put one for my parents and grandparents there. It is memorable. Efim put one for his parents there, too.

We always attend meetings held annually on 14th June, the day of deportation. We also mark Jewish holidays. We keep in touch with the Uzbek community. It is rather small in Tallinn. There are very few Uzbeks there. Many people go there because they used to live in Uzbekistan. We also follow traditions of  Uzbekistan, as it has become a second motherland for both of us. Uzbeks saved me – gave me lodging, work and skills. I lived in Tashkent for 50 years. It was a long and happy life.

The chairman of the community, a pure Uzbek, preserves all Uzbek traditions and one of them is to treat elderly people with respect. We are always invited there and we feel the warmth. The community is not funded to hand out treats. We have a potluck party, that means that everybody brings what he has. We sit at the table and talk. We are grateful to the fate for being alive, having good children and grandchildren, being together. That is really a lot.


Glossary:

1 Common name

Russified or Russian first names used by Jews in everyday life and adopted in official documents. The Russification of first names was one of the manifestations of the assimilation of Russian Jews at the turn of the 19th and 20th century. In some cases only the spelling and pronunciation of Jewish names was russified (e.g. Isaac instead of Yitskhak; Boris instead of Borukh), while in other cases traditional Jewish names were replaced by similarly sounding Russian names (e.g. Eugenia instead of Ghita; Yury instead of Yuda). When state anti-Semitism intensified in the USSR at the end of the 1940s, most Jewish parents stopped giving their children traditional Jewish names to avoid discrimination.

2 Vitebsk

Provincial town in the Russian Empire, near the Baltic Republics, with 66,000 inhabitants at the end of the 19th century; birthplace of Russian Jewish painter Marc Chagall (1887-1985).

3 Hasid

Follower of the Hasidic movement, a Jewish mystic movement founded in the 18th century that reacted against Talmudic learning and maintained that God's presence was in all of one's surroundings and that one should serve God in one's every deed and word. The movement provided spiritual hope and uplifted the common people. There were large branches of Hasidic movements and schools throughout Eastern Europe before World War II, each following the teachings of famous scholars and thinkers. Most had their own customs, rituals and life styles. Today there are substantial Hasidic communities in New York, London, Israel and Antwerp.

4 Guild I

In tsarist Russia merchants belonged to Guild I, II or III. Merchants of Guild I were allowed to trade with foreign merchants, while the others were allowed to trade only within Russia.

5 Russian Revolution of 1917

Revolution in which the tsarist regime was overthrown in the Russian Empire and, under Lenin, was replaced by the Bolshevik rule. The two phases of the Revolution were: February Revolution, which came about due to food and fuel shortages during World War I, and during which the tsar abdicated and a provisional government took over. The second phase took place in the form of a coup led by Lenin in October/November (October Revolution) and saw the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.

6 Hitler's rise to power

In the German parliamentary elections in January 1933, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) won one-third of the votes. On 30th January 1933 the German president swore in Adolf Hitler, the party's leader, as chancellor. On 27th February 1933 the building of the Reichstag (the parliament) in Berlin was burned down. The government laid the blame with the Bulgarian communists, and a show trial was staged. This served as the pretext for ushering in a state of emergency and holding a re-election. It was won by the NSDAP, which gained 44% of the votes, and following the cancellation of the communists' votes it commanded over half of the mandates. The new Reichstag passed an extraordinary resolution granting the government special legislative powers and waiving the constitution for 4 years. This enabled the implementation of a series of moves that laid the foundations of the totalitarian state: all parties other than the NSDAP were dissolved, key state offices were filled by party luminaries, and the political police and the apparatus of terror swiftly developed.

7 Occupation of the Baltic Republics (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania)

Although the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact regarded only Latvia and Estonia as parts of the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, according to a supplementary protocol (signed in 28th September 1939) most of Lithuania was also transferred under the Soviets. The three states were forced to sign the 'Pact of Defense and Mutual Assistance' with the USSR allowing it to station troops in their territories. In June 1940 Moscow issued an ultimatum demanding the change of governments and the occupation of the Baltic Republics. The three states were incorporated into the Soviet Union as the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics.

8 NKVD

People’s Committee of Internal Affairs; it took over from the GPU, the state security agency, in 1934.

9 Deportations from the Baltics (1940-1953)

After the Soviet Union occupied the three Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) in June 1940 as a part of establishing the Soviet system, mass deportation of the local population began. The victims of these were mainly but not exclusively those unwanted by the regime: the local bourgeoisie and the previously politically active strata. Deportations to remote parts of the Soviet Union continued up until the death of Stalin. The first major wave of deportation took place between 11th and 14th June 1941, when 36,000, mostly politically active people were deported. Deportations were reintroduced after the Soviet Army recaptured the three countries from Nazi Germany in 1944. Partisan fights against the Soviet occupiers were going on all up to 1956, when the last squad was eliminated. Between June 1948 and January 1950, in accordance with a Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR under the pretext of 'grossly dodged from labor activity in the agricultural field and led anti-social and parasitic mode of life' from Latvia 52,541, from Lithuania 118,599 and from Estonai 32,450 people were deported. The total number of deportees from the three republics amounted to 203,590. Among them were entire Lithuanian families of different social strata (peasants, workers, intelligentsia), everybody who was able to reject or deemed capable to reject the regime. Most of the exiled died in the foreign land. Besides, about 100,000 people were killed in action and in fusillade for being members of partisan squads and some other 100,000 were sentenced to 25 years in camps.

10 Gulag

The Soviet system of forced labor camps in the remote regions of Siberia and the Far North, which was first established in 1919. However, it was not until the early 1930s that there was a significant number of inmates in the camps. By 1934 the Gulag, or the Main Directorate for Corrective Labor Camps, then under the Cheka's successor organization the NKVD, had several million inmates. The prisoners included murderers, thieves, and other common criminals, along with political and religious dissenters. The Gulag camps made significant contributions to the Soviet economy during the rule of Stalin. Conditions in the camps were extremely harsh. After Stalin died in 1953, the population of the camps was reduced significantly, and conditions for the inmates improved somewhat.

11 Great Terror (1934-1938)

During the Great Terror, or Great Purges, which included the notorious show trials of Stalin's former Bolshevik opponents in 1936-1938 and reached its peak in 1937 and 1938, millions of innocent Soviet citizens were sent off to labor camps or killed in prison. The major targets of the Great Terror were communists. Over half of the people who were arrested were members of the party at the time of their arrest. The armed forces, the Communist Party, and the government in general were purged of all allegedly dissident persons; the victims were generally sentenced to death or to long terms of hard labor. Much of the purge was carried out in secret, and only a few cases were tried in public 'show trials'. By the time the terror subsided in 1939, Stalin had managed to bring both the Party and the public to a state of complete submission to his rule. Soviet society was so atomized and the people so fearful of reprisals that mass arrests were no longer necessary. Stalin ruled as absolute dictator of the Soviet Union until his death in March 1953.

12 Great Patriotic War

On 22nd June 1941 at 5 o'clock in the morning Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union without declaring war. This was the beginning of the so-called Great Patriotic War. The German blitzkrieg, known as Operation Barbarossa, nearly succeeded in breaking the Soviet Union in the months that followed. Caught unprepared, the Soviet forces lost whole armies and vast quantities of equipment to the German onslaught in the first weeks of the war. By November 1941 the German army had seized the Ukrainian Republic, besieged Leningrad, the Soviet Union's second largest city, and threatened Moscow itself. The war ended for the Soviet Union on 9th May 1945.

13 Victory Day in Russia (9th May)

National holiday to commemorate the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of World War II and honor the Soviets who died in the war.

14 Judenfrei (Judenrein)

German for 'free (purified) of Jews'. A term created by the Nazis in Germany in connection with the plan entitled 'The Final Solution to the Jewish Question', the aim of which was defined as 'the creation of a Europe free of Jews'. The term 'Judenrein'/'Judenfrei' in Nazi terminology referred to the extermination of the Jews and described an area (a town or a region), from which the entire Jewish population had been deported to extermination camps or forced labor camps. The term was, particularly in occupied Poland, an established part of the official and unofficial Nazi language.

15 Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’

The campaign against 'cosmopolitans', i.e. Jews, was initiated in articles in the central organs of the Communist Party in 1949. The campaign was directed primarily at the Jewish intelligentsia and it was the first public attack on Soviet Jews as Jews. 'Cosmopolitans' writers were accused of hating the Russian people, of supporting Zionism, etc. Many Yiddish writers as well as the leaders of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee were arrested in November 1948 on charges that they maintained ties with Zionism and with American 'imperialism'. They were executed secretly in 1952. The anti-Semitic Doctors' Plot was launched in January 1953. A wave of anti-Semitism spread through the USSR. Jews were removed from their positions, and rumors of an imminent mass deportation of Jews to the eastern part of the USSR began to spread. Stalin's death in March 1953 put an end to the campaign against 'cosmopolitans.'

16 Passport 24

Such passports were issued to people that authorities didn't put full trust into: they were former political prisoners or those that had recently arrived in the USSR, etc. There was a note in such passports stating that the owner of that passport was not allowed to reside in the 24 biggest towns of the USSR.

17 Rehabilitation in the Soviet Union

Many people who had been arrested, disappeared or killed during the Stalinist era were rehabilitated after the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956, where Khrushchev publicly debunked the cult of Stalin and lifted the veil of secrecy from what had happened in the USSR during Stalin's leadership. It was only after the official rehabilitation that people learnt for the first time what had happened to their relatives as information on arrested people had not been disclosed before.

18 Twentieth Party Congress

At the Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956 Khrushchev publicly debunked the cult of Stalin and lifted the veil of secrecy from what had happened in the USSR during Stalin's leadership.

19 Khrushchev, Nikita (1894-1971)

Soviet communist leader. After Stalin's death in 1953, he became first secretary of the Central Committee, in effect the head of the Communist Party of the USSR. In 1956, during the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev took an unprecedented step and denounced Stalin and his methods. He was deposed as premier and party head in October 1964. In 1966 he was dropped from the Party's Central Committee.

20 KGB

The KGB or Committee for State Security was the main Soviet external security and intelligence agency, as well as the main secret police agency from 1954 to 1991.
21 Jewish community of Estonia: On 30th March 1988 in a meeting of Jews of Estonia, consisting of 100 people, convened by David Slomka, a resolution was made to establish the Community of Jewish Culture of Estonia (KJCE) and in May 1988 the community was registered in the Tallinn municipal Ispolkom. KJCE was the first independent Jewish cultural organization in the USSR to be officially registered by the Soviet authorities. In 1989 the first Ivrit courses started, although the study of Ivrit was equal to Zionist propaganda and considered to be anti-Soviet activity. Contacts with Jewish organizations of other countries were established. KJCE was part of the Peoples' Front of Estonia, struggling for an independent state. In December 1989 the first issue of the KJCE paper Kashachar (Dawn) was published in Estonian and Russian language. In 1991 the first radio program about Jewish culture and activities of KJCE, 'Sholem Aleichem,' was broadcast in Estonia. In 1991 the Jewish religious community and KJCE had a joined meeting, where it was decided to found the Jewish Community of Estonia.

Heda Ambrova

Heda Ambrova
Piestany
Slovakia
Interviewer: Martin Korcok
Date of interview: March 2007

Heda Ambrova has lived in Piestany all her life, except for the war years, when she and her family were in hiding in the mountains in central Slovakia. She’s from a liberal family. As she herself says: “I no longer observe the holidays, but have Judaism in my heart.” During our meetings I found her to be an intelligent and accommodating lady with an incredible memory. I would like to take the liberty to say that it was mainly her doing that in 2006 a memorial to the victims of the Holocaust was unveiled in Piestany. The once-blossoming Jewish community in this city is on the wane, and the Jewish religious community in Piestany has already completely ceased to exist. Aside from Mrs. Ambrova, only a few witnesses to the Holocaust live in the city, who for various reasons refused to be interviewed.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My father was from the Eckstein family. They lived in Orava [a region in Slovakia], in the town of Tvrdosin. I can't tell you any more about this family, because my father became an orphan when he was eight. He was born on 22nd December 1889. Besides him, my grandparents also had two daughters. One was named Vilma, and the second one I never knew. Both of them died during the Holocaust. Vilma was deported from Ruzomberok. After their parents died, the girls were cared for by their uncle, who was a doctor in Orava. But people there didn’t have much money, and even doctors weren’t very well off financially. My father lived with a family and made a living by tutoring children. That’s how he scraped by.

My father’s original name was Arpad Eckstein. When he was in high school he changed his surname to Erdelyi. He graduated from a Catholic high school in Ruzomberok and then went on to study pharmacy in Budapest. He graduated in 1912. After school he settled down in Piestany, where he worked as a pharmacist. During World War I he joined the Austro-Hungarian army 1. They sent him to Poland. He was wounded during the war. His upper lip was cut open, which is why he then grew a mustache.

My father was one of the best people you could imagine. You could say that he was a do-gooder. After his death, old women would stop me and say: ‘We know you. That father of yours, that was some person!’ He was very sensitive and retiring. But he had a great deal of knowledge in the area of pharmacy. All the local doctors respected him. He was actually a doctor for the children of doctors. In practice this meant that when a doctor’s child fell ill, he’d come and consult with my father as to how to treat him. Everything I know about my father’s past is from what my mother told me; he himself never talked about it. When he was having a good day, he’d at most tell us that when he was in school he had 10 kreuzers per day. That was enough for some bread and a bit of ‘bryndza.’ [Bryndza is a sheep’s milk cheese made in the Balkans, Eastern Austria, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine.] He’d have no money left for anything else.

My maternal grandfather was named Benedikt Duschnitz. He was born in Dolny Kubin in 1856. My grandmother's name was Cecilia Duschnitz, née Meisl. She was born in Podbiel, or Namestovo, in 1865. My grandmother was 17 when she got married. She was a dark-haired, slim lady. My mother’s parents initially lived in Slanica. There my grandfather owned a button factory and a distillery. Otherwise he was a builder. During the time of World War I he designed buildings. At the age of 20, my mother, Ruzena Erdelyiova, née Duschnitz, took over the distillery. Because my grandparents had ten children, they moved from the village to the town of Ruzomberok. Once my grandfather loaded us, his grandchildren, into a taxi and took us on a tour of Slanice and the house where they’d lived. There were still eyelets sticking out of the doorframe where a swing had once hung. They’d also had a horizontal bar and a set of rings there.

The Jewish community in Ruzomberok was very liberal. My mother’s family for example didn’t observe kosher food practices 2. Grandpa Benedikt became the president of the Ruzomberok Jewish religious community. He was a very respected man, and people were ‘afraid’ of him. He told everyone exactly what he thought of them. He and my grandma had ten children together. The girls’ names were Anna, Malvin, Elza, Leona, Frida, and Ruzena, and the boys were Berci, Robert, Ernö and Jenö. All the boys were in the Austro-Hungarian army during World War I. Nothing happened to any of them.

In Ruzomberok they lived in a house that belonged to their brother-in-law, Dr. Kürti. Dr. Kürti was the husband of my mother’s sister Malvin. It was a multi-story building. Downstairs was the doctor’s office. Up on the first floor, in the back, lived Malvin with her family. In the front lived my grandparents, and another family rented the back part of the ground floor. Dr. Kürti died early. He had so-called galloping consumption. That’s tuberculosis that progresses very quickly. The boys were named Alexander, Vojtech and Karol. All three finished Technical University in Brno. None of them are alive any longer.

At home the Duschnitz family spoke mainly German and Hungarian. They of course knew Slovak as well. My mother spoke beautiful Slovak. My grandfather was for example great friends with the poet Hviezdoslav 3. Once we asked Grandma what they spoke between themselves. She said: ‘German or Hungarian. After all Orszagh Hviezdoslav wrote his first poems in Hungarian.’

We worshipped our grandparents in Ruzomberok. They’d visit us in Piestany every summer. The climate in Ruzomberok is quite harsh. My grandmother was sickly. She had bronchial asthma. They way it went in their family was that my grandfather’s word was law. Grandpa was a very lively and educated man for the times. In our eyes, he knew everything. He was interested in new inventions, and would then tell us about them. Once he told us that a certain Russian scientist, Dr. Voronov, had performed a transplant of monkey glands. That this transplant, which rejuvenates people, is really very expensive and so on. Back then my sister and I were getting an allowance, and we managed to save up ten crowns. [In 1929 the Czechoslovak crown (Kc) was decreed by law to be equal to 44.58 mg of gold]. We then gave them to our mother, to give it as a contribution for the transplant that our grandfather had told us about.

My grandfather was a heavy smoker, and so used to cough. He used to eat black licorice candy that he had stored in a silver box. The candies had numbers on them. We asked him: ‘What are those numbers for?’ He told us that they were Negro [African-American] coins. My sister was a little older and knew that coins were minted. He told us that in Africa they grew on trees. He didn’t lose any time, and got up early in the morning and in one garden that belonged to friends of ours he hung those candies on a tree. Can you imagine how we used to worship him when he knew how to play with us like that?! Because our grandparents used to visit us in the summer, we used to return the favor. Our parents had always raised us to be independent. In Piestany they’d put us on a train and we’d travel all the way to Ruzomberok. They told us to stand up in Ilava. There’s a jail in Ilava, and back then there was a superstition that whoever would be ‘sitting’ in the train while in Ilava, could also go ‘sit’ in jail.

My grandmother did handiwork. She crocheted and embroidered beautifully. Because she had six daughters, it was passed on to them as well. Elza was the only exception. She didn’t do it. It was even passed down to her granddaughters and through me to my granddaughter, too. Besides crocheting beautifully, she also grew flowers. This fondness of hers was also passed down to me. I grow all flowers from seedlings; I like to watch them grow.

Grandfather Benedikt Duschnitz lived to a relatively advanced age. He died on 16th August 1933 at the age of 77. He had a heart attack. My grandmother died relatively young, on 2nd November 1936 at the age of 71. They're both buried at the Jewish cemetery in Ruzomberok.

My mother had nine siblings. I remember all of them. Aunt Anna got married to Leopold Diamant. Mr. Diamant was from Trnava. They had a daughter, Frederika, who we called Fritzi. Fritzi married a lawyer named Gotfried, before the war. In 1936 she and her husband moved to the USA. Her husband learned perfect English in a few years. During the Nuremberg trial 4 he was one of the interpreters. They had a son, Paul. Paul was in the US army during World War II. He participated in the war with Japan 5. There he met one young lady, who he married. One part of the family claimed that she was Korean, the other that she was Japanese. He returned to the USA with her. He didn’t want any more to do with Judaism, nor with Israel. He said that he’d married a non-Jew, and that was that. They had two beautiful sons. I only saw them in photos, but they were truly beautiful children. We didn’t hear any more of them after that.

Then there was Aunt Malvin Kürti. Her husband, Artur Kürti, was a doctor. They lived in Ruzomberok. They had three sons. Uncle Artur died at a young age of TBC [tuberculosis]. When my aunt became a widow, she opened a store with sporting goods in the town. Her sons helped her a lot with it. The oldest was Alexander. He was born in 1904 and studied mechanical engineering. The middle one, Vojtech, was born in 1907 and the youngest, Karol, in 1914. Both of them graduated from university in Brno, specializing in roads and bridges.

After graduation Alexander worked in some mechanical engineering company in Berlin. His superiors were so decent that when Hitler came to power 6, they transferred him to the Skoda plant in Pilsen 7 and from there he moved to the USA. Alexander had two sons. The older one was a doctor, and his son lives in Dallas. They younger one had some sort of physical defect that he suffered during childbirth. Despite this he graduated from high school with honors and was employed for 30 years. Alexander died in the USA at the age of 95, and correspondence with the rest of the family was interrupted.

Malvin, Vojtech and Karol survived the Holocaust. Both boys were very active during the war. During the Slovak National Uprising 8 Karol planned and stood by the landing strip for Allied planes at the Tri Duby and Sliac airstrips, and Vojtech by Brezno. We’ll get back to this story a little later. Malvin died in Banska Bystrica at the age of 89. Vojtech died a sudden death in January 1989. Karol died a tragic death right after the liberation, in June 1945. He was working in the reconstruction of a railway bridge by Kozarovce. No one ever found out how it happened. Some say that someone stepped on a mine and Karol was nearby. Others say that it was an attempt to assassinate the manager of the company that was doing the reconstruction.

Uncle Berci [Bertalan] Duschnitz graduated from a high school specializing in economics in Budapest. Back then it was called an Academy, one that specialized in export and import. He married a widow. Her name was Györgyi. She brought two sons into the marriage. I never met this family. All I know is that one of the boys was named Elemér. They lived in the town of Gyöngyös in northern Hungary, where they owned a huge vineyard. Elemér was drafted for ‘munkaszolgálat’ 9, and didn’t survive the war. I don’t know anything about the other boy. Their mother was also murdered. Only Uncle Berci survived. But after the war our contact was very sporadic. All I know is that once he spent the entire summer with us in Piestany. He died at over 80 years of age. I’m assuming that he’s buried either in Gyöngyös or in Budapest. In Budapest in the event that Gyöngyös doesn’t have a Jewish cemetery. [Editor’s note: The Jewish community in Gyöngyös goes back to the beginning of the 19th century and there is a Jewish cemetery there.]

Aunt Elza Lakatos married a doctor, Imre Lakatos. Imre had hungarianized his name. After World War I, in 1918, a typhus epidemic broke out in eastern Czechoslovakia. Every doctor who was willing to work in this region was promised Czechoslovak citizenship. Doctor Lakatos accepted this offer, and he and Aunt Elza settled in Subcarpathian Ruthenia 10, in Chust. My aunt got herself a parrot that used to sit in the waiting room of my uncle’s office. Because all sorts of people passed through there, the parrot learned profanities. It progressed so far that he’d swear at everyone: ‘Te marha, te marha’ [Hungarian for ‘You cow, you cow.’]. They were childless. They had Maltese Pinschers. When the deportations began in Subcarpathian Ruthenia, they committed suicide.

Uncle Robert Duschnitz was a banker and lived in Vienna. His wife’s name was Liesl, and they had a daughter named Zuzana. My uncle held a very important post at the bank, because even during the beginning of the Fascist era, they allowed him to keep working there. I don’t know exactly what sort of specialization it was, but they called it a ‘tarifar.’ Our family used to send him food from Slovakia 11 through friends who used to drive freight trucks to Austria. I know that right when he was to get our last package, they were taking him away. We have no idea how he perished and neither do we have any information about the death of his wife. Their daughter Zuzana through some miracle got to England. It must have been a similar thing like Winton’s 12 in Bohemia. My daughter visited her once in England, and that was our entire contact with her family.

Uncle Ernö Duschnitz graduated from economics. He married a divorced woman, Mrs. Stefania Roth. She was a very beautiful woman. Stefania had a son from her first marriage. His name was Juraj, and he was born in 1918 or 1919. The lived together in Bratislava. Juraj was a member of the Bratislava Bar Kochba 13 swimming team. He managed to escape to England before World War II broke out. My daughter was the last in the family to go visit him. He then didn’t want to talk to anyone else. He especially held against us the fact that my parents had survived and his hadn’t. His father was arrested in 1944 along with his wife. They were jailed until February 1945. In February they were emptying out the jails and they transported them. This transport was attacked and bombed by Allied planes by the city of Melk [Austria]. Ernö died during the bombing, and we never found out anything about the death of his wife.

Aunt Leona married Max Porges. At first they lived in Dobsina, and later in Zilina. Mr. Porges was in the wood business. They had two children, a son and a daughter. The daughter’s name was Edit, and she married an engineer by the name of Bock. In 1944 they caught and executed them. The boy’s name was Artur, and he was born in Dobsina on 11th November 1922. In 1939 he left with the ‘Kinderaliyah’ for Palestine. In Palestine he said he was a year older so that he could join the army. He was sent to fight in Italy and in Egypt. After the war he got married to a girl from Piestany by the name of Truda Sohnenschein. She left with the same aliyah as he did. They’ve got two children, girls. One is named Irit and is a biologist, and the other’s name is Ronit. She teaches geography and physical education at high school. Artur is still alive.

Aunt Leona and Uncle Max were caught in 1944. They were murdered and buried in a mass grave by Turcianske Teplice. Those graves were later opened. One lady managed to survive in the following manner: my aunt, Leona Porges, was second last in the lineup for execution, and the lady that survived was to have been last. When they were leading them there, they knew that they were going to be shot. The lady said to her: ‘Let’s hide behind a tree; they can’t do anything worse than shoot us.’ My aunt didn’t hide, but that lady did. She then told us about it.

Frida was married to Sigmund Dezider. They lived in Budapest. I think that my uncle was a bank president. They had two children. The older one’s name was Zsuzsanna [Zsuzsa, Zuzana], and she is still alive. The boy’s name is Jakob. When after World War I the banks failed, they moved to Zilina, because my uncle was originally from Dolny Kubin. During World War I he was wounded and remained an invalid, so Aunt Frida supported the entire family. In 1936 or 1937 they made her the manager of a fuel depot – petroleum and gasoline. She was a very organized woman, and led it so well that during the time of the Slovak State they granted her an exception 14. When the situation in Slovakia began getting worse, they left for Budapest, because they all spoke Hungarian. Towards the end of the war, they deported her husband Sigmund Dezider from Budapest. They sent the whole group that they’d caught in just their underwear into the icy Danube. From there the Swedish took them in, into the Red Cross building in Budapest 15. After the war she lived with us for about a half to three quarters of a year; she was in very poor health.

Jakob left along with his cousin, Artur Porges, with the aliyah to Palestine. There they joined the English army together. He survived the war. His sister Zsuzsa was born in 1923. Because she wasn’t allowed to study, she learned to sew. She was a seamstress. During the war, the Germans wanted to exchange an unknown number of Jews from Hungary for wolfram. She applied for that transport. I received a letter from her: ‘We’re really going to Portugal. I don’t believe it, but we applied. I hope we’ll meet again.’ They took this postcard to Israel for me, and it’s in some museum.

We didn’t hear from Zsuzsa for a long time. After the war we found out that she’d ended up in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp 16. She was there together with Milan Mayer. Milan was from Liptovsky Mikulas. After the war they got married. They got out of Bergen-Belsen to Switzerland in exchange for some goods. [Editor’s note: On the basis of an agreement between R. Kasztner, the head of a Hungarian humanitarian organization, and Kurt Becher, commissioned by Himmler to utilize Jews for labor, at the end of 1944, 1684 Hungarian Jews were allowed to leave the Bergen-Belsen camp, from where they were to continue to Switzerland. In exchange the German Reich was to receive various goods. Negotiations started, where Becher wanted 20 million Swiss francs from Joint (American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee) for the purchase of goods. Though the transport reached its destination, sources say that the contract was never completed.] The Swiss more or less took care of them.

At the end of the war, the papers wrote who’d survived. Zsuzsa’s brother Jakob found out in this way that his sister was alive. They met. Jakob then returned to the army, and Zsuzsa and Milan came to stay with us. We were this house of asylum. After the war, 17 people came to stay with us. Her mother, Aunt Frida, survived the war together with us. We’ll get to that later. After Zsuzsi and Milan’s wedding, the newly-weds moved to Prague and took Aunt Frida in to live with them.

Jenö Duschnitz was in the wood business. He was a beautiful person. He lived somewhere in central Slovakia. Doctor Lakatos arranged a place for his in Subcarpathian Ruthenia, where he also got married. He had a daughter, Vera. In 1944 they offered that they’d take the child to Slovakia. [After the First Vienna Decision 17, Subcarpathian Ruthenia was given to Hungary] At that time she may have been two or three years old, but it was already too late, because they deported them. Uncle Jenö survived, but only until November 1945, because he was in some facility where typhus broke out, and he died. That was somewhere in Germany.

My mother was born on 2nd November 1892, as my grandparents’ seventh child. She had beautiful blond hair and blue eyes. As my grandfather was building houses, she took a distilling exam and ran a distillery. My mother was engaged to some physicist who fell during the first weeks of World War I. In those days it wasn’t usual for girls to graduate from high school, it wasn’t in fashion. But my mother was headstrong and graduated. She was only allowed to attend a Catholic school, part time. She attended school once a week. When they were going up the stairs she had to go last, so that they wouldn’t see her ankles, and when they went downstairs she had to go first. She was the only girl in the class. Right at the beginning of the semester they told her that she’d never finish school. That the boys wouldn’t allow it. She had a hard life there. During anatomy class someone put a finger on her exercise book. After that incident she left medicine and transferred to pharmacy.

After being forced to leave medicine, my mother began working in one pharmacy in Ruzomberok. There she met my father, who apparently was also working in Ruzomberok. They were married on 1st July 1919, probably in Ruzomberok. From the beginning my mother had someone to help her with the household, because she was very active. Not only did she found the Maccabi 18 in Piestany, but she also gave free courses in making carpets using Persian knots, and net-making.

Growing up

I was born on 12th September 1922 in Piestany as Hedviga [Heda] Erdelyiova. We lived in what is now Teplicka Street, before it was Wilsonova Street No. 22. We didn’t have any animals, not even a canary. My sister’s name was Magda. She was born on 16th May 1920 in Piestany, and was two and a half years older. We didn’t have nannies as such.

We attended Jewish school together, my sister for two or three years and I for only a year. The teacher at the Jewish school was an 80-year-old man named Weiss. It was a one-room schoolhouse. Several grades in one classroom. The principal of the state school told my father that Mr. Weiss is a very good teacher, but that he was 80, after all. It was a big thing for us to leave to attend a state school. I don’t even think any more Jewish children transferred.

After elementary school we wanted to keep studying. There was no high school in Piestany, so our parents were trying to find out where my sister could start attending school. She was in Grade 5 of elementary school. In Nove Mesto nad Vahom they said that if she was a good pupil and wrote a differential exam between fifth year of elementary school and first year of high school, she could go straight into second year of high school. There was this one talented student in Piestany, and he was preparing her for the exam. She got into the school. I then went normally after Grade 4 of elementary school for an entrance interview, and started attending first year of high school. We had to travel to Nove Mesto nad Vahom every day.

It was an excellent high school, as it’s registered on the UNESCO list of selected schools. Later I found out that our high school had been founded by the Moravian Rabbi Weisselle. He also brought in high school teachers. After the creation of the Czechoslovak Republic 19 the high school was taken over by the state. My sister and I both graduated there. My sister was two grades ahead of me.

On school days we’d get up at 5.30am. We’d walk to the train station, because our father was a very strict teacher. There we’d get on the train. We’d arrive at Nove Mesto [Nove Mesto nad Vahom] at 7am. That was a huge problem, because for some unknown reason, the principal didn’t want to let us in the school before a quarter to eight [classes started at 8am]. There were more of us. He requested that from 7 to 7.45am we be with some family. It’s very hard to find a family that would let strangers’ children into their homes at 7am. Otherwise the school was tolerant, because Jewish children from devout families didn’t have to write on Saturdays. Many misused this, but we didn’t. Because we then had to finish it at home. We were also traveling, which is why it seemed ridiculous to us to not write. [Sabbath: during the Sabbath, 39 main work activities are forbidden, upon which injunctions on others are based. These also include writing and traveling.]

We had religion class, taught by some Dr. Weiss. We were relatively ignorant of religion. We read the Old Testament. One column was in Hebrew, and one in Czech, because we mostly had Czech textbooks. We mainly read Czech translations, but we also knew how to read Hebrew with punctuation. We were all great friends. About 100 of us commuted, and the high school’s capacity was 500. Students from villages also commuted. Back then there were no buses running, so we had classmates that walked five or six kilometers to the nearest [train] station. In general they belonged amongst the best students.

A relatively large number of Jews attended the high school. What was peculiar was that we were divided into several classes. I know that in first year there were three classes, and in second year already only two. There was a lot of screening. Later I found out that we were divided up according to religion. There was a class of Catholics and Protestants. Ours was mixed. One of our classmates was of no denomination, which was very rare in those days, one of the Czech Brotherhood and about twelve Jews. [The Czech Brotherhood Evangelic Church: a Christian denomination in the Czech Republic. It is the largest Protestant denomination in Bohemia.]

As children we studied French, and in high school as well. In Piestany a group of children who were studying French was formed. One French lady who lived there taught us. She had a bad case of rheumatism. Her name was Rauter. At the age of ten we spoke French as well as Slovak. Alas, one forgets. I speak Slovak, German, Hungarian, French, and also a bit of English. But I’ve forgotten a lot of the French language. My mother tongue is Slovak, as well as German. My son also says that he’s got two mother tongues, because like my grandfather spoke German with us, my father spoke German with my children.

During our high school studies, we didn’t have a lot of free time. Before that, in elementary school, we used to go on outings with our mother every Sunday. Back then going out into nature was something new among Jews. Later we began exercising at Maccabi.

Our mother also wrote children’s plays, so we’d help her. She also designed costumes. She had helpers who’d then sew them. They’d sew the costumes at our place. Our mother would write the scripts, and the practices also took place at our place. The plays were put on only by Jewish children, but in the audience there’d also be non-Jewish children. We had a busy life. The plays were put on in a park in Piestany. There was this one terrace there, and in the summer various performances would take place on it. There was no admission, it was for free. Well, and then when we were already in high school, there were classes six days a week. On Saturdays we’d come home at 3.30 in the afternoon. On top of that, there was French, exercise at Maccabi and piano. My sister played excellently – she had long fingers. My daughter inherited the musical talent in our family.

I graduated, but didn’t get into university, because it was already 1940 20. They still accepted my sister into university, back in 1938. She was very talented. She attended the State Music Conservatory in Prague. Besides music she also studied English. Right when the Germans occupied Prague in 1939 21 she had to stop her studies 22. By coincidence, our mother was visiting her at the time. When she was returning home, at Kuty [a town on the border with the Czech Republic], to the great surprise of the train passengers, there was a customs check. [The division of the first Czechoslovak Republic into the Slovak State and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia necessitated the creation of a border.] My sister returned, and made use of her music and English studies to give lessons. One of her pupils was the son of a highly placed Guardist 23, so he looked the other way and she didn’t need any documents.

After graduation, I went to Nove Mesto for hakhsharah 24. I was very ardent about Palestine. Rabbi Fried was in charge there. A very modern man he was. He’d come to see us at hakhsharah. He taught us a lot. There was also one Jewish teacher there with us, by the name of Eisler. He then left for Palestine. I was a member of the Maccabi Hatzair youth organization. Politically, it inclined towards social democracy. It was led by one miller from Breclav. Later this organization was dissolved. Many were successful in getting to Palestine, legally as well as illegally. I didn’t leave.

My sister fell ill. In 1940, around Christmas, an epidemic of meningitis broke out, an infection of the brain’s membranes. My sister didn’t survive. She died on 26th December 1940. She couldn’t go to the hospital, but we were getting serum from Berlin, because my father had contacts. It didn’t help, even though many doctors were taking care of her. I know that it was a huge funeral. They buried her at the Jewish cemetery in Piestany.

Up to 1928 there was only one Jewish community in Piestany, an Orthodox 25 one. In 1928 it divided into a Neolog 26 one and an Orthodox one. I don’t know the reasons for the division. The Orthodox Jews had their own synagogue, a very nice one. Jewish social life in the town took place only via the Maccabi. We didn’t have a gym, so my mother and her friends signed an agreement with the workers’ gymnastics club. They had a hall that also had a stage for theater performances. The club let us use the hall, and Maccabi purchased equipment – parallel bars, uneven bars, a mat, a pommel horse and a sawhorse. We then exercised there twice a week. Our instructors were qualified. I know that one of them had come all the way from Ostrava. His name was Müller. He found a job here, and then began instructing. He even taught preschoolers. He also taught two young women, very talented ones, from Trnava. Towards the end, a student from the Faculty of Philosophy who was taking physical fitness, English and German also exercised there. Each year a so-called Academy was held, where a gymnastics program was put on, and later also musical numbers. It was very popular amongst the non-Jewish population as well. The gymnastics numbers were so good that Sokol 27 came to see my mother to see whether she wouldn’t take on some group of Sokol children.

Children from Orthodox families were very strictly watched. They didn’t even associate with us very much. They attended only a Jewish school. Later, in 1938 and 1939, Protestant and Jewish children were expelled from the state school. A special class was created for them. The only Orthodox child that came to Maccabi to exercise was Lili Hersteinova. She was from a family of eight or nine children. She had a very nice voice, clear as a bell. She was a lot younger than I. My mother managed to pull off one master stroke. She convinced her mother, who was a widow, to let Lili leave with the ‘Kinderaliyah’ to Palestine. She lives there to this day. From the Orthodox families, only one girl returned from the girls’ transport, and that was Miriam Leitner. She was a year younger than I.

Jewish social life blossomed up until 1938. Each Purim a Purim ball was held. It was at the Slovan Hotel. Back then it was an elegant, beautiful hotel, visited by non-Jews as well. The Purim ball was also being prepared for 12th March 1938. But on 12th March Hitler occupied Vienna 28. Of course, my mother wanted to cancel it. Dr. Skycar came to visit and I can hear him as if it was today: ‘Ruzenka, you can’t do that, it would cause panic amongst people!’ Dr. Skycar was the district chief in Piestany. The non-Jewish population didn’t take it as seriously as all that. In the end the ball took place. That was my first and last ball in my life.

Relations amongst the population were problem-free. When we traveled to Nove Mesto, we Jews would keep together more, but we also had friendly relations with Christians. There was nothing like you’re a Jew and you’re not. Boys would buy the A-Z newspaper, and the girls would by the Hviezda weekly magazine. Each week someone else would buy one, and pass it around. They were Czech newspapers, because in those days there weren’t very many Slovak newspapers.

My favorite holidays were mainly those when we didn’t have to go to synagogue. For Chanukkah we’d light candles each day. We also sang. We didn’t give gifts, perhaps only sweets. In the spring there was Tu bi-Shevat, of fifteen fruits. At that time you had to collect fifteen types of fruit. [The custom on Tu bi-Shevat is to put on a celebratory supper and eat fifteen types of fruit.] Then there was Passover, but we didn’t change dishes. We didn’t observe holidays very much from a religious standpoint. My father held seder, and I know that we’d begin with the Haggadah. That was still during the years I was attending elementary school. We’d say the mah nishtanah, and as the youngest I’d ask the questions. For Sukkot only Orthodox Jews would build a sukkah. Those that didn’t have a yard, on their balcony. We used to make decorations from shiny paper and stars as well. Then there was of course Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

My parents didn’t lead a very active social life. It was apparently also due to the fact that we would come home from school late, and so ate lunch at 4pm. Well, and Mother had to first and foremost take care of us. My father wasn’t a social person; he was in the pharmacy from morning till evening. Our pharmacy is located in what back then was a pedestrian zone. Today in its place is the showroom ‘U starej lekarne’ [The Old Pharmacy]. I missed it for a long time, because it was very nicely appointed, there were these carved columns.

During the war

In 1942, right when talk of deportations 29 began, I got married. There was a cell of illegal workers here that helped me very much. An acquaintance of mine, who lived in the former Soviet Union, came along and said: ‘We won’t allow for Heda to be deported. Two years ago you lost a daughter. We’ll get her married for you.’ Dr. Hecht came to see me, later he was named Horal. He told me: ‘I’ll marry you, but after the war we’ll get divorced, because I’ve got a girlfriend in Prague. We’ll help each other; I was told that you’re honest people.’

He was also a Jew, it wasn’t even possible otherwise. I also had a boyfriend, a Jewish boy, who was finishing university in Prague, but couldn’t finish, because Adolf arrived. His name was Goldstein. We were married at the Piestany city hall. The official was this ‘nice’ man, and said: ‘Even so, they’ll deport you.’ My husband was polite, and said to him: ‘So we’ll go together.’ We didn’t feel much like laughing. Someone ratted on us, that we’d been formally married. Luckily, a week after the wedding they transferred my husband to Michalovce. As a good wife, I thus had to move with him. My husband was a doctor. It was there that I got the telegram regarding my parents.

During the time of the Slovak State, as a pharmacist, my father had a presidential exception. Despite that, they took him to the collection camp in Zilina. At that time I was living in Michalovce. I got a telegram that my parents were in the Zilina sanatorium. The hidden meaning behind sanatorium was collection camp. You couldn’t write it openly. We automatically knew what that meant.

I know that it was on Saturday, but travel permits weren’t issued during the weekend. I traveled illegally to Zilina. My mother’s sister, Aunt Frida, lived in Zilina. She explained to me what was actually happening. She said that we needed a phonogram from the Ministry of Health, so that they’d release him, he being a pharmacist. [Phonograms are telegrams which are rung over the telephone i.e. dictated to the Acceptance Office.]

I took her advice. I asked someone as to whom I should go see. I went to Bratislava to the ministry. There I was greeted right at the door with a sign: ‘No Jews or dogs allowed!’ I didn’t let that discourage me, and I found some friends who referred me to Topolcany, because a pharmacist lived there, a non-Jew of course, who was in charge of the pharmacy resort. I went to see him, and told him what the problem was. He said that even though he didn’t know my father personally, he knew that he was a well-known expert and that he owned several patents on drugs manufactured by the company Fragner Praha. [The roots of the largest Czech pharmaceutical company, Leciva a.s., go as far back as the year 1488. In 1857 the company was bought by Benjamin Fragner. In 1930 it began operating a pharmaceuticals factory named Benjamin Franger in Prague. Leciva a.s. currently belongs to the Zentiva combine.] He told me that if I brought him the recipe for Arneumylen and the necessary know-how, he’d help him. I had no choice, as I had no money.

With bated breath we watched transports leave for Auschwitz. One such transport was composed of up to a thousand people. I heard that dirty deals were being made there. I began searching, until I got to that group of people. I asked what had happened, why was my father still here, when they’d already sent a phonogram from Bratislava regarding his release. I had of course made this up. They looked at each other and said: ‘Hey, it’s already been here for ages!’ It was really there! We managed to get several people out in this fashion.

The pharmacist who I’d gone to see in Topolcany told me: ‘Pick where you’d like for you father to work.’ I was 20 and didn’t know my way in the world yet. He gave me a few places to pick from, and I picked Batovce. I had a very ‘good nose,’ as it was a purely Protestant village. My father traveled straight from Zilina to Batovce. My mother went to Piestany, packed their things and went to join him.

That’s how our family ended up in Batovce. The people there were excellent. Together we prepared the evacuation of the women and children from the Novaky camp 30. The local young people helped me very much. That was in 1944, but we didn’t manage to pull it off, because the uprising broke out. The town had these so-called ‘lochs.’ A loch is a wine cellar dug deep into the ground. They prepared food and blankets in them, and that without us saying even a word. They were amazing people. Our friendship lasted until the 1970s, until that old guard died out.

In 1944, when the uprising broke out, I had to leave Michalovce, as I was an ‘undesirable element.’ I went to join my parents in Batovce. Back then my husband was transferred to Trnava, to an army garrison. In Batovce I learned to plow with a horse, and we’d also go to the mill. One day a group of soldiers stopped us. The showed us their ID; they were from the Sixth Battalion 31. They’d disarmed the Guardists and positioned themselves along the border between Slovakia and Hungary. Because Batovce was close to the border, I had an agreement with them that when the situation would be unfavorable, they’d let me know at the pharmacy.

On 6th October 1944, a message came, so we left Batovce. We went over the mountains to Krupina. In Krupina we needed to buy food. They said: ‘We won’t sell any to you, unless you come husk corn for an hour! Then I’ll sell you bread!’ I still hear her to this day. So I had to work for an hour so that I could pay 30 crowns for a piece of bread! [The value of one Slovak crown during the time of the Slovak State (1939 – 1945) was equal to 31.21 mg of gold. The exchange rate between the German mark and the Slovak crown was artificially set at 1:11.] At that time everything was expensive.

From Krupina we went by train to Sliac. My father, mother and I. We were heading to the Kürti’s. We weren’t just relatives, but also very good friends with the boys. We arrived in Sliac in the evening. It was already dark, and besides the lights from landing planes, you couldn’t see anything. I sat my parents down, and though they were young, back then they seemed old to me. My mother was 52 and my father was three years older. I approached one railway worker, and said I was looking for Mr. Kürti. He asked: ‘Which one?’ I answered that Karol. ‘I’ll take you to him, I know him.’ We went to some office. He told me: ‘It’s good that you’ve come, tomorrow you’ll go on some trucks to Horehronie [a region in Slovakia]! And that’s what happened.

They loaded up two trucks with fuel and tools. My mother was responsible for one truck, and I for the other. My father was a cardiac [had a weak heart], and we didn’t want to burden him. We got to Polhora, by Tisovec. The National Committee issued us a house. We locked the gate, because we had the trucks in the courtyard. My mother guarded the trucks and I went to work.

The village radio announced that everyone up to a certain age had to go work in the army warehouse. So I set off for there. I worked in the local school with silver. They had cutlery and candlesticks there of all imaginable types. In the back room there was army underwear. In the morning pretty, slim girls would arrive, and in the evening they’d be as fat as old matrons. They’d have all sort of layers on; they were smuggling out the army underwear underneath their clothes. Stupid me, I didn’t take anything. It was only the next day that one of them advised me: ‘Do you have any clothes yet?’ ‘I don’t.’ ‘So take some.’

The silver was confiscated Jewish property. They most likely suspected that we were Jews. We didn’t have it written on our foreheads, nor did we wear the star 32. There were decent people there, too. We didn’t have anything to eat. It was a damp fall, and so we went to the forest to pick mushrooms. There we met Mrs. Porges, my mother’s sister, whom they then shot. So we went into the forest, but none of us knew mushrooms. We collected a huge amount. One local lady then picked through it, what was good and what was bad. We’d had luck. We made mushroom goulash.

One day an order came from Tri Duby [the Tri Duby airstrip], from Sliac, that we were supposed to move to Nemecka. There they ordered us to stay with one farmer. I don’t know his name, but he was an unpleasant person. He led us into a room. He even removed the straw mattresses from the beds. We had only the wood planks there. He didn’t want to give us anything. Another message came from the Kürtis’, that we’re to leave for Banska Bystrica. We of course didn’t have a travel permit. An order is an order, so I went to the train station. I naively asked for a ticket to Banska Bystrica. They asked me where in heaven I was from, that the trains had stopped running ages ago. Standing in the station was one so-called armored train. I was young, so I convinced them to take me. I hid under a bench. They let me off in Banska Bystrica.

I knew where I was supposed to go. There was one German woman there, whose husband was a Jew, but he was in hiding somewhere. My parents remained in Nemecka, but when they saw that I wasn’t returning and there was no news from me, they set off after me. At the intersection between Banska Bystrica and Bukoved they met two young men. The young men told them that they had weapons, but didn’t have ammunition. My mother had a hundred crowns with her, so she gave it to them, which [later] saved my parents’ life. They went in the direction of Bukovec, where they found a place to stay in one house.

In Banska Bystrica, Karol Kürti was waiting for me. Right away he asked me where my parents were. I replied that in Nemecka. Karol Kürti had a red Aero automobile. He set off to go look for them. He got to the intersection where the two young men were. He asked them whether they hadn’t seen an older married couple. They answered that they’d gone up the hill. He went and picked them up, and they got as far as Stare Hory. There the Soviets stopped them, and told them they were commandeering the Aero. They couldn’t tell them no. They said they’d return it by a certain time. No one believed it, but the Russians returned, along with the Aero.

In Banska Bystrica, a message from Karol was waiting for me at the German woman’s place, that I’m to leave at 6am and go in the direction of Donovaly, but that I’d get two children to take along. The girl was 12 and the boy 15. They were Jewish children. In the morning at 6am we set off for Donovaly. Donovaly was about 12 kilometers away. We went on foot. Towards Harmane we were stopped at an army checkpoint. No one was allowed any further – Jew or not, child or not, old people, young ones with baby carriages, wheelbarrows, everyone wanted to keep going, but they weren’t letting anyone through.

Luckily I had a pass that my ‘paper’ husband had arranged for me. I said that the two children were my siblings. They didn’t check. It was a terrible experience, because people were yelling at us to take them with us. Along the road lay dead horses and destroyed weapons. I went to a so-called lumberjacks’ cabin. It was a forested region. As soon as I arrived, my mother flew out the door. Karol had driven them there in the meantime.

In the forest we found some used parachutes. There were silk ones as well as cotton ones. Because they were wet, like naive civilians we spread them out. Suddenly Stukas attacked us, fighter planes with guns. Luckily nothing happened to us, because there were bushes nearby. If it hadn’t been for those bushes, they would have shot us to bits. After we’d been in the mountains for several days, some army patrol came by. They gave us food and clothing. They stood up on some high ground and threw us army shoes and clothes. What you caught, you kept. Our group was all strong men, so we got it all. Bags of sugar, and dry peas which we had to throw out though, because they were full of worms. We even got rice. There was so much of it that after the war no on wanted to even see rice. We drank coffee. I remember to this day that they’d bring it to us packed into cubes along with sugar. We’d throw the cube into a cup of boiling water. The result was a terribly sweet drink.

The younger of the Kürti brothers [Karol] was in charge of our group. We were relatively well armed. We had guns and ammunition. In the meantime, we had to leave the lumberjacks’ cabin. We ended up under the open sky. But we needed to live somewhere. Well, and because our group was all builders, engineers, we began to build. There was a very steep rise there, so that’s where we decided to build. We made L-shaped trenches. It was raining buckets. Great attention was paid to everything. Trees were cut right above the ground. Nothing could be allowed to betray us. Each mistake could cost us our lives. From the trees we built temporary scaffolding. We also made tent sections with which we covered the scaffolding. There we spent the first night. We lay on branches we’d cut. At least it wasn’t raining on us anymore, but on the other hand the wind was blowing at us from all sides. We lived though it. In the morning we worked busily on.

After two or three days we already had a roof above our heads. The roof was made from a tarp and branches. Again nature helped us out. We stuck branches into the ground close to each other, which we then also crisscrossed together. November was approaching. It started being cold. We were constantly improving our dwelling. We even discovered a half-ruined cottage made of bricks. So we carried those bricks over and built ourselves a stove. At least we had something to warm ourselves by. Close by, about two kilometers away, we also had a source of drinking water. It was some sort of spring. We widened its channel. You can imagine how much we enjoyed carrying it.

On 20th November 1944, the first snow fell and stayed. At that time we already had a roof above our heads, and even those parachutes had finally dried. After that we were no longer freezing. After 20th November we didn’t take anything off, but put on all the clothes we had. It was so cold that our hair would freeze to the tent sections. What’s interesting is that none of us even sneezed. Our situation was gradually improving. One road worker lived nearby. Because the Kürti brothers built roads and bridges, everyone knew them. He told us that he had a Meteor brand stove for us. It was really heavy. The Kürti brothers and Ruzicka went for it. They had to take turns carrying it, because the path was uphill. That was the first night we didn’t put everything on. We felt as if we were in paradise.

After the snow fell, we had to set up guards. While there wasn’t snow, no one would find our tracks, but afterwards it was dangerous. There were paths to the cabin from each side. He who knew the surrounding terrain could find his way there. We were erasing our tracks. I was the youngest and also the lightest, so on the way down I went first. And on the way up, I went last. We made two brooms with which we erased our tracks in the snow.

Our group wasn’t composed only of Jews. One of the non-Jews was a former employee of the Ministry of Defense of the Slovak State, then a Czech engineer, Domin [Dominik] Ruzicka. There was one Russian, too – Stolpyansky, whose parents left Russia in 1917. The rest of us were Jews. During our stay in the mountains, two German women were sending us messages. We had a connection down in the village. We would also get packages of red paprika, because we’d heard that if we sprinkled it on the ground, dogs wouldn’t be able to follow our scent. That’s what we also did, but luckily no dogs arrived.

Once at night we heard someone shouting my name. They were looking for me. He must have known it there, because he’d gone around the guard. It turned out that my war husband, who was a doctor at Stare Hory, had fallen ill. They’d diagnosed him with typhus. They couldn’t keep him at the base, and so were looking for a group that would take care of him. We went to get him. We quickly put together a stretcher, on which we carried him up. Karol and Vojtech Kürti, Domin and I went. We were this inseparable foursome. He was in the town of Rybov. As soon as we brought him up, we had to isolate him. We built a log cabin, lightning-quick. There was lots of wood. In it we put this little oven, with an open fire. That’s where we put up my husband along with his brother. We’d bring them food there.

He got through it and got well. But someone told him that we’d wanted to shoot him. There was an unwritten law that partisans don’t leave their wounded at the mercy of the Germany army, but shoot them. But we hadn’t wanted to shoot him. In the end it turned out that he’d had hepatitis. He left us in great anger. After the war we had a relatively good relationship. He moved here and there. He finally dropped anchor at the Na Frantisku Hospital in Prague. We didn’t get divorced until 1946.

We spent Christmas in our ‘log cabin.’ It was nice and warm there. We took a branch and decorated it like a Christmas tree. Vojtech Kürti was incredibly handy, and he made candle holders for the tree. We made some paper stars and it was Christmas. We had some food, but we were missing ‘kolace’ [small, usually round, sweet cakes]. Domin Ruzicka couldn’t stand it and announced: ‘I’m going to Bratislava.’ He managed to get to Bratislava and return with ingredients. In the village they gave us flour. Mother and Malvin mixed the dough. We set out for the roadman’s cabin, and baked all night. We even thought up a story for the Germans, if they came by to check. I was supposed to be an evacuee from Michalovce without anything, not even papers. We baked as much as we could and carried it back up. We had hot coffee and ‘kolace.’ Domin Ruzicka brought back news from Bratislava that they’d arrested my uncle, Ernö Duschnitz.

In the mountains, even everyday trifles were hard to perform. In the first place, we had to have heat. We looked for trees that were already falling apart, and thus well dried out. We had tools like saws and axes. Once by one of these fallen trees we found a box with alcoholic beverages. That day everyone got a shot of alcohol. What a treat that was! Going to the toilet was complicated as well. One C was built, not a WC [water closet, or toilet], but a C. A sidewalk led up to it, on which a ramp was built. Whoever went up would close it. That meant that it was occupied. Of course tracks were erased after everyone.

On a side path we built three walls of snow, on which we’d pour water overnight. The walls froze, and thus a women’s and men’s washroom was made. That was very important, because most people that were living in the mountains were infested with lice. We didn’t allow even one louse. We heated snow and washed. Once a week everyone had to wash with warm water. We had two wash basins. Everyone had his own toothbrush, that was part of the plan when we were leaving for the mountains. Everyone had to brush their teeth. There was an exact program of what people had to do. Doing laundry was also one of the very difficult tasks. We’d heat water. My mother would wash the laundry, and I go to the creek to rinse it. Domin Ruzicka would go with me, with a rifle. We’d push aside the snow, cut a hole in the ice, and that’s where I’d rinse. My hands were so frozen that they were purple.

One day I saw ski tracks on the slope opposite us. After that we didn’t cook or heat. We would walk down to the village to find out what was going on. We found out that Dano Chladny, an officer of the Czechoslovak army, had begun to organize a partisan group, which later we also joined. I don’t know why, but my cousin Vojtech Kürti signed up only the men as members. Maybe he didn’t like women. When he was three years old, he was burned. His entire body was covered in scars. On one side he had someone else’s ear sewn on in a plastic surgery operation, and he had only three fingers on his hand. He survived thanks to his father being a doctor, and that he was suspended in an oil bath.

One day a Soviet patrol from Jelenska Skala came to see us. They wanted to take our weapons, but our guys managed to keep them. They registered our group. Our code names were Orech 1 and Orech 2. After that we functioned on a professional level. We also began keeping proper guard. Once we received a report that above Jelenska Skala was a cave in which a woman was going to give birth in a few days. The Kürti brothers were excellent skiers, so they sent them there. We packed them some cotton parachutes, so the baby would have diapers. They were very well supplied. The baby really was born there. Mr. Gross went with the Kürtis as well, because he was a children’s doctor. Mr. Gross was part of our group. He was also Jewish. The poor guy, he was more afraid than that woman. The baby was born healthy.

The women who were in hiding with the men in the mountains were mostly Jewish, but not all of them managed to stand it and stay. Many of them went down, and that cost them their lives. Our group was supposed to be split up as well, because we had those two children they’d given me in Banska Bystrica. Mrs. Kürti, my parents, the two children and I were supposed to go to some village. Everything was prepared in advance, because we didn’t know if we’d have to cross the front or not. Luckily it never happened. One night we heard a siren. The Kürtis knew that it wasn’t a siren, but an avalanche. Not far from us an avalanche fell and buried many partisans who’d been crossing the front. We don’t know how many people died there. Finally the idea of splitting the group was abandoned. We wintered there, and kept on guard.

During our stay in the mountains we also experienced a few close calls. Another group was active nearby. They weren’t very disciplined. They used to go on the castle road, where the German army had patrols. Well, as luck would have it, they caught them. Their only one bit of luck is that they were older soldiers, Austrians. They didn’t concern themselves with them, and said to them: ‘You know what, we’ll turn around, and you’ll go away!’ The second close call was when Domin and I went on patrol. Suddenly he threw me on the ground. I asked him what was going on!? ‘You didn’t hear that bullet?!’ Back then we told ourselves that we’d had amazing luck. If it was to happen again, we probably wouldn’t have survived. Daily we’d wake up to the unknown. We didn’t know what the day had in store for us.

After the war

We were in the mountains until the liberation of Banska Bystrica. Bystrica was liberated on 26th March 1945. We didn’t want to leave our hiding place yet. Karol Kürti said that we still had very hard times in store. ‘Don’t be in a rush, you’ll look back fondly at our stay in Turiec [a region in central Slovakia].’ That happened, too. We didn’t come down until 10th April. We packed everything up and set out in the direction of Bystrica. On the way we met Dr. Geiger from Ruzomberok. He joined us. Because we didn’t have any way of getting to Bystrica, we went to our friend the German lady, who’d been our connection the last several months. Her name was Mrs. Müller. There we found out that my boyfriend at the time, Goldstein, had fallen in the uprising. If he hadn’t fallen, I would’ve probably married him.

Mr. Müller greeted us, and brought duvets, quilts and blankets. Imagine that we didn’t know how to sleep in a bed, that’s how unused we’d gotten to it. We slept only on the floor. At Mrs. Müller’s we split up. The Kürtis went to Komarno. They had a long trip ahead of them, because the trains weren’t running. My father decided that we’d go to Batovce, as the last several years before the war he’d worked there. We made it to one village, about five kilometers from Batovce, where we met some people we knew. They were glad to see us. We asked them to please not let people in Batovce know that we were on the way home. One of them sat on a bicycle and went to Batovce. Imagine that they were waiting for us on the square with a band.

In the meantime they’d prepared a room for us. Because there was no future for us in Batovce, my parents went to Piestany. The guys in Batovce who’d wanted to help me during the evacuation of Novak found out that a Romanian army transport was running to Piestany. It didn’t go directly from Batovce, but from some nearby village. The Romanians had an army hospital in Piestany. I knew that the Romanians spoke French, and I knew French, after all. So I put on civilian clothes and stopped an ambulance. I asked the man beside the driver, who was an older man, whether he wouldn’t take me to Piestany. He answered: ‘Yes, but I have to pretend you’re my wife.’ Because the Soviets were checking everyone. Luckily we didn’t have any complications. He told me that they’d be returning in three days, and that they’d take me, but in the meantime the front moved and they went on to Trencin.

In Piestany, at the National Committee, I found a few good friends and they told me: ‘Have your father come to Piestany right away, he’ll get a pharmacy. It’s empty, but he’ll fix it up himself. We’ll find an apartment for you as well.’ In Piestany there was this one spa treatment facility named Ivanka, which they emptied, and everyone who returned got one room and three meals a day.

We returned to Piestany. My father was taking care of the destroyed pharmacy and my mother got the task of handing out things and clothing from UNRA [United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration] for people affected by the war. My task was the household. Everyone who returned and had nowhere to live got a room in the Ivanka treatment facility. Once in the dining room of the treatment facility I heard about the bombing of an army transport that had been going to Melk. They mentioned some names, and among them was also the name of my mother’s brother. I was at the Regional Court in Bratislava. There they showed me a huge list of people who’d been deported. Doctor Karadzcic, I think was his name, was one of the few who’d survived the transport. They allowed me a ten-minute meeting with him, because he was seriously wounded. He told me what had happened.

Our priority was to get an apartment. There were people on the National Committee who knew us from the prewar years and they said to me: ‘Find an apartment, and if there’s a Guardist living there, we’ll kick him out.’ I didn’t think too much of that, but I went around and was successful. I found one apartment where a lady from Topolcany lived, whose husband had left with the Germans. That did her in, as they say. So they moved her out. She left without much protest. We moved in there, but weren’t there long, because the apartment was on the second floor, and my father had a very ill heart. He couldn’t handle taking the stairs. Because my partner-to-be had fallen in the uprising, I wanted to have my own family. I got married in 1946.

For many years after the war I lived with my parents, even though I got married in the meantime. I was looking for an apartment and found one, too, but my husband didn’t want to leave my parents. He felt safe with us. He said that we’d be abandoning them. I argued that that was normal, after all. That didn’t help, so we remained together. We also managed to get a bigger apartment. We lived with them for 30 years. My mother was in charge of the household; we called her Mussolini, because she was bossy. If we wanted to get along, we had to find a platform. Sometimes conflicts took place, but we resolved them as calmly as possible. I went to work and my mother helped me with the children. I valued the presence of my parents greatly, and that smoothed everything out.

I met my husband, Edmund Ambra, in a very romantic fashion. During the war I lived in Michalovce for a certain time, and my parents in Batovce. I’d go visit them twice a year. As the Germans were pushing across eastern Slovakia into Romania, Jews were being evacuated, political undesirables, basically ‘undesirable elements.’ In the meantime, my wartime husband was transferred to an army hospital in Trnava, which they later evacuated to Stare Hory. I then went with my parents to Batovce. We blended in with the population there. I used to go work in the fields with them. At the end of August 1944 we went to the mill to grind grain. Some soldiers stopped us. They told us that they were members of the Czechoslovak Army. They needed axes and shovels, as they’d been ordered to block the road to Hungary. This was because Levice was nearby. And my future husband was in this group. I and my ‘paper husband’ were divorced as soon as possible. Edmund and I were married on 13th October 1946. We were together 54 years.

My husband was from a devout family from Presov. Their name was Meisel, but afterwards he then changed his name to Ambra. The name was changed in a curious fashion. His younger brother, Imrich Meisel, was seriously injured at the beginning of the war. He was run over by a motorcycle. As soon as he’d barely recovered, the deportations began. So that he wouldn’t be taken away, they arranged Aryan papers for him. In the archive they found the birth certificate of a certain Ambra who’d fallen at the front. Based on that birth certificate, they arranged false papers for him. He then survived the entire war as Imrich Ambra in Horne Srnie. Right after the war, my husband took the same name as his brother.

My husband was very intelligent and educated. He loved classical music, though he was from a simple family. His father didn’t know Latin script, and knew how to write only in Hebrew. He worked as a shoemaker. My husband was very hard-working and fit in at my father’s pharmacy, because he’d also graduated from pharmacy. Before the war he’d begun studying chemical engineering, but after a half year he had to stop. They recognized some of his exams, and he continued with his studies in Brno, in pharmacy.

My husband was a big joiner. To my chagrin, he was also a member of the Party 33. In this aspect we didn’t agree. We couldn’t discuss politics at home, because right away there was a big conflict. During the Slansky trials 34 we didn’t have any problems in particular. Nothing happened, because he wasn’t that prominent in the Party. But to my taste he was, all too much, but what could you do. I let him be. It was his thing, as long as it didn’t affect our children. I know that once he had the night shift, and was invited to a meeting. I told him: ‘Pick up the phone and tell them that you’re on call!’ No, he’s got to go there in person. He went there in person and apologized. One friend then told him that as soon as he left, people started saying: ‘That Ambra’s a decent guy, hopefully he’s not a Slansky supporter!?’

My husband’s parents perished, as well as several siblings. His sister remained alive, and his brother, Imrich Ambra. His sister, Barbora, was a very pretty girl and one Jewish boy by the name of Weiner took a liking to her. When he was young he went to Belgium and learned to cut diamonds. He was from the East, and after the war he came here to pick a wife. Barbora caught his eye because she was very pretty. He took her to Belgium. They kept a kosher household, because everything was easily available. They had two daughters, who were brought up in a religious manner. They attended Jewish schools. My husband used to go visit them occasionally.

Both their children were brought up in a Jewish spirit. One of their daughters married a Belgian, a Jew. There wasn’t really any other option. They had three children together. One of them finished law and didn’t find a life partner. Now she’s about 30, which for a Jewish girl is already an advanced age. At work she met a blue-eyed blond guy, Taras, from Minsk. Believe it or not, he’s not a Jew. They brought Taras to her grandma, Barbora Weinerova. Because Slovak and Russian are related, she welcomed him very warmly. I’ve been invited to the wedding, but I’m afraid to go to Minsk, because that’s where the wedding is supposed to be. This is because his parents can’t get permission to leave.

After our wedding my husband began working for my father at the pharmacy. My father had decided to buy the pharmacy from his partner right after the end of World War I. He paid the last installment on the pharmacy in October 1938. They deported his partner. He perished, but an heir in France remained. Finally after 1948 they nationalized it 35. After that my father worked there as only an employee, and so did my husband. They later transferred my father to a different pharmacy. As far as management went, their opinions differed. My mother and I tried to keep it in balance. My father was almost never home. He worked from morning till night. Our pharmacy still exists to this day. It’s in a pedestrian zone. Now there’s a showroom there, ‘U Starej lekarne’ [The Old Pharmacy]. After 1989 36 we fought for it, but we finally gave up. I’m glad that that’s how I decided.

We had two children. A daughter, Hana, in 1947, and a son, Karol, in 1953. Inasmuch as we lived under one roof with my parents, there were occasionally differences of opinion on bringing up the children. My mother was an ambitious woman. My sister had been a talented musician, but, alas, died when she was 20. My mother wanted at all costs for my daughter to become a musician as well. The poor thing had to sit at the piano and practice at the age of six. I pleaded with her, that she doesn’t have to be an artist, that if she’s got talent, it’ll show itself eventually. We didn’t argue, but there were differences.

The children were good, excellent students. My father spoke German with them, so they learned another language. We went on hikes, always with a backpack on our backs. My husband and I took vacations together with the children. We spent our free time under Rosutec [the Maly Rosutec and Velky Rosutec mountains rise above the town of Terchova in the Zilina region], in Demanovska Dolina [Valley] and in the Tatras [The Low Tatras and the High Tatras are mountain ranges in Slovakia]. We’d stay in cabins. Then when the children grew up they each went with their own group. We didn’t have a car. We wanted to find out how our children would behave in the company of other children, so we sent them to camp. The boy was in a camp by Senica, but he didn’t like it there at all. And because our daughter spoke some French, we sent her to a camp with children from abroad. She wasn’t happy there either. So we decided we’d rather vacation as a family.

As far as our children’s religious upbringing goes, we didn’t observe holidays much. My father kept seder regularly, which interested them. We didn’t observe Yom Kippur, just my parents fasted. In the beginning we didn’t have a Christmas tree. We finally got one when we had our grandson with us. We didn’t want to completely isolate him. Because of him we decorated a small tree. In front of my grandfather’s photograph I pleaded: ‘Don’t be angry.’ Our grandfather hadn’t been tolerant in these matters. Our children read a lot, and when our daughter was about 13, she told me: ‘I often run into quotes from the Bible. I know very little about the various characters.’ I got her a Bible and that took care of that.

Our daughter began studying in Brno, biochemistry. I’m very proud of her, because there were only five spots available for biochemistry in the entire country, and they accepted her. In the beginning she came home very often, because she was an introvert. When she finished, she applied for work in Bratislava. She went for a job interview. The secretary told her: ‘You were first at school, but that doesn’t mean a thing!’ She asked: ‘Why?’ ‘Do you know any languages?’ ‘Slovak, German, French, English. You can test me!’ ‘You’re young and pretty, you’ll get married.’ ‘I won’t get married.’ They didn’t accept her. She was so annoyed that she left for Prague. There she found a job at the patent office. She grew close with one colleague there, and got married. Her husband wasn’t a Jew. The first thing I asked my daughter was whether he knew she was Jewish. She answered: ‘I told him right away.’ In the beginning they visited us every six weeks.

Our daughter had one son, Viktor, but alas not long after giving birth she died. My husband and I then raised Viktor. The boy lived with us from the age of four weeks. Her death was a huge tragedy. Our daughter had been working as a scientist in India. They wanted to go to America, but they told them: ‘First you have to go to India.’ They were working on subject matter that was being researched in India and the USA. In India she became infected by a parasite similar to a tapeworm, but which deposits its young in the cornea, or in the brain. Our daughter had the worse version, in the brain.

No one else in their team was infected. She underwent treatment in Belgium, and there they told her she could have caught it from improperly washed vegetables. Her illness dragged on for a long time. At first they thought that she was mentally ill. She was behaving strangely. They thought that it was related to late pregnancy. They said that she was 34, which is a fairly advanced age for a first pregnancy. That wasn’t confirmed. The child was born via caesarean section, and at that time they found out what was really the matter. A suppurating infection of the brain membranes, which is the same as the symptoms of the parasite. I asked the doctors how they were going to treat it. The medical minds in Prague told me: ‘We don’t know, we’ve never seen it before.’

I had one friend in Prague that opened some doors for me. He’d been in the diplomatic service for many years, and so knew various ways. He said that there was a hospital for tropical diseases in Hamburg, in London and in Antwerp. Because my husband had a sister in Antwerp, we applied for permission to leave the country. We also got it, ten days later. What they’d searched for here for a year, there they found out in 24 hours. They took a live tapeworm from her, 2 ½ meters long. Alas, nothing more could be done. During the time she was lying in the hospital in Antwerp, there was a parasitology congress in Paris. Her physician, Dr. Heyes, participated in it. At the conference he presented her case. One doctor from Mexico spoke up, as this disease is very frequent there. They diagnosed it in one 14-year-old boy, too. They operated on him and he was cured. After the operation our daughter was still alive. I traveled to go see her. The third day she died. Her son ended up with us.

For the first three years our grandson lived with us. Our son-in-law insisted that he learn perfect Czech, so he registered him in a kindergarten in Prague. He then only came to be with us during vacation. After some time they invited our son-in-law to America. He’s a chemist, and now he’s a professor in Chicago. Our grandson lived in America for some time, he finished biochemistry, but he moved to Prague. He didn’t want to live in America. The didn’t like the life there. We call each other at least once a week; he always says: ‘You’re my mother.’ His father lives in America. When they were supposed to move to America, I said to him: ‘You can’t go to America with a girlfriend, you have to get married!’ It was very hard for me, but she’s very nice and good to the boy. We still keep in touch, they phone me every month.

Our son married a woman who isn’t Jewish; they’re together for 30 years already, and get along very well. They’ve got two gorgeous girls. I see them very little. Zuzana lives with her husband in Orbiste, which is about six kilometers from Piestany, but when your legs don’t serve you, even that’s far. The second, Hana, has a peculiar nature. She’s still got to grow up, but I love her.

Our son graduated from economics. In the beginning he worked at the spa, but they began trying to trip him up. He resigned. He had a hard time finding a job. Finally he had to take some sort of requalification course in accounting. He bought a computer and all sorts of programs. Later he started a company with a friend, and is in business.

After the war I began studying pharmacy, but my back was bothering me. In Prague they told me that I had to change my occupation. I turned to a friend who was a doctor, and he recommended me to a specialist. His advice was for me to change my occupation. Finally I found a job in a company that needed someone that knew foreign languages. In time I became manager of the entire department. I was in charge of ten women. Our department was named the study department. Our work was sorting information from all over the world. We used to get about a hundred different foreign magazines, German, French, Russian ones. I informed upper management as to what was going on in the world. We of course monitored information only in certain fields, like mechanical engineering and healthcare. It was very interesting. My greatest success was when they wrote me all the way from China, but I wasn’t allowed to answer, because there was a total ban. That disappointed me greatly.

I retired when I was 58. I worked three years extra. At that time my son had come to Piestany and I promised him that I’d take care of the grandkids. So I took care of the children. When my grandson grew up, I started giving German lessons. I gave only private lessons, even though they also wanted me at school. Back then my granddaughter told me: ‘Grandma, please, don’t go to school. You don’t know what kids are like these days.’ So I didn’t go. It got on my husband’s nerves, because I translated a lot.

After the war there were almost no Jews in Piestany. Most of them left for Prague, and some of them went even further, to England or Israel. In 1949 there was a large wave of emigration. Back then there was the so-called ‘lift.’ There were wooden crates into which things were packed. Each crate had to have an exact list, which went to the customs office. They came to see my father as well, and said: ‘Mr. Pharmacist, we’ll pack up your pharmacy as it stands, all the furnishings and everything, and it’ll go to Israel.’ My father wasn’t well, and didn’t want to go to a place with a harsh climate. So we stayed here.

Life returned to the Jewish community in Piestany to the extent that my parents’ generation occasionally met up. There was one prayer hall here, and that’s where they’d meet. Likely they talked and reminisced. My generation almost wasn’t. They also observed holidays in that prayer hall. When we were building the memorial, one man from Vrbova was here. He came over to me and asked where the Torahs were. I didn’t know, all I knew was that when the Torah is in danger, it has to be buried. He said: ‘It’s got to be here, because in 1953 I had a bar mitzvah in that little prayer hall. We searched for it, but didn’t find out anything. If anyone knew anything, they kept quiet.

Currently a few older members of the community live in the town. Mrs. Vesela is 90, and I’m 85. Then there’s one married couple, Dr. [and Mrs.] Braun. He’s from Vrbova. He and his wife have two daughters that are very active in Bratislava, they’re already in university. Dr. Stastny also came to live here, from Trnava. For some time he was also a so-called Rosh Hakol [president of a Jewish community]. There are also a lot of mixed marriages here. On 15th December 2005, we unveiled a memorial to victims of the Holocaust, and at that time we decided that we’d meet there each year in December. An unbelievable number of people come here, non-Jews as well.

The idea of the memorial came about long before that. Sometime around the 1970s they approached me, that they wanted to write about some forgotten architects. I met with Mr. Mrna, who was looking for information on Mr. Weiss. Mr. Weiss was a contemporary of my parents’. By coincidence we had his photograph. He had a list of Jews who’d been deported and hadn’t returned. I looked at it and told him that there was a huge number of people missing. The town should build them a memorial. Piestany, Trnava, Topolcany. Those were Guardist bastions. I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and so I wrote my relatives in Israel, and they sent me a list of Piestany Jews that hadn’t returned. That list was put together right in 1945 at the initiative of Mr. Grünwald from Vrbova.

We didn’t want to write on the memorial that a thousand Jews had perished. We wanted to return those people their identities. Later they held it against us, that it could have come out a lot cheaper. We wanted to do it properly. At that time we started down the hard road of looking for the first names of children and adults that had been deported. Getting access to the birth records of the town of Piestany was a huge problem, because the permission of the mayor was necessary. I complained to a children’s doctor, Dr. Sajmovic, that we weren’t able to make contact with Cicutto [Cicutto, Remo: current mayor of Piestany]. Dr. Sajmovic told me: ‘That’s no problem, I treated him when he was a boy.’ Finally the mayor gave me permission. I couldn’t just look into the birth records, where the birth certificates were. One civil servant helped me immensely in this. I was writing out Jewish names and dates of birth. She would then look for the birth certificate in another file. In this manner we searched out entire families.

The biggest problem was to get into the State Archive in Bratislava. They’re big anti-Semites there. Again Dr. Sajmovic helped me; he belongs to the Hidden Child group. [Hidden Child: a group of children of Jewish origin who were in hiding in territory occupied by Nazi German during the Holocaust (1939 – 1945). They currently form the last generation that survived the Holocaust.] Once during a get-together in Bratislava a lady appeared who spoke very good Slovak. She was an American who’d married a Slovak and had come here to visit. I met with her, and she gave me the name of a woman who worked for the state archive. I called her and got into the state archive. They told me that I had to announce myself two days in advance. So I announced myself.

They’re large archives, and they contain lists of the names of people that had been deported. They brought me the list of individual transports, and one they forgot. They forgot to bring me the list of names of the transport of Piestany girls. There were 200 of them. I undertook that we’d write former residents of Piestany for a contribution. The Slovak Union of Jewish Religious Communities also contributed 250,000 crowns. [According to the current rate of exchange (July 2007) 250,000 SKK is approximately 7,650 EUR.] A friend put an ad into the Hebrew-Slovak newspaper in Israel. Many answered it. We communicated in English and German, but many of them still spoke broken Slovak.

During the years that we worked on the memorial, we had a lot of experiences. I even copied one story:

Mancika survived...

Bernat Templer and his wife Rachel were deported together with their children Moses and Mala (they called her Mancika) probably sometime in 1942. The fate of this family was to be similar to the fate of thousands of other Jewish families – liquidation as the final solution.
But Mancika (born 1933) survived. Was it an instinct for survival, chance, luck, a higher power? It’s not our task to concern ourselves with why it happened, but how it really was.
But let’s let Mancika speak, so that the story has authenticity.
‘Once some uncles [some men] came to our place, they were dressed in black clothes. We had to take our bags that we’d prepared and go to the station. Then a freight train arrived at the station, which we had to board. They slammed the door behind us and we traveled for a very long time. When we got off, someone said that we were in Poland.
They led us to a fenced-in place, I don’t even know how long we were there, but I was cold and I was hungry. Then they loaded us onto trucks, there were many of them, and we traveled to some forest. I was in the last truck, and a girl from Rome was standing beside me. I didn’t understand what she was saying, and she didn’t understand me. I knew that they were going to shoot us. Suddenly we caught each other by the hand and jumped. No one saw it. We hid in the forest. During the night we were very cold. In the morning a woman dressed like the village women back home found us. She brought us something to eat and in the evening took us into her house. She gave us some food, warm things and hid us in the cellar. Twice snow fell and melted, and it was warm. One day we were able to go out in the courtyard - there were soldiers there, but they were smiling. They drove us in a car for a long time, until we arrived in a large city and could understand what people there were saying. The soldiers told us that we were in Prague.”
That's how Mancika ended up in a Prague orphanage. "Once we were out for a walk on one wide street, and I heard someone say the word Piestany. There was a man standing on the sidewalk, and I caught him by the coat and yelled, I’m from Piestany, too, I want to go home.”
How do you explain to a child, scarred by the many tribulations of war, escapes, hiding, hunger and want, that she doesn’t have a home, that she has no parents? What took place in that child’s little head when she realized that she was heading for death? Did she even know what death was? Will her children one day believe her? Will anyone at all who lived outside of Europe during the war believe her?
At that time orphanages in Prague were overly full. The young man persuaded the management of the orphanage and with his signature guaranteed that he’d take the child to safety. He knew that in Piestany the door of the Erdelyi family was always open. Mancika stayed with us for some time. My mother always lit two candles on Friday. This time she lit four, in memory of Mancika’s mother "My mother used to light candles, too,” wept Mancika.
With the help of the Red Cross and Piestany natives that had left for Palestine before World War II, we succeeded in searching out Mancika’s relatives. Manckia left with a normal emigrant’s passport for Palestine, and we never heard of her again. I only hope that she started her own family and is happy.
It’s a small world, and unusual things happen, too – on 20th July 2004 we found Mancika Templer! Today her name is Malka Vered, and she lives in Tel Aviv. She’s got a nice family, is a grandmother, and will soon be a great-grandmother.
I’m happy that we can strike out the name Mala Templer, number 903 on the list. If there could only be more of them.
[Editor’s note: When the list of names of the Holocaust Victims Memorial in Piestany was being put together, Mrs. Heda Ambrova had no idea that Mancika Templerova had survived the war, and that after the Holocaust had also spent a few days with their family.]

Mr. Mrna is incredibly meticulous. When we began, I told him that we didn’t have any money or connections. So I approached Dr. Samovic. He helped us a lot. Because he was a doctor and treated children as well as their parents, he had connections. With his help we gained a lot of generous sponsors. Mr. Sajmovic is still alive to this day, but is currently in Hungary. We built the memorial in the ceremonial chamber of the Piestany Jewish cemetery. The ceremonial chamber was in a state of neglect, but we had an expert, Mr. Mrna, an engineer, who said that after certain repairs it could be used. So the whole thing succeeded.

During the time of Communism we didn’t travel much. We lived modestly. We saved and said to ourselves that when the children would be grown and secure, it would be our turn. Then later we went on Cedok tours. [Cedok used to be the largest travel agency in former Czechoslovakia; it was founded in 1920 with headquarters in Prague. Its name is an acronym formed from the Czech words "Ceskoslovenska dopravni kancelar" (Czechoslovak Transport Agency).] Besides that, I was in Israel three times. The first time, in 1966, I went through Belgium. I waited three quarters of a year for permission to leave the country. We landed in Tel Aviv. The entire family was waiting there for me. I was very touched by that. It was amazing, a whole different world. Then my friends arranged it amongst each other and each one of them took me someplace else. All told, I was there five weeks. It was beautiful, but in order for a person to move there, he’d have to be young.

As far as Western European countries are concerned, around 1971 we did one tour, to Vienna, Luxembourg, Ostende, Dover and Paris. The trip lasted about two weeks. There was a big difference between Western countries and Czechoslovakia. You could see it in the accommodations, too. The clean streets. I liked England the most. I don’t even know why. Maybe because our English tour guide was from Liberec. She hugged us all. It was very touching. We prepared in advance what we wanted to see, otherwise it makes no sense.

My husband and I didn’t collect anything. In order for a person to become a collector, he’s got to have money. My hobby was art, mainly painting. My favorite period is the Renaissance. I always wrote down what I’d seen in which museum. I know that in Florence I couldn’t for the life of me find Botticelli [Botticelli, Sandro (1445 – 1510): an Italian Renaissance painter from the Florence school], but in the end I found him. The second tour we went on was to northern Germany, from where we took a ship to Denmark, Sweden and to Helsinki. The trip ended in Leningrad, from where we flew home. Another of our trips was to Greece. That we really enjoyed. Our wandering feet also led us to Italy. We of course saw Rome. We were also in St. Petersburg, Riga and Moscow. After my husband’s death I flew to America. Back then my son-in-law came here and told me that I’ve got to take a break. So I flew there.

My husband died in the year 2000, for us it was a matter of course that we’d bury him at the Jewish cemetery. That was no dilemma; even though we didn’t observe the holidays, we’ve got Judaism in our hearts.

Glossary

1 KuK (Kaiserlich und Königlich) army

The name 'Imperial and Royal' was used for the army of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, as well as for other state institutions of the Monarchy originated from the dual political system. Following the Compromise of 1867, which established the Dual Monarchy, Austrian emperor and Hungarian King Franz Joseph was the head of the state and also commander-in-chief of the army. Hence the name 'Imperial and Royal'.
2 Kashrut in eating habits: Kashrut means ritual behavior. A term indicating the religious validity of some object or article according to Jewish law, mainly in the case of foodstuffs. Biblical law dictates which living creatures are allowed to be eaten. The use of blood is strictly forbidden. The method of slaughter is prescribed, the so-called shechitah. The main rule of kashrut is the prohibition of eating dairy and meat products at the same time, even when they weren't cooked together. The time interval between eating foods differs. On the territory of Slovakia six hours must pass between the eating of a meat and dairy product. In the opposite case, when a dairy product is eaten first and then a meat product, the time interval is different. In some Jewish communities it is sufficient to wash out one's mouth with water. The longest time interval was three hours - for example in Orthodox communities in Southwestern Slovakia.
3 Hviezdoslav Orszagh, Pavol (1849-1921): Slovak poet, dramatist, translator and a member of the Czechoslovak parliament for a short time. Literary theoreticians consider him the most important Slovak poet of all times.
4 The Nuremberg Trials: are a series of trials most notable for the prosecution of prominent members of the political, military and economic leadership of Nazi Germany. The trials were held in the city of Nuremberg, Germany, from 1945 to 1949, at the Nuremberg Palace of Justice. The first and best known of these trials was the Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal (IMT), which tried 24 of the most important captured leaders of Nazi Germany. It was held from 20th November 1945 to 1st October 1946. The second set of trials of lesser war criminals was conducted under Control Council Law No. 10 at the U.S. Nuremberg Military Tribunals (NMT), among them the Doctors' Trial and the Judges' Trial.
5 War with Japan: In 1945 the war in Europe was over, but in the Far East Japan was still fighting against the anti-fascist coalition countries and China. The USSR declared war on Japan on 8 August 1945 and Japan signed the act of capitulation in September 1945.

6 Hitler's rise to power

In the German parliamentary elections in January 1933, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) won one-third of the votes. On 30th January 1933 the German president swore in Adolf Hitler, the party's leader, as chancellor. On 27th February 1933 the building of the Reichstag (the parliament) in Berlin was burned down. The government laid the blame with the Bulgarian communists, and a show trial was staged. This served as the pretext for ushering in a state of emergency and holding a re-election. It was won by the NSDAP, which gained 44% of the votes, and following the cancellation of the communists' votes it commanded over half of the mandates. The new Reichstag passed an extraordinary resolution granting the government special legislative powers and waiving the constitution for 4 years. This enabled the implementation of a series of moves that laid the foundations of the totalitarian state: all parties other than the NSDAP were dissolved, key state offices were filled by party luminaries, and the political police and the apparatus of terror swiftly developed.

7 Skoda Company

Car factory, the foundations of which were laid in 1895 by the mechanics V. Laurin and V. Klement with the production of Slavia bicycles. Just before the end of the 19th century they began manufacturing motor cycles and, in 1905, they started manufacturing automobiles. The name Skoda was introduced in 1925. Having survived economic difficulties, the company made a name for itself on the international market even within the constraints of the Socialist economy. In 1991 Skoda became a joint stock company in association with Volkswagen.

8 Slovak Uprising

At Christmas 1943 the Slovak National Council was formed, consisting of various oppositional groups (communists, social democrats, agrarians etc.). Their aim was to fight the Slovak fascist state. The uprising broke out in Banska Bystrica, central Slovakia, on 20th August 1944. On 18th October the Germans launched an offensive. A large part of the regular Slovak army joined the uprising and the Soviet Army also joined in. Nevertheless the Germans put down the riot and occupied Banska Bystrica on 27th October, but weren't able to stop the partisan activities. As the Soviet army was drawing closer many of the Slovak partisans joined them in Eastern Slovakia under either Soviet or Slovak command.

9 Labor Battalion

Under the 1939 II. Law 230, those deemed unfit for military service were required to complete "public interest work service". After the implementation of the second anti-Jewish Law within the military, the military arranged "special work battalions" for those Jews, who were not called up for armed service. With the entry into northern Transylvania (August 1940), those of Jewish origin who had begun, and were now finishing, their military service were directed to the work battalions. A decree in 1941 unified the arrangement, saying that the Jews were to fulfill military obligations in the support units of the National Guard. In the summer of 1942, thousands of Jews were recruited to labor battalions with the Hungarian troops going to the Soviet front. Some 50,000 in labor battalions went with the Second Hungarian Army to the Eastern Front - of these, only 6-7,000 returned.

10 Subcarpathian Ruthenia

Is found in the region where the Carpathian Mountains meet the Central Dnieper Lowlands. Its larger towns are Beregovo, Mukacevo and Hust. Up until the World War I the region belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, but in the year 1919, according to the St. Germain peace treaty, was made a part of Czechoslovakia. Exact statistics regarding ethnic and linguistic composition of the population aren't available. Between the two World Wars Ruthenia's inhabitants included Hungarians, Ruthenians, Russians, Ukrainians, Czechs and Slovaks, plus numerous Jewish and Gypsy communities. The first Vienna  Decision (1938) gave Hungary that part of Ruthenia inhabited by Hungarians. The remainder of the region gained autonomy within Czechoslovakia, and was occupied by Hungarian troops. In 1944 the Soviet Army and local resistance units took power in Ruthenia. According to an agreement dated 29th June 1945, Czechoslovakia ceded the region to the Soviet Union. Up until 1991 it was a part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. After Ukraine declared its independence, it became one of the country's administrative regions.

11 Slovak State (1939-1945)

Czechoslovakia, which was created after the disintegration of Austria-Hungary, lasted until it was broken up by the Munich Pact of 1938; Slovakia became a separate (autonomous) republic on 6th October 1938 with Jozef Tiso as Slovak PM. Becoming suspicious of the Slovakian moves to gain independence, the Prague government applied martial law and deposed Tiso at the beginning of March 1939, replacing him with Karol Sidor. Slovakian personalities appealed to Hitler, who used this appeal as a pretext for making Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia a German protectorate. On 14th March 1939 the Slovak Diet declared the independence of Slovakia, which in fact was a nominal one, tightly controlled by Nazi Germany.

12 Winton, Sir Nicholas (b

1909): A British broker and humanitarian worker, who in 1939 saved 669 Jewish children from the territory of the endangered Czechoslovakia from death by transporting them to Great Britain.

13 SK Bar Kochba Bratislava

The most important representative of swimming sports in the First Czechoslovak Republic. The club was a participant in Czechoslovak championships, which it dominated in the late 1930s. The performance of SK Bar Kochba Bratislava swimmers is also documented by the world record in the 4 x 200m freestyle relay, which was achieved by four swimmers: Frucht, Baderle, Steiner, Foldes. They also won several Czechoslovak championships in relays. SK Bar Kochba was also the most successful from the standpoint of number of titles of Czechoslovak champion in individual disciplines. In 1936, despite being nominated, athletes of Jewish nationality didn't participate in the Olympic Games in Berlin. The Czechoslovak Olympic Committee didn't recognize this legitimate protest against the political situation in Germany, denounced it in the media and financially penalized the athletes.

14 Exemption and exceptions in the Slovak State (1939-1945)

In the Jewish Codex they are included under § 254 and § 255. Exemption and exceptions, § 255 - the President of the Slovak Republic may grant an exemption from the stipulations of this decree. Exemption may be complete or partial and may be subject to conditions. Exemption may be revoked at any time. In the case of exemption, administrative fees are collected according to § 255 in the following amounts:
a) for the granting of an exception according to § 1, the sum of 1,000 to 500,000 Ks.
b) for the granting of an exception according to § 2, the sum of 500 to 100,000 Ks
c) for the granting of an exception according to single or multiple decrees, the sum of 10 Ks to 300,000 Ks
d) a certificate issued according to § 3 is charged at 10 Ks
§ 255 enabled the President to grant exceptions from decrees for a fee. Disputes are still led regarding how this paragraph got into the Jewish Codex and how many exceptions the President granted. According to documents there were 1111 Jews protected by exceptions, including family members. Exceptions were valid from the commencement of deportations from the territory of the Slovak State, in 1942, up until the outbreak of the Slovak National Rebellion, in the year 1944.

15 Swedish Red Cross

One of the oldest delegations of the International Federation of the Red Cross, it was established in 1865. In 1944-45 it played a significant role in the Jews' rescue actions in Hungary. On 11th June 1944 Carl Danielsson, the Swedish ambassador in Budapest submitted a petition to the Hungarian government, asking permission for the Swedish Red Cross to intervene in the administration of Jews in Hungary. The main policies of the planned action (for which the organization requested permission) were: contribution to the accommodation and supply of orphaned Jewish children, acquisition of Swedish free pass for persons who had relatives in Sweden, or who had confirmed business relations for a longer period in Sweden. The action was directed by Dr. Waldemar Langlet, the delegate of the Swedish Red Cross in Hungary. He much overstepped his authority in what concerned the number of the issued free passes. One must mention among the rescue actions of the Swedish Red Cross the agreement with the SS-leadership concluded by the Swedish ambassador, Count Folke Bernadotte. Under this agreement, in March and April 1945 the Swedish Red Cross took out and transported from the German concentration camps to Sweden more than 25,000 Danish and Swedish political prisoners (mainly Jews) with 36 buses.

16 Bergen-Belsen

Concentration camp located in northern Germany. Bergen-Belsen was established in April 1943 as a  detention camp for prisoners who were to be exchanged with Germans imprisoned in Allied countries. Bergen-Belsen was liberated by the British army on 15th April, 1945. The soldiers were shocked at what they found, including 60,000 prisoners in the camp, many on the brink of death, and thousands of unburied bodies lying about. (Source: Rozett R. - Spector S.: Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, Facts on File, G.G. The Jerusalem Publishing House Ltd. 2000, pg. 139 -141) 

17 First Vienna Decision

On 2nd November 1938 a German-Italian international committee in Vienna obliged Czechoslovakia to surrender much of the southern Slovakian territories that were inhabited mainly by Hungarians. The cities of Kassa (Kosice), Komarom (Komarno), Ersekujvar (Nove Zamky), Ungvar (Uzhorod) and Munkacs (Mukacevo), all in all 11.927 km? of land, and a population of 1.6 million people became part of Hungary. According to the Hungarian census in 1941 84% of the people in the annexed lands were Hungarian-speaking.

18 Maccabi Sports Club in the Czechoslovak Republic

The Maccabi World Union was founded in 1903 in Basel at the VI. Zionist Congress. In 1935 the Maccabi World Union had 100,000 members, 10,000 of which were in Czechoslovakia. Physical education organizations in Bohemia have their roots in the 19th century. For example, the first Maccabi gymnastic club in Bohemia was founded in 1899. The first sport club, Bar Kochba, was founded in 1893 in Moravia. The total number of Maccabi clubs in Bohemia and Moravia before WWI was fifteen. The Czechoslovak Maccabi Union was officially founded in June 1924, and in the same year became a member of the Maccabi World Union, located in Berlin.

19 First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938)

The First Czechoslovak Republic was created after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy following World War I. The union of the Czech lands and Slovakia was officially proclaimed in Prague in 1918, and formally recognized by the Treaty of St. Germain in 1919. Ruthenia was added by the Treaty of Trianon in 1920. Czechoslovakia inherited the greater part of the industries of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the new government carried out an extensive land reform, as a result of which the living conditions of the peasantry increasingly improved. However, the constitution of 1920 set up a highly centralized state and failed to take into account the issue of national minorities, and thus internal political life was dominated by the struggle of national minorities (especially the Hungarians and the Germans) against Czech rule. In foreign policy Czechoslovakia kept close contacts with France and initiated the foundation of the Little Entente in 1921.

20 Jewish Codex

Order no. 198 of the Slovakian government, issued in September 1941, on the legal status of the Jews, went down in history as Jewish Codex. Based on the Nuremberg Laws, it was one of the most stringent and inhuman anti-Jewish laws all over Europe. It paraphrased the Jewish issue on a racial basis, religious considerations were fading into the background; categories of Jew, Half Jew, moreover 'Mixture' were specified by it. The majority of the 270 paragraphs dealt with the transfer of Jewish property (so-called Aryanizing; replacing Jews by non-Jews) and the exclusion of Jews from economic, political and public life.

21 Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

Bohemia and Moravia were occupied by the Germans and transformed into a German Protectorate in March 1939, after Slovakia declared its independence. The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was placed under the supervision of the Reich protector, Konstantin von Neurath. The Gestapo assumed police authority. Jews were dismissed from civil service and placed in an extralegal position. In the fall of 1941, the Reich adopted a more radical policy in the Protectorate. The Gestapo became very active in arrests and executions. The deportation of Jews to concentration camps was organized, and Terezin/Theresienstadt was turned into a ghetto for Jewish families. During the existence of the Protectorate the Jewish population of Bohemia and Moravia was virtually annihilated. After World War II the pre-1938 boundaries were restored, and most of the German-speaking population was expelled.

22 Exclusion of Jews from schools in the Protectorate

The Ministry of Education of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia sent round a ministerial decree in 1940, which stated that from school year 1940/41 Jewish pupils were not allowed to visit Czech public and private schools and those who were already in school should be excluded. After 1942 Jews were not allowed to visit Jewish schools or courses organized by the Jewish communities either.

23 Hlinka-Guards

Military group under the leadership of the radical wing of the Slovakian Popular Party. The radicals claimed an independent Slovakia and a fascist political and public life. The Hlinka-Guards deported brutally, and without German help, 58,000 (according to other sources 68,000) Slovak Jews between March and October 1942.

24 Hakhsharah

Training camps organized by the Zionists, in which Jewish youth in the Diaspora received intellectual and physical training, especially in agricultural work, in preparation for settling in Palestine.

25 Orthodox communities

The traditionalist Jewish communities founded their own Orthodox organizations after the Universal Meeting in 1868-1869.They organized their life according to Judaist principles and opposed to assimilative aspirations. The community leaders were the rabbis. The statute of their communities was sanctioned by the king in 1871. In the western part of Hungary the communities of the German and Slovakian immigrants' descendants were formed according to the Western Orthodox principles. At the same time in the East, among the Jews of Galician origins the 'eastern' type of Orthodoxy was formed; there the Hassidism prevailed. In time the Western Orthodoxy also spread over to the eastern part of Hungary. In 1896, there were 294 Orthodox mother-communities and 1,001 subsidiary communities registered all over Hungary, mainly in Transylvania and in the north-eastern part of the country,. In 1930, the 136 mother-communities and 300 subsidiary communities made up 30.4 percent of all Hungarian Jews. This number increased to 535 Orthodox communities in 1944, including 242,059 believers (46 percent).

26 Neolog Jewry

Following a Congress in 1868/69 in Budapest, where the Jewish community was supposed to discuss several issues on which the opinion of the traditionalists and the modernizers differed and which aimed at uniting Hungarian Jews, Hungarian Jewry was officially split into two (later three) communities, which all built up their own national community network. The Neologs were the modernizers, who opposed the Orthodox on various questions. The third group, the sop-called Status Quo Ante advocated that the Jewish community was maintained the same as before the 1868/69 Congress.

27 Sokol

One of the best-known Czech sports organizations. It was founded in 1862 as the first physical educational organization in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Besides regular training of all age groups, units organized sports competitions, colorful gymnastics rallies, cultural events including drama, literature and music, excursions and youth camps. Although its main goal had always been the promotion of national health and sports, Sokol also played a key role in the national resistance to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Nazi occupation and the communist regime. Sokol flourished between the two World Wars; its membership grew to over a million. Important statesmen, including the first two presidents of interwar Czechoslovakia, Tomas Garrigue Masaryk and Edvard Benes, were members of Sokol. Sokol was banned three times: during World War I, during the Nazi occupation and finally by the communists after 1948, but branches of the organization continued to exist abroad. Sokol was restored in 1990.

28 Anschluss

The German term "Anschluss" (literally: connection) refers to the inclusion of Austria in a "Greater Germany" in 1938. In February 1938, Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg had been invited to visit Hitler at his mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden. A two-hour tirade against Schuschnigg and his government followed, ending with an ultimatum, which Schuschnigg signed. On his return to Vienna, Schuschnigg proved both courageous and foolhardy. He decided to reaffirm Austria's independence, and scheduled a plebiscite for Sunday, 13th March, to determine whether Austrians wanted a "free, independent, social, Christian and united Austria." Hitler' protégé, Seyss-Inquart, presented Schuschnigg with another ultimatum: Postpone the plebiscite or face a German invasion. On 11th March Schuschnigg gave in and canceled the plebiscite. On 12th March 1938 Hitler announced the annexation of Austria. When German troops crossed into Austria, they were welcomed with flowers and Nazi flags. Hitler arrived later that day to a rapturous reception in his hometown of Linz. Less well disposed Austrians soon learned what the "Anschluss" held in store for them. Known Socialists and Communists were stripped to the waist and flogged. Jews were forced to scrub streets and public latrines. Schuschnigg ended up in a concentration camp and was only freed in 1945 by American troops.

29 Deportation of Jews from the Slovak State

The size of the Jewish community in the Slovak State in 1939 was around 89,000 residents (according to the 1930 census - it was around 135,000 residents), while after the I. Vienna Decision in November 1938, around 40,000 Jews were on the territory gained by Hungary. At a government session on 24th March 1942, the Minister of the Interior, A. Mach, presented a proposed law regarding the expulsion of Jews. From March 1942 to October 1942, 58 transports left Slovakia, and 57,628 people (2/3 of the Jewish population) were deported. The deportees, according to a constitutional law regarding the divestment of state citizenship, could take with them only 50 kg of precisely specified personal property. The Slovak government paid Nazi Germany a "settlement" subsidy, 500 RM (around 5,000 Sk in the currency of the time) for each person. Constitutional law legalized deportations. After the deportations, not even 20,000 Jews remained in Slovakia. In the fall of 1944 - after the arrival of the Nazi army on the territory of Slovakia, which suppressed the Slovak National Uprising - deportations were renewed. This time the Slovak side fully left their realization to Nazi Germany. In the second phase of 1944-1945, 13,500 Jews were deported from Slovakia, with about 1000 Jewish persons being executed directly on Slovak territory. About 10,000 Jewish citizens were saved thanks to the help of the Slovak populace.(Source: Niznansky, Eduard: Zidovska komunita na Slovensku 1939-1945, http://www.holocaust.cz/cz2/resources/texts/niznansky_komunita)Niznansky, Eduard: Zidovska komunita na Slovensku 1939-1945)

30 Novaky labor camp

Established in 1941 in the central Slovakian town of Novaky. In an area of 2.27 km? 24 barracks were built, which accommodated 2,500-3,000 people in 1943. Many of the people detained in Novaky were transported to the Polish camps. The camp was liberated by the partisans on 30th August 1944 and the inmates joined the partisans.

31 Sixth Labor Battalion of Jews

The first discriminatory legal statute of the Slovak State in the army was the government decree No. 74 Sl. z., dated 24th April 1939, regarding the expulsion of Jews from public services. On 21st June 1939 a second legal statute was passed, government decree No. 150 Sl. z. regarding Jews' military responsibilities. On its basis all Jews in the army were transferred to special work formations. Decree 230/1939 Sl. z. stripped Jewish persons of rank. All stated laws were part of the racially discriminatory legal framework of the Slovak State. In 1939, 1940 and 1941 three years of Jewish draftees entered army work formations, which formed the so-called Sixth Battalion. The year 1942 did not enter, as its members were assigned to the first transports. The first mass concentration of Jewish draftees into an army work formation was on 3rd March 1941 in the town of Cemerne. On 31st May 1943 three Jewish companies were transferred to work centers of the Ministry of the Interior watched over by the Hlinka Guard. Most members were transferred to labor camps: Novaky, Sered, Kostolna and Vyhne. A large majority of them later participated in fighting during the Slovak National Uprising. (Source: Knezo Schönbrun, Bernard, Zidia v siestom robotnom prapore, In. Zidia v interakcii II., IJ UK Bratislava, 1999, pp. 63 - 80)Knezo-Shönbrun, Bernard: Zidia v siestom robotnom prapore, In. Zidia v interakcii II., IJ UK Bratislava, 1999, pgs. 63 - 81.

32 Yellow star in Slovakia

On 18th September 1941 an order passed by the Slovakian Minister of the Interior required all Jews to wear a clearly visible yellow star, at least 6 cm in diameter, on the left side of their clothing. After 20th October 1941 only stars issued by the Jewish Center were permitted. Children under the age of six, Jews married to non-Jews and their children if not of Jewish religion, were exempt, as well as those who had converted before 10th September 1941. Further exemptions were given to Jews who filled certain posts (civil servants, industrial executives, leaders of institutions and funds) and to those receiving reprieve from the state president. Exempted Jews were certified at the relevant constabulary authority. The order was valid from 22nd September 1941.
33 Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSC): Founded in 1921 following a split from the Social Democratic Party, it was banned under the Nazi occupation. It was only after Soviet Russia entered World War II that the Party developed resistance activity in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; because of this, it gained a certain degree of popularity with the general public after 1945. After the communist coup in 1948, the Party had sole power in Czechoslovakia for over 40 years. The 1950s were marked by party purges and a war against the 'enemy within'. A rift in the Party led to a relaxing of control during the Prague Spring starting in 1967, which came to an end with the occupation of Czechoslovakia by Soviet and allied troops in 1968 and was followed by a period of normalization. The communist rule came to an end after the Velvet Revolution of November 1989.

34 Slansky trial

In the years 1948-1949 the Czechoslovak government together with the Soviet Union strongly supported the idea of the founding of a new state, Israel. Despite all efforts, Stalin's politics never found fertile ground in Israel; therefore the Arab states became objects of his interest. In the first place the Communists had to allay suspicions that they had supplied the Jewish state with arms. The Soviet leadership announced that arms shipments to Israel had been arranged by Zionists in Czechoslovakia. The times required that every Jew in Czechoslovakia be automatically considered a Zionist and cosmopolitan. In 1951 on the basis of a show trial, 14 defendants (eleven of them were Jews) with Rudolf Slansky, First Secretary of the Communist Party at the head were convicted. Eleven of the accused got the death penalty; three were sentenced to life imprisonment. The executions were carried out on 3rd December 1952. The Communist Party later finally admitted its mistakes in carrying out the trial and all those sentenced were socially and legally rehabilitated in 1963.

35 Nationalization in Czechoslovakia

The goal of nationalization was to put privately-owned means of production and private property into public control and into the hands of the Socialist state. The attempts to change property relations after WWI (1918-1921) were unsuccessful. Directly after WWII, already by May 1945, the heads of state took over possession of the collaborators' (that is, Hungarian and German) property. In July 1945, members of the Communist Party before the National Front openly called for the nationalization of banks, financial institutions, insurance companies and industrial enterprises, the execution of which fell to the Nationalization Central Committee. The first decree for nationalization was signed 11th August 1945 by the Republic President. This decree affected agricultural production, the film industry and foreign trade. Members of the Communist Party fought representatives of the National Socialist Party and the Democratic Party for further expansion of the process of nationalization, which resulted in the president signing four new decrees on 24th October, barely two months after taking office. These called for nationalization of the mining industry companies and industrial plants, the food industry plants, as well as joint-stock companies, banks and life insurance companies. The nationalization established Czechoslovakia's financial development, and shaped the 'Socialist financial sphere.' Despite this, significantly valuable property disappeared from companies in public ownership into the private and foreign trade network. Because of this, the activist committee of the trade unions called for further nationalizations on 22nd February 1948. This process was stopped in Czechoslovakia by new laws of the National Assembly in April 1948, which were passed that December.
36 Velvet Revolution: Also known as November Events, this term is used for the period between 17th November and 29th December 1989, which resulted in the downfall of the Czechoslovak communist regime. A non-violent political revolution in Czechoslovakia that meant the transition from Communist dictatorship to democracy. The Velvet Revolution began with a police attack against Prague students on 17th November 1989. That same month the citizen's democratic movement Civic Forum (OF) in Czech and Public Against Violence (VPN) in Slovakia were formed. On 10th December a government of National Reconciliation was established, which started to realize democratic reforms. On 29th December Vaclav Havel was elected president. In June 1990 the first democratic elections since 1948 took place.

Bitoush Behar

Bitoush Behar

Plovdiv

Bulgaria

Interviewer: Svetlana Avdala

Date of Interview: May 2006

 

I think that the most idiosyncratic feature of Bitoush Behar is the sound spirit of a craftsman he carries about himself. I have come across such people. They walk firmly on the ground and have the self-confidence of people who are able to provide for themselves. They are not rich; they haven’t gathered a fortune but feel free enough because they don’t depend on the winds and storms of the times they live in. Their words are always sincere, frank and clear. For them two plus two makes four in most of the cases. They are not prone to talking about things in a philosophical way and they don’t look for ‘a calf under the ox’, as the Bulgarian proverb has it. Their spiritual health is obvious and they are not susceptible to the diseases of the soul. For them the most valuable things are simple – family, marriage, children, home, work and having order in their lives. That’s what Bitoush is like. In appearance – a massively built man with dense presence.

I met him for the first time in the café of ‘Shalom’ in Plovdiv. He was playing cards. He told me he was taking a nap every afternoon and every evening he came to the club to play cards. He didn’t agree right away to give an interview, but after a conversation in which we found a lot of things we had in common, he agreed. He was very punctual when coming to our meetings, with preliminary prepared photos and the necessary documents. In the end we separated as old friends.

My name is Bitoush Yuda Behar. I was born in Plovdiv 1 on 2nd August 1930. I have a brother Samuil Behar and a sister Victoria Tadzher (nee Behar). My wife’s name is Yovka Behar (nee Zlatanova) - a Bulgarian. We have two daughters – identical twins – Liza Zhelyazkova and Dora Spasova.

We are Sephardi Jews 2 both on mother’s and on father’s side. We came form the town of Behar [Bejar] in Spain more than 500 years ago 3. I have drawn this conclusion from the fact that there is a town called Behar in Spain and last year [He is talking about the meeting of all the people with the name Behar from the whole world, organized in 2004] there was a meeting of the Behar families from all over the world. I was invited as well. The organizing committee of the event in Sofia sent me a letter but the journey would have cost $ 1800. I couldn’t afford it and didn’t go.

I don’t have any recollections and don’t know any stories about my great-grandparents on either side. I only remember my grandparents.

The name of my father’s mother was Rahel Behar (nee Kovo). I don’t know when she had been born and she didn’t have any idea about that either. When I was a child, she would often say that the Russian – Turkish war 4 was in progress when she was twenty years old. She remembered those times because she got engaged then. She told me how she had seen my grandfather – her future husband Samuil Behar (? – 1936) for the first time on his way to the synagogue. He was walking past the house and she saw him, she was in the garden, and her father told her: ‘This is your future fiancé.’ My grandfather wasn’t rich, just the opposite, he was very poor but he was said to have two pairs of hands and two of feet, and his feet could work as well. That meant that he was not only extremely laborious but also very skillful. His work was connected with household utilities – locks, doors, he was the best installer of stoves on wood and coal and he was skillful in making pipes which were passing through the whole room in order to heat more. He was the only one who could make such pipe serpentines.

He didn’t have any education but spoke Ladino 5 fluently and could also write in that language. He also knew Hebrew. I don’t know how he had learned those languages, somewhere on the roads probably. My grandfather died when I was six, in 1936. I have dim memories of him. For example, I recall that he used to have a white beard and mustaches. He washed his head and beard with water and soap every Friday. My granny was pouring the water and it was falling into a basin. Afterwards, he used to go to the synagogue and he was taking me with him. He was religious although his son – Yuda Samuil Behar (1896 – 1959) - and I are absolute atheists. I remember that my father and grandfather had their own places in the synagogue. They had to pay for those places in the Jewish municipality. The places to the fore were more expensive, the ones to the rear – cheaper. The women’s places were on the balcony.

The house that was occupied by my grandparents – my father’s parents, was in a big yard and there were living a lot of other Jewish families. It was like a ghetto. The house was a two-storey building and other Jewish families were living on the ground floor. My grandparents used to have a room and a kitchen. I visited that house when only the two of them had remained to live there as all their children, my father’s brothers and sisters (Bouka, Nisim, Sofi, Rebeka, Stela) had already got married and had gone to live elsewhere.

My granny Rahel Behar (? – 1956) had a lot of siblings, too. I don’t know their names. And because of that she was brought up in Asenovgrad [A town in Bulgaria, situated on the northern skirts of the Rhodopi Mountains, at the exit of the Chepelare River called Chaya. The name of the town was Stanimaka until 1934. Nowadays there are about 44, 800 inhabitants. In the town there is well-developed food industry, timber processing, well-developed vine-growing and agriculture. The town is an important transport center on the road network that connects Plovdiv, Smolyan and Kurdzhali]. Her parents gave her to an aunt of hers who lived there – I don’t know her name. At that time, only the Greek language was spoken in Asenovgrad and there was a saying: ‘If you don’t like Bulgaria, go to Stanimaka.’ The Jews there were speaking Ladino but you could mainly hear Greek in the streets. My granny knew Turkish, she knew Greek, she knew Ladino and least of all she knew Bulgarian. I’ll tell you a story. I recall that she took me to the shops once in Plovdiv when I was about ten, so it must have been around 1940. We went to do the shopping. The action took place on Chetvurtuk Pazarya (Thursday Market Place). We lived just next to it. And we were looking after some hens. Granny asked the seller: ‘How much money for hens?’ He said: ‘Two napoleons.’ And one napoleon was twenty levs. And she was looking at the chickens, touching them, touching them and asking in a way typical for the Ladino language turning all the words of feminine gender to masculine. So she changed the Bulgarian word for ‘hen’, which is feminine, to masculine. [The woman was speaking Bulgarian by using endings and grammatical forms typical of Ladino.] But she was able to understand and, most importantly, she was understood. After 1936, 1937, after grandpa died, granny started living with us. Granny told me a lot of fairy-tales and stories about Ally Baba and the forty bandits [a classical story, told by Scheherazade]. There was also a story about a pot full of gold but I don’t remember it very well. On Saturday she usually visited her older daughter Bouka at lunch. I recall that she would always bring us sweets hidden somewhere in her clothes. She used to take them from Bouka’s son Isak, who owned a sugar and sweets workshop.

My mother Liza Presiado Behar was born in Sofia. Her maiden name was Benataf. In Israel the surname Benataf was transformed to Benatov (that means good, ben – very well). My maternal grandparents - granny Vintoura (? – 1940) and my grandpa Presiado (? – 1943) used to live in Sofia and every summer we spent our holidays with them. I knew only one of my granny’s brothers but I can’t remember his name. My granny was illiterate but grandpa had finished a French college 6. I can’t say whether he had a secondary education but he spoke French and German. His name was Presiado, which is a synonym of Yuda. I wasn’t named after my grandpa because my father’s name was Yuda, too. That’s why I was named after my mother’s grandfather Sabitay. Sabitay and Bitoush are synonyms. I know that the names Presiado and Yuda, as well as Sabitay and Bitoush are synonyms and mean one and the same thing in Ladino, but I can’t comment on anything else. I don’t know when granny Vintoura was born but she died in 1940. My grandpa died in 1943 during the Holocaust. He was interned to Plovdiv and died here. In Sofia my parents were living on the corner of ‘Opalchenska’ and ‘Bregalnitsa’. Their house doesn’t exist anymore. In its place was built the overhead crossing between ‘Stamboliiski’ Boulevard and Ruski [Russian] Monument. I remember it was a two-storey house. My grandparents paid a rent. They weren’t rich. Grandpa used to sell fruit and vegetables, he used to have a greengrocery at some time but he went broke. The shop was in Halite [a covered market popular to the present day – it is situated in the central part of Sofia, not far from Sofia Mineral Public Baths, the famous Baths bashi Dzhamya and the Sofia Synagogue. The ‘Halite’ store was designed by Ts. Torbov. The architectural style of the building is considered to be Neo-Byzantine.] He had six children – my mother’s siblings. They had an older sister, whom I don’t recall, she died. Apart from her – uncle Haim, aunt Mati, uncle Yosif, aunt Nemka, uncle Lazar.


My father Yuda Samuil Behar was born in Plovdiv in 1896 and died in 1959 there. There were six children in the family which means that dad had five more siblings – Bouka, Nisim, Sofi, Rebeka, Stela. He finished the fourth grade at the Jewish school. And irrespectively of the fact that he had only primary education, he was quite a specialist on Bulgarian grammar. He knew it better than the majority of people because he worked as a typesetter for years and years on end. When he turned twelve he started working as an apprentice at a printer’s. At that time the local, Plovdiv, newspapers were printed there as well as the Jewish newspaper at that time ‘Shofar’ 7. In his spare time he was reading books with a pencil in hand and we could often hear him say: ‘Oh, bullshit! Here a dash must be put, here – a comma, and here – a semi-colon.’ I remember a very interesting occasion. I had a little book with his corrections. After his death I decided to give it to the greatest specialist on the Bulgarian language at the time – the teacher Vera Gulubova. At that time I was a student at the Rabfak [Worker’s Faculty] 8 and she was my teacher. ‘Comrade Gulubova, I want you to tell me if this correction is accurate.’ And about a month and a half later she brought the book back and told me: ‘Behar, who has done that correction – because that is a person who is perfectly familiar with the grammar of Bulgarian.’ I told her that it was done by my father – a person who had finished the fourth grade but who worked as a typesetter for 52 or 53 years. He didn’t know what the rules were for the usage of commas and dashes but had an intuitive feeling as to where to put them. My father had always been a well-informed man, he worked at the printer’s after all. Apart from being a typesetter, he was also a stamp-cutter – he was making stamps. On top of that he was very skillful and could engrave with slate pencils. Yes, he was skillful indeed – he was making his living with his two hands but the money he was earning was only sufficient for a meal every day and for bread.

My father had taken part in World War I 9. He was a signaler. He was wounded in the leg by a metal fragment but I don’t know more details. In 1924 he married my mother who was born in Sofia. At that time he was 26 or 27 years old. Before that, they had met in the capital city while my father was working there for a year and a half. I can’t say what exactly he was doing and why he had decided to live in the capital for a while. I don’t know any details about the first meeting of my parents. It was probably someone from the family who talked to my father about her or they were introduced to each other on purpose. I can’t say what the circumstances were but they liked each other – this is something I can state without any doubt. They were engaged for a year and they were having a great time while engaged. They used often go on outings, to Vitosha Mountain – there were two more couples and they were having a really good time. They got married in the synagogue in Plovdiv according to all the traditions. They were living in agreement afterwards.


In our neighborhood my father was known as Zhoudi. He was very sociable. Everybody in Plovdiv knew him. He was friends not only with Jews but with Bulgarians as well. I recall that he was the heart and soul of the group of friends he communicated with. He used to often go to the chitalishte 10 after 9th September [1944] 11. At that time there was a dance school and my father was teaching quadrille and polka. He was perofrming at the dancing-parties, he was going out on stage and was telling jokes and funny stories. He never joined a Jewish Zionist organziation because he was a socialist. He became a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) 12 in 1936.

He used to be a right-wing socialist and then he became a left-wing, revolutionary socialist. [origin of Bulgarian Communist Party] 13 He was in jail because of the Jewish conspiracy. There was a Jewish conspiracy in Plovdiv (its members were communists and BCP was banned at the time 14).  They were accomlishing educational activities and defended the interests of the poor, mainly of the workers. At the beginning the conspiracy didn’t have a name but later it took the name of its leader Pardo. I can neither say the names of the people who took part nor where their headquarters and sphere of activities were. It started operating in 1935 – 1936 when I was only five or six years old.

After a failure my father was sent to jail. The charges were that he had faked a stamp in order to forge the ID card of someone from Silistra region [a town in Northeastern Bulgaria]. And I saw what real friendship means. In his group from the conspiracy there were only three married men, all the others were bachelors. At that time my father was already married. And the leaders took a decision which ordered the bachelors to take on the blame and to back up the married ones so that the married men would get a suspended sentence and go out to look after their families. And one of the accused said at the trial: ‘Mr. Judge, sir, if there is a man with a gun standing in front of you, you would do what he tells you to do. That’s why Yuda faked the stamp. I was with a gun pointed at him.’ And my dad was released because he had made the stamp under threat of being shot. And that wasn’t true. Yes, that’s esprit de corps, a sacrifice in the name of your comrade. There were people from the conspiracy sentenced to fifteen years in jail and they were released on 9th September 1944.

My father had already had two children when he was in jail – my older brother Samuil Zhoudi Behar who was born in 1925 and was eleven. I was six. My mother was pregnant with my sister Victoria who was born in 1937.

My brother Samuil Zhoudi Behar (1925 – 1974) was the oldest and most responsible of us all. We had always felt his presence as a support. That was especially true for my sister who was taken under his guardianship. He was happy to look after her and later when in 1942 he was dealing with some illegal activities he was taking her as a cover-up. He was very skillful, too, but not as mush as my father or me. And he was studious. And he had finished, like my sister and me, a Bulgarian school which was cheaper and which we could afford. After finishing the junior secondary school in 1938 he told my father: ‘Papa, I want to study.’ ‘Impossible, my boy, we don’t have money – there are six mouths to feed. You have to start work.’ And he started work at ‘Napreduk’ [Advancement] Printing House where my dad was working. He was a machine operator and a typesetter and so on. He had become a member of BCP before 9th September. Because of his illegal activities he was sent to jail in 1942-1943. After 9th September he finished the Party School. Then he was a militiaman for some time and by decree he started studying at something like Rabfak and he obtained a secondary education. For a certain period of time he worked as a secretary of the second region of the municipality council in Plovdiv. Much later he studied Chemistry at Plovdiv University. He studied there together with his daughter Lily. He graduated and became the director of the ‘Drouzhba’ glass works in Plovdiv.

He is married to Amada – a Jew, whom he met in the period of his illegal activities. They have two children – Lily and Zhoudi. Lily has a daughter Maria. Zhoudi is married to the Bulgarian Maria and has a son Samuil.

My sister Victoria Tadzher (1937) also finished the Bulgarian school and afterwards she studied at a vocational school of design. She is rather skillful, too – it obviously runs in the family. It seems to me she could have become an excellent designer. She is skillful but she doesn’t like this profession. She is capable of making a piece of clothing for you that would fit you perfectly. She worked as a designer but didn’t like it. She was a worker for some time and then she worked in the personnel department. She was head of a production shop for some time but now she has been a secretary of the Jewish organization ‘Shalom’ in Sofia 15 for twenty years. [Until she retired. Nowadays she is working as an organizer of club ‘Health’ where over fifty men and women practice some sport, celebrate their birthdays and make cultural programs. She is also working at the Day Rehabilitation Center of ‘Shalom’ Organization. An eminent public activist] We are extremely fond of each other. We talk on the phone every single day – I call from Plovdiv, she – from Sofia no matter that when we were children my brother had turned himself into her guardian. There is some gap between our interests because I am seven years older. When I started showing interest in girls, she was still keen on her toys. My brother had a big share in her bringing up. He replaced my father to a great extent because he died relatively early – when she was 22. She married in Sofia to the Jew Solomon Tadzher. She has a daughter – Ely and two grandchildren – Bozhidar and Monica.

My mother was born on 23rd January 1900. She had six siblings – uncle Haim, aunt Mati, uncle Yosif, aunt Nemka and uncle Lazar. They had an older sister Bela but she died while giving birth. According to the Jewish tradition the second oldest girl should take the place of the late bride and marry the widower. But my mother refused, she married my father instead. How their parents accepted that I don’t know. She spoke Ladino and Bulgarian. She had only finished the fourth grade at the Jewish school but she was a very curious, energetic and quite intelligent Jew. She loved us very much although she never kissed us but her love was visible in her eyes. All the people in the neighborhood were very fond of her, they were absolutely delighted when talking about her. When the moment came for some pregnant woman to give birth mum would tell her: ‘I’ll take you to the hospital on foot.’ And she took maybe about ten women giving birth for the first time to the Public Hospital and she was talking on the way: ‘The more we walk, the easier your labors will be.’ She was giving advice to the young mothers, she was knitting baby clothes, she was cutting out diapers.

She was an exquisite cook. I loved almodrati most of all – baked aubergine, chopped, mixed with eggs and cheese and baked in the oven. Superb… you can’t imagine how delicious it was. She also prepared apio with celery, andjinara – pickled marrows, agristada – something like fricassee but with eggs and a little sugar. [Some chicken is also added to this dish.]

I like Plovdiv very much and am greatly committed to this city. I call myself a great-Plovdiv chauvinist. Several times I changed Plovdiv for other towns and lived there for some years but I have always returned. At that time – the 1930s – the years of my early childhood, I recall that there was electricity in Plovdiv. We used to have electric bulbs but there were houses in which one could see the gas lamps shedding light until late in the evening. Those made about fifty per cent of the houses. Not only did our house have electricity but it had sewerage as well. 80% of the houses didn’t have sewerage. There was this profound smell which could be felt everywhere because the cesspits were in the yards and everything was done there, people even bathed there in the summer. When the cesspits were full, gypsies were hired to clean them with buckets. The payment was per bucket. Much later, in the 1940s, the sewerage was regulated. At that time the tunnel was built which helped the traffic in Plovdiv. Before that there were awful traffic jams because the traffic was taking place on one main street and there were horse phaetons, horse carts and cars moving on it. There was the noise from the horse clatter and the horns. The phaetons were waiting for clients at the station.

The Maritsa was not only part of the landscape – it was the place around which we spent our childhood. There was more water in the river at the time than there is now. Now there are a lot of dams. And it was clean and clear, transparent... we were in the water all the time. The current wasn’t very strong because there were islands which separated the river into branches – one of them was shallow, the other one – deep and the island in between. We always bathed in the Maritsa River and our mothers would ask us: ‘Were you in the Maritsa?’ We wouldn’t admit anything. Then she would strictly say: ‘Let me see your leg.’ And she drew a line with her finger along the leg and, as the skin was dried, there appeared a white line on the leg. Then followed a lecture about the dangers of getting drowned. Another site of Plovdiv was the market places. The Chetvurtuk Pazarya [Thursday market] was only on Thursday and not every day as it is nowadays, Subota Pazarya [Saturday market] was only on Saturday. Ponedelnik Pazarya [Monday market] was only on Monday. They had their own locations. There didn’t exist permanent market places like the ones that we have today. After that there was a grape market where only grapes were sold, a grain market. The grain market was east of Chetvurtuk Pazarya. There was a potato market, too. The shopping at home was done exclusively by my mum, dad and granny – I only helped them with the bags.

Our house was near Chetvurtuk Pazarya in ‘Angel Kunchev’ Street and was in the Jewish quarter. Most of the Jews were shoemakers, saddlers, tinsmiths, plumbers, carpenters. There were families that dealt with knitting and sewing. Some families were manufacturing knitwear. Only few people were doing with mechanical work – only two families – one of those were millers and the others who were dealing with knitting and sewing. There were some excellent seamstresses. Some families were making knitwear. More than 60 per cent of the Jews in Plovdiv were poor. And out of the other 40 per cent, not less than 20 per cent were craftsmen who could make a living. There were doctors; those of them who were wealthy used to have houses with surgeries in them in ‘Ivan Vazov’ Street – like Dr. Syarov, Dr. Moskona. There were some other people in the medical profession – doctors, dentists, midwifes.

We were living in rented lodgings – five or six of us were living in two rooms and a kitchen.  After 1936 – 1937, after grandpa died, granny came to live with us. During the Holocaust there were ten of us because my aunt Sofia and her family came to live in our house. We lived in a big two-storey house surrounded by a yard where six Jewish families were living – Assa, Lafchievi, Barouh, Bouka Pasi, Albert Shini, Varon. We were often completing different household chores together in the yard. For example, whenever one of the families started preparing ‘liutenitsa’ [a typical Bulgarian dish of stewed onions, peppers and tomatoes] everybody would take the ‘kalmour’ – do you know what ‘kalmour’ is – a sieve made of copper and they were all helping the family with the straining of the vegetables, if coal was needed for the fire, we were eager to help by carrying a bucket of coal for the family who were boiling the dish. Every family had their own cellar and the products for the winter were stored there but the point is that we were preparing those products together. The Bulgarian families took part too because in the Jewish quarter, where we were living, there were mainly Jewish families but there were some Bulgarian families as well. We were friends not only with Jews but also with Bulgarians. They knew some words and even whole phrases in Ladino. During the Holocaust not a single one of them turned against the Jews. We were on very friendly terms with them. Our families were visiting one another. What were those visits like – a cup of coffee, a spoonful of jam, a glass of water and you get the album with the family photos on your knees right away. The same album each and every time.

When the Bulgarian people celebrated Easter they were giving us Easter cakes, painted eggs while we were eating ‘boyos’ for Pesach and were treating the Bulgarians to ‘burmolikos’ 16. We were preparing the ‘boyos’ ourselves from dough made of flour, water, but without salt, which we baked afterwards. The result was a pretty hard round loaf. The ‘burmolikos’ we made from matzah which we bought from the synagogue for Pesach. It has nothing to do with the matzah we are buying these days because it was thick and hard. In order to prepare the burmolikos we put the matzah in water in advance so that it would become softer. After that we kneaded it, added eggs and fried it. There were two types of ‘burmolikos’ – salty ‘burmolikos’ with salt and black pepper and sweet ones dipped in cold sugar syrup after having been fried. At Purim we treated our Bulgarian friends and neighbors to different sweet things.

Our house was furnished poorly. We used to have two iron beds where my parents were sleeping. My sister was sleeping together with me. There was a wooden bed for granny. My brother and I were sleeping on a hard sofa in the kitchen. We had one single wardrobe. Well, after all, we weren’t so needy because we used to have decent furniture although sometimes food turned out to be difficult to obtain. We always had something to eat but we couldn’t afford to do whatever we wanted to do. A certain dish was cooked in the morning and we would eat from it at lunch and would have the same for dinner. One day I wanted to peep into the pot to see what we were going to have for lunch, and to steal a bite if possible. Dad saw me and ‘slap’ – a smack across the face. ‘You are going to eat what you find served in front of you!’ The whole family usually gathered for lunch and dinner. We waited for dad to sit at the table and then we would sit at the table, too. Mum would always put the first plate in front of him and after that she served us. We didn’t have servants. While my granny was alive the meal for Saturday was always prepared on Friday. We were not allowed to cook on Saturday. But the table was laid in a rather formal manner with a white tablecloth. Before that, on Thursday or Friday, a chicken, a hen or a duck had been slaughtered. In the yard of the synagogue, behind a fence there was a slaughterhouse for hens and lambs. We used to buy the hens alive from Chetvurtuk Pazarya [Thursday market] and we transported them in baskets. The price of the slaughtering varied according to the type of the animal. Some of our dishes were kosher. Never has pork been cooked. All the cutlery and crockery was being cleaned with boiling water for Pesach. Milk and meat were never mixed but we didn’t have separate plates for the different types of food. My parents haven’t done bar mitzvah for me, I don’t know if my brother had had it done. The women had a bath on Friday but we, the men, only washed. I recall that dad had a bath every fifteen days or once a month and there were Jews who took a bath rarely still – twice a year, for Pesach and Rosh Hashanah.

My grandparents were very religious – grandpa attended the synagogue every Friday where he had a booked place after having paid a fee, he was keeping ‘taanit’ whereas my father and I are absolute atheists.

When grandpa died we started convening at Seder Pesach with my father’s brother – uncle Nisim and his family – his wife Bouka and their children – Ester, Rashka, Zelma. Uncle Nisim started reading the prayer and leafing through the Haggadah and granny continued after him. She knew some parts of it by rote. After her my father would go on reading but his turn was over very quickly because while turning the pages, he was turning three pages at a time. And we, the children, were staying still and listening. Well, we lost concentration at times. They gave us bags with a piece of ‘boyos’ inside. And we waited for the prayer to finish with the words ‘this year here, next year – in Jerusalem’ and here we were in.

At Purim we used to have much more fun. We organized groups – all of us were children of friends from the Jewish street and relatives. We used to sing a lot of songs. I know only one song but there were lots of them. We used to mask ourselves. Every year we prepared the masks ourselves but, of course, there were masks sold in the bookstores, in the groceries. They were polished, shining but were quite expensive. The wealthier could afford them. My usual disguise was as a black man with my face painted in black. Once I was a wolf, on other occasions – a buffoon or a clown. We used to have those special bags that we filled with sweets. We were visiting in our disguise all our relatives or the wealthiest Jews from whom we could expect more treats. They used to give us all sorts of sweets and some change. And we spent the money on swings or on the lotteries organized by the Jewish merchants in the street. There was always hustle and bustle here – the merchants were taking out all kind of goods and started shouting, making people get involved – ‘Here is the profit’ – they urged us to buy tickets and get an object or a wish. After having eaten the sweets given to us by our relatives, we took the money they had given us and went to the commercial street to gobble more food. We used to get on the merry-go-rounds, on the ferris wheel, we used to shoot at the shooting-galleries. Everything looked like a big fair.

Every holiday evening spent with my family ended with singing. I used to know a lot of songs, dad, too. We were known among the neighbors as the singing family because our signing could be heard far. In the summer I used to go to my grandparents in Sofia. There I used to meet with the famous director and writer Angel Vagenshtain 17 who is a cousin of mine. He was older than me and used to keep in touch mainly with my brother as they shared common interests, but we used to be very fond of each other. Angel (Dzheki), in his turn, visited us in the summer in Plovdiv. His arrival turned our day into a holiday. My father loved him very much. I recall that when he was sentenced to death for his antifascist activities later dad got so drunk out of grief, that, under the influence of the alcohol, he was shouting: ‘They will exterminate the golden youth of Bulgaria.’ Together with the neighbors from the yard we hardly managed to stop him from taking the matters in his hands.

The children were playing in the yard and in the streets – they played chilik, machka [children’s games], we used to set matchboxes full of acetylene on fire – you make a hole in the ground, put a little carbide and place a box on top. We used to seal it hermetically and one of us used to place his finger on the box whereas another one stood and shouted; ‘Take care!’, the finger was removed and the box exploded because of the pressure. It was such a pleasure, ‘kef’ 18 as we say in Bulgarian because we managed to make this imitation of a little bomb. We were also playing ‘magare’ [donkey] - one of us would lean against a wall and three or four of the others would stand in a line behind him, one after the other, holding each other by the small of the backs and start jumping. When one of us fell, we changed our places. After that – ‘bouki’ – a tin was placed on the ground in the middle of a circle restricted by a line. We used little tokens and the boy who managed to hit the ‘bouki’ was the winner. It was placed in a circle and the furthest you managed to push it, the more points you got. We were also playing ‘hilka’ – two teams with a ball. The game was played on a pitch. The ball had to be hit with a board. It is very similar to baseball. The girls didn’t lag behind in those games and played together with us.

I’ve never attended a Jewish kindergarten or a Jewish school because the tuition fee was too high for me. It was affordable only for those of the poor children whose parents had seasonal jobs like the tobacco pickers, for example, not the ones with permanent jobs like my father. In their case the education was free of charge. I finished ‘King Boris III’ Primary School 19 and the Fifth Junior High School ‘Lyuben Karavelov’20.  Both educational institutions were within the limits of the Jewish quarter and in the classes of thirty students there were four or five Jewish children. In our class there were four Jews. I, Barouh, Marko and a girl, whose name I can’t remember. I attended the Sunday school at the Jewish center where we had religion classes devoted to our religion. There were religion classes in the Bulgarian school as well but the Jews didn’t have to attend them. We could remain in class if we wanted to and sometimes I stayed. My favorite subject was Manual Labor. I am a skillful man, just like my father and brother. I can make anything – no matter where you put me – I manage to complete any task – I can paint, I can make installations, doors, window frames, ironmongery and so on. I have been a member of both Maccabi 21 and Hashomer Hatzair 22. My brother was a member of Maccabi at the beginning and then he joined Hashomer Hatzair. There was also an organization called Betar 23 – the most right-oriented, the most armed wing of the Zionist movement. They believed that Palestine had to be liberated through revolution, through weapons. The Maccabeans on the other hand were sports people. They used to have a large gym which was their own property. Hashomer Hatzair’s members were with leftist orientation. They were for social equality. The majority of its members left for Israel in 1947 [Mass Alyiah] 24. During the Holocaust most of its members started co-operating with the UYW 25. The main occupation of the members of Hashomer Hatzair was tilling the land. There was a big farm, ‘chiflik’, which was owned by the Bulgarian Baltov and, for that reason, known as the Baltov Chiflik. They were giving ‘ahshara’ – a public service which they weren’t paid for, and at the same time were training in agriculture. So there they were working and training in agriculture professionally at one and the same time. Their aim was to be able to till the land after leaving for Israel. There was some competition between the different organizations. Each one of them wanted to attract as many members as possible. At first I was a Maccabean, then I became a Hashomerist but I felt best at Maccabi. In the gym we used to have different exercise facilities – bars, a vaulting horse, a horizontal bar - we were practicing sports and apart from being Zionist, the focus was on the healthy way of living.

I hadn’t felt any anti-Semitist attitudes until 1939 – 1940, until the moment when the Fascist organizations Brannik 26, ‘Han Krum’ Legion were established in 1941. In the Jewish quarter their members – all of them young men - would come to break windows, to eventually beat somebody and they went away. I had such a case. We used to have a neighbor. His name was Kasurov and he used to live on the corner of ‘Tsar Samuil’ and ‘Yuri Venelin’. One day he saw how the members of Brannik were coming into the quarter ready to vandalize and ran towards them because they started bullying some of my friends. ‘Bastards, what wrong have these people done, leave them alone.’ We realized the Jewry was in jeopardy at the very moment of the begetting of fascism, with the appearance of the book ‘Mein Kampf’ by Adolf Hitler. A lot of the Jews were aware of the real dimensions of the situation, of the fact that a peril was approaching because we received information that the Jews from the region of the Aegean Sea were sent to the camps of death and we knew that was our destiny as well [Deportation of Jews from Aegean Thrace and Macedonia] 27. But nonetheless, we were used to being in good relations with the Bulgarians, to being tolerated by them and that gave us reasons to believe that those terrible things were not going to happen in Bulgaria. It was not by chance that a lot of the Jews joined the armed fight as a reaction against the jeopardy.

I get furious when some people say: ‘They were communists’. The truth was that the Jews found a way to fight for their own cause by joining UYW and BCP. Some of the members of the youth Jewish organizations joined their ranks. I was too young but my brother was a Maccabean and then he joined Hashomer Hatzair – they were different you know, and then he joined UYW and then became a member of BCP. Later, in 1943, he was a political prisoner.

What I remember first about the period of the Holocaust is how my father was completing the documents. We enlisted in a declaration all our property and real estate – an incessant succession of documents [Law for Protection of the Nation] 28. They didn’t take anything from us because there was nothing to take. We were living in rented lodgings but we had to pay very high taxes for everything we owned. After that appeared the badges [yellow stars] 29 that all the people of Jewish origin over the age of ten were obliged to put on. We were obliged to wear them. The badge had to be sewn, but we put them on with safety pins so that we could put them on different clothes. My father was buying them from somewhere, I don’t know where from. Dad had bought a badge for every member of our family. There were differences in the badges of the Jews who were decorated with a military star and the cripples from the wars. Theirs had a big black button and not a David’s star. My father had taken part in the wars but hadn’t been injured and he was wearing an ordinary badge. The ones who had a button on their badges were privileged but I don’t know in what way. We, the Jews, were not allowed to work at certain institutions like the police, the municipality council, but the craftsmen went on working. After 1943, when the Jews interned from Sofia came, the doctors were forbidden to work in the towns they lived in [Internment of Jews in Bulgaria] 30. They were sent to other places, where there were no doctors. That’s how the doctors of Jewish origin from Plovdiv were sent to the most difficult job positions. During the war incredible home production developed – necklace making, bag-knitting, knitting of different hand-made objects. People were trying to earn a morsel. There was a great demand on the market and people were in need of all possible goods, you could sell and buy anything – war.

During the Holocaust I was working as an apprentice shoemaker and was repairing the shoes of the entire family and I’m still doing it. I have a kit of instruments at home. I worked like that for about two years but then one day I said to my father: ‘I don’t like this job. I have learned everything and now I want to work on the trains.’ But he replied: ‘No, you’ll go on working.’ But I said: ‘But I’m already familiar with this craft. I’ll make you a pair of shoes – if they’re not comfortable, I’ll go on working until I learn how to make comfortable shoes. If you like them, you’ll find me a job on the trains.’ And I made him a pair of shoes – for his extremely crooked feet. He put them on, took a walk and told me: ‘To my satisfaction and dissatisfaction at the same time, these shoes are extremely comfortable.’ He admitted – in that respect he was an extremely decent man.

The men between the age of 19 and 40 were mobilized in the labor camps 31. My father was getting on and I was too young for the labor camps. In 1942 my father was sent to the village of Gorno Voroshilovo because of his party membership. The village used to have the same name before 9th September but then it was quite a forlorn place. Now the highway is going through it.

There were also some men of the same age from present-day Greek territories, from towns like Drama, Salonika, Xanti whose relatives had been deported. They were mobilized in the labor camps of Kingdom Bulgaria which at that time used to have an outlet to the Aegean Sea. [50 000 Jews from Salonika were deported to Poland in 1943 but that has nothing to do with Bulgaria. The mobilization was of Jews-relatives who were from the old territories of Bulgaria – otherwise there are no facts about Jews from the newly-annexed lands who were mobilized to work.] When they were demobilized in winter they used to sleep in one of the rooms from the synagogue in Plovdiv. There were five such rooms in the yard. There were about 40 or 50 of those Greeks. There is an interesting story with them. The Branniks started bullying us again. They were attacking us ruthlessly. Somebody saw them coming and shouted: ‘Call the Greek boys’ (the Greek boys because they could only speak Greek). They quickly came out and there was such a fight. In the end there was a pile of the members of Brannik, like dogs, and they were severely beaten. But suddenly there was a shout ‘Police!’ and we disappeared into thin air. That was possible because the streets ‘Angel Kunchev’, ‘Vodoprovodna’, ‘Tsar Samuil’ and ‘Yuri Venelin’ formed a square. The houses and yards of those houses were connected by little doors and we could move from yard to yard. We entered a house in ‘Angel Kunchev’ and went out from a house in ‘Yuri Venelin’.

Afterwards the interned Jews from Sofia arrived. They were first sent to Chepelare. [A small town in the Rhodopi Mountains, nowadays a winter ski resort. There was probably a Jewish forced labor group which was working in the region of Devin and Chepelare. Otherwise there is no information about internment of Jews to Chepelare] and later they came to Plovdiv. A part of them were staying with friends and relatives. My aunt Sofi and my uncle came to our house. Well, what can I tell you? We the children were sleeping on the table – my brother on top of the table, I – on the lower board. On the table! It was possible to accommodate 12-13 people in those rooms. It was difficult to handle with the food but that was the reality not only for the Jews but for the Bulgarians as well. We used to have vouchers at the time and we ate 250 grams bread a day. We had to take care of ourselves, like everybody else. There was also a black market where the prices were extremely high. So flour, butter, oil could all be bought on the black market but that kind of providing supplies was the same for both Jews and Bulgarians. It was the same. For some of the Jews and for the Jews living in the synagogue there was a soup kitchen.

In 1943 my brother Samuil Behar was sent to jail after the failure of a Jewish youth UYW organization. He was sentenced to 10 years but was freed on 9th September. He was in the prison in Plovdiv. His wife, my sister-in-law, Amada, also spent some time in jail. They met while conducting different activities for UYW and got married immediately after 9th September in 1945. Later my sister told me that when she was younger our brother Samuil had always taken her to his secret meetings with Amada and his comrades from the group. She served as a cover. They had even told her that Amada’s name was actually Hana so that she wouldn’t betray her unintentionally. I believe that my parents had drawn their conclusions about the illegal activities of my brother but there were no comments and questions because they didn’t want to embarrass him and to be embarrassed in their turn. After all it was an illegal activity and too much talk was inadvisable. My sister-in-law had been not only in the prison in Plovdiv, but also in the prisons in Pazardzhik and Sliven. We used to visit my brother on Wednesday and Sunday and brought food and coal. My arms started hurting from carrying the buckets – one or two buckets of coal and wood on top. And in the end we found out that the wardens used the coal for heating and our relatives were freezing.

In January 1943 my father was freed from the village of Gorno Voroshilovo and was mobilized as a typesetter because they started publishing the newspapers ‘Utro’ 32, ‘Zarya’ [Fireworks - a daily informational newspaper. Printed in Sofia from 1914 till 1944] – and we were extremely happy that he got permission to move about freely whenever he wanted although there was a curfew for the entire population of Bulgaria. He even got permission to be outside after 10 p.m. He was going to work, they were printing the newspaper, they loaded it on the trucks and so on.

There was a decision to deport us on 10th March 1943. [Plan for deportation of Jews in Bulgaria] 33 They woke us at 3.15 in the morning and told us to take up to 10 kg luggage. And together with my six-year-old sister and ninety-year-old grandmother we went to the Jewish school. We were pushed into the Maccabi gym. There were about 200 of us and we could hardly breathe. There is an interesting story with my father. Dr. Araf was crying and talking through tears; ‘Do you know where we’re going?’ And dad replied: ‘I know very well but you have to pull yourself together – we have to set the example for the young people’. But he went on crying and my father slapped him across the face to make him stop. ‘We have been to war, we have looked death into the face. We have to be brave because of the women and the children.’ And at these words the man became behaving normally again.

We stayed there for about ten hours. I didn’t actually realize what was going to happen but my brother was fully aware because he was trying to get in touch with the partisans. At a certain moment they started separating men from women. They were reading our names from a list. They were letting us enter the schoolyard. And some time around noon, I can’t say at what time exactly, protest demonstrations started down ‘Tsar Osvoboditel’ Blvd, which at that time was called ‘Adolf Hitler’, and down ‘Aleko Konstantinov’, with slogans ‘Liberate the people who have fought for the sacred lands of Bulgaria.’ Tobacco workers and craftsmen from Plovdiv took part in the demonstrations. The people had sent tens of telegrams to the government saying ‘Stop the violence over the Jews!’, ‘We have lived together and will live together again!’ The patriarch also came out with the stole and the scepter and said: ‘The trains cannot pass! Only over my dead body!’ I think that the greatest influence was exerted by the Jews from Kyustendil and the Bulgarian intelligentsia – the unions of the lawyers, of the journalists, of the writers…, but there was some influence from abroad as well. Boris was a cousin of the British queen so she got in touch with him and told him: ‘Do not forget that there is Doomsday.’ [There is no data about such a conversation but this is a popular proverb in Bulgaria meaning that there is justice in the end.] Of course, the events on the Eastern Front played an extremely important role. The fall of Stalingrad, the Kursk Duga [Kursk Arc] and so on. They let us go. We realized that they wouldn’t deport us and then Zhan Levi [an eminent Jewish lawyer in Plovidv] delivered a speech of gratitude for His Majesty but I think that he wasn’t the only one to contribute for this decision.

A couple of days before 9th September 1944 my father came home and said ‘They’re liberating the political prisoners.’ And we all ran to the prison. Somebody there said: ‘Don’t go home, all of us will manifest together.’ We separated into two columns – one of the columns went over the bridge of Gherdzhika, the other one – over the old Karlovsky Bridge and the two columns met here in front of Dzhumayata and the speeches started. Then we went to the Police Inspectorate, which was functioning as a town-hall at the same time, and they started pushing the policemen and making them go outside. They didn’t surrender that easily; they even tried to shoot several times and injured one of our Jewish boys in the leg. And after that we went to the monument in ‘Hristo Botev’ Street. There was a symbol in front of it – the Latin letter V – for victory. Then somebody said: ‘This shameful sign cannot be left before the chief and the teacher of the communist movement in Bulgaria! Smash it!’ And we tore the flowers to pieces in seconds. On 9th September we first met and greeted the partisans from Sredna Gora Mountain and later the partisans from the Rhodopi Mountains – the first at one exit of the town, the others – at another. At that time the song ‘A Partisan is Preparing for Battle’ was extremely popular.

My brother was released from prison and the family was whole again. In 1947 for Israel left my dad’s relatives aunt Sofi and aunt Bouka. Another aunt of mine, Stella, emigrated to Paris in 1928. Aunt Rebeka and uncle Nisim remained in Bulgaria as well. All my mother’s relatives left the country in 1947; the only ones who remained were her sister Mati and she. I’ve never thought about leaving Bulgaria. I am married to a Bulgarian and my life is here in Plovdiv.

I was regularly writing letters to my relatives until they were alive. My mother was very active in this correspondence – she was regularly writing letters to our relatives in Israel irrespectively of the official policy of Bulgaria towards Israel.

After my mother’s death, my aunts died as well, but we talk on the phone with my cousins every now and then.

After 9th September life returned to normal again. Even before 9th September, in 1943-1944, I was working as a shoemaker. Afterwards, at the end of 1945, I started work at ‘Mikromer’ Locksmith’s. There we were making keys, locks, oxygen welding. My master, whose name was uncle Georgi, and my father had been together in prison in 1936. I spent two years there and then from the town committee of UYW sent me to ORT 34 in Sofia. At that time UYW hadn’t been transformed into Dimitrov Communist Youth Union [Bulgarian Komsomol] 35 yet. That took place later, in 1948. In ORT I attended six-month courses to train for jig locksmith. After completing them I worked for 4 or 5 months at ‘Osvobozhdenie’ Cooperation – a Jewish cooperative company in which the machines were from ‘Joint’ 36 I worked there for 6 months and came back to Plovdiv and worked at ‘Ustrem’ Metal-Working Cooperation, a subsidiary of ‘Joint’ too from 1946 till 1950. ‘Ustrem’ Cooperation was the first manufacturer of machine-tools. I worked there for a year and a half and then I was sent to Rabfak, where I studied for a year and a half. I was very good at Physics and Chemistry there. Our teachers were wonderful, all of them were so good – the best, the elite of the teachers in Plovdiv and they were eager to work there. For example, the eminent teacher of Bulgarian and Literature, Vera Gulubova, who I have mentioned at the beginning. I remember that I used to smoke at the time, she came to me and told me: ‘Behar, you smell like a tobacco warehouse, if nature had wanted the man to smoke, it would have put chimneys on our heads.’

After that I was advised to enroll in the Institute of Mining and Geology, into a field where specialists were needed. I enrolled and spent nine terms studying from 1952 till 1957. At that time I was living with the family of one of my father’s sisters. After graduating I got a job at Gorubso. I worked there for ten years until 1967 and then I decided to quit because I wanted to return to Plovdiv. I came back and started work at the Electrical Equipment Plant where I started as a dies technologist and reached the position of a head of the Instruments Department. And I grew a little further in the hierarchy by becoming a head of department in the town of Peroushtitsa [a small town 26 km from Plovdiv].

I have never had any problems with my Jewish origin – neither at school and at university, nor at my work places.

In 1955 at a birthday party I met my future wife. As a matter of fact, my brother was invited there and I went with him. We quickly made our acquaintances, we kept in touch and at the end of the year she came to celebrate together with me the New Year’s Eve in Sofia where I was a student. She was born in the village of Borets, Plovdiv region, but she went to live in Plovdiv in 1947. Her father was a militiaman here. She is a weaver by profession.

At the time of our first meeting I was preparing my diploma paper at the Institute of Mining and Technology. I graduated in 1956. We got officially engaged. My parents had nothing against the fact that she wasn’t Jewish. As far as her parents were concerned there was a certain opposition on the part of her mother because she was worried about what the people would say but her father was firm – he said it was her choice and it had to be respected. We got married before the officially chosen date. It happened absolutely by accident. At that time I was already working at Gorubso. We were invited to the wedding reception of a colleague of mine, which was organized in the village of Brestovitsa, Plovdiv region. His name was Lyubo. His best man was the Director of Gorubso and brother-in-law at the same time – the director’s wife was Lyubcho’s wife-to-be sister. The Director of Gorubso started joking with us in the end and told us: ‘Come on, why don’t you get married as well? Come on, it will be fun, I’ll give you the jeep and you’ll make a honeymoon to Plovdiv.’ So we went in the registry office with one bride, separated the bouquet and went out with two brides. That is how we made our civic marriage in Brestovitsa. Afterwards we went to buy some chocolates and the first thing we did when we returned to Plovdiv was to go to her parents and she said: ‘Mum, Dad, we got married.’ ‘How come, the date of the marriage is in autumn? She started collecting her things and her mother asked: ‘Where are you going?’ ‘Well, I’m going with him.’ That’s how we started living together in our house with my parents. We got married in 1956. Our children were born in 1957 – twin sisters. Their names are Liza and Dora.

I became a member of BCP in 1957. I’ll tell you a very interesting case. A decision was taken to make a TKZS – a Co-operative Farm [labor co-operative agriculture farms – the law for their establishment dates back to 1945. At first those were voluntary organizations but by 1956 they have turned into obligatory organizations. They were based on the principle of co-operative property and tilling of the land.] in the Balkan. Its chairperson started talking and was trying to win us for the idea. I had just graduated and was well-versed in Marxism. There was a meeting at which the Co-operative Farm issue was being discussed. I couldn’t contain myself and said: ‘Look, comrades, there must be some mistake here. According to Lenin’s theses about the rural economy this should take place on the basis of profound mechanization, automation and application of chemicals. Here we are using mules [a hybrid between donkey and horse] for work, mules for tilling the land. What kind of Co-operative Farm are we going to make?’ Break was announced and the chairperson came to me: ‘Hey, you, if you want to become a member of the party, you wouldn’t say such things!’ I replied: ‘That’s my opinion.’ – ‘What opinion of yours is that? This is according to Lenin’s theses.’ And I recall that I was looking for those theses afterwards. The Co-operative Farm existed for a year, then it was turned into forestry and once I bumped into the chairperson and asked him: ‘What happened, my man?’ – ‘Those were the general instructions.’ Even though I had made such a comment I was accepted for a member of the party.

My granny Rahel, dad’s mother, died in 1952. We buried her observing all the Jewish rituals in the Jewish cemetery. We kept on observing the Jewish rituals even after her death but not with the same solemnity as when she was alive. The large tablecloths at Pesach were missing. Now we buy matzah, make burmolikos, we put a tablecloth on the table again but there is no reading of prayers and so on. This tradition continued no matter I married a Bulgarian. My wife started making ‘alkashul’ for Purim. She learned how to cook a lot of typical Jewish dishes – agristаda and apio, andjinara and burmolikos. At Chanukkah we are still visiting uncle Nisim to light a Chanukkiyah – only once, and the children come then.

And our twins – our children grew up in this atmosphere but, of course, there is an important detail – my wife paints 40 or 50 eggs every Easter and she prepares Easter cookies. At Christmas we celebrate with her kin.

My two daughters were raised as Jews. For a short period of time they attended the Jewish kindergarten. They are twins. When they were children we dressed them identically. In 1979 my daughters got married on one and the same day. They feel very strong connection even nowadays despite living in different countries. Liza has a college education and is a sanitary inspector – to control the quality of the food – but she doesn’t work in this field. Now she lives in Israel and works at a hotel in Elad. She married twice and has two children from her two husbands. From her marriage with Svetozar Zhelyazkov is her son Branimir, and from her second marriage to Tsenko Kunchev is her daughter Vanya, who is a student.

Dora is married to George Spasov, a master of sports – mechanized water sports. She has a secondary education of technology. She lives in Plovdiv and works as a beautician here.

Liza, who lives in Israel at the moment, is more committed to the Jewish organization whereas Dora, who lives here, is not committed to that extent. She is a member of Shalom but comes rarely, and her children, too, but on the other hand Liza is very devoted. Her daughter Vanya, who lives in Plovdiv, is an activist and a madriha. Dora has two children, Nikolay and Iva. Iva is a third-year student. My two daughters are married to Bulgarian men. The Jewish origin of my daughters has never been an obstacle for the choice of their Bulgarian husbands, otherwise they wouldn’t have married them, right? Dora works as a beautician in Plovdiv. Irrespectively of the fact that they have different professions and destinies, they feel very strongly connected. I’ll tell you a very interesting fact. When Dora was pregnant, Liza could feel her labor pains from a distance.

We keep in touch with the Jewish community. Its activities after 9th September expanded very much, the ‘Sholom Aleichem’ Chitalishte was created, which didn’t exist before that. The Jewish singing union was restored and while I am in Plovdiv I keep in touch with the Jewish community all the time. After 1957 – 1958 it became a state property but the name remained unchanged. The Jewish holidays were still celebrated but they became somewhat more European. For example, from Purim we have kept mainly the carnival, Chanukkah was turned into a celebration of bravery. And people aren’t that much focused on religion any more but it seems to me that at the time when I was working at Gorubso, there weren’t so many people going to the Jewish Chitalishte, the flow of people going there diminished greatly. That was in the period between 1957 and 1962.

We lived in my parents’ house until a cousin of mine bought her own place and I went to live in her old apartment which was actually a Jewish real estate left by people who had emigrated to Israel. I didn’t buy it, but rented it. The Jews who had left for Israel had left a representative and I was paying the rent to him. Once a year we met because I was paying the taxes. I bought that place in 1989 and went on living there while my daughter who lives in Bulgaria – Dora – had bought the apartment in which I live now. The two grandchildren were born – her children Nikolay and Iva – and once she told me: ‘Papa – they call me Papa – Papa, there are four of us now. Mum and you are only two. Let’s swap our apartments.’ And we swapped.

I hail the establishment of the state of Israel. I believe that every Jew should have a place to call home. I think that the Israeli state system should be something like federation. It is not the only state in the world where people from various nationalities live together. There were years when the official policy of Bulgaria towards Israel wasn’t very friendly. I personally accepted critically some aggressive extremities on the part of the Israelis as well as the Arab attacks.

I accept myself as a citizen of Bulgaria and give examples with football. If Bulgaria plays Israel I’ll be for Bulgaria but if Israel plays any other country, I’ll be for Israel.

I was in Israel in 1999. I was impressed because it is an excellently constituted country, very different from Bulgaria at the moment. In general, democracy is a good thing but we shouldn’t have destroyed what we had already achieved.

In Bulgaria the democratic changes started in 1989 [10th November 1989] 37. I’ll give an example with the Electrical Equipment Plant in Plovdiv, which was a leader in the industry before 10th November. It had certified products in the international laboratory in Hague and we actually had received European machines. There were 400 employees working at several branches. At the moment there are 150 employees.

Or another example – in the rural economy. People have tried for years, for hundreds of years to consolidate the land plots. We had achieved this consolidation and afterwards it was returned to the owners in real boundaries. And now when you walk through the fields you can see two decares of wheat, a decare of sunflower, two decares of alfalfa and so on. The main mistake of the socialist movement is the complete lack of changes of people in authority. If there was an opportunity for such changes and T. Zhivkov 38 hadn’t been the leader for 34 years, if somebody else had come – there were a lot of students who were studying in Europe and in the world. Lyudmila Zhivkova 39 opened Bulgaria for the outside world. If a lot of people were rotating in the administration of the party only for two mandates and then were replaced by other people by younger and more competent people, now the situation would have been different.

I became much poorer after 10th November. I retired in 1980 and was getting the highest possible pension – 230 levs. Afterwards I was immediately hired again as a locksmith at the same plant that I had worked before. So I started completing my job as a worker again, I was standing at the vice again. I worked for ten more years. I was responsible for the maintenance of the instrumental equipment of the mass consumer goods shop. We were making door hinges, case hinges, shop shelves, we were making the Rubik’s cube, pegs, hairdryers. I was responsible for the entire instrumental maintenance. And that was the most creative period of my, how shall I put it, of my conscious manufacturing life. The boss whose subordinate I was would come and say: ‘Behar, do something because the people who are making this part are putting in too much effort and it’s too difficult.’ And I would go and observe the process, would look the people in the hands to see what they were doing. I would go there, take a seat, make drawings, would move to the machines – I am a technologist, I am a constructor – and start applying the new method and I would assemble the part, bring it to the workers and say: ‘OK, now, my girl, look now, see if this time you will assemble it more easily. Give it a try.’ In half an hour: ‘Wow, uncle Behar, that’s a good thing you have done, a very good thing indeed!’

I have another very interesting story to tell. There was an exhibition of all the shops in Bulgaria producing consumer goods and I went behind the sales stall. The guy standing behind the stall told me: ‘Behar, stay here for a while, I am a little fed up.’ And while he was away there came this guy and I said: ‘How can I help you?’ He was looking at me and said: ‘All you have shown here is very interesting but what I need is hinges. How many can you produce?’ ‘Tell me the quantities you need?’ ‘A really large quantity.’ And while this conversation was taking place I was estimating the time for which I could make new dies and asked him to be more specific about the amounts he would need. ‘Well, a million from each type. From each type.’ I was still thinking at that moment and told him: ‘No problem!’ But I had estimated that I could make one die for a week and that one die could cut 300 parts per minute, depending on the size. And that guy threw a business card on the counter – a director of ‘Raznoiznos’ Directorate. I immediately called the head engineer who said: ‘Have you gone mad?’ I replied: ‘Listen, we will make a mint from that.’ And we started right away – that guy would order 10,000 of that hinge, 40,000 – from another. I would take one of the boys working there and we would make three new dies. That dies provided for 12 people from that shop for eight years. Every year huge amounts of hinges were planned for manufacture.

I’ve never interrupted my connections with the Jewish community. I’ve been tightly related to it for 45 years, whenever I’ve been in Plovdiv. After 1989 the Jewish center expanded its activities and somehow changed in itself. Many holidays preserved their religious nature, as it was before 9th September. But I’m still a complete atheist. I attend the synagogue at memorial services or at the big holidays.

I haven’t received anything from the Joint but there were some 400 Swiss dollars and some German from the Red Cross. Before the denominations they amounted to 20,000 levs which means 500 levs nowadays. Every evening I play belote at Shalom. Even now I am in a hurry because I have to tell them I won’t play tonight so they have to find another partner.

Translated by Dimka Stoeva

Glossary

1 Plovdiv

a town in Bulgaria situated in the Upper-Thracian Lowlands, along the two banks of the Maritsa River and on six unique syenite hills or as everybody calls them – tepeta. On about three of those hills the Thracians founded the ancient Thracian settlement called Evmolpias, later renamed to Poulpoudeva. In 342 BC the town was conquered by Philip II of Macedonia and renamed to Philipopol. During the Roman rule it turned into a major economic, cultural and political center of Thrace. The three hills around which the town was founded were called Trimontsium. After the downfall of the Roman Empire in VI century the town was conquered by the Slavs. Two centuries later it was included within the boundaries of Bulgaria and was called. Puldin. In XIV century it was conquered by the Turks and its name was changed again – to Phelibe. At the time of the Russian – Turkish Liberation War Plovdiv was the biggest town in Bulgaria. Following the decisions of the Berlin Congress and the separation of Bulgarian Principality and Eastern Rumelia, the town became the administrative center of Eastern Rumelia. Here, in Plovdiv, on 6th September 1885 was announced the Union of the Bulgarian Principality and Eastern Roumelia. The town is famous for the peaceful life of a mixture of Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Bulgarians and Jews.

2 Sephardi Jewry

Jews of Spanish and Portuguese origin. Their ancestors settled down in North Africa, the Ottoman Empire, South America, Italy and the Netherlands after they had been driven out from the Iberian peninsula at the end of the 15th century. About 250,000 Jews left Spain and Portugal on this occasion. A distant group among Sephardi refugees were the Crypto-Jews (Marranos), who converted to Christianity under the pressure of the Inquisition but at the first occasion reassumed their Jewish identity. Sephardi preserved their community identity; they speak Ladino language in their communities up until today. The Jewish nation is formed by two main groups: the Ashkenazi and the Sephardi group which differ in habits, liturgy their relation toward Kabala, pronunciation as well in their philosophy.

3 Expulsion of the Jews from Spain

The Sephardi population of the Balkans originates from the Jews who were expelled from the Iberian peninsula, as a result of the ‘Reconquista’ in the late 15th century (Spain 1492, and Portugal 1495). The majority of the Sephardim subsequently settled in the territory of the Ottoman Empire, mainly in maritime cities (Salonika, Istanbul, Smyrna, etc.) and also in the ones situated on significant overland trading routes to Central Europe (Bitola, Skopje, and Sarajevo) and to the Danube (Adrianople, Philipopolis, Sofia, and Vidin).

4 Russian-Turkish War (1877-78)

After the loss of the Crimean War (1856) the Russian Empire made a second attempt in 1877 to secure its outlet from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean by conquering the strategic straits (Bosporus and Dardanelles) and strengthening its position in the Balkans. The pretext of the war declaration was pan-Slavism: protecting the fellow Christian Orthodox and Slavic speaking population of the Ottoman controlled South Eastern Europe. From the Russian controlled Bessarabia the Russian army entered Romania and attacked the Ottomans south of the Danube. With enthusiastic Bulgarian support the Russians won the decisive battles at Plevna (Pleven) and the Shipka straight in the Balkan Mountains. They took Adrianople (Edirne) in 1878 and reached San Stefano (Yesilkoy), an Istanbul suburb, where they signed a treaty with the Porte. This provided for an autonomous Bulgarian state, under Russian protection, bordering the Black and the Aegean seas, including also most of historic Thrace and Macedonia. Britain (safeguarding status quo on the European continent) and Austria-Hungary (having strategic interests in the region) initiated a joint Great Power decision to limit Russian dominance in the Balkans. Their diplomatic efforts were successful and resulted in the Treaty of Berlin in 1878. According to this Bulgaria was made much smaller and large populations of Bulgarians remained outside the new frontiers. Eastern Rumelia as an autonomous Ottoman province was created. In Berlin the Romanian, the Serbian and the Montenegrin states were internationally recognized and Austria-Hungary was given the right to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina to restore order.

5 Ladino

also known as Judeo-Spanish, it is the spoken and written Hispanic language of Jews of Spanish and Portugese origin. Ladino did not become a specifically Jewish language until after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 (and Portugal in 1495) - it was merely the language of their province. It is also known as Judezmo, Dzhudezmo, or Spaniolit. When the Jews were expelled from Spain and Portugal they were cut off from the further development of the language, but they continued to speak it in the communities and countries to which they emigrated. Ladino therefore reflects the grammar and vocabulary of 15th century Spanish. In Amsterdam, England and Italy, those Jews who continued to speak ‘Ladino’ were in constant contact with Spain and therefore they basically continued to speak the Castilian Spanish of the time. Ladino was nowhere near as diverse as the various forms of Yiddish, but there were still two different dialects, which corresponded to the different origins of the speakers: ‘Oriental’ Ladino was spoken in Turkey and Rhodes and reflected Castilian Spanish, whereas ‘Western’ Ladino was spoken in Greece, Macedonia, Bosnia, Serbia and Romania, and preserved the characteristics of northern Spanish and Portuguese. The vocabulary of Ladino includes hundreds of archaic Spanish words, and also includes many words from different languages: mainly from Hebrew, Arabic, Turkish, Greek, French, and to a lesser extent from Italian. In the Ladino spoken in Israel, several words have been borrowed from Yiddish. For most of its lifetime, Ladino was written in the Hebrew alphabet, in Rashi script, or in Solitro. It was only in the late 19th century that Ladino was ever written using the Latin alphabet. At various times Ladino has been spoken in North Africa, Egypt, Greece, Turkey, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania, France, Israel, and, to a lesser extent, in the United States and Latin America.

6 French Colleges in Bulgaria

Bulgarian-French diplomatic relations date officially from 8th July 1879 when the French Consul Y. Shefer handed to King Batenberg his letters of accreditation. There were French colleges in Ruse, Varna and Plovdiv. The one in Ruse was founded before the establishment of diplomatic relations between Bulgaria and France because there was a French consul in the town from the time of the Ottoman Empire. French colleges are famous for their good education. There is no information on the number of Jews who studied in them. They were usually established at Catholic missions.

7 ’Shofar’ newspaper

a Jewish newspaper, issued in Plovdiv and Sofia from 1919 till 1944. The total number of the newspapers and magazines issued in Bulgaria from 1844 till 1944 is 8,622. Out of them there were 90 Jewish newspapers that were in Bulgarian. There were several groups of Jewish newspapers and magazines according to their ideology and other features: Zionist – 51; BCP publications – 9; publications of the Bulgarian Workers Social Democratic Party (radical socialists) - 2; mason’s – 1; charity – 3; religious – 5; advertising and informational; economic and so on – 7; tourist – 1; to spread ideas among the Jews – 1; with undefined ideology, cultural included – 9. at the same time the Jewish newspapers and magazines that were printed in Ladino and Hebrew were 56. Among them is the ‘Shofar’ newspaper which was issued in Ladino from 1901 till 1911 in Plovdiv.

8 Rafbak

Rafbak is an abbreviation for 'Rabotnicheski Fakultet' meaning Workers' Faculty. They were much popular in the 1970s and 1980s. They were organized with the cooperation of the Bulgarian Communist Party and their main goal was to prepare specialists to enroll in universities. The people were mostly from industrial companies. The courses lasted a number of months and people did not go to work while they were studying. The people sent to such courses had a good professional background and were recommended by the party representatives. In socialist times Workers’ Schools were organized throughout the entire Eastern Block. Modes of instruction included both evening and correspondence classes and all educational levels were served – from elementary school to higher education.

9 Bulgaria in World War I

Bulgaria entered the war in October 1915 on the side of the Central Powers. Its main aim was the revision of the Treaty of Bucharest: the acquisition of Macedonia. Bulgaria quickly overran most of Serbian Macedonia as well as parts of Serbia; in 1916 with German backing it entered Greece (Western Thrace and the hinterlands of Salonika). After Romania surrendered to the Central Powers Bulgaria also recovered Southern Dobrudzha, which had been lost to Romania after the First Balkan War. The Bulgarian advance to Greece was halted after British, French and Serbian troops landed in Salonika, while in the north Romania joined the Allies in 1916. Conditions at the front deteriorated rapidly and political support for the war eroded. The agrarians and socialist workers intensified their antiwar campaigns, and soldier committees were formed in the army. A battle at Dobro Pole brought total retreat, and in ten days the Allies entered Bulgaria. On 29th September 1918 Bulgaria signed an armistice and withdrew from the war. The Treaty of Neuilly (November 1919) imposed by the Allies on Bulgaria, deprived the country of its World War I gains as well as its outlet to the Aegean Sea (Eastern Thrace).

10 Chitalishte

literally ‘a place to read’; a community and an institution for public enlightenment carrying a supply of books, holding discussions and lectures, performances etc. The first such organizations were set up during the period of the Bulgarian National Revival (18th-19th centuries) and were gradually transformed into cultural centers in Bulgaria. Unlike in the 1930s, when the chitalishte network could maintain its activities for the most part through its own income, today, as during the communist regime, they are mainly supported by the state. There are over 3,000 chitalishtes in Bulgaria today, although they have become less popular.

11 9th September 1944

The day of the communist takeover in Bulgaria. In September 1944 the Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria. On 9th September 1944 the Fatherland Front, a broad left-wing coalition, deposed the government. Although the communists were in the minority in the Fatherland Front, they were the driving force in forming the coalition, and their position was strengthened by the presence of the Red Army in Bulgaria.

12 Bulgarian Communist Party [up to 1990]

the ruling party of the People's Republic of Bulgaria from 1946 until 1990 when it ceased to be a Communist state. The Bulgarian Communist Party had dominated the Fatherland Front coalition that took power in 1944, late in World War II, after it led a coup against Bulgaria's fascist government in conjunction with the Red Army's crossing the border. The party's origins lay in the Social Democratic and Labour Party of Bulgaria,  which was founded in 1903 after a split in the Social-Democratic Party. The party's founding leader was Dimitar Blagoev and its subsequent leaders included Georgi Dimitrov.

13 Origin of Bulgarian Communist Party

In the Bulgarian Workers’ Socialist Democratic Party there fromed two wings – revolutionary, left-wing and right-wing socialists. The revolutionary socialists’ leader was Dimitar Blagoev and, in practice, they were following the ideas of the Second Socialist International and were taking active part in the international socialist movement. The left-wing, revolutionary socialists were for national unity of the Bulgarian people but they didn’t approve of the way in which it was being achieved and that was adopted by the monarch and the government of the coalition of the narodniaks [narod means people] which means they were against a next Balkan, Second Balkan and World War I. Their idea was the creation of a Balkan Federation and the peaceful solution of the national issue. The right-wing socialists were led by Yanko Sakuzov, Evtim Dabev and K. Bozveliev. The right-wing socialists were also considered to be an integral part of the international socialist movement and the Second Socialist International but their social grounds were the hired laborers, the lowest and medium strata mainly of the urban population, the teachers and the clerks. In May 1919, after World War I had ended, there was held a congress at which the wings officially separated. The Bulgarian Communist Party – left-wing socialists – was the successor to the Bulgarian Workers’ Socialist Democratic Party – Left-wing Socialists. The change of the name took place at the XXII congress in May 1919. The very reason for the change of the name was the adoption of Lenin’s theory about imperialism as the last stage of capitalism, about the real chances of the proletarian revolution to win even in one separate country, about the role of the peasantry as an ally of the proletariat in the fulfillment of the socialist revolution.

14 Banning of Bulgarian Communist Party

It happened after the September Rebellion which was organized under pressure from the Comintern in Moscow. During the rebellion and after its defeat a lot of members and followers of BCP died, others were thrown in jail. The organized lif of the party was stopped whereas the party itself was practically declared to be outside the law. Inside the party a fractionist fight between the liquidators was taking place and it was led by Dr. Nikola Sakarov, Ivan Klincharov and S. Todorov. They announced that they had been against the September Rebellion line of the party, against the Communist International and the turning BCP (left-wing) into an illegal party. At the beginning of April 1924 in accordance with the Law for the Protection of the State BCP (Left-wing) was banned. Nonethless, in May that same year BCP (left-wing) held an illegal conference at which a decision for new armed uprising was taken. Without assessing the new situation correctly, the military fraction of the party organized and conducted a terrorist act in ‘Sveta Nedelia’ Church. A Jew took part in that terrorist act – Marko Fridman who was arrested and hanged immediately after the explosion on 16th April 1925 in response to the terrorist activity the government of Alexander Tsankov started a terror during which hundreds of party members lost their lives.

15 Shalom Organization

Organization of the Jews in Bulgaria. It is an umbrella organization uniting 8,000 Jews in Bulgaria and has 19 regional branches. Shalom supports all forms of Jewish activities in the country and organizes various programs.

16 Burmoelos (or burmolikos, burlikus)

A sweetmeat made from matzah, typical for Pesach. First, the matzah is put into water, then squashed and mixed with eggs. Balls are made from the mixture, they are fried and the result is something like donuts.

17 Vagenshtain, Angel (1922)

A classic of Bulgarian cinema. He graduated in cinema dramaturgy from the Russian State Institute of Cinematography (VGIK) in Moscow. Author of some 50 scripts for feature, documentary and animation films, as well as of novels published in Bulgaria, France, Germany, Russia, and the USA. Since 1950 he has worked in Bulgarian and East German cinematography. His 1959 film ‘Stars’, dedicated to the fate of Jews in WWII, and directed by Konrad Wolf, won the Special Prize of the jury at the 59th Cannes International Film Festival. Among Vagenshtain’s most famous films as a scriptwriter are: ‘Amendment to the Law for the Defense of the Nation’, ‘Goya’, ‘Stars In Her Hair, Tears In Her Eyes’, ‘Boris I’, etc.

18 Kef

Comes from the Turkish word keyif meaning delight, great pleasure akin to Arab kayif – well-being. The word is very common in Bulgarian and it is used often.

19 King Boris III

The Third Bulgarian Kingdom was a constitutional monarchy with democratic constitution. Although pro-German, Bulgaria did not take part in World War II with its armed forces. King Boris III (who reigned from 1918-1943) joined the Axis to prevent an imminent German invasion in Bulgaria, but he refused to send Bulgarian troops to German aid on the Eastern front. He died suddenly after a meeting with Hitler and there have been speculations that he was actually poisoned by the Nazi dictator who wanted a more obedient Bulgaria. Many Bulgarian Jews saved from the Holocaust (over 50,000 people) regard King Boris III as their savior.

20 Karavelov, Lyuben (1834 - 1879)

a Bulgarian writer from the Renascence period; an activist of the revolutionary movement for liberation from the Ottoman yoke. He was born in 1834 in Koprivshtitsa and died in 1879 in Ruse. He got his primary education in Plovdiv. Then he studied in Istanbul – 1856 and at the Department of History and Philology at Moscow University – 1859. He worked as a correspondent for the Moscow newspapers ‘Golos’ (Voice) and ‘Moscva’ (Moscow) while he was living in Belgrade in 1867. In 1868 he was living and working in Novi Sad and from 1869 – in Bucharest where he started printing the Svoboda (Freedom) newspaper. In 1872 together with some other Bulgarian revolutionaries he founded the Bulgarian Revolutionary Central Committee which was aiming at the liberation of Bulgaria. Among his most popular works are: ‘A Description of the Bulgarian Way of Living’, ‘Is it the Destiny’s Fault’, ‘Bulgarians from Past Times’, ‘Stories from the Bulgarian Reality’.

21 Maccabi World Union

International Jewish sports organization whose origins go back to the end of the 19th century. A growing number of young Eastern European Jews involved in Zionism felt that one essential prerequisite of the establishment of a national home in Palestine was the improvement of the physical condition and training of ghetto youth. In order to achieve this, gymnastics clubs were founded in many Eastern and Central European countries, which later came to be called Maccabi. The movement soon spread to more countries in Europe and to Palestine. The World Maccabi Union was formed in 1921. In less than two decades its membership was estimated at 200,000 with branches located in most countries of Europe and in Palestine, Australia, South America, South Africa, etc.

22 Hashomer Hatzair in Bulgaria

‘The Young Watchman’; A Zionist-socialist pioneering movement established in Bulgaria in 1932, Hashomer Hatzair trained youth for kibbutz life and set up kibbutzim in Palestine. During World War II, members were sent to Nazi-occupied areas and became leaders in Jewish resistance groups. After the war, Hashomer Hatzair was active in ‘illegal’ immigration to Palestine.

23 Betar

(abbreviation of Berit Trumpeldor) A right-wing Zionist youth movement founded in 1923 in Riga, Latvia. Betar played an important role in Zionist education, in teaching the Hebrew language and culture, and methods of self-defense. It also inculcated the ideals of aliyah to Erez Israel by any means, legal and illegal, and the creation of a Jewish state on both sides of the Jordan. Its members supported the idea to create a Jewish legion in order to liberate Palestine. In Bulgaria the organization started publishing its newspaper in 1934.

24 Mass Aliyah

Between September 1944 and October 1948, 7,000 Bulgarian Jews left for Palestine. The exodus was due to deep-rooted Zionist sentiments, relative alienation from Bulgarian intellectual and political life, and depressed economic conditions. Bulgarian policies toward national minorities were also a factor that motivated emigration. In the late 1940s Bulgaria was anxious to rid itself of national minority groups, such as Armenians and Turks, and thus make its population more homogeneous. More people were allowed to depart in the winter of 1948 and the spring of 1949. The mass exodus continued between 1949 and 1951: 44,267 Jews immigrated to Israel until only a few thousand Jews remained in the country.

25 UYW

The Union of Young Workers (also called Revolutionary Youth Union). A communist youth organization, which was legally established in 1928 as a sub-organization of the Bulgarian Communist Youth Union (BCYU). After the coup d’etat in 1934, when parties in Bulgaria were banned, it went underground and became the strongest wing of the BCYU. Some 70% of the partisans in Bulgaria were members of it. In 1947 it was renamed Dimitrov’s Communist Youth Union, after Georgi Dimitrov, the leader of the Bulgarian Communist Party at the time.

26 Brannik

Pro-fascist youth organization. It started functioning after the Law for the Protection of the Nation was passed in 1941 and the Bulgarian government forged its pro-German policy. The Branniks regularly maltreated Jews.

27 Deportation of Jews from Aegean Thrace and Macedonia

On 22nd February 1943 in Sofia, late in the evening, at the Commissariat for Jewish Affairs an agreement was signed between Alexander Belev – a commissar for Jewish affairs and Teodor Daneker – SS hauptsturmbanfuhrer, an assistant to the military attaché at the German Legation in Sofia concerning the deportation of Jews to Poland. According to the agreement 20,000 of the newly-annexed in 1941 Aegean Thrace and Macedonia had to be deported to Poland. As their number amounted to 12,000 the others, who were supposed to make up for the needed numbers, were from the interior of the country – from the towns of Plovdiv, Kyustendil, Dupnitsa, Pazardzhik, Yambol, Varna – the more enlightened, the wealthier and more socially active, those who were known to be ‘the leaders of Jewry’ were preferred. The very act of deportation of the Jews from Aegean Thrace and Macedonia was accomplished from 1st to 8th March and those Jews were deported through Yugoslavia and Bulgaria to the concentration camp Treblinka in Poland. The deportation of Jews from the interior of the country didn’t take place. Although it was planned as a secret mission due to the active interference of the citizens and society, the operation failed and not a single Jew was deported from the old territories of Bulgaria.

28 Law for the Protection of the Nation

A comprehensive anti-Jewish legislation in Bulgaria was introduced after the outbreak of World War II. The ‘Law for the Protection of the Nation’ was officially promulgated in January 1941. According to this law, Jews did not have the right to own shops and factories. Jews had to wear the distinctive yellow star; Jewish houses had to display a special sign identifying it as being Jewish; Jews were dismissed from all posts in schools and universities. The internment of Jews in certain designated towns was legalized and all Jews were expelled from Sofia in 1943. Jews were only allowed to go out into the streets for one or two hours a day. They were prohibited from using the main streets, from entering certain business establishments, and from attending places of entertainment. Their radios, automobiles, bicycles and other valuables were confiscated. From 1941 on Jewish males were sent to forced labor battalions and ordered to do extremely hard work in mountains, forests and road construction. In the Bulgarian-occupied Yugoslav (Macedonia) and Greek (Aegean Thrace) territories the Bulgarian army and administration introduced extreme measures. The Jews from these areas were deported to concentration camps, while the plans for the deportation of Jews from Bulgaria proper were halted by a protest movement launched by the vice-chairman of the Bulgarian Parliament.

29 Yellow star in Bulgaria

According to a governmental decree all Bulgarian Jews were forced to wear distinctive yellow stars after 24th September 1942. Contrary to the German-occupied countries the stars in Bulgaria were made of yellow plastic or textile and were also smaller. Volunteers in previous wars, the war-disabled, orphans and widows of victims of wars, and those awarded the military cross were given the privilege to wear the star in the form of a button. Jews who converted to Christianity and their families were totally exempt. The discriminatory measures and persecutions ended with the cancellation of the Law for the Protection of the Nation on 17th August 1944.

30 Internment of Jews in Bulgaria

Although Jews living in Bulgaria where not deported to concentration camps abroad or to death camps, many were interned to different locations within Bulgaria. In accordance with the Law for the Protection of the Nation, the comprehensive anti-Jewish legislation initiated after the outbreak of WWII, males were sent to forced labor battalions in different locations of the country, and had to engage in hard work. There were plans to deport Bulgarian Jews to Nazi Death Camps, but these plans were not realized. Preparations had been made at certain points along the Danube, such as at Somovit and Lom. In fact, in 1943 the port at Lom was used to deport Jews from Aegean Thrace and from Macedonia, but in the end, the Jews from Bulgaria proper were spared.

31 Forced labor camps in Bulgaria

Established under the Council of Ministers’ Act in 1941. All Jewish men between the ages of 18–50, eligible for military service, were called up. In these labor groups Jewish men were forced to work 7-8 months a year on different road constructions under very hard living and working conditions.

32 Utro

Meaning Morning, it was a Bulgarian bourgeois daily, issued between 1911 and 1914. It was founded by St. Damyanov and the first editor-in-chief was St. Tanev. Utro published sensational both local and international news, supporting the policy of the Government, especially during the World War II, as well as Bulgaria’s pro-German orientation. Its circulation amounted to 160,000 copies.

33 Plan for deportation of Jews in Bulgaria

In accordance with the agreement signed on 22nd February 1943 by the Commissar for Jewish Affairs Alexander Belev on the Bulgarian side and Teodor Daneker on the German side, it was decided to deport 20 000 Jews at first. Since the number of the Aegean and Macedonian Jews, or the Jews from the 'new lands', annexed to Bulgaria in WWII, was around 12 000, the other 8 000 Jews had to be selected from the so-called 'old borders', i.e. Bulgaria. A couple of days later, on 26th February Alexander Belev sent an order to the delegates of the Commissariat in all towns with a larger Jewish population to prepare lists of the so-called 'unwanted or anti-state elements'. The 'richer, more distinguished and socially prominent' Jews had to be listed among the first. The deportation started in March 1943 with the transportation of the Aegean and the Thrace Jews from the new lands. The overall number of the deported was 11 342. In order to reach the number 20 000, the Jews from the so-called old borders of Bulgaria had to be deported. But that did not happen thanks to the active intervention of the citizens of Kyustendil Petar Mihalev, Asen Suichmezov, Vladimir Kurtev, Ivan Momchilov and the deputy chairman of the 25th National Assembly Dimitar Peshev and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. Before the deportation was canceled, the Jews in Plovdiv, Pazardzhik, Kyustendil, Dupnitsa, Yambol and Sliven were shut in barracks, tobacco warehouses and schools in order to be ready to be transported to the eastern provinces of The Third Reich. The arrests were made on the eve of 9th March. Thanks to the intervention of the people, the deportation of the Jews from the old borders of Bulgaria did not happen. The Jews in Dupnitsa were also arrested to be ready for deportation.

34 Organisation for the Distribution of Artisanal and Agricultural Skills among the Jews in Russia ORT

On 22nd March 1880, by order of the Minister of Interior Affairs of Russia, the Organisation for the Distribution of Artisanal and Agricultural Skills among the Jews in Russia - ORT - was established. A small group of prominent Russian Jews petitioned Tzar Alexander II for permission to start a fund to help lift Russia’s five million Jews out of crushing poverty. ORT, Obschestvo Remeslenovo i zemledelcheskovo Trouda (the Society for Trades and Agricultural Labour) was founded. ORT today provides skills-training and self-help projects for some of the world’s most impoverished communities, using funds raised by its supporters, and added to by development agencies and national governments, to put people on the path to economic independence.

35 Bulgarian Komsomol

The communist youth organization in Bulgaria in socialist times. The task of the Komsomol was to spread the ideas of communism among worker and peasant youth. The Komsomol also aimed at providing a communist upbringing by involving the youth worker in the political struggle, supplemented by theoretical education.

36 Joint (American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee)

The Joint was formed in 1914 with the fusion of three American Jewish aid committees, which were alarmed by the suffering of Jews during World War I. In late 1944, the Joint entered Europe’s liberated areas and organized a massive relief operation. It provided food for Jewish survivors all over Europe, it supplied clothing, books and school supplies for children. It supported the establishment of cultural meeting places, including libraries, theaters and gardens. It also provided religious supplies for the Jewish communities. The Joint also operated DP camps, in which it organized retraining programs to help people learn trades that would enable them to earn a living, while its cultural and religious activities helped re-establish Jewish life. The Joint was also closely involved in helping Jews to emigrate from European and Muslim countries. The Joint was expelled from East Central Europe for decades during the Cold War and it has only come back to many of these countries after the fall of communism. Today the Joint provides social welfare programs for elderly Holocaust survivors and encourages Jewish renewal and communal development.

37 10th November 1989

After 35 years of rule, Communist Party leader Todor Zhivkov was replaced by the hitherto Prime Minister Peter Mladenov who changed the Bulgarian Communist Party’s name to Socialist Party. On 17th November 1989 Mladenov became head of state, as successor of Zhivkov. Massive opposition demonstrations in Sofia with hundreds of thousands of participants calling for democratic reforms followed from 18th November to December 1989. On 7th December the ‘Union of Democratic Forces’ (SDS) was formed consisting of different political organizations and groups.

38 Zhivkov, Todor (1911-1998)

First Secretary of the Central Committee of the ruling Bulgarian Communist Party (1954-1989) and the leader of Bulgaria (1971-1989). His 35 years as Bulgaria's ruler made him the longest-serving leader in any of the Soviet-block nations of Eastern Europe. When communist governments across Eastern Europe began to collapse in 1989, the aged Zhivkov resigned from all his posts. He was placed under arrest in January 1990. Zhivkov was convicted of embezzlement in 1992 and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. He was allowed to serve his sentence under house arrest.

39 Zhivkova, Lyudmila (1942-1981)

daughter of the general secretary of the Bulgarian communist party, Todor Zhivkov, and a founder of the international children’s assembly ‘Flag of Peace’. In 1980 Todor Zhivkov appointed her a chairwoman of the Commission on science, culture and art. In this powerful position, she became extremely popular by promoting Bulgaria’s national cultural heritage. She spent large sums of money in a highly visible campaign to support scholars, collect Bulgarian art, and sponsor cultural institutions. Among her policies was closer cultural contact with the West; her most visible project was the spectacular celebration of Bulgaria’s 1300 years of nationhood in 1981.

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