Travel

Grigoriy Kagan
Kiev
Ukraine
Interviewer: Ella Levitskaya
Date of interview: September 2004

Grigoriy Kagan surprised me all at once with his young looks, light movements and shrewd eyes. Grigoriy is tall and has a muscular athletic stature and gray hair cut short. Grigoriy moves around quickly and he is a very interesting conversationalist. About a year ago he bought a computer to be able to communicate with his sons and grandchildren by e-mail correspondence, but later he started studying the software. Grigoriy gave me a disc with Grigoriy’s memories and the story of his life and the collection of stories ‘Only pleasant memories’. Even the title describes his personality.  I enjoyed reading his book: Grigoriy writes with a sense of humor and picks something funny even in the situation that another person would consider hard or sad. He also likes his dacha. He likes planting and taking care of his crops and enjoys talking about this. He lives in a 2-bedroom apartment in a 5-storied apartment building constructed in the 1970s in the Rusanovka district in Kiev. Rusanovka is also called the ‘Venice of Kiev’. It stands on the bank of the Dnieper and there are channels running all across the area. Grigoriy and his wife Ludmila make a very sweet couple. Ludmila is a short tiny lady, always friendly and gentle. One can tell the husband and wife love and understand each other.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

I know very little about my father’s family. My father Aron - Arl in Jewish - Kagan did not know much about them either. My grandfather’s name was Mordekhai Kagan and my grandmother’s name was Yura. I don’t know my grandmother’s maiden name or where they were born. They lived in Sovskaya Street in Demeyevka, a suburb of Kiev. Demeyevka was within the [Jewish] Pale of Settlement 1. My grandfather was a cabman and owned horses and wagons. My grandfather died in 1898, when my father turned 2. My grandmother Yura died in 1903. My grandfather and grandmother were buried in the Lukianovka Jewish cemetery 2 in Kiev. My father remained an orphan at the age of 7. He was the youngest in the family. I knew his three older brothers and two sisters. My father’s sister Zelda Bykova was the oldest of all children. Her husband was a clerk and Zelda was a housewife. The next was my father’s brother Yankl Kagan. He was a cabman. He was much older than my father: Yankl’s children were the same age with my father. Yankl had a house, stables and wagons in Sovskaya Street. Horses made the main means of transportation in those years. The next child in the family was Iosif. He was a blacksmith. He had a forge near his house. The third brother Moishe also dealt in the transportation business. My father’s sister Haya was born in 1895.

After my grandfather and grandmother died my father went to live with Yankl and his wife Perl, and Haya lived with Iosif. In winter and summer my father lived at the hayloft. When my father grew older, Yankl trained him in his business, and later his brother Iosif trained him his vocation and before getting married my father worked in Iosif’s forge. 

My father’s mother tongue was Yiddish. I think the only place my father’s brothers studied was cheder. My father studied in the cheder for two years, but he did not finish it. He could write a little and knew only one arithmetic action: addition. My father and his brothers were religious. When they were growing up, the community only acknowledged religious way of life, and different views were not appreciated.

In 1918 my father married Doba Braginskaya, a cheerful girl from the nearby Romanovka village. I don’t know how my parents met. Their marriage may have been prearranged that was quite common at their time. I think my parents had a traditional Jewish wedding.

My grandfather Gersh Braginskiy had died before I was born. My grandmother’s name was Mara Braginskaya, but I don’t know her maiden name. I don’t know what my grandfather did for living.

They had five children: four daughters and one son. His name was Boruch. The oldest daughter’s name was Shyfra. Malka and Boruch came after her. My mother Doba was born in 1900. My mother’s sister Elka was the youngest.

My mother’s family spoke Yiddish. They also spoke Russian and Ukrainian with their non-Jewish neighbors. Romanovka was a Ukrainian village where few Jewish families resided. I’ve never been in Romanovka. When I was born, my mother’s family lived in Kiev. The Pale of Settlement was cancelled in 1917 [Russian Revolution of 1917] 3, and numbers of Jewish families living in Kiev region started moving to Kiev. Only my grandfather Gersh’s grave remained in Romanovka. Mama hardly told me anything about her family and I don’t know how religious they were.

My mother’s sister Shyfra and her husband moved to the USA in 1923. I was 3 years old, and my parents and I went to say good bye to them. I was put on a stool to kiss my aunt and uncle. This is all information I have about them. We had no contacts with them. In the late 1920s the authorities had a suspicious attitude to those, who had relatives abroad and corresponded with them [Keep in touch with relatives abroad] 4. They might accuse people of espionage without any reason. Mama received few letters from Shyfra, but she did not reply and the correspondence terminates. My mother’s sister Malka married Elia Elman, a Jewish guy, who had moved to Kiev from a small nearby village. Elia worked as a foreman at a furniture factory and Malka was a housewife. They had six children: 3 daughters: Ida, a middle daughter, whose name I can’t remember, and Anna, and three sons: Fitel, Grisha, who was older than me, and Pyotr, the youngest, born in 1921. Elia was a convinced communist and atheist, of course, since the Bolsheviks and the Soviet regime had an intolerant attitude toward religion [struggled against religion] 5 calling it delusion. A communist could not be religious by definition. The Elman family observed no Jewish traditions. Elia did not allow having his sons circumcised. He did not acknowledge religious rituals. By the way, this served his youngest son well. During the Great Patriotic War 6 Pyotr was recruited to the army, and his military unit was encircled. They were captured by Germans, who could not ignore Pyotr’s Semitic appearance, of course. The Germans asked his name and Pyotr replied he was Ukrainian and his surname was Vasilenko. This was his older sister Ida husband’s surname. The Germans ordered him to take his pants down and were surprised to see that he was not circumcised. This was probably one of just few cases, when the communist ideas had served anybody well. My mother’s sister Elka, who had the Russian name 7 of Olga, lived near the Vladimirskiy market in Kiev. Her family name was Gershtein. Her husband’s name was Elia. Elia worked at a pant and Olga was a housewife. Their son Israel was born in 1932. My mother’s brother Boris Braginskiy got fond of revolutionary ideas and got actively involved in the revolution. After moving to Kiev he went to work in the party bodies and by the 1930s he became some high official in Kiev. Boris married Alla, a jewish woman, some time in 1934, they had no children. My grandmother lived with him after moving to Kiev, and later she moved to a one-bedroom apartment in Proreznaya Street in the center of Kiev. Of my mother’s whole family that I knew only my grandmother, my mother and her sister Olga were moderately religious. They celebrated the main Jewish holidays at home. The rest of the family was atheist.

My father bought horses and a wagon to work on his own before getting married. He also somehow managed to get a 2-bedroom apartment on the 2nd floor of a 2-storied mansion in the center of Kiev. My parents had their bedroom in a smaller room, and the bigger room served as the children’s room. There was also a kitchen. I was born in this house in 1920. I was named Grigoriy after my mother’s father and my Jewish name is Gersh. My sister was born in 1922. Mama wanted to name her Yura after my father’s mother. However, when she went to register the little girl at the civil registry office, the registrar refused to write down this name (the Russian name of Yura is affectionate from the man’s name of Yuri). For this reason my sister was registered as Yulia.  

When my sister was 2 and I was 4, an incident decided my future. Mama went out leaving my sister and me sitting on the window sill for us to look out of the window. Yulia, seeing our mother approaching the house pushed the window and fell out of it. Mama grabbed her and ran to the ‘Milk drop’ clinic across the street. Leiba Rabinovich, an old Jew and director of this clinic, examined the girl and said she was perfectly all right. When she was falling, her blouse puffed up lie a parachute softening her fall down. This was when I decided to become a parachutist when I grew up.

I cannot say my parents were strongly religious. My father often worked on Saturday. We did not celebrate Sabbath. My father went to the small one-storied nearby synagogue in Bolshaya Vasilkovskaya Street on the main Jewish holidays. He took me with him after I turned five. The building of the synagogue was removed in the 1930s. I remember celebration of Pesach in our family. There was no bread in our house through 8 days of Pesach and we only ate matzah. Mama cooked delicious food: chicken broth, stuffed fish, chicken neck filled with liver and strudels. In the evening we sat at the table and my father recited a prayer. We also celebrated other Jewish holidays as well, but I don’t remember any details. My parents spoke Yiddish and Russian at home and I spoke both languages well.

In 1926 the authorities forced us out of our apartment. They needed the mansion for some reason, and forced all tenants out. There was another 2-storied building nearby. The owner of the house was selling apartments in the house for a very low price. Another part of the building had housed a restaurant before. The restaurant had been damaged by fire. There were two apartments on each floor: one 2- and one 3-bedroom apartment. My father and his brother Moishe bought 3-bedroom apartments on different floors: my father bought one on the 1st floor, and Moishe bought one on the 2nd floor. There were no comforts in the house. 2 houses away from our house water was sold in buckets in a small booth. There was a toilet in the yard. The apartments were heated with stoves. My mother cooked on the Russian stove 8 in the kitchen. There were sheds in the big backyard where my father and uncle Moishe arranged stables. My father had two pairs of draft horses and wagons. This house was removed in the mid 1960s. However, we didn’t live there long. The local authorities took a decision to make a food store in our apartment and we were ordered to move out. My parents rented a small room on the corner of Sovskaya Street and Kladbischenskiy Lane. There was a cemetery nearby, it was a common town cemetery and I don’t think there was a name of it. and I remember the numerous funeral processions. Later this cemetery was closed and a general education school built on the site. My sister studied in this school later. We lived in the Kladbischenskiy Lane for a little over a year before my father made arrangements with the tenants of the 2-bedroom apartment on the 1st floor of our previous house: he bought them another dwelling and we moved into their apartment. My father fenced the yard.

Growing up

When I turned five, my parents decided it was time for me to start my studies. It was common for Jewish children to go to study at the age of 5. I don’t know the reason, but at least all our relatives and friends sent their children to study at the age of 5. However, I could not go to school before turning 8 years of age, which was a rule, at that time children went to school at the age of 8 according to Soviet standards, but my parents arranged with the teacher to give me classes at home. Within three years I attained the knowledge corresponding to the syllabus of 3 grades of general education school. I turned 8 in 1928 and my mother and I went to the nearby 7-year Ukrainian school. It was a small 2-storied building. Its director told mama that there was an order issued by the people’s commissar of education for Jewish children to study in Jewish schools, Russian children in Russian schools and Ukrainian children in Ukrainian schools. He refused to admit me to the 1st grade. Mama asked him whether it was possible for me to go to the 2nd grade. Since the order was issued in 1928 it did not refer to pupils of the 2nd grade. I was given an entrance test: the teacher of mathematic wrote a problem on the blackboard during a break at school and I resolved it instantly. I was admitted to the 2nd grade. My classmates were one year older than me. They were born in 1919. However, I was the best pupil in my class. I was one of the first to become a pioneer [All-Union pioneer organization] 9 in my class, though I was the youngest. I was elected chairman of the pioneer unit in my class and then chairman of the pupils’ committee at school. There were few other Jewish children in my class. There was no anti-Semitism. There was no national segregation in my school.

I had many chores at home. My father got up very early. He had his horses harnessed before 5 o’clock in the morning to go to work. He hauled beer, sweets, sugar and he did the loading himself to save his earnings. He returned home by 5 p.m. and was exhausted after a day’s work. Mama and I were waiting for him at the gate. I opened the gate and unharnessed the horses. Mama had a bucket of water for my father to wash himself. I was to feed the horses, give them oats or hay, give them water and clean them an hour and a half later. I was to take care of the horses. Occasionally I took the horses to a vet. I rode one horse and led another holding it by the bridle. I had to stand in line to the vet and these visits might last a day or so. I always smelled of horses. Once Pyotr Shebiakin, with whom I shared my desk in my class, said that I smelled of horse manure. I hit him. The teacher asked what the matter was and when I explained she told Pyotr to go out of the classroom and told me that I was right. I can still remember this.

1932-33 was the period of terrible famine in Ukraine 10. The food store arranged in our 3-bedroom apartment on the 1st floor turned out to be very helpful. People had to stand in lines at night to get some bread. The shop assistants used to come by our apartment to heat or cook some food in our kitchen during their lunch time. They did it since we moved into the house. Thanks to this we did not have to stand in long lines. The shop assistants brought us bread and mama gave them our bread coupons. We somehow managed through this hard time.

There was a club and a gymnasium in the basement of the house where I had been born. When I was in the 5th grade, I enrolled into a wrestling club. When I told my father in the evening, he said I was a fool, and on the following day I enrolled in a box club. My father didn’t mind it, though he did not quite like the idea. Having attained numerous bruises and bumps, I was soon awarded a junior category, and before finishing the 7th grade at school I already had the 3rd grade in boxing. This helped me to enter a military school later. Boxing was not my single hobby. I went to the radio station the moment I heard there was one, established by Ierehim Tolochinskiy, a smart and keen Jewish guy. We studied the Morse receipt and transmission. It didn’t take me long to learn it. Ierehim sent me to the short wave class on the corner of current Kreschatik and Institutskaya Street. My trainer was Aaronov, unfortunately, I cannot remember his first name. I learned the Morse code receipt and transmission promptly. Over a year later in 1936 I became a skilled radio operator. This became the main course of my life. It determined my future career success. In 1936 I returned to Ierehim’s radio station, but this time I became an operator. The call letter of the radio station was UK5KJ, and I was assigned a personal international call letter: ORS 1030. There was an operator work schedule. I was to take up the shift, sign up in the roster and work 2-3 hours before the next shift man came. This short-wave transmission hobby spread all over the world at that time. I sent messages and someone responded. I corresponded with many people. To confirm our communication my partners were supposed to send me their QSL-cards and I sent them mine. Once I established communication with a radio amateur, whose call letter was W2KK. ‘W’ stood for America! This was the first time I contacted someone from so far away. He sent me his QSL-card, and before sending him mine I boasted to Ierehim of this contact with America. He told me not to send him my card and never show his to anybody since this was a direct path to the GULAG 11 in Kolyma. This occurred in 1936, during the period of arrests [Great Terror ] 12. Later I understood that Ierehim saved my life giving his advice, but at that time I was rather upset that nobody would ever hear about my accomplishment.  

After finishing the lower secondary school I had to go on with my studies. I was admitted to the 8th grade of a Russian school. Russian was no problem for me. I joined Komsomol 13 in the 8th grade. I wouldn’t say I made my parents happy with my successes at school. The radio station was what I dedicated most of my time to. After classes I went to my club and returned home before my father was to come home. My classmates went to the cinema or theater and met with their girlfriends while I spent my time sitting by the radio transmitter sending my call letter on the air. I finished school in 1937. 

Every day newspapers and radio published about new arrests and discovering new ‘enemies of the people’ 14. My friends and I admired Yezhov 15 and those decisive efforts he undertook to discover and eliminate enemies of the people and enemies of the Soviet power. Of course, my friends and I believed it all, being Komsomol members. How could we doubt the Communist Party and Stalin’s decisions! When my mother’s brother Boris Braginskiy was arrested, I started having doubts about what was happening. I knew and admired him since my childhood. He was a wonderful person. We didn’t see him often: he was a high official and did not have much in common with an ordinary cabman’s family. Boris and his wife Alla visited us occasionally. Once he told me that Trotskiy 16 was a great man. I never mentioned it to anybody since we had this discussion after Stalin deported Trotskiy from the USSR. Boris may have spoken it out elsewhere. He was arrested, prosecuted for being a Trotskist and enemy of the people and executed in August 1936. Grandmother Mara died few days after her son was executed. She was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Kiev. I don’t know where Boris’ grave is. I don’t know what happened to Alla after Boris was killed.

I finished the 10th grade in 1937. I did not have the highest marks in my certificate and knew that I hardly had a chance to enter a college and decided to go to a military school. I went to Kharkov [440 km from Kiev] where I entered the Kharkov Air Force School of Communications. There were two companies in this school: one trained radio operators for landing troops and another company trained operators for Air Force troops. I became the best cadet at this school. While the other cadets were just beginners of studying the Morse code, I was already the 1st class operator. The 1st class radio operator can receive and transmit at least 80 signs, a 2nd class operator can operate 60 and a 3rd class operator can operate 40 signs per minute. We had Morse code classes every day. Our classes started after we had breakfast. In class my trainer gave me a transmission task while the others were receiving what I transmitted. We also studied self-defense and jumped with parachutes.  It’s not true that one can get used to everything. I remember the feeling of fear before my first jump, but the following ones were even more fearful, when the door opened and I looked down… I never got used to this, though I jumped a number of times. Perhaps, the feeling of fear is natural, and it is important to overcome it.

I finished this school with honors. In August 1939 I was awarded the rank of lieutenant and was assigned to serve in Engels town [800 km from Moscow] near Saratov in Povolzhiye populated with German colonists 17. My Yiddish helped me to communicate with them. I served in the 202nd airborne landing brigade. About one month later my headquarters informed me that the 64th howitzer artillery regiment in Saratov needed communication officer and I was sent to Saratov. I became communication commanding officer at the age of 20. Afanasiy Zaborskiy, commanding officer of a howitzer squad, became my best friend. Howitzers have short barrels, which makes them different from cannons. 3 pairs of horses had to pull one 152-mm howitzer. Once one Afanasiy’s howitzer flunked into snow. I tried to help them pull it out of there. It resulted in hernia and I had a surgery. I stayed in hospital for few days before I was released. However, I could not lift weights and was not fit for combatant service. I decided to enter the Military Academy. This was in 1940. The regiment commander approved my application. I took entrance exams in the regiment headquarters in Kuibyshev [present Samara, about 1200 km from Moscow]. I passed mathematic and physics and was to take the Russian language exam. There were few subjects given at the exam and I chose the subject of Mayakovskiy 18, whom I liked and knew well. I wrote an excellent composition with multiple quotations. Then we gathered in the conference hall to hear the results, when the teacher of the Russian language and literature, who happened to be the wife of a big commander asked, who lieutenant Kagan was. When I stood up, she said I had written an excellent composition, and even the excellent mark was not enough to give for it. They confirmed my admission to the Leningrad Academy. It was called the Military Electrotechnical Academy of Communication. After the war it was renamed into the Academy of Communication. In September 1940 I started my studies in the Academy. We lived in barracks. On Sunday cadets had a day off and were allowed to walk in the city. I went to museums and theaters. Leningrad [called St. Petersburg today] is a wonderfully beautiful city. One day I met Masha, Maria Akimova on a tram stop. After the war she became my wife and the mother of our two sons.  

During the war

In June 1941 I finished my first academic year in the Academy. I was eager to visit my parents on vacation, and we were surprised to hear that we were supposed to stay in the Academy after exams. My distant relative living in Leningrad invited me to the opening of fountains in Petergof [Petergof or Peterhof - a palace, fountain and park ensemble built by Peter the Great in the early 1700s, often called the ’ Russian Versailles’ and ’Capital of Fountains', is situated 30 km from Saint Petersburg. The fountains operate during the summer.] on 22nd June 1941. We went to Petergof and were walking around, when a military patrol approached me and ordered to go back to my military unit. I was bewildered: I had a leave and observed the rules so there seemed to be no reason for me to be notified like this. Another patrol repeated this requirement. I went to the station to take a local train and that was where I heard that the Great Patriotic War began. However, people had a rather optimistic attitude we had been convinced that if somebody attacked us, the war would be instant and we would defeat the enemy on its own territory. This was a common belief. The vacation was cancelled and we started having classes in the Academy again. Then there was an order to form the 11th special infantry brigade from cadets issued. I was appointed commanding officer of a squad. We were given no weapons, but some digging tools. We marched to the front line in the south of Leningrad. A company commanding officer, my fellow cadet at the Academy, marched beside me and I asked him why we had no weapons. He silently unbuttoned his empty holster. He didn’t even have a gun. When we arrived at Ust’-Izhora, we dug trenches. I started training my subordinates self-defense methods, when we received another order. It stated that all Academy cadets had to go back to Leningrad. When our replacement forces arrived, I transferred command to another lieutenant and we went back to Leningrad to continue our studies. And then the siege of Leningrad [Blockade of Leningrad] 19 began. This was when I learned what starving was like. We, strong guys, received small pieces of bread per day. We ate our ration at once and then had nothing to eat until the following morning. Then we got an order for the Academy to relocate to Tomsk [3000 km east from Moscow in Siberia]. The planes delivering food products to Leningrad transported us from Leningrad. On our way to the evacuation we got a little encouraged. After two months in Tomsk we were notified that we would have an accelerated graduation to have the right to finish the Academy after the war. I was one of the first 5 graduates of the Academy.

In 1942 I submitted my request for joining the Communist Party. This was my sincere step. I believed the party consolidated the best part of society. This was the way my generation was raised. I became a candidate for the Party membership. I received my party membership certificate in early 1943. It was a big honor for me. Later, in my peaceful life, it turned out that this party membership was also important for making a career, but I did not give this a thought at that time. I was not looking for any personal benefits.

In March 1942 we were awarded the rank of lieutenants and took a train to Moscow to the Communication Headquarters of the army. I was assigned to the 99th Guard tank brigade as communication commanding officer. However, before I could make my appearance at the point of destination, the Communication Headquarters human resource officer took back my assignment notice. I asked him what happened and he explained that commander of the Air Force communications General Vasiliev requested that I was assigned to his unit. General Vasiliev was deputy chief of Kharkov School and knew me well. He appointed me chief of the radio center of the Air Force headquarters located in Moscow. My subordinates were the girls, who volunteered to be radio operators. We received ciphered cables and I submitted them to the headquarters. One month later General Vasiliev notified me that the radio operator of the 4th Air Force Corps under the command of General Kazankin deployed in the German rear near Smolensk perished from an antipersonnel mine. Vasiliev asked me whether I wanted to go there as a radio operator. I was very surprised that my general asked my consent rather than issuing an order to me. I agreed to go. I took a plane with two soldiers. I was given two parachutes and they had one each. One of them had a receiver on his chest and another had a dynamo machine (we called it a ‘soldier engine’ since it had a handle generating power by continuous turning of this handle). It was necessary since batteries were only sufficient to support the receipt, but not transmission. We flew at night. In landing troops their commander is person number one, and number two is the radio operator receiving directions of the headquarters and hands them to the commander. These were ciphered messages and I was the only person, who knew the content. The deployment of our landing troops in the German rear was very dangerous for them. Our 6 brigades were well-trained paratroopers, and we caused severe damages in the enemy’s rear. On 6th May 1942 I received another cipher message from Moscow. It was a direction for us to leave the site of our deployment. My brigade and I relocated to Ramenskoye. Our brigade commander Colonel Rodimtsev, who was promoted to general soon, thought high of me, but I did not stay in his brigade. General Vasiliev ordered me to come to his office in Moscow and sent me to Teykovo town where I was appointed communication chief of the 4th maneuver airborne landing brigade. I had to train its radio operators. Commander of this brigade was Colonel Zhelo drank at least one liter of vodka per day and was never sober. He was a partisan before he was appointed commander of the brigade, but this appointment was cancelled before long. Our new brigade commander was Lieutenant Colonel Nikolay Dvornikov, a highly-skilled parachutist, who had over 200 parachute jumps. He was an idol for me: I had over 50 jumps by then. I arrived at the brigade in the rank of captain, and I was appointed assistant chief of communication of the brigade. Chief of communication, a major, was a stupid person having no idea of our area of responsibility. He was concerned that I when I was promoted to the rank of major, this would jeopardize his position, and this conviction of his postponed my promotion to this rank. I wasn’t promoted to the rank of major until I was back in the Academy after the war. 

The 4th maneuver airborne landing brigade and the 6th brigade were merged to form the 10th guard airborne landing brigade. After it recaptured Krivoy Rog [370 km south-east of Kiev] was awarded the name of the Krivoy Rog Red Banner Airborne Landing Division, but then we were on the front-line in the north making efforts to recapture Staraya Russa [about 800 km east of Kiev]. Redia was ahead of us. We were fighting on the 12-km front line that was transferred to us by the previous division by an acceptance deed. There was a village in this area, and the deed indicated that it was liberated from Germans, but this was not true. Vasiliy Ivanov, commander of the division, issued an order: ‘Well, parachutist guys, seize this village!’ This happened on 4th May 1943. I remember this date well. A group of parachutists started on their way to the village at night. They also had mine engineers with them to remove mines to make passages to the village. They stabbed all Germans in their trenches at night. The Germans did not know what happened till their guys called their headquarters and heard cursing in Russian. The Germans sent a battalion to recapture the village, but our paratroopers already had additional forces sent to them. Our commander was the lieutenant colonel, deputy commander of the regiment. He was in one blindage and I was in another with my radio station. Our wounded troopers were taken to my blindage. I told them to stay calm since no cannon was going to hit our blindage. Why did I tell this? Because a gypsy fortune-teller had told me that my wife would kill me, and I was not even married yet. This called them down, and they only asked me to stay with them. I looked out of the blindage and saw a column of Germans moving toward us. They were coming slowly, but they were still moving in our direction. I tuned the radio station to a ‘Katyusha’ division [editor’s note: The 82mm BM-8 and 132mm BM-13 Katyusha rocket launchers were built and fielded by the Soviet Union in World War II. The launcher got this unofficial, but immediately recognized in the Red Army, name from the title of a Russian wartime song, Katyusha] and notified them that a German division was openly moving in my direction. The communication officer of this division recognized me and said: ‘We shall play a merry song now’. There were 32 units in the ‘Katyusha’ division and they all started firing. The German battalion was gone. The ‘Katyusha’ units made a fearful weapon. It was tested in 1942, when Germans wanted to capture Moscow. Well, anyway, I had to run to the division commander’s blindage to deliver the messages to him. At one moment a German sniper started shooting at me. I fell onto the ground thinking what I could do. I crawled about 15 meters aside across the dirt, before I stood up and ran. I managed to escape. There were long and hard fights near Staraya Russa, and we had to retreat incurring losses.  I lost many friends there. We almost lost the division. There were just few survivors.

The remains of our division relocated to Kharkov [450 km east of Kiev] for remanning. There were 7 echelon trains with 5 of them transporting cannons. After remanning and reequipment near Kharkov we were sent to cross the Dnieper River in October 1943. We started crossing the river on 8th October 1943. Our infantry went first followed by our landing division and parachutists, when our Army Commander ordered the parachutists to go first. There was an island on the Dnieper that we could use. The Germans used Ferdinand cannons [new German heavy self-propelled gun nicknamed ‘Ferdinand’ after it's creator, Ferdinand Porsche] with thick armor. My division commander sent me to the observation point on a hill. Our artillery people installed a 45-mm cannon to shoot at this Ferdinand cannon, but it didn’t work. The Ferdinand cannon fired back and destroyed our cannon. Its crew perished, and a splinter injured my head. My orderly pulled me to the crossing. I had a bandage applied on my injury and transported me to the left bank of the Dnieper on a raft. Our medical battalion was already there. The surgeon examined my wound and told Major Vasiliy Pokrovskiy, chief of the sanitary service of the division, that I had to be taken to a rear hospital. Pokrovskiy replied: ‘No hospitals! There are many captains in hospitals, but we have only one Grigoriy’. I could never forget this. I was taken to a house in Perevolochnaya village. I stayed in bed and medical nurses came to replace my bandages, give me medications and food. 10 days later Pokrovskiy said: ‘Enough of staying in bed’. I had another bandage replaced and was ordered to cross the river to the opposite bank. My fellow comrades joked that I had to cover the bandage or they might draw attention of Germans. After crossing the Dnieper we moved in the direction of Krivoy Rog. That was when I was awarded the first order. General Ivanov, commander of the division, declared that I deserved an Order of the Red Combat Banner 20 for being wounded, but staying in the formation. He sent the documents for review and meanwhile we relocated to another front line and I had no chance to receive the award. My commander unpinned his order of Red Banner [Order of the Red Star ] 21 and handed it to me. This was my first combatant order.

I always stood beside my division commander. We developed good relationships. In December 1943 we started preparations for our attack on Krivoy Rog. The division advanced, and the paratroopers, communications people and the headquarters stayed behind. A tank leader left his tank with us and went back to his unit. I asked him to show me how to start the tank. My division commander and I were alone, when German troops approached closer. I suggested that we drove the tank. I started the engine and we drove to Pervomayskoye near Krivoy Rog. There were Katyusha units on the bank of the Dnieper. The army commander was preparing for an attack. Germans feared Katyusha units a lot. They played an important role in the liberation of Krivoy Rog. The Katyusha units smashed Germans troops from their positions. We liberated Krivoy Rog by 23rd February 1944, the Soviet Army Day 22. My friend colonel Nikolay Dvornikov perished there. The infantry was deployed ahead of us. Landing troops were always behind on the front line. The 24th paratrooper regiment that was under command of Dvornikov, was behind an infantry regiment that consisted mainly of the Kazakh troopers, who did not understand a word in Russian. They were miserable fighters and ran away hearing the first shots. It was the same that time. Therefore, the 24th paratrooper regiment deployed in the echelon of our division at some distance from the front line did not expect this prompt advance of German troops and was encircled. Nikolay Dvornikov perished repulsing an attack. A street in Krivoy Rog was named after him. Later we resumed our position and seized the town, but the deceased ones were lost forever. Many things happened.... There were also communication problems. The division had to relocate about 15 km from our position. Our chief of communication ordered to install the line of communication. Why did we have to do this, when we were on the go? We had to save the cable. So, we were installing the cable, when we ran out of it. The regiments entered Pervomayskoye village, when the communication was lost. Then we received additional quantities of cable from American supplies: big rolls of 1.5-2 km cable lengths. My people were still behind. What was I to do to establish the communication? I went to the nearest hut where I discovered three guys. We knew there were young guys in all villages who were hiding from being regimented to the front line. When they saw me, they got scared that I might kill them, but I explained that I would do them no harm if they helped me to install the cable. They ran ahead installing the cable and I followed them with my gun. We established the communication promptly. My commander was greatly surprised that I managed it so well. I was awarded a II Grade Order of the Great Patriotic War 23 for my participation in the liberation of Krivoy Rog.

When Krivoy Rog was liberated, all parachutists who had experienced over 50 jumps were directed to relocate to Moscow for another formation of paratroopers. Our division was renamed into an infantry division after all parachutists left it. I had over 100 jumps and went to Moscow. I was appointed chief of communication of the 3rd Guard paratrooper brigade in Teykovo [200 km north-east of Moscow]. The brigade was based in a forest few km from the town. There was a field for training parachute jumps nearby. The jumps were performed from a gondola where 3 parachutists and one instructor could fit. A powerful winch was lifting and lowering the gondola. I was to take part in the training. I additionally received 100 rubles more for each training jump. Besides personal training, I also trained beginner parachutists. There were the first women parachutists involved in the training and they happened to have more courage than men. There were few girls in my paratrooper brigade and they never waited for being pushed to jump. On the contrary, they always asked the instructor to let them take the first jump, the so-called ‘zeroing in’, when an instructor fixed the spot where the first parachutist landed. It was different with the guys. I happened to have to push a parachutist. I also had to tie myself inside to not be pulled out by a parachutist. In early 1944 I and other paratroopers relocated to Bykhov [450 km south-west of Moscow] in Belarus where we were to form the 103rd paratrooper division. I was appointed chief of communication in the 3rd paratrooper brigade within this division. 

I kept in touch with my family through these years. In 1941, when I was a cadet of the Academy, I sent my parents a letter writing them to have no concerns about the war since we would defeat them in no time. Fortunately, my father, who had little education, happened to be smarter than me. He didn’t wait till our brave army would defeat the enemy. He harnessed the horses and my mother, my sister and my father headed to the east. He tried to convince his older sister Zelda to join them, but Zelda and her husband refused. They said they were too old to leave home. They were killed on 29th September 1941 in Babi Yar 24. My family arrived at a town on the bank of the Dnieper where the army expropriated their wagon and horses and they took a train to Uzbekistan. They arrived at and stayed in Margelan near Fergana. They returned home after the liberation of Kiev in 1944. My father’s brother Meishe, his wife Basia, their daughters Mara and Sophia also returned to Kiev from evacuation, they were in Central Asia. Meishe’s apartment was vacant, but some people had moved in my parents’ apartment. They refused to move out of it. My parents wrote me about it. I was in Bykhov. My commandment sent me and 10 soldiers to Kiev to help my parents and we also trained installation of long-distance communication. We came to our house and I demanded that the tenants moved out of my parents’ apartment. They refused and I ordered the soldiers to take their belongings outside. One of the tenants started threatening me and I explained that I was a paratrooper and they had better obey. I helped my parents to move back into our apartment. The previous tenants appealed to court, but it did not work. I returned to my unit. When the formation and training were over I went to the front line again. We cheered up. We were advancing smashing the German forces. There was the feeling of close victory. We were heading to Germany. Our division was involved in the liberation of Vienna. In early May 1945 we stopped in a small village near Vienna, unfortunately, I forgot its name. Our paratrooper forces were in the 2nd echelon. The village was lovely and we enjoyed the quietude and calmness. On 8th May 1945 we got together for a division meeting, when our division commissar came in and declared: ‘Guys, the war is over!’ We rushed outside and started shooting into the air. The commissar allowed us some time to express our cheers before he announced that the war was over for all, but for us. There was still action in process in Prague, Czechoslovakia. Stalin issued an order: ‘Tank brigades and paratrooper forces, go ahead to Czechoslovakia to rescue it from German forces’. We relocated there immediately. We separated, when we arrived in Czechoslovakia: one part moved in the direction of Prague, and we headed to Ceske Budejovice. We were merciless towards German troops. We exterminated all of them: taking captives was out of the question. The war was over for our division 24 km from Ceskе Budejovice. I was awarded another order of Red Banner for Vienna. I received my 4th order in 1965, to the 20th anniversary of the victory over Germany. I was invited to the military registry office and awarded an order of the Patriotic War Grade I.

I also corresponded with Maria Akimova. Maria came from a small village near Smolensk, I don’t remember its name. Her parents Pyotr Akimov and Aksinia gave birth to four children. Aria had to take care of her younger sisters and brother, being the oldest in the family. They perished during the Great Patriotic War. After finishing secondary school Maria went to her aunt in Leningrad. Maria was a siege survivor. We decided to get married after the war. I went to see her and we registered our marriage in a registry office. Of course, we had no wedding party considering the circumstances. I was allowed a few days’ leave to spend with my wife and then I returned to my division. My parents had nothing against my marriage with a non-Jewish woman. They thought that our love was what mattered.  

By the end of the war I was chief of communication of the 114th division where I was transferred from the position of the 103rd division battalion chief of communication. I did not face any anti-Semitism in the army. I don’t think there was any. I was treated with love and respect like other Jews in the army. I think that in extreme situations insignificant things move to the background, and personal values come into focus. 

After the war

I was going to resume my studies in the Academy. Before going to the front line we obtained certificates that we were cadets of the Academy and could return there after the war. However, our division General Vasiliy Ivanov received an order from Moscow: ‘Send Captain Grigoriy Kagan to the Moscow Air Force headquarters’. I had to obey this order. It turned out the Moscow Air Force headquarters worked on the formation of a hockey team. It was organized by Vsevolod Bobrov, a popular hockey player. I had met him in Tomsk where our Academy relocated from Leningrad. I was fond of playing hockey, when I studied in the Kharkov school. This was Russian hockey with a ball, with 11 team players, a field as big as a football field and a smaller gate. By the way, Russia, Norway, Sweden and Finland play Russian hockey that has been renamed to be called Bandy. The teams of these countries hold championships. I took part in hockey matches in Tomsk. Bobrov was a student of the military logistic school. He attended the games and remembered how I was playing. When Vasiliy, Stalin’s son, who was an Air Force pilot and chief, ordered to form an Air Force hockey team, Bobrov remembered me and sent a telegram to invite me. I stayed in Moscow and started training. I wouldn’t say I was happy about this turn in my life. My wife Maria lived with her aunt in Leningrad. I wanted to be with my wife and study in the Academy, but I could not reject this offer fearing Vasiliy Stalin. I was considering quitting the team and asked Bobrov to find and replacement for me. I only saw my life, when we toured to Leningrad. On 11th November 1946 our first son Oleg was born. I didn’t see my son before early December, when he was almost one month old and I arrived in Leningrad on another tour. Perhaps, Oleg brought me luck. Vsevolod Bobrov had birthday on 1st December and celebrated it on 5th December on the Stalin Constitution Day [on 5th December 1936 the second Constitution of the Soviet Union was adopted and it was commonly called the Stalin’s Constitution. It existed till 1977. Until 1991 this day was a Constitution Day, an official holiday in the USSR.] At that time all birthdays were dated for official holidays. Vasiliy Stalin, an Air Force general at the time, decided to arrange Bobrov’s birthday party in the hotel where he was staying. Vsevolod invited me to the party. After numerous toasts Vsevolod mentioned to Vasiliy Stalin that I wanted to continue my studies in the academy and that there was already my replacement found. Stalin ordered his adjutant to find General Lieutenant Muraviyov, Communication Forces, Chief of the Academy. It was about 2 o’clock in the morning. The adjutant called him at home and said that Stalin wanted to talk to him. Vasiliy picked the receiver and said that he was sitting in front of a captain who had left for the front line after finishing the first year in the Academy, but wanted to continue his study in the Academy now. Muraviyov told me to come to his office the following day. When I made my appearance Muraviyov asked me how I was going to study when the classes had begun 3 months before. I replied: ‘I’ll be an excellent student, don’t worry about it’. So I was admitted to the first course of the Communication faculty of the Academy. I kept my word: I had all excellent marks in all subjects in the Academy. I also received a room in the dormitory of the Academy where I could live with my wife and son. I graduated from the Academy with honors on 25th August 1950, and my Jewish surname was written in golden letters on the white marble board in the Academy. There was already strong anti-Semitism in the society. It grew stronger since 1948, the period of struggle against cosmopolitism [Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’] 25. However, I did not face it during my study in the Academy. Upon graduation I was promoted to the rank of major. I was appointed deputy chief of communication forces of the 25th Air Force army deployed in Leningrad. I went to the human resource department of the 25th army. Their HR manager was happy to see me and said I was expected. However, when he read my surname in my diploma, his expression changed and he said that regretfully he had forgotten that this position had already been assigned to someone else. After graduating the Academy with honors and having a job assignment I had no job while I had to provide for my wife and my 4-year old son. I could not find a job. The three of us had to live on 90 rubles per month. I received this allowance for my rank and this was the only income our family had. Of course, I understood this had to do with my Jewish identity: the other graduates of the Academy, who had worse marks than I, were appointed to higher positions and were duly promoted. The military career was closed for me. Some time later I was invited to Moscow where I got an offer to fill the position of a lecturer at a military school. I had a choice to teach electric engineering in Zhytomyr, and this position corresponded to my rank of major, or physical basics of radio equipment and location in anti-aircraft artillery school #3 in Aluksne town in Latvia, and this position corresponded to the rank of lieutenant colonel. I decided for Aluksne, thought Zhytomyr was near Kiev and I could visit my parents if I had decided to go there. 

My wife, my son and I moved to Aluksne. The Baltic Republics were annexed to the USSR in 1940 [Occupation of the Baltic Republics] 26. The Latvians considered it to be occupation of their country. They treated us as if we were occupants and they were right since we behaved like occupants. When I arrived I was offered to choose some accommodation. I looked around and decided for a small cozy cottage in the center of the town. The owner of the house was ordered to vacate one room for me and he did it obediently. He did not have the right to argue since he might have been arrested for disobedience otherwise. Such requirements were explained as needed by the state. However, the negative attitude of the locals showed itself in many ways. Shop assistants pretended they did not understand Russian, but if they were addressed in Latvian, they smiled in response and sold their goods. I spoke fluent Latvian within half a year and spoke it without an accent, though I did not know the grammar.

I was surprised that there was no anti-Semitism in Latvia. Perhaps, this was another demonstration of the negative attitude of Latvians toward everything that was Soviet. Stalin was an idol for us, but a barbarian and an aggressor for them. If Stalin and his alliances persecuted Jews, it meant that Jews were worth respecting. This was what Latvia thought about the ‘Doctors’ Plot’ 27. This persecution started in January 1953 and caused an outburst of anti-Semitism in the USSR. By the way, most lecturers in our school were Jewish. One of them had a rather ‘decent’ surname of Sorokin, but it didn’t do him well: the 5th line item [Item 5] 28 was what mattered. This period was very pleasant for me. I was also involved in the sports activities at my school. I was a football trainer and played hockey for my school. Both students and lecturers had a warm attitude toward me. I liked and enjoyed my job. However, I had to think about my career.

Stalin, the ‘father of all people’, as he was called, died in March 1953. Many people cried and grieved after him. I also felt the bitterness of this loss. My generation was growing up with the name of Stalin. We sincerely believed Stalin to be the ‘best friend of children’ and the ‘beloved chief of all people’ that the official propaganda called him. Even the people who had been affected by Stalin’s persecution could not believe that Stalin was connected to this. However, I cannot help mentioning here that when I heard Khrushchev’s 29 speech on the 20th Congress of the party in 1956 [Twentieth Party Congress] 30, I was very happy about it. I thought that if the party was brave and committed to the acknowledgement of mistakes and recognition that the Stalin’s regime was a criminal regime. I also believed that our life would improve significantly. I believed everything Khrushchev said at once and unconditionally. Everything Khrushchev said was a revelation for me. How mean Stalin was! He exterminated all those whom he believed to be more intelligent than he was. There were many such people. Nobody could say a word against Stalin. There was a wide network of his volunteer informers. They reported everything to NKVD 31. There were decision of ‘great’ Stalin, the ‘best friend of all children’ kept in the archives. In those documents he signed his execution verdict for over 40 thousand people, including children under 12. I think Stalin was worse than Hitler, at least with regards to his attitude toward Jews. Hitler did it openly while Stalin exterminated Jews on the quiet, covering himself with crackling phrases about the ‘revolutionary need’ and falsified trials.  Now it’s no secret that he had barracks for deported Jews installed in Siberia. There was a mass deportation prepared and this was not his first experience. He had deported the Crimean Tatars, Chechen and Ingushi people [Forced deportation to Siberia] 32 before. Jews were to follow into their steps and there were already trains for them prepared. Stalin died on the Jewish holiday of Purim. Could it be that his evil deeds overfilled the God’s cup of patience?

One way or another I benefited from Stalin’s death. Shortly afterward I was offered the post of communication chief in Moscow. It was a significant promotion for me. I finished the war in the rank of chief of division communication. A corps included 3 divisions. Of course, I gave my consent and did not even ask where this corps was located. Actually, this was the Northern Air Defense in Belomorsk, between Murmansk and Petrozavodsk, 6000 km from Moscow. This town was located on the bank of the last sluice on the Belomor-Baltic Channel. My wife, my son and I moved to where my job was. In 1957 my second son Igor was born in Arkhangelsk.

My predecessor did not work too hard, and I had to work hard to improve the communication system. What made my work much easier was that my former fellow students, who were not as good in his studies as I was, succeeded well having no 5th item. One of my former fellow students even became deputy chief of communication forces of the Ministry of Defense. My friend Mikhail Kapustin, whom I used to help with his studies on various subjects, was communication cable logistic manager in the Ministry. This helped me a lot in the future. I established convenient and extensive communication between the two radio engineering regiments of the corps (in Murmansk and Petrozavodsk) and two RE battalions at the command post. It was based on the cable lines of the Ministry of Communication that we rented. It also covered our neighbors and command posts of the Anti-Aircraft Defense forces of the country and the 22nd Air Force army in Petrozavodsk. Besides, I installed a powerful radio transmitting center in the reinforced concrete shelter that could not be destroyed even by a direct hit of a radio bomb. Actually, the anti-aircraft defense of the country included just radio engineering forces: two regiments and two battalions. This was another stupidity of the Supreme Commandment: 5 Air Force fighter divisions were not in our subordination. They belonged to the 22nd Air Force army that was under the command of the Air Force rather than the anti-aircraft defense. It was the same with the anti-aircraft artillery units equipped with 100-mm caliber guns and radio engineering facility navigation systems that belonged to the land forces. America proved this inefficiency of the anti-aircraft defense system. One day in summer 1955 a B-47 bomber took off from an US-controlled air field in Norway. It turned around insolently, and this is the only word I can find, over Petrozavodsk, the headquarters of the Northern Military district and the headquarters of the 22nd Air Force army, and flew over the Petrozavodsk-Murmansk railroad. Our anti-aircraft means reproduced this accurately on the command post of the 22nd Air Force army where General Serov was on duty. When our command point requested General Serov why he took no efforts having 5 Air Force fighter divisions available, he declared that we made up the story. So, this B-47 had no obstacles flying over our anti-aircraft means and landed on the Tule air field in Norway. Half hour later another B-47 flew the same route! And again General Serov responded to general Tabunchenko that the anti-aircraft defense was confused about something. The anti-aircraft defense in Moscow asked General Tabunchenko why we hesitated and took no efforts. The general replied that we were aware of what was happening, but we could not hit the plane by our radar set. We should have been grateful to the US commandment for this lesson! Some decisive and serious steps were undertaken. These 5 Air Force fighter regiments were assigned to the anti-aircraft defense agency. Our corps merged with the Arkhangelsk Belomorsk AACD Corps. Then the Severomorsk Corps deployed in Severomorsk north-east of Murmansk was subordinated to us. And finally the Northern and then the 10th separate AACD army covering the territory of the USSR from Vologda [town 350 km north of Moscow] to the Franz-Joseph land [islands in the Arctic Ocean] and from the Finnish border to the Ural were formed. And of course, restaffing took place. General Serov was outranked and resigned. The 22nd army commander was demoted. Commander of the Northern Military district was fired. His replacement was General Tabunchenko, Commander of our corps. His three subordinates, including me, followed him to Arkhangelsk. Despite my Jewish surname I was significantly promoted by being appointed commanding officer of the 34th communication regiment and then chief of the new AACD communication forces. However, before this happened, I had to do a lot of work bringing the communication system to order. The communication system in my 10th separate army spreading to the south, west and east: with the chief AACD command post in Moscow and the neighbors, the Leningrad and Novosibirsk AACD and units of our army in the south, were based on the communication lines that we rented from the Ministry of Communication and the radio communication system. The radio communication was the only way of communication with ‘Novaya Zemlia’ [New Land]. The main disadvantage of the radio communication in the Far North was the impact of winter ionospheric perturbations on short waves. The radio waves reflected from the ionosphere, and any ionospheric perturbations terminate the radio communication. One can imagine what might happen, when radio communication with the radio location companies on remote northern areas was affected. I requested General Maximenko, chief of the AACD communication forces to provide middle wave transmitters to us, but he refused. I understood that communication failures jeopardized the defense capability of our country, and I addressed this request to comrade Loginov, secretary of the Arkhangelsk regional party committee, who was also a member of the Central Committee of the USSR. Loginov listened to me carefully and understood me very well, even though he was not a specialist. He told me to write another request to the AACD Headquarters and show it to him before sending it out. As a result, a cipher message was received from the AACD Headquarters. It read: ‘Till when this slob, colonel Kagan shall be fooling busy people!’ I showed this message to Loginov. He picked the receiver of direct communication with Moscow and loudly explained to the AACD Commander what was going on. The commander ordered to send back the cipher and undertake investigation of this outrageous disgrace. Loginov told me to write a complaint to the Party Central Committee. I described the essence of this cause emphasizing that due to ionospheric perturbations we might fail to provide communication with the units. I also described what was needed to prevent this. A short time later I was invited to the Central Committee in Moscow. General Maximenko was removed from his position and expelled from the party. His replacement general Gavrilenko appointed my friend and former fellow student Vadim Chuyskiy from Kiev chief of the communication forces of the 1st AACD army in Moscow. He was the first of our peer graduates to be promoted to the rank of General for his involvement in the nuclear weapon training that took place near the Ural in 1954. This training covered 4 divisions, 40,000 soldiers and officers. An atomic bomb was dropped and then an order to attack was given.  The official report indicated exposure to fireballs and mechanic jolts, but no exposure to radiation.  These poor people were exposed to exceeding doses and died a short time later. Well, the first act of General Gavrilenko was provision of R-640 transmitters that are not affected by ionospheric perturbations. I supervised installation of these transmitters on the ‘Novaya Zemlia’ in many taiga settlements, in the AACD division headquarters and in the headquarters of the 11th regiment in Vorkuta. My commandment developed a very good opinion of me.

On 17 August 1958 I had my last, 163rd, parachute jump in Arkhangelsk. I was chief of the army communication department and a colonel. On the Aviation Day chief of paratroopers of the army suggested that the veterans did a group jump. At landing I hit my leg on the root of a tree, but didn’t notice it at once. I only felt pain about two hours later, when we were in the restaurant. I was taken to the hospital in Arkangelsk where they X-rayed my leg and applied the cast. This happened to be my last jump.

In 1963 I had to resign from the army due to my health condition. I lived a long time in the severe northern climate and it resulted in my foot artery congestion. The doctors said it might mean amputation of my foot. The doctor said that if I wanted to survive, I had to change the climatic conditions and my job. I resigned and decided to move to my parents in Kiev. By that time the relations between my wife and me were misbalanced. Maria took after her father Pyotr Akimov, who was an officer of the czarist army during WWI. She had a strong character and accepted no objections. She even tried to resolve our family disagreements by means of fights and scandals. I wanted to divorce her several times, but divorce was not appreciated in the army. Chief of the political department warned me that if I applied for divorce, I would be expelled from the party and demounted in my position at best. I divorced her immediately after I resigned. I left her everything we had in Arkhangelsk. I wanted to take my books with me, but Maria did not give them to me. My sons studied at school. They stayed with Maria. I left Arkhangelsk having just one small suitcase. I went to my parents in Kiev. I was 43 and had to start life anew. Probably to make my life easier ‘Destiny’ sent me another wife. My cousin Israel Gershtein, my aunt Olga’s son, introduced me to my second wife Asia German. Asia was about to marry Yakov Tsegliar, a composer, but when we met we understood instantly that we were to be together. I remember how Asia and I were preparing to visit my parents. We were both concerned about how they would meet us. My father had a character and had a negative attitude toward divorce. However, everything went very well. My parents liked Asia. We got married. We had a common wedding. Of course, a traditional Jewish wedding was out of the question: I was a member of the party and we were both atheists. We lived a happy life together. I moved into Asia’s one-bedroom apartment. Asia was a dentist. The doctors she knew saved my leg. I didn’t even need a surgery. I jogged in the morning until two years before, when I had to stop jogging in the morning. I jogged 7.5 km on weekdays and 10 km at weekends. I was a hockey and a box referee for many years. It was hard. I used to be referee at 3 hockey matches in a row: children at first, 3 15-minute periods, junior teams, 3 20-minute periods, and then adult games. I was on ice all this time. A referee has to be in the center of the field. Besides enjoying the sport, it also paid well and was a good addition to our family budget.

I started experiencing anti-Semitism immediately after I joined the civil life. It was hard for me to ignore it, though it did not refer to me directly. Those were anti-Semitic talks in transport means and in lines. One day something happened that I could never forget. In spring 1964 the Ukrainian Soccer federation authorized me to take command of the parade dedicated to the opening of a season on the Olympic Stadium in Kiev. This was a match between the Kiev and Moscow Dynamo. The teams lined up before the gate of the stadium. I was to lead them onto the field where they were to line up facing the main tribune and then I had to give them this direction: ‘Align! Attention! Eyes …’ and then I was to enunciate my words clearly: ‘Commander of Parade Colonel Kagan!’ When I was already at the head of the column, the master of ceremony approached me and told me to not say my surname! This as unequivocal: my Jewish surname was not to be said at the stadium! This made me angry, of course, but I knew that the parade commander should stay in line whatever the circumstances. I did not object. I don’t know whether I was right.

I went to work in the ‘Liftmontazh’ [elevator assembly] trust in 1964. I was chief mechanic. Shvetsov, chief of the trust, employed Jews willingly, particularly as key personnel. Jews are decent employees and do not drink. Unfortunately, drinking at work was quite common. It was not even persecuted. I didn’t like my job due to poor organization and lack of order. It depressed me, particularly considering that I was used to the order in the army. I was lucky again: my former fellow comrade Zakharov, who was a lieutenant in my regiment, became a supervisor in the ‘Gosradioproject’  [state radio project] design institute. We met incidentally and he offered me the position of a design group supervisor. Some time later I was offered the position of chief of department. I could not accept this position for financial restrictions considering that I was receiving a military pension already. I went to work as supervisor of a design group for fire safety automation and communication in another design institute. I wanted to retire in 1975, but my management convinced me to keep working. I finally retired in 1995. They occasionally invite me to work and I never refuse. My institute built a cooperative apartment building and I received a two-bedroom apartment in it. This is where I live now.

My younger sister Yulia finished the College of Economics after the war. She married Iosif Rabin, a Jewish guy. Iosif was born in Kiev and was my peer. When anti-Semitism developed, he changed one letter in his surname to make it sound Russian: Riabin. My sister named her first baby, born in 1947, Boris after mama’s brother Boris Braginskiy, executed in 1936. Her second son Mikhail was born in 1950. Our relative working as chief accountant at the factory of artistic glass helped Olga to get employed after finishing the college. Yulia worked as an accountant there till she retired. Yulia died in 1994. She was buried in the Berkovtsy town cemetery. The Lukianovska cemetery 33, the last Jewish cemetery in Kiev, was closed in the 1961. Iosif Riabin died in 2002 and was buried near Yulia’s grave. My parents were also buried in this cemetery. My father died in 1965 and my mother died in 1981. The funerals were not Jewish.

I kept in touch with my sons in Arkhangelsk. My older son Oleg wanted to enter the Aviation College in Tomsk, but he failed the exams. Oleg was rather upset. He arrived in Kiev. The situation was critical. If he did not enter a higher educational institution he was to be regimented to the army. I called my friend, the dean of Mechanical Faculty of the Arkhangelsk Forestry College. They admitted Oleg without exams. After finishing the college he worked as chief of the department of urban and rural young people in the regional Komsomol committee in Arkhangelsk. He went on frequent business trips. Oleg was married. His wife did not like it that Oleg was away from home a lot. She left Oleg and remarried. The regional committee declared they could not tolerate that Oleg had divorced. However, they helped him to get a job at the gas department of the town. He was a smart guy and it didn’t take long before he was promoted to chief of the department. Before getting married again Oleg asked me whether I agreed if he took his wife’s surname of Bykov. I knew he would have a more difficult life with the surname of Kagan. Oleg and his wife Vera have three children: daughters Oksana, born in 1971, Yulia, born in 1975, and son Grigoriy, born in 1977. By the way, I helped my grandson Grigoriy to move to Israel in 2001. He asked my permission to take my surname. There are two Grigoriy Kagans now: my grandson and I. He writes me letters addressing me: ’To Grigoriy Kagan from Grigoriy Kagan’. He works as a driver and prepares to the exams to confirm his qualification. 

I helped my younger son Igor to enter the Mechanic and Mathematic Faculty of Leningrad University. He finished his studies with honors and got a job assignment [Mandatory job assignment in the USSR] 34 to be a lecturer on mathematic in a college in Arkhangelsk. However, Igor decided for something different. He called me to discuss something. He had a job offer from a militia office and this was a chance for him to stay and work in Leningrad. I wasn’t quite happy about it, but this was his life and he was the one to take decisions. He accepted this job offer and became a militiaman. He was promoted soon, got an apartment and remarried. My both sons married non-Jewish women and both changed their surname. Igor adopted his mother’s last name. He is Akimov. Igor and Ludmila have three children:  daughters Anna, born in 1981, Daria, born in 1988, and my favorite Luka, born in 1994. Igor was promoted to captain. During Perestroika 35 he quit the militia and went to work to a realty company. Later he established his own firm. His company is doing well. My sons visit me in Kiev on vacations and I visit them.

I, my friends and my family, besides our professional holiday which was the Air Force Day, celebrated Soviet holidays: 1st May, 7th November [October Revolution Day] 36, Soviet Army Day, Victory Day 37. Traditionally on this day officers got together in the division headquarters to go to a restaurant. We celebrated these holidays at work and at home. We also celebrated New Year and family members’ birthdays. We had guests and enjoyed the celebrations.

When mass departure of Jews to Israel started in the 1970s, I sympathized and supported them.  They wanted a decent life and wanted their children and grandchildren to be decent people and never hear the word ‘zhyd’ addressed to them. I did not consider departure, but this was my choice. I had a job, my sport and my apartment and I had everything I needed. My sons are here and I want to be with them. However, I believed that everybody had the right to make his own choice and nobody could force them to stay in the USSR, or call them traitors, if they chose to live in another country. Many of my friends and relatives have moved to Israel. I corresponded with them. We could not even dream that there would be a time, when our people could travel abroad and invite their friends and relatives to visit them. Perestroika brought this time. However, I did not consider Gorbachev 38, the leader of the Communist Party, to be a serious politician at first. He gave many promises, but there were few actions, but he managed to accomplish some things. Gorbachev removed the ‘Iron Curtain’ 39, which separated us from the rest of the world for many years. He allowed the freedom of speech and the freedom of press. This is true. But it is also true that the poor and unemployed appeared during his rule. Pensioners could not live on their devaluating pensions. The breakup of the USSR [1991], which crowned the Perestroika, was painful for me. The USSR was a strong and powerful state. What do we have instead? We could save the USSR, had we refused from the leading role of the CPSU and socialist ideas. May capitalism have replaced socialism. May the Baltic Republics have separated: they had been forcefully annexed to the USSR and were occupied and they never accepted this, but all other republics may have stayed with the USSR. We would have been strong together.

In 1989 my dearest wife Asia died. The diagnosis ‘cancer’ had been given to her shortly before her death. We lived together for over 20 years and I was always grateful to my destiny for having sent Asia to me. Asia’s sister Zoya had also lost her husband and we got married, but we lived together less than a year. Zoya obtained permission to move to the USA, but I did not want to go: everything I cherished was here. Zoya left. I suffered from being alone. My sons and grandchildren lived in different towns, and my friends, however numerous, cannot replace my family for me. I met my future wife Ludmila Slovskaya visiting my friends in 1994. Ludmila was born in Kiev in 1930. When we met, she was a widow. Her first husband Konstantin Slovskiy, a Jew, had died few years before we met. He was a wonderful person, and when we got married in 1996, Ludmila kept his surname. I had no objections. We have been together for 8 years. Ludmila worked as chief of the design group in the Institute of Electric Welding. I insisted that she quit her job. We are no longer young and we cannot afford wasting the time that we can spend together. My sons and grandchildren accepted Ludmila. They love her well. She is a wonderful person and one cannot help liking her. We are always together and what is interesting for one is significant and important for another one. 

The break up of the USSR terminated my membership in the CPSU.  I did not join the Communist Party of Ukraine. I started going to the synagogue. At first I just wanted to recall my childhood, when my father took me to the synagogue with him, but now it has become a necessity for me. I go to the synagogue every Saturday. On my relatives’ death anniversaries I recite the Kaddish for them.  

A number of Jewish societies were established during the Perestroika. There is also Jewish press.  The Jewish life is gradually developing in independent Ukraine. We have gatherings in the association of Jewish veterans twice a month. We know each other well. I also work in the section of Jewish veterans of sports at the Jewish cultural center. I am deputy chairman of this section. Our chairman is a former Olympic champion in fencing. On 24th September 2004 we celebrated the 82nd birthday of Ludmila Yakir-Kogan, the 6-time chess champion and 10-time finalist of Ukraine.

There is another Jewish organization in Ukraine, and that is the Hesed 40. I think, it is a very important organization for us. Many Jews would not survive, if it hadn’t been for the Hesed’s assistance. It’s no secret that pensioners are below any poverty lines. Hesed is also involved in another important activity, and that is, attachment of Jews to traditions, to the religion and giving back our spirituality, lost during the Soviet rule. 

Glossary:

Alexander Tsvey
Russia
Моscow
Interviewer: Svetlana Bogdanova
Date of the Interview: November 2004

Alexander Tsvey is a tall and slender, good-looking man with vivacious young eyes. He lives by himself in a 2-room apartment of a five-storied house, built in early 1970s on the outskirt of Moscow. The way the apartment looks, I can say that the lady’s presence is not felt here. There are a lot of books- a good collection of verses and military memoirs. There are a lot of pictures on the walls, namely of his mother, children, grandchildren and his deceased wife.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My paternal great grandfather Moses Tsvey lived in the town Sebezh, Pskov oblast not far from Latvian border [about 500 km to the west from Moscow]. I do not know when and where he was born. Moses was a jeweler, making bronze and copper ware. He also worked as a watch mender. He was an educated and well-read man, which was a rarity among Jewish craftsmen. Moses was a peculiar man. He was a vegetarian, which was not common with Jews. His family did not stick to vegetarianism and great grandfather let everybody choose their own way. Besides, great grandfather was a free thinker criticizing certain dogmas of Judaic religion. He did not recognize some of the rites. I do not know what exactly he disapproved of, but I know that he did not cover his head and smoked on Sabbath to boot. They wanted to excommunicate him from the synagogue for that. Back in that time it was a rigid punishment. They took into account his literacy and his large family and he was not excommunicated, fortunately. Great grandfather remained living the way he was used to.

I was interested in the origin of the last name Tsvey [the similarly pronounced ‘zwei’ means ‘two’ in Yiddish]. I asked grandfather about it. Then, I had an idea that it was a distorted version of the ancient Jewish name Tsvi. Name or a surname Tsvi is widely spread in Israel. I think the clerk misheard the name and put Tsvey instead of Tsvi.

My paternal grandfather Moishe Tsvey and grandmother Basya-Riva Tsvey (nee Mostova) lived in the town of Volyntsy [800 km to the west from Moscow] Gomel oblast, Belorussia. My paternal great grandfather Berl Mostov also lived in the town Volyntsy. I do not know when and where he was born. He was an elderly tall man. He was well respected in the town. My father took after him, and I after my father, but my mother and all her kin were of short height. Great grandfather Berl was a merchant. The Mostovs family was one of the three richest families in the town. Great grandfather Berl died in 1919. I do not know how many children were there in the Mostovs family. My grandmother Basya-Riva was born in 1883.

Grandmother was a stately and beautiful woman. My grandfather fell in love with her and wooed her. There is a family legend - grandmother told grandpa: «Prove that you love me!» and he took off valenki [warm Russian felt boots] in wintertime and had been running around on the snow until grandmother agreed to marry him. Of course, grandmother was the boss in the family.

My father was the first–born. Grandmother gave birth to him in 1902. I know only his Russian name [Common name] 1 Yuri. He must have had a Jewish name, but I did not know it. Mother had escaped to talk about father. He was a grey-eyed, tall and good-looking man. He played mandolin very well. The Tsvey family was musical on the whole. Unfortunately there is little I know my father’s siblings. Now the family is gone, and there is nobody I can ask questions. I remember father’s brothers Abram, Israel, Solomon, Efim and sister Sofia.

The family Tsvey was well-off. They dealt with leather - beginning from the tannery, making leatherwear and selling it. Grandfather had his own store. Children also were involved in work. They bought skin of the animals and tanned it. Being the eldest my father did most of the work. He tanned the skin manually by using hazardous chemical agents, staying by the tub with the solution for tanning. He must have undermined his health during work and was afflicted with tuberculosis, which caused his death, also during his work. After revolution as of 1917 [Russian Revolution of 1917] 2 authorities took production from grandfather and the family was bereft of the source of income.

My father’s siblings were married and had children. Unfortunately, I do not remember anybody but the youngest brother, Solomon. I was bonded with him. Uncle had been taking care of me all his life. Solomon was born in 1912. He used to say that he had chosen his profession because of me. He was present during my mother’s parturition. It was dark and Solomon held a candle while mother was giving birth. Parturition was hard and Solomon decided to become an obstetrician to help suffering women. He became a brilliant gynecologist. He devoted his life to work and remained single. The person who helped to bring hundreds of babies in the world, did not have his own children. Solomon died in Saint-Petersburg in 2000. The only thing I can say about other father’s brothers is that Abram was drafted in the army and was killed in action during the first days of World War II [Great Patriotic War] 3.

My mother’s family lived in a Jewish town Drissa [now Verkhnedvinsk, Belarus, about 220 km from Minsk]. Mother’s father Israel Perlov was the most revered man in the Jewish community of the town. I do not know what he did for a living. I did not know my maternal grandmother, not even her first name. Her maiden name was Novik. Grandparents had four children. Haim was the eldest (in Russian Efim), born in 1900. In 1902 my mother Tsilya Perlovа was born. Her Russian name was Sima. After my mother two sons were born: in 1904 Fayvel or Fyodor in Russian and 1907 the youngest Joseph was born, in his family called Russian name Iosif. Grandmother died when she was giving birth to Joseph. Of course, it was hard for the widowed grandfather to take care of four small children. When the mourning period was over, he was married to the widow with a child. In 1916 their common child, Mikhail, was born. In 1918 grandfather died. Mother remained a full orphan at the age of 16. She did not even manage to finish secondary school.

Grandfather’s brother Moses Perlov also lived in the town with his wife Dobe-Liba (Dora) and their children – mother’s cousins Efim, Abram, Solomon and Simon. Almost all of them perished in the front in 1940s and after World War II we did not keep in touch with their family. I only knew one of grandmother’s brothers out of all Novik’s kin. I do not remember his name. Mother kept in touch with his children all life long. The Noviks lived in Moscow, on Arbat [street, from the second half of the 18th century it became Moscow's most aristocratic and literary neighborhood and home to the city's intelligentsia]. It was the most intelligent branch of the family. Оne Novik became the rector of the institute and the other deputy of the regional prosecutor,.

I do not know how my parents met. It was a love wedlock. They had a traditional Jewish wedding. After wedding mother moved to father’s house. They lived with his parents. Grandmother used to boss around in the family and had quite a difficult authoritarian character. Mother-in-law was hard on my mom and blamed her in everything. Mother was an orphan and her brothers were far away and there was nobody to stand up for her. Besides, nobody told my mother about father’s disease- open form of tuberculosis. Father’s kin was aware of it and they found it unnecessary to inform mother of it.

Growing up

I was born in 1925 in the town Volyntsy. I was named Israel after my deceased maternal great grandfather. I do not know what was the reason of the tiff between my parents. All I know is that they separated in 1927.

Mother’s elder brother Efim finished vocational school and acquired a profession of an accountant in his native town. Then he left for Moscow. He must have insisted that mother also moved with him to Moscow. Efim did not have his place at that time, so he rented a room in house where common people lived. They were really indigent. We had a passage room. An artist named Zhukovskaya lived in the next room. Every morning she passed through our room and walked to the toilet to pour out her night pot. There was hardly any furniture in our room- 2 chairs, a table, mother’s bed and my cot. We had nothing to live on, so mother found a job аt sugar mill as a packager. I did not have a baby-sitter, so I went to work with mother. I was in the workshop observing the assembly line with sugar bales. In spite of the fact that mother was lonely and worked hard, she remained brisk and cheerful. Her life was extremely difficult, but I never remember her being despondent. In general, all Perlovs, including my mother were very energetic and vivacious.

Efim was involved in commerce in Moscow and was promoted rather swiftly. He was assigned deputy chairman of the all-union procurement organization Tsentrosoyuz, which bought out and sold production manufactured by different small-scale companies. Efim had a personal car, which was rare back in that time. He was assigned to the same post after World War II as well. Efim was married. His wife’s name was Roza. They had two children - daughter Lina and son Mikhail. When Uncle Efim became a dignitary, he was literally made to join the party. He also talked his younger brothers Fyodor and Joseph into moving to Moscow. Efim took good care of them as they were poor orphans. Brother welcomed soviet regime and became its active sticklers. Joseph was an active Komsomol 4 member. He married a Jewish girl Sara, also Komsomol member. Joseph was a passionate orator, devoted to the ideas of the party and revolution. He was a political go-getter. In 1934 he became the secretary of the party committee of one of the largest plants in Moscow (I do not remember which one). Then he was assigned the secretary of the regional party committee and then later on the secretary of Kursk [about 450 km to the south from Moscow] municipal party committee. Joseph did very well before the outbreak of repressions [Great Terror] 5. Then in 1938 there was a brief article in the paper «The Secretary of Kursk municipal party committee is mistaken», wherein Joseph was unfairly castigated. He went to Moscow to seek truth and did not come back. He was arrested and in 1938 shot without trial. We found about it only in the 1960s when we got his rehabilitation certificate [Rehabilitation in the Soviet Union] 6, but back in 1937 mother had been staying by walls of NKVD 7 days and nights and still did not manage to find anything about the brother. They even did not let her give him a parcel with the rusks and tobacco. I had never met a more decent and honest man than my uncle Joseph. Two of Joseph’s children survived- sons Vladimir and Stanislav. Vladimir now lives in Israel. I correspond with him. Stanislav immigrated to the USA in the 1990s.

Uncle Fyodor was a frontier man by the Ministry of Internal Affairs. He was promoted to the rank of a major no matter that his brother was repressed. It was Stalin’s politics- imprison one and persecute – another. Fyodor was married to a Russian, Klavdia. They had 6 children. Unfortunately, I do not remember their names. All of them became worthy people. Now they live in different Russian cities. Their stepbrother Mikhail graduated from Moscow Construction institute, then worked as a chief engineer for a construction company in Barnaul (Altaskiy Kray, Russia, 3000 km from Moscow). Mikhail was married to a Jewish girl, whose name I forgot. They did not have children. He died from blood cancer in the 1950s at a rather young age.

My father died from lung tuberculosis in 1927. He was buried in Volyntsy. I do not know where his grave is. Mother did not tell me hardly anything about father. Even Uncle Solomon did not tell me all about him. Grandfather commemorated the day of father’s death till the end of his days. He always went to the synagogue on that day and read kaddish for his son, who died earlier than he. Candles were lit at home on that day. Father’s kin probably felt guilty and tried to help mother the best they could. Grandfather’s family had been taking care of me, especially uncle Solomon.

In late 1920s father’s parents and brothers moved to Leningrad with families. Grandmother died in 1940. She was buried in Leningrad Jewish cemetery in accordance with the Jewish rite. Grandfather got married for the second time. She was also a Jew. Grandfather remained religious till death. It is difficult for me to judge his religiousness, but I know that he strictly observed Jewish traditions, observed kashrut. Grandfather died in 1966 in Leningrad having survived the siege [Blockade of Leningrad] 8. He was buried next to grandmother in accordance with the Jewish rite, the way he wished.

Mother coped with her work and took an active part in social life. She was noticed and then promoted to the post of deputy the regional council [regional administration], though she was not the member of the party. Then mother was hired by the plant as a time-keeper. Again her skills did not remain unnoticed. She was assigned as an instructor to the children’s board by BTsIK [Bsesoyuzny Tsentralny Ispolitelny Komitet, All-Union Central Executive Committee]. Mother was a young, single and beautiful woman. Of course, she drew attention. Her director asked to accompany him to different events. She was twice at the jubilee of Kalinin 9. Mother said that Kalinin was still a ladies’ man despite of his elderly age.

Mother did not work in the children’s board for a long time. She had been on the trips all over the country, supervising orphanages and organizing work. I stayed at home with a nanny. Those were the times of hunger. There was a dreadful starvation in Ukraine [Famine in Ukraine] 10, there was hunger in Moscow as well. We were famished. A lump of sugar was a rare dainty for me. Couple of times mother got the cards [Card system] 11 for the canteen for the privileged workers. We had a lavish meal there. I remember when I was in the metro in 1935, I saw a man eating a candy. My eyes looked so hungry and wretched that mother promised to buy me a candy. On Sundays we went for lunch to our relatives, usually to uncle Efim, mother’s eldest brother. He was more well-off than others. It was an event for me. At home I ate ‘black’ [black, rotten] frozen potatoes - it was not the name of the dish, but the color it looked like, and aunt treated me with potatoes fried in sour cream. It seemed the acme of richness to me. In summer mother took me to the dacha [summer house] of her acquaintances. When I was 6, she managed to send me to the children’s spa in Crimea. I was afflicted with lung disease because of constant malnutrition. Mother was very worried. She sent me to winter and summer sanatoriums in the forest. Life was hard on mother and I. She often said that she was mother and father for me. Mother left father when she was 25 and she never got married again. She feared that my step father would not treat me the way she would like to. She adored me and I doted on her as well. In 1938 children’s board terminated its work and mother went to work in city park, one of the recreation and entertainment parks of the city, as a director.

Mother and her brothers were totally unreligious. They were bereft of parents rather early and there was nobody to teach them traditions and religion. Mother knew some words in Yiddish. When I was little she sang me some Yiddish songs. I also remember Jewish aphorisms. Mother spoke Russian with her brothers. They considered Russian to be the language of all peoples in USSR. I was raised Russian and did not think of religion at all.

I went to school, when I turned 8. I had studied in Russian school, not far from our house for the first 3 years. Then the house, where we lived, was demolished and we were given a room in a communal apartment 12 in a different district of Moscow. My former school was far from our house and I was transferred to another school. I made new friends there. A Russian boy Volodya Belin was my chum. I was a good student. Mother kept on telling me if I wanted to achieve anything in my life I should study well. I preferred sciences at school and mathematics was my favorite subject. When I was in the 7th grade I was the only student from school who was sent to the town Olympiad in mathematics and I took a prize. I did not feel Anti-Semitism at school. Both teachers and my peer treated me very well. At that time nationality was of no importance. I even did not know whether there any other Jews in my class. I did not feel any inferiority complexes because of my nationality. I did not feel myself harmed of lower-class. I was confident. I was a pioneer 13 and Komsomol member. My mother and I were very poor at that time. When I was in the 7th grade there was a party at school and I did not have anything dressy. All my pants were patched and short. I wore them everyday, but I wanted to dress up on the holiday. I went to uncle Fyodor and he gave me his pants. Uncle was of short height and his pants were ankle length to me. I lowered the belt and wore them on the party. 

I was named Israel at birth. My tender name was Izya. I did not like it. I came to liking the name Sasha a lot, a short name from Alexander when I heard a popular romance song: «Sasha, do you remember our dates in the maritime park…». When I was in the pioneer camp at the age of 15, I was asked what my name was and I said at once: «Sasha!». Thus, since that time I had 2 names- one passport name and another name was used my friends, colleges and kin. Officially I did not change my name. I did not want people to think that I changed my name to conceal my nationality. I was not going to do that. Jewish people have double name, so have I - Alexander Israel.

Our family was not touched by repressions after death of uncle Joseph. Before leaving for Moscow he wrote letter to Stalin asking to look into the issue and exonerate his honest name. I wrote all his letters. Joseph wrote that he was a loyal son of the party and we knew that it was true. All of us were aware that it was unjust but he could not have thought that Stalin had something to do with that. We thought that all those things were done behind his back and believed that Stalin would look into the issue and punish the guilty. We did not associate Stalin with the assassination of Kirov 14, loved by all people. We were shocked by it as well as by the wave of new repressions. We merely cursed the enemies of the Soviet regime [enemy of the people] 15.

I often read in memoirs of different people that World War II was unexpected. It is not true, everybody understood that we would not escape war, besides soviet propaganda had been disseminating that thought starting from junior school age. Since childhood we were taught that our invincible army would crash any enemy and if a а guile enemy attacked our country, the war would be over very soon on his territory. Schoolchildren were taught at civil defense class how to shoot, use personal protective equipment, render assistance to the suffering and wounded. We were raised with patriotic movies, faming our country and army. When in Germany fascists came to power, soviet regime condemned them. Anti-fascist movies were demonstrated in our cinemas, namely «Professor Mamlock» 16, «The Oppenheim Family» [‘Semya Opengeym’ 1939, feature film about a tragic fate of a Jewish family in the Nazi Germany. Producer: Grigoriy Roshal. Story based on Lion Feuchtwanger’s Die Openhemern]. Then Molotov-Ribbentrop non-aggression agreement was signed [Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact] 17, and anti-fascist campaign was put to end. There were no more anti-fascist movies and propaganda. Of course, many people were bewildered.

During the war

In middle June 1941 I went to the pioneer camp in the vicinity of Mozhaisk [about 100 km to the west from Moscow]. It was a common summer recreation area, I could not have dreamt of anything more. I was 16 , with the height of about 180 cm. I took an active part in all camp events. Shortly after my arrival in the camp I had sharp abdominal pain and fever during volleyball game. I was isolated and I did not feel any better. They called Ambulance. They said I had an acute appendicitis. I was taken to hospital, straight on the operation table. It happened on 22 June 1941 when World War II was unleashed. When I was on the operation table, Germans had already started bombing Moscow. The nurses took us to the air-raid shelter. In a month I was discharged from the hospital, but my wound still did not heal up. School did not start on the 1st of September in accordance with the schedule. Moscow looked different, camouflaged. At times I went to the downtown area, which looked strange. There were trees on the roof of Bolshoy Theatre 18. Moscow river was masked as a high-way with the floating so-called roofs. We got used to the raids of Germans and calmly went down to the basement of our house.

In middle October 1941 there was a rumor that Germans approached Moscow. The city was panic-stricken. Thousands people moved towords East - in cars, on foot, trying to find a sconce from Germans. On the 16th of October 1941 mother’s brother Efim came to pick us up. His family and the family of his driver were in the wagon with precious things. Mother and I tried to squeeze in some clothes in the car, linen and a bag with rusks and headed out. There was no room in the wagon and we had to sit with our legs pressed to the bellies. Accidentally we met mother’s junior brother Fyodor in the street. His family was evacuated a long time ago and he joined us. Now we were packed like the tin of sardines. In the evening we came to Gorkiy [about 400 km to the East from Moscow]. We spent night in a school gym. Of course, we had to sleep on the floor. We had stayed there for 2 days and then went to Kazan [about 800 km to the east from Moscow] by ship. Again we had to sleep on the floor behind the ladder to the engine room. The only thing I remembered in Kazan was delicious buckwheat porridge with meat [grechnievaya kasha]. Fyodor got the cards for the canteen, where we tasted that porridge. There he went to the drafting point and we and Efim’s family took a train and went to Alma-Ata [about 3200 km to the east from Moscow]. Mother did not find a job there and we had to go to her cousin, Alla Perlova, to a hamlet Shakhtstroy in Kazakhstan [about 2000 km to the east from Moscow]. It was a God-forsaken place - just mines and coal dust. Mother was a businesslike woman with good organizational skills. She became the chairman of Russian Red Cross Community [in Shakhtstroy]. We lived in the common barrack, but we were not desponded by the tightness. We escaped danger and it was the most important. I went to the 9th grade of the local school there in Shakhtstroy.

In December 1942 I was drafted in the army. I was in the 10th grade and had not turned 18 yet. I and some of my classmates were sent to Ufa [Bashkyrya, about 1200 km to the east from Moscow] infantry school, to the mortar gun battalion. At school I was issued a certificate that I finished the first half year with straight excellent marks. Mother sturdily got over the coming separation. There were no tears nor wailing.

Our train came to Ufa on the 12th of January 1943. The school was in the city center. The auditoriums and barracks with double-tiered bunks were in the 3-storied premises. Upon arrival we went to the bathhouse. We were given uniforms, solder’s boots; we were taught how to put foot wraps on. Then we were shown our bunks. I was to sleep on the upper bunk. We started school immediately. March drilling, crawling, studies on mortar guns and infantry military statute. We hardly had any leisure time. We got up at 6 and went to bed at 23. We had one hour of rest after lunch. Even on Sunday we had to do something- clean the territory or ski etc. When we ran out of food brought from home, we were starving even thought the cadet’s ration was not bad for that time: 800 grams of bread, 50 grams of butter, 65 grams of sugars, but the feeling of constant hunger was caused by a significant physical loading. I was perseverant in military studies. I took a keen interest in gun studies, taught by senior lieutenant Nazarov. He was an intelligent red-haired man of medium height, aged about thirty. Nazarov did not conceal his emotions when cadets did not solve or understand the task. Once he loudly made a remark on my success: "Look... Tsvey –well done and as for the rest – vice versa!" The guys kept on teasing me calling me “Well done". Later on Nazarov wrote me warm words in his letter to the front, then we did not keep in touch.

Then we had classes on shooting-range. I was an excellent marksman. In June mother came to Ufa for couple of days. I was so happy to spend those days with my mother. The commander gave me leave for couple of days. In late June the load was even harder on the soldiers. In the mourning we were awaken by alarm. In the afternoon we were supposed to run with gas-masks. How could I have stood that and found stamina?! I think my energy was coming from the thirst for knowledge nurtured by mother. Not all cadets were able to overcome the difficulties in the studies. I noticed the gloomy looks and retarded walk of some soldiers. They hardly spoke and remained introverted. Maybe those guys were thinking of the coming battles and the consequences? Most often guys like that were expelled from school at the rank of sergeant and sent in the lines.

Meanwhile mother returned in Moscow and stayed with her junior brother Fyodor as our room was taken by the family of a front-line soldier, whose house was demolished during bombing. The family illegitimately took my mother’s room. Court proceedings took over a year and finally her room was returned. At that time mother worked as a director of the production and studies workshops. Apart from Fyodor and mother there were 7 people in one room. Mother came home only to spend a night. She wrote me about her wandering. I worried about her and tried to cheer her up, assuring her that every cloud had a silver linen.

There was a graduation party at school. After the concert we were supposed to dance with the ladies invited from medical school. I was in high spirits. We had been just given officer’s uniform, all new: boots, waist belt, shoulder straps. It looked nice. Another reason for me to feel happy was that I was among the 10 of the top students, who graduated with excellent marks. By the order from the ministry of defense we were conferred lieutenant rank in advance. I had to recite the poems on stage. Suddenly one of the commanders rushed in the room. "Go take your documents! Have dinner! Today we are leaving to the front". There was a perturbation and hassle caused by certain phrase we heard. There was no festive mood any more. Meanwhile the club was filled with actors and audience: newly arrived cadets, officers and invited girls. When draftees gathered in the yard, the anchorman announced: «And now junior lieutenant Tsvey appears on stage, leaving to the front today». I recited verses with the inner anxiety without seeing the audience in the hall. I said good-bye to the school, commanders and teachers. I believed that things would turn well. When I was leaving the club with my things I heard the applause addressed to me. I joined the lines and heard the order: «Quick march!». The 11th February 1944 was coming to an end...

I was lucky: I was in the lines when our troops were attacking in – Byelorussia, Poland, and Eastern Prussia [Germany]. I did not feel bitter disappointment when during the first days of war our army was being constantly defeated. But still dreadful and fierce war was ahead of us- 452 days before the victory.

We went to the Byelorussia with the comfort in a sanitary car. Finally we went through all authorities in the headquarters and I arrived at 40th Amur rifle regiment # 102 of Far Eastern division of 48 Army. The division was formed on the Far East, and was named accordingly. In afternoon 19th of March I reported commanders of mortar gun squad on our arrival. I was lucky that our squad was just out of battle and positioned six kilometers away from the leading edge. The closest residential area was a village of Yashitsy [This village does not exist today. It might have merged with a bigger town or may have disappeared for some other reason.]. To the north from it is the town of Zhlobin [Belarus, about 500 km to the west from Moscow]. There in couple of months after fierce battle Germans stopped their assault. We knew about it at school and said as if having a premonition: «When we come to Zhlobin, we crack that nut». That was the way it happened ... Commander of mortar gun squad asked whether I was lieutenant Tsvey. It seemed to me that he was surprised. When I confirmed that I was Tsvey he jovially said: «Well, we’ll see how Jews will fight».

The regiment settled in the place. Next day I received a platoon. In couple of days something happened that I would never forget in my life. A soldier was shot in front of the regiment aligned in a hollow square. I even did not understand the reason. Either he deserted or he was a traitor. I still remember that nervous tremor. Military prosecutor read the verdict and shot the kneeling soldier in the occiput. I also was shocked that the soldier did not say anything before death. We had been looking silently on that terrible procedure and then we had no discussion on that.

So, I became a platoon commander. There were two large mortar guns in our platoon, each served 5-6 people. Three carried the parts of the gun: mortar barrel, gun-carriage base plate, the rest carried mines. Besides, there were aide of the commander and an orderly. The total number of people were 12 in platoon, excluding commander. Most of the soldiers were aged 19-20, two or three of them were older than that. All of them were battle-seasoned and had awards. I still remember my front-line comrades.

I think that sergeant-major Volodin became the dearest man for me on the front.  Unfortunately I do not remember his name. «Sergeant-major Volodin», he was called that way. We usually called each other by last name and rank. He was very kind and benevolent. He looked like Mordvinian. He spoke Russian with an accent. I felt his care from the first days, though we did not get in touch that often nor were we bosom friends. It was hard for me to abide by the grief over his death. On the 15th of April 1944 we moved to the leading edge. The gun-soldiers were 800 meters away from the infantry trenches. Firing points were dug in the forest, 4 rollings were made, disguises, shots.  Of course, the adversary noticed our positions and sometimes was shooting at us. We systematically were moving to the leading edge, the infantry, to be on duty, and supported night reconnaissance operations. We thought that Germans would attack and we would be resisting their assault. May just fled. From the events of that day I remembered the return of sergeant Prikhodko. Before that he was spoken about in the regiment. Prikhodko was distinguished in one of the battles by performing a feat. I saw a short, freckled modest man who did not look heroic at all. Prikhodko was awarded with the Red Banner 19, though he was listed for the title of the Hero of the Soviet Union 20. There were rumors that ‘the misconception’ was caused by one of the regiment clerks. At any rate, our commander expressed his indignation. Soon during the inspection of the regiment, carried out by general-major, the commander of our corps publicly raised the issue on the ‘mishap’. As people are not awarded for one and the same feat twice, the verdict of the general was concise and simple: "Include in the list for the conferment of the title Hero". Everybody found out about it...

It seems to me that on the 10th of June 1944 our division took off and headed on a trip for many days. Where? What for? Nobody knew. Having walked for over a hundred km we reached the destination point on the 17th of June, which was called the town of Rogachev [about 450 km to the west from Moscow]. Of course, we could not have assumed that we had to take park in one of the most large-scale operation of our troops, called Bagration. In the book written by marshal G. Zhukov 21 «Memoirs and Recollections» [«Vospamynyanya I razmyslenya», Moscow, 1968]: «...The task of the 1st Byelorussian front was to crash Zhlobin-Bobruisk grouping. The key cities plus river Dnepr, Drut, Beresina, Svisloch and a number of shallow boggy rivers and streams were the base of the echeloned defense of the adversary, which covered the main Western Warsaw-Berlin strategic direction.»

In spite of that the fact that headquarters focused significant forces to exterminate the ‘Center’ we still believed that for the operation to be successful it was necessary for the troops participating in Bagration to get ready thoroughly. There were trenches, dugs-out, people, horses and weapon… It was clear that the intensive preparation was underway. Germans were shooting comparatively rare, but each released shell hit the mark. We did not even have time for a respite from a long trip. At night we were ordered to bring materials to the river for the construction of the bridge. We did it in groups 8-10 people. In 2-3 days we were given a more difficult and dangerous task: carry the boxes with shells to the river Drut, separating us from Germans and stack them on the neutral stripe in special niches, dug by the infantry men. About 6 people carried one box. I accompanied such groups for quite a few times. Our caravan was walking along the neutral stripe and suddenly German flash rocket emerged producing bright light; we could not drop a box as Germans would notice the movement so we had to stand still hoping that the enemy would take us for trees or bushes on the bog. Good thing that it took us only 300 meters to the nearest trenches. Of course, at that moment we felt so miserable- bullets were whistling, but we could not hide or even lie down. Soon the flash was gone and we could move forward. It recurred couple of times before we reached the destination. On the 23rd of June we were read the order on tomorrow’s assault. It was also mentioned there that mortar gun soldiers and gun soldiers would be distributed to the rifle squads by platoons and cross the river. My platoon #3 was to join rifle squad #9. Gun platoon under command of sergeant-major Prikhodko also joined that squad. Soon the orderly came over with the order to follow squad #9. We moved towards the river rather slowly, with frequent halts. Even though the trenches were rather deep we had to bend down as shell were exploding in the closest vicinity. During one of our halts Prikhodko happened to be close by and we had a talk that I had remembered for all my life. Prikhodko spoke Yiddish to me. I was taken aback. Shortly before we met, somebody told me that Prikhodko was a Jew. I did not believe in it at that time. Now I admired Prikhodko. The hero was to go in the battle with me, and he was my tribesman!.. «Are you a Jew?!» - I said dubiously. He firmly answered me in Yiddish. I said that I did not believe him. His last name Prikhodko was purely Ukrainian and I asked him to speak Russian as I did not know Yiddish. Prikhodko said that he was raised in the orphanage where he got that name, but remembered Yiddish since childhood. Gradually we were approaching river. Strange as it may be I was calm and cheerful at that time. My companion was frankly sad. ‘Why are you so wistful, sergeant-major?!’ - I said in a patron way. – ‘You will be conferred the title Hero after battle’. ‘Ah... – he brandished with his hand and said as if he was predoomed: - Hope the head will be safe’. ‘How come?!!’ - I, self-assured boy, who was to take in the first battle, was cheering up a front-line soldier who went through thick and thin beginning in 1939.

Finally our rifle squad came to the breakthrough boundary, located in the trenches on the high bank of Drut. By that time artillery transferred fire deeper to the German defense positions. Aviation showed up in the air. Tanks were roaring. We could see everything vividly from our trenches: steep descent to the river, bridge, filled with corpses and horse carcasses, and further on the opposite bank infantry men running along acclivity to German trenches. Germans rather accurately and rhythmically were firing at bridge from long-distance weapons. Rapid fire... successive fire... pause. And again, repeated in the same succession. I noticed that many commanders of platoons gave the order "advance!" when there was a pause. It took the first group of soldiers couple of minutes to cross the bridge, but next groups were caught under demolishing fire. Judging by the rhythm of the fire I understood that I should run to the river without waiting for the pause; moreover than gun soldier had to carry heavy equipment. When our platoon was given a command to cross, I decided to run to the river a little bit earlier before the pause. I just had a hunch and I think I did not see things around me. I jumped from the trench, ordered: platoon, follow me and dashed to the crossing. When I was approaching the bridge, there were fragments of shells not far from me. I could only assume what fortification the bridge had. I got on and off the bridge, being half-knee in water. «Forward, forward, forward!» I ran for about a hundred meters away from the bridge and finally I fell on the ground and looked around worrying about my soldiers, whether they were alive, thinking whether ammunition was safe. Things were all right. Guys ran up and lied down close by. On the back of the bridge there was a squall of German long-distance weapon. We got up and ran again and with sudden advances approached the first trenches of the enemy. We practically ran out of mines. All of a sudden we saw sergeant-major Volodin holding the bridle on the horsed cart with mines. He calmly asked where to place the mines. Then I was thinking how could he had managed to cross the bridge with the cart? Finally, we fired the first volley at fascists. Soon close to us mortar guns were installed by the soldiers from other platoons. They were much less lucky during forcing Drut. There were casualties, besides somebody lost the barrel from the mortar gun. For right now our fire did not help the infantry that much and no advancement was observed. Finally, the defense of the adversary was broken through. The enemy was retreating and our army #48 headed to Bobruysk [about 600 km to the west from Moscow]. I became more sturdy within those 2-3 days. I felt myself a true front-line solders and gained more self-respect. Pyotr Prikhodko was lethally wounded on the day of the breakthrough and perished on the 26th of June 1944. He was buried in the common grave in the village Zapolie of Rogachevsk region [Russia]. Later on he was posthumously named Hero of the Soviet Union. Secondary school № 1 22 was named after him in Kremenchug [Ukraine], the city where he was born in 1918. I found out about it from the letters written by students of that school in many years after war. I wrote them about the feat of Pyotr Prikhodko and about our crossing the river Drut.

Defeated troops of the enemy were stampeding towards the West. We had to chase them. First, we moved towards Minsk [Byelorussia], then we turned to the south towards Baranovichi [about 800 km to the west from Moscow]. We walked 65 kilometers in one day. We did not have to carry mortar guns as they were on the carts. We were really thirsty. I remember how I bent over a small puddle, covered by some midges and sucked on the water through my sweaty and dirty kerchief. In early August we crossed the border with Poland. I was happy to liberate my motherland, Byelorussia. Now we were to take fierce and ruthless battles in Poland.

Once, one of the commanders of the regiment found it necessary to take agitation leaflets to Germans. I was called in the headquarters and asked whether mortar gun-soldiers could help out. I promised to give it a thought. In theory, there were special mines called agitation ones. They were exploded at a certain distance in the flight. I did not know whether they were used in practice, I just saw them on the picture, when I studied at school. I started thinking whether I was possible to remake a common fragmentation mine into agitation one. I decided to make an experiment. Of course, I asked for preliminary permission. Mine flies from the tube with armed fuse under the action of gasses, formed during combustion of the shells. As soon as a mine encounters the object, it is exploded into about 350 fragments.

My idea was to unscrew the main fuse (of course very gingerly), remove a considerable amount of the explosive material from the body and put some leaflets instead as well as sand to preserve the necessary weight. As a result during explosion the mine would split in some large parts and leaflets would fall out from it. Germans would pick them up and read. It sounded pretty simple. What we had to do was to think what weight to put in the mine body to determine the distance of the flight. I performed all those steps.

On the 25th of October a serious battle ordeal was ahead of me. There was a hamlet on the hill, in 300 meters ahead of us. Germans were well noticeable when we looked in binoculars. Nobody even questioned that the adversary could clearly see us as well. My front-line experience prompted me that Germans would not linger with fire. The premonition of danger spurred me on to take actions swiftly. Having determined the location of our observation point, I told the data for firing over the phone. Shortly after that the first mine was exploded to the right and behind. Having made an adjustment, I gave a new order. The second mine exploded in the yard of the hamlet. Now the whole group was able to fire. Having informed that the target was straddled we were permitted to leave the observation point. I cried out to the orderly who was close by that it was time to run away from here. We jumped out from our pits and ran towards the thickness of the forest. At once we heard the sound of flying shells. We ran ‘home’ among tall trees and it seemed to us the shells were exploding right behind us. We were egged on by blind fear; our hearts were thudding and we started walking only when we understood that the blasts were distant.

It was the end of 1944. We moved forward with fierce battles, liberating one inhabited locality after another. Once after a battle four men in civilian clothes were taken out from a village house. The suits looked fit. Especially it referred to one husky man with military bearing. Those disguised Germans stood by the porch surrounded by our soldiers and nobody seemed to know what to do with them. It did not last long. All of a sudden battalion party organizer came up. He took out his pistol and started to cry out some threats. Captives kept silent. They must have hoped that they would be taken to the rear, where their fate would be decided. The first shot by the party organizer was unexpected for me. A huge husky man fell on the ground. Other men followed them. All of them met death silently, but one. He knelt and whispered rather loudly: «Jesus, Maria!..». Though I was aware that disguised German soldiers were in front of us as well as we apparently had no opportunity to convoy them in the rear, all the same I felt ill at ease seeing the fusillade of unarmed people face to face. I think that the party organizer was authorized to do that.

It was gloomy. Our infantry moved forward along with our squad and battalion commanders with their headquarters. I remained the senior at the firing point. Soon we started firing, first at the distance of one kilometer. In a while there was an order to increase the distance. The attack appeared to be successful so that we could move forward. But we received no orders towards that. We kept on firing incessantly, which lead to overheat of the mortar guns and plates of guns were deeper settling in the ground. There was a strong smell of the powder. Suddenly, time as if stopped. The telephone was silent. We did not know what to do. I do not remember how long the silence lasted. Uncertainty caused even more agitation. Germans started shooting at the hamlet from gun and some of the houses were on fire. It was getting dark for some reason -either because so much time elapsed or because it was cloudy or due to the fumes over our positions. Soon we were stricken with fear. Someone frantically cried: «Tanks! Tanks!». The clatter of German machines was vivid. What were we to do in that situation?! There were no thought to escape. Besides, mortar plates were so deep in the ground that it would take long to remove them. To leave ammunition on the battle field meant to be in tribunal court. We had to protect ourselves somehow and be ready for the worse. I was afraid to be hold in captivity. For me a Jew, an officer and communist it would equal tormenting death. That is why I always had a pineapple grenade by me. At that time I had two German grenades. Without a slightest doubt I would put them in action. But these thoughts were not important. My priority was how to stop the running soldiers. We did not panic, though the roaring of the German tanks was getting harder and harder. It seemed they were in hamlet. The infantrymen were running to the rear by one or two. I took out the piston from the holster started brandishing with it and cried to the running soldiers: «Don’t move!.. or I will shoot!..». One of them was affected by my words, he squatted. The other one kept running. I shot, but I could not kill our soldier, the bullet went past his head. It worked. He lied down immediately. I saw junior lieutenant running. He seemed to be crying out something being happy that he was among ours. I "discharged". I think I blurted out all swearwords I knew. I remember that junior lieutenant very well. I think he was my age, but he looked even younger than that. It must have been his first battle. First he looked numb, completely being unaware of what was going on, but my foul language and manipulations with the revolver did their work. There were flashes of thoughts in his eyes. Soon and couple of other soldiers lied down not far from us. At that time our artillery was acting. Terrible din was produced the shells of Katyushas [the 82mm BM-8 and 132mm BM-13 “Katyusha” rocket launchers were built and fielded by the Soviet Union in World War II. The launcher got this unofficial, but immediately recognized name from the title of a Russian wartime song, Katyusha.]. Their appeared to blast close by. We squeezed in the dug-out and were frightened by thought that one of the shells would blanket us. I do not remember how long that consternation lasted. Then things calmed down and it was clear that German counterattack was over. What happened? Germans gave our infantry to move forward and then send their tanks in its flanks making it severed from the main subdivision – us mortar gunners. It is not hard to imagine what our rifle division thought when German tanks showed up in their rear. Good thing that their tanks were not accompanied by infantry. To our luck, having deterred us they approached the hamlet and turned back. Other than that they could raze us to the ground. We did not have any anti-tank weapons. As far as I know the unsuccessful operation was ended as follows: squads of the 48th and 2nd attack army took initial positions. By the way, some of the generals decided that none of the officers should be awarded for that operation.

During the days, when we came to the second echelon I did some silly thing that might have turned really bad against me. Our nutrition got pretty bad. Once, they brought a soup, in which grains of wheat could be counted. I composed a ‘funny’ song on that subject. It started with the words:

Knock-knock-knock.
Today’s soup is brought.
Tastes like water salty,
For you not to go potty».

I sang my composed crambo to the officers. I remember that in the tent where I sang the song, there was a commander of the battalion, his new deputy on political issues [Political officer] 23 Ioffe and couple of more  officers. Somebody, I think Joffe recommended me to forget that song and I did what he told me. A year and a half passed and once in summer our squad was in Armavir [Russia]. I went to town park. There, the head of regiment counterintelligence department SMERSH 24 was sitting on the bench by himself. All officers knew him, of course. All of a sudden he asked me to take a seat by him. We had a small talk and then he asked me to sing the song that I composed in Poland. He said it in a peaceful, even paternal tone. First, I fumbled and then I finally sang the first couplet. He said that at that time I was spared as I was too young. Neither at that time, nor later on, I did not manage to find out who informed them of that song. 

I implicitly came across with SMERSH in the lines. At that time I was friends with Valeriy Moskovkin. He was of medium height, blond, a little bit older than me. He was a good man and rather literate officer. Moskovkin came to our squad from hospital. Before that he served in a different army. Once, he came back rather late at night to the dug-out, drank vodka and told me (there were only two of us) that they had found him even here. He thought that he would be left in peace after his wound. The sense of his words was pretty clear. SMERSH demanded from him to stooge on his comrades. I do not know why he was so frank with me. Maybe he wanted to admonish me not to blurt anything. Of course, I pretended not to understand anything and I asked him no questions.

On the 30th November 1944 we took part in combat engineering works on the leading edge. We had been making mortar-gun trenches all night long. We were involved in preparation for the coming attack. Combat engineers exploded frozen earth and we ‘finished’ the pits. Frankly speaking it was eerie to work 100 - 200 meters away from the trenches of the adversary. 

The year of 1944 was over. It was full of the hardest and most dangerous events in my life. In January I was a military school cadet and took final exams. By December I had been in severe battles in Byelorussia and Poland. I had a contusion and was in the hospital. I can bravely say that I became really battle-seasoned and skillful officer. The final year of war with the fascist Germany was ahead of me. Fierce battles, the bitterness of loss and the joy of victory were waiting for me.

Our squad entered on the territory of Eastern Prussia on the 19th or 20th of January 1945. That picture was engraved on my memory. It was dusk. We were marching and almost entire forest horizon was glowing with fire. It was the den of the fascist beast! Soldiers were anxious for vengeance on the enemy. Perhaps only those who were in the battle can understand without judging that some times front-line soldiers were overwhelmed with the feeling of vindictiveness. First we had quite an amusing adventure. Hardly had we come in the forest, met we a soldier guarding four cows. The sentinel must have been from the division which came here earlier. Some of our commanders started bargaining with the soldiers and asked him to give us one cow. Touching his gun, the sentinel said that he was fulfilling the order of his commander and would not give the cow. When he saw the gun pointed at him, he obeyed at once. Then we had a real ordeal with that cow, which did not want to follow us. We did everything- beat a poor animal, tied it to the cart, even danced in front of it. We had been pulling our trophy all night long, foretasting the stew at the first halt. Good thing we were moving slowly, with frequent stops. We passed the forest at dawn. In front of us there was a huge barn in a winter haze. There were great many geese, chickens, swine and pigs. All those forsaken cattle and poultry were clucking, grunting, mooing. It was an end to our lean and undiversified food. Since then a new life started and we became true gourmands.

I remember the events, connected with the battle by a tiny railroad substation. On the 26th of January our advancement was stopped by a strong gunfire of Germans from an inconsiderable hill, where they had pillboxes. The fire of our mortar gunner practically was of no help to the infantry. In words of the rifle squad commander he lead his soldiers to onslaught the hill having drunk pretty much alcohol. As a result he died as well as many other our guys. In the end the hill had been taken. When we were up the hill, having followed the infantry we saw our soldiers taking two huge German gun soldiers from the pillbox. The feeling of hatred towards them was so strong that they were shot immediately. I did not see who shot them. I just saw the falling on the frozen earth. In a jiffy, some of the soldiers started taking off the boots from the German guy. He cried out that the German was alive and tried to resist. All of a sudden a junior lieutenant, commander of gun platoon showed up. There was a wide dagger in his hand. Before we could say Jack Robinson, junior lieutenant started striking one blow after another as if in frenzy and crying out something. All of us were numb. Then somebody said that on the eve he got a letter informing him of the death of one of his kin.

It was the April of 1945. On our front sector the troops of the enemy together with the fugitives were pressed to the coast of the Baltic Sea. Germans hoped that ships would come and help them. Having that expectation they were fighting most fiercely. Our commandment decided to spare the infantry and sent aviation. Hundreds of aircrafts were incessantly bombing the territory, held by the enemy. The eradicated land was strewn with crashed cars and guns, cadavers and horse carcasses. Our regiment was not directly involved in the battles for a month. We moved in the second line, when the enemy was defeated. We were positioned 100 km away from the sea closer to the town Heiligenthal, Lower Saxony, Germany. The war was not over yet. Battles were held for Konigsberg 25 and militaries of our squad had a respite.

I had to fulfill another task. It was not in connection of the battle but it was fraught with danger. On the 3rd of April 1945 commander of the mortar gun squad and I were called in the regiment headquarters. One major had a talk with us there. I remember that talk very well. He asked us to take a seat and said in a non-mandative way that we had to clear the coast from the cadavers. Of course, captives were supposed to do that. Three teams of captives, each consisting 80 - 100 people, were formed in 3 squads. We were offered to be at the lead of this job. We silently listened to him. I even was not asking myself why it was me who was chosen for such an unusual task and who suggested that we should do it. Of course, we could not object to anything and the major informed us that 12 soldiers and a sergeant-major were send for the guarding and direct supervision over work of the captives. Accommodation was provided for us and captives. The major ordered me to contact the captives directly. I said calmly to the major that Germans would kill me, but he said that I had nothing to fear as I would have guards. Then I asked what would happen if I killed anybody he also said that nothing would happen. There were no questions to ask and I went to meet with Germans. I went armless to the house, where they lived. Czech, who I was assigned the head of the group, was interpreting for me. I sat on the chair in the center of the hall. Germans surrounded me. Having informed them of the tasks and the conditions I toughly added: ‘I am a Jew. 8 of my relatives perished in the war as well as millions of my tribesmen. I hope I will have to resort to the weapon to establish order and disciple.’ Sergeant-major interpreted my words to the Germans, who were sitting still. Of course, my actions looked like a boyish self-assertion. I was 19 at that time. Now I can look differently at that. Well, it happened. I should say that even did not have to rise my voice to Germans. They were bona-fide, very polite and obliging.

After the war

We met Victory day [9 May 1945] in the vicinity of Konigsberg, on the coast of the bay Freshgaf bay. When Berlin was captured on the 1st of May it was clear that the war was winding up. But still the 9th of May 1945 was a true fete for all of us. Everybody was exulting. Militaries were shooting in the air, giving hugs and kisses, drinking to the victory and future happy life, their household, their kin and commemorating the perished.

I got 2 military orders: Order of the Red Star 26 and Order of the Great Patriotic War 2nd class 27.

I was not demobilized at once. Our squad served in Krasnodar [Russia, 1300 km from Moscow] for another year. I had a good reputation among squadron commandment. A separate training battalion was formed in our division and I was the only officer out of entire division who was assigned commander of training mortar gun platoon of that battalion. I was highly appreciated by commanders. I was eager to study in Moscow artillery military academy, but I did not pass entrance exams in Moscow. I was a battery commander, I had a 10-year education and battle experience, i.e. fit in all respects, but still I was refused. I did not fit in accordance with item 5 28. I did not doubt that. Then I decided to enter officers’ institute, gun department. I was not admitted either. I was told that I was young and had time to obtain education. They also said that there were a lot of officers with high rank having no education at all, so the benefits were for them. I could not picture myself without being educated and I decided not to stay in the army and enter civilian institute after demobilization. In 1946 I was demobilized.

In August I came to Moscow. Since childhood I dreamed to be a cinematographer of an actor. I took an attempt to enter cinematography institute, but failed again. Then I opened up a reference book for school-leavers to find out which institute was closer to our house. Moscow Engineering and Construction Institute and I submitted my documents to the mechanics department. In September 1946 I started classes in the institute. I had straight excellent marks for the entire 5 –year period. I was a patriot and took an active part in social work. I was a deputy secretary of Komsomol committee at the institute [Komsomol units existed at all educational and industrial enterprises, headed by Komsomol committees involved in organizational activities]. 2 months before graduation from the institute the rector Boris Ukhov called me. It was the year of 1951. Jewish Anti-fascist Committee 29 was exterminated, cosmopolite processes were finished [Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’] 30, they did not even try to conceal anti-Semitism. Even under that condition the rector said that he and other teachers knew me very well, were aware of my success and would recommend me to the post-graduate studies. In the end he said:’ We want to show everybody that we are not biased against anybody’. I has always been lucky to meet good people. In actuality the academic council at the institute unanimously recommended me to the post-graduate and party organization supported my candidacy as well, but when the state exams were over I was not admitted to post-graduate department. I was told that there was no vacancy in the chair. There were 10 offers to the scientific and research institute when I was given mandatory job assignment 31. I was to choose either to work at the plant or at the construction site. When I said that I wanted to work at scientific and research institute, deputy minister of higher education, who was present there, said that I should be grateful for having been left in Moscow. I said that they were doing evil and that the history would not forgive them that. The rector of the institute was sitting there with his hands on his head. He was ashamed and could not even look in my eyes. The secretary of the party committee merely did not show up at the mandatory job assignment board. Then after Stalin’s death [1953] I asked why he was not present. He said he was reprimanded for the party organization to act on its own and recommend me, a Jew, to the post-graduate studies. 

I got a mandatory job assignment to the trust ‘Stroitel’ as a mechanic. It was a small-scale plant. It looked like a construction site, where automobile plant named after Stalin, later Likhachev 32 was being build. I did not get along with the director of the plant. He was a semiliterate man and an inveterate anti-Semitist to boot. In 1952 I was transferred to the construction trust to the department of the chief mechanics. After Stalin’s death I got an invitation letter to the post-graduate department of my dear Engineering and Construction Institute. In 1954 I was admitted there and in 2 years I brilliantly defended my dissertation. In 1959 I began teaching at Moscow Road Transport Institute, Construction Mechanics. I had worked for that institute all my life. I am still employed there. I was promoted rather rapidly. Soon I became senior teacher. Then I defended doctorate theses 33 and became a professor. I am respected both by my colleagues and peers in spite of my reputation of being strict, reserved and a man of principle. There were cases when my colleagues asked me to put good marks either to their children or acquaintances and I had to refuse them as those students knew hardly anything. My reputation was important for me and I could not prevaricate. Pro-rector of our institute did not want to talk to me when I refused him in one of those requests. In spite of that when there was a secret vote of the academic council for conferment the title of the senior staff scientist, there was a unanimous vote. The vote had taken place for 4 times and I was elected unanimously all the time. My jubilees are always celebrated in our chair. People always sincerely greet me. I am keen on poetry. I compose my own verses, write recollections about war. The Institute assists me in publishing my books and prints them in its typography. I never came across anti-Semitism at work.

I think anti-Semitism commenced at war. I did not feel it towards me, but it was conspicuous in Stalin’s anti-Semitism policy. They tried not to give high ranks to the Jews, delayed awarding or gave lower-class award than it was in the list. During war there were rumors that Jews ‘fought by Tashkent’ [Tashkent is a town in Middle Asia; it was the town where many people evacuated during the Great Patriotic War, including many Jewish families. Many people had an idea that all Jewish population was in evacuation rather than at the front and anti-Semites spoke about it in mocking tones]. During the war there was no mass anti-Semitism among soldiers and officers. But there has always been pathological people who imbibed it with mother’s milk.

In post war years, beginning from 1948 anti-Semitism was all-wide state policy. I remember what I felt when read the information about the tragic death of Mikhoels 34. It was terrible. At that time it was informed that he died in a car accident, but it was clear that it had been insinuated. There was an open struggle against the so-called cosmopolitism, against Jews in fact. I understood the misery of those satirical newspaper articles, wherein Jewish surname of the actor or a writer, known under alias name, was mentioned. After such a divulgement I had such a feeling as if I was stamped in dirt. After arrest and execution of the members of the Jewish anti-fascist committee I understood that it was an open struggle against Jews. It was the time when Jews were fired. Open meetings were held, where hidden enemies of the Soviet regime were stigmatized. Real anti-Semitism reigned in the country. The most terrible things started after ‘Doctors’ plot’ 35. I like any other Jew was indignant. I worked for a construction company with one of my former fellow students. We got along very well. When there was an article in the paper regarding ‘doctors-poisons’ she pretended not to notice me in the morning. She did not want to greet me, talk to me. It was as if boiled water was poured on me. I still shudder when I go back to that time. People blamed Beriya 36 in that. We always believed Stalin and remembered his words in one of his pre-war speeches: ‘Anti-Semitism is a wrong way, which leads astray’ [1939]. Only after Khrushchev’s speech 37 at ХХ Party Congress 38 I understood that Stalin was devil incarnate. I stopped believing in him, but I still believe Lenin 39 and consider him to be a great man.

I met my wife-to-be Inga Kisina during my studies at the institute. Inga was born in 1932 in Moscow in a very intellectual Jewish family. She was an only child in the family. Inga’s father Mikhail Kisin was a scientist, an expert in the field of heating and ventilation. Mikhail was an assistant professor of Moscow Engineering and Construction Institute and was the chief of the laboratory at the scientific and research institute. He was a great, interesting intellectual man. He died in 1954, at a considerably young age, 52. Inga’s mother, Mira Kisinа, was also an engineer in one of the design institutes in Moscow. She is still alive. Her age is 96. Inga and I got married in December 1951. I was about to finish the institute and Inga was in the 3rd year. We got registered in the marriage registration office and in the evening we had a wedding party for our kin and friends. Mother and I had a room in a communal apartment, and wife’s family also lived in communal apartment in the center of Moscow, in 3 poky rooms. My wife and I moved in one of them after wedding. Later on, when we had two children, we still lived in that room. In 1953 I was afflicted with tuberculosis. I found out about the death of my father-in-law when I was on a treatment course in Crimea sanatorium. Of course, I left everything I went to the funeral. Soon doctors found out that Inga had a diabetes. She was a very good person, beautiful, smart and intellectual. She was a giver rather than taker. She has worked for scientific and research institute all her life, but still she found time to take care of children. As for material side, life was hard on us. We constantly had debts and could not only afford luxury, we could not even afford to go on vacation to the suburb of Moscow. Children often went to pioneer camps. My wife and I were atheists and raised our children soviet. We even bid not break the subject of religion in our family. We gladly marked soviet holidays – 1st of May, 7th of November [October Revolution Day] 40, Soviet Army Day 41, Victory Day 42. We invited our friends to come and share potluck with us no matter that we could not afford a feast.

Our elder son Yuri Tsvey, named after my father, was born in 1954, and my daughter Irina was born in 1959. On her birthday, the 15th of December was the all-union census. I had to spend a night at my mother’s place, as when people came to put my data, I was supposed to stay at the place, for which I had a residence permit 43, аnd I had it for my mother’s apartment to take over the room in the event she died. Early in the morning my neighbor gave me a call and said that my daughter was born. I rushed to the delivery house and saw TV cameras and crowds of people. Then I got a note from my wife saying: ‘TV came over from the Program ‘Daily News’ and had been teasing Irishka (we knew how we would name the daughter before she was born) and I for 2 hours. But at last they changed linen, put flowers and said that the video would be shown on TV. Of course, we turned TV on when it was evening news was broadcast. First it was informed that all-union census commenced on that day. Then we saw the ward of the delivery house.  Inga was in bed and there was a tiny moppet by her, my daughter Irina. The announcer said: «Inga Tsvey is giving information on her newly born daughter in the delivery house ‘. ‘Daily News’ was broadcast throughout USSR. We received telephone calls with congratulations from every corner, where our kin and friends lived.

Son and daughter followed into parents’ footsteps. Both of them graduated from Moscow Engineering and Construction institute. Son did well as he was capable. Upon graduation he worked as a designer/engineer for some period of time. Then computers appeared and he was keen on programming. He became a brilliant programmer. Then there was a hard period of time, when the engineers got skimpy salaries. Son was married already and in 1995 his son Alexander was born. He had to provide for his family and to look for a new job. He went to work in commerce. Now he is a realtor. Son is rather well-off, but he does not enjoy his work that much.

Irina is joking that she has been on camera since the first day of her life. After graduation from the institute daughter was involved in work on TV. She was the anchorwoman of one of the popular TV amusement programs. Now Irina is working on the radio as deputy chief editor of radio station Moscow Echo. Irina is married, but she preserved her maiden name Tsvey. She knew it would make me happy. Many people at work advised her to change her name, but daughter said that she did not want to disgrace her father, whose Jewish name did not bother him when he was fighting in the lines.

In late 1970s wife’s disease was progressing. It was getting really bad: Inga became blind. Then she had gangrene. She died in 1988 at the age of 56. She was buried next to her father, in city Vvedenskiy cemetery in Moscow. In 1986 my dear mother, whom I loved so much, died at the age of 84. Mother had been sick for a long time. I was tossing about my sick mother, family and work. My mother was buried in Vvedenskiy cemetery.

When in 1948 the state Israel of founded I was beaming with joy. Figuratively speaking I think of Russia as mother and of Israel as father. I have always followed the history of Israel. I would not like to live there. I am Jew in my blood, but Russian in my soul. My mother and wife are buried here. I cannot imagine myself not hearing Russian language. I love it very much. Nobody spoke Yiddish in my family. I was raised in the Russian speaking environment, in the family where people were thinking in Russian. Russia is as dear to me as Israel. During my first visit to Israel in 1991 I was rapt by the country, but I did not think of staying there, I felt homesick.

Like most people I took perestroika 44 and social democratization with joy. I never like the word ‘perestroika’ as I am conservative, but I welcomed Gorbachev 45, because for the first time we heard lively words from the head of the state. He was not just falteringly reading the speech, written by somebody else. I did not like that Gorbachev talked too much and beat around the bush. The leader should give certain tasks and clearly answer questions asked. 

I consider breakup of USSR [1991] to be despicable. In my opinion our government should be blamed for that as they followed their career interests. I think that perestroika could be more fruitful if our country was plundered in the most savage way. As a result there was a de-stratification of society, the top was practically merged with oligarchs, the gangsters.

As for material side, it is pretty good, especially as compared with most of my coevals. Teachers got a pay rise. I got 5000 rubles, which was less than 200 USD, now my salary is 7000 rubles. Of course, it is not big money, but I also receive double pension, 6000 rubels. It is quite enough for me to get by, and still there is enough for making presents for my grandchildren.

Glossary:

MARK KABAKOV 
Russia 
Moscow 
Date of interview: May 2005 
Interviewer: Svetlana Bogdanova 

Mark Kabakov is of short height. He is very hospitable.
Mark lives in the downtown Moscow in the brick house constructed in late 1950s.

His apartment consists of three rooms. He lives with his younger son’s family.

The pieces painted by a talented artist, father-in-law Isai Seitman, are hung all over the apartment.

There is Mark Kabakov’s Study in the apartment. The walls are adorned with marine symbolism,
sea landscapes of Arctic and the Black Sea, where the owner of the Study had served.

There are a lot of books - collected works of Russian poetry and classic literature.

Mark is seldom in.
He takes frequent trips in the country and abroad.
He is very agile and brisk.

• My family background
• Growing up
• During the war
• After the war
• Glossary

• My family background

There were different versions on the origin of a surname Kabakov. There were a lot of people carrying that name. There were two lines of Kabakovs – Ukrainian and Byelorussian. I belong to Byelorussian one. In my opinion the most plausible version is the one that says that there is a small town by Minsk called Kabaki, where the Kabakovs probably came from. There is another, more romantic version found by my distant relative Rabinovich, who lived in Minsk and who was the representative of a multimillion ‘clan’ Kabakovs. His mother’s maiden name was Kabakova. He was so carried away by the history of his maternal relatives, that he made the lineage of Kabakovs, which goes back to the 16th century. Jews appeared in Russian after division of Polish territory, i.e. after the 16th century. Jews came as independent settlers during the reign of Catherine 1. My relative Kabakov managed to discover that the origin of Kabakov’s name stems from the phrase ‘kanai ben kanai’ which means in Ivrit ‘zealot is the son of zealot.  This phrase is mentioned in Talmud. When Moshe lead the Jews in the desert that Kanai was an ardent stickler of the ideas expressed by Moshe and his son Ben Kanai was even a more ardent follower. He became the progenitor of the Kabakovs, being the abbreviate K-B-K. This is Rabinovich’s version. It is hard to judge how authentic it was, but it has the right to exist as a version.

I did not live to see my paternal grandparents. I do not know exactly where they were born, but I know for sure that they came from Byelorussia. When they reached mature age, they lived in Minsk. Grandfather Morduch did not have a house, but a spacious comfortable apartment in the downtown area. Grandmother Sofia Kabakovа died at the age of 25-26 while having parturition of her younger daughter in 1900. Grandpa remained with 3 little kids. My father was only four, the eldest Gersh was 6 and Sofia was a new-born. My grandfather’s second wife was Feiga. She was called Feigale or Fanya at home. They did not have common children. Fanya raised my father and his siblings. My father, his brother and sister loved her very much, like their mother, but they called her auntie.

Grandfather Morduch Kabakov worked as an accountant for his rich relatives Kabakovs. There were two lines of Kabakovs in Minsk- one wealthy and another one, where my grandpa belonged to, was not very rich. The business of the Kabakovs my grandpa worked for was very prosperous. They even had their own synagogue. There were only 50-60 telephone subscribers, 20-30 out of which pertained to public institutions and one of them belonged to the rich family of Kabakovs. At that time it spoke for welfare. Though, my grandfather, the accountant, was not a poor man either. All his children finished lyceum and obtained higher education in Warsaw and Saint Petersburg, which was rather problematic for the Jews of that time. My grandpa Morduch Kabakov died of heart stroke in 1916. Grandparents Kabakovs were buried in Jewish cemetery of Minsk. Their tombs were not preserved after Great Patriotic War 2.

Father’s elder brother Gersh Kabakov was born in 1892. He finished Realschule 3 in Minsk. He studied in Poland in Warsaw University. Then he became timber engineer. He lived in Moscow and died in 1966. He was buried in Vostryakovskoye cemetery in Moscow. His son Matvey Kabakov is currently living in Moscow. He is an engineer like his father. Now he is a great expert in machine-building. Father had a sister Sofia Kabakovа. She was born in 1900.  She remained single. I do not know what she did for a living. I did not know her. She died of consumption in Moscow in 1938. It is not known to me where she was buried. I assume there was a sad story behind it. She was probably buried in Dragomilovskoye cemetery. Half of that cemetery was Jewish 4. On the eve of Great Patriotic War in 1941 Moscow authorities decided to build a new avenue, the construction of which was completed after war. Now that avenue is called Kutuzovskiy. Part of the avenue went through Dragomilovskoye cemetery. I remember there was tittle-tattle that the tombs would be taken to another place, but they did not manage to do that and the cemetery was razed to the ground by the tractors. 

Grandpa Morduch Kabakov was very religious. He strictly observed all Jewish traditions. The solemn holiday of Yom-Kippur was the most revered by grandpa. On that day all Jews, including women went to the synagogue. They had stayed there all day long and fasted until the first evening star. If some of the children broke the fast, grandpa was infuriated and in father’s words the violator got in the neck.

My father Volf Kabakov was born in 1896. Having finished lyceum father left for Saint Petersburg, where he studied at Juridical Department of the University. He managed to finish only two courses. He could not go on with his education as the civil war was unleashed 5,there was no scholarship, no heating in the hostel, no prospects for future and in a word it was not the time to study. Father went to his relatives in Minsk. He married my mother Anna Pelix in 1919. I do not know what kind of wedding they had- secular of religious. Unfortunately, I know hardly anything about my parents for two reasons: first the upbringing of our generation, the motto of that time was: «We would raze the world of violation…!», and we were taught that after October 1917 [Russian Revolution of 1917] 6 we would start a new life and we should not care for the past and forget it.

I belonged to that generation Secondly, it was even more aggravated by my service in fleet since the age of 16. I was rarely at home and was hardly involved in the life of my kin. The only thing I know that parents’ wedlock was considered to be a misalliance. At that time the gradation of the past was still there, and Soviet regime had not affected the minds and mentality of Jews. The marriage between Haim Pelix daughter, who had his own business, and the son of Gersh Kabakov, who owned no business, was reckoned as misalliance. Nonetheless, they got married. Daughter Sofia was born in 1920. She died soon. Then they moved to Leningrad. Father was an officer, i.e. performing office functions. Such profession was called clerk in the west. Clerk was supposed to work in different branches, one day in one, tomorrow in another etc. My father was such type of a clerk. Though he was called the economist or statistics expert, all the same it changed nothing. He had never been involved in legal work.

My parents came of traditional Jewish families, but they were rather liberal in mind. They belonged to such type of Jews, who wanted to escape from Jewry and patriarchal principles of the past. It was not rare at that time. Though, as the experience showed, they were not able to do as they wished. They remained Jews subconsciously. Having denied religion and Jewry in the years of adolescence, my parents at a mature age came back to Jewry and started thinking of God. Father being over the hill, at the age of 70 started to go to the synagogue and fast on Yom-Kippur. Mother also took an interest in religion. I remember her cry when she was listening to Hatikvah 7.

Father was hot-tempered He had a hard life which made his temperamental character even more acerbated. He was declared peoples’ enemy 8 and imprisoned in 1929 being charged with bourgeois views. He was exiled to Solovetskiye Islands [about 1000 km. to the north from Moscow]. He got off with that pretty easily and was released in 1932. His incarceration in GULAG 6 left an imprint on his further life. Father was broken down. That year 1932 he left mother and married another woman. He was still thinking of mom and he loved me very much. It is hard to say who had a bigger influence on me. Both of my parents equally took part in my raising. After divorce, father was very tender and affectionate to me. Moreover, I spent most of my childhood with father. The reason for it was that my mother’s apartment was in the basement- father had much better living conditions. The most important for parents was to care of me, but not thinking of their offences.

Mother Anna Kabakovа came from Pelix family. She was born in Minsk in 1897. My mother’s history is also unique. All people having the last name Pelix are close relatives. The last name of my maternal great grandfather was Levin. He was to be drafted in the army. My great grandpa was strongly against it. He was an educated man, knew how to read in Russian which was very rare among the Jews from hick towns. He read some book about Polish life and he liked the character Felix. My ancestor came up to the clerk of the synagogue and offered money to change his son’s name to Felix. The clerk was not very knowledgeable in Russian and put down Pelix instead of Felix. That was the way such a unique last name appeared.

My maternal grandfather’s name was Haim Pelix. He was involved in timbering. He owned plots in the forest. Byelorussia was rich in forests. It started exporting timber to the Western Europe a long time ago. Haim Pelix was not rich, when he was young. His wife, whose name I do not remember, came of the family Kogelman. That family was not rich, but it had some inconsiderable profit. The money grandpa was to receive after wedding as a dowry was enough to start his own business. First, he had nothing, but grandpa Haim managed his business so well, that he finally got rich. He was able to get all his children educated. Mother had 2 brothers Jacob Pelix, Solomon Pelix and sister Esfir’ Pelix.

Mother Anna Pelix studied at conservatoire in Saint Petersburg. She had a good voice. Her siblings studied in Lausanne, Switzerland. For a Jew to study in conservatoire at that time, it was necessary to have a wonderful voice as well as wealthy parents who would be able to pay tuition. Mother’s family was one of the richest in Minsk. There was a house in Minsk with servants and maids and there was a house out of town, where his office was located. After revolution Bolsheviks demanded money from rich people and arrested their children, threatening that they would be killed if money was not brought. Mother was among those arrested children. It proves that grandpa was one of the wealthiest people in the city. The money was collected and children were released. There are terrible recollections of the time being cooped up in ChK 10. Later on grandpa Haim was murdered in 1918 during civil war. He took the wages to the forest and on his way he was attacked by a pack of gangsters, who robbed and killed him. Grandpa was buried in Jewish cemetery in Minsk. His grave was not preserved.

Mother’s elder brother Jacob Pelix studied at Lausanne University. He did not come back to Russia. He stayed in Switzerland. He had lived a long life and died in Bern in early 1970s, when he was over 80. He was buried in Swiss cemetery. He was baptized. His wife Matilda was a Swiss German. They had two children. They are still alive. Edward Pelix is rather odd, though not insane, is still studying in the Swiss University in spite of a mature age. He and his mother are living on a dole. My wife and I stayed with Edward in Matilda for two weeks in 1993. Unfortunately uncle Jacob was not alive, when I came there. German speaking Swiss speak the language approximated to Yiddish. At an old age all kinds of things are coming back to the memory, so I started remembering the forgotten language. I was able to communicate with them. It was a very lucky time. The only thing I know about another Jacob’s son Robert is that he is married, has a daughter and lives in Bern. I’ve seen him only once during my stay in Bern.

Another mother’s brother Solomon Pelix lived in France. He was married to a French lady who was thirty years younger than he. She gave birth to two children. Son Daniel Pelix lives in Nice. He is an artist. Another son Gerard Pelix is a famous engineer. He lives in Paris. They have a comfortable living. In 2001 my wife and I visited our relatives in Paris. Uncle Solomon was deceased by then. We communicated with the help of interpreters, whoever was close by. It was really hard, though my cousins were anxious to have a chat.

Mother’s sister Esfir’ Pelix was born in 1894. Aunt Fira also studied in Switzerland, but she came back to Russia for some reason. He had worked as a journalist all her life. She worked for many publishers, including the major one, where most soviet news-papers and magazines were published. I loved my auntie Firochka. During the time of starvation I had lunches in the canteen of the publisher company. Auntie was single. She loved, pampered and gave me expensive toys. She died in 1973. She was cremated and her ashes were buried in the Jewish sector of Vostryakovskoye cemetery.

Mother did not correspond with her brothers, since her son was the navy officer. At that time it was jeopardous to keep in touch with the relatives, living abroad 11. Though, mother managed to correspond with aunt Esfir’ Pelix. She did it in some complicated way via poste restante.

Mother was very gifted. She had a wonderful voice and did well in conservatoire. Mother lost her voice and could not continue singing after the death of my little elder sister, who died in 1921 at the age of 1. Later on mother was a director of the kindergarten. She was very impulsive and she lost her temper if someone was getting on her nerves. I think very many people of her generation were like that because there was a lot they had to go through. Nevertheless, she loved life and fun. She was a merry-maker. There were a lot of people around her who were willing to laugh, dance and sing. She was always in the highlight of the company. She knew a lot of jokes and was good at cracking them. She was a bright person. She loved her kin, especially aunt Fira.

Of course, father and all my relatives as well as people surrounding me considered revolution to be a tribulation for them and their families. They wanted to live and tried to adapt the best way they could. None them was a politician. I do not think any of my relatives was a communist. Within a family people openly expressed their negative attitude towards the regime authorities and leaders. Though I cannot say what children at the age up to 16 are more prone to perceive – the talks in the family or the school with the rigidly organized system of studies and propaganda, nurturing children with certain trends. Besides, there were so-called extra-curriculum activities held in Oktobrist 12, pioneer 13 and comsomol 14 organizations. I went through all of that. School had a strong influence on me. I welcomed communism ideas , but on the other being a child I could not ignore things told by parents and aunt.

• Growing up

I was born in Leningrad in 1924. I was not named Mark right away. There is a whole story behind it, mould from the epoch. In accordance with the Jewish traditions I was to be named after deceased maternal grandfather. He was called Haim, which means life. It was decided to name me in accordance with the Jewish traditions after grandfather, so that the name would not be Jewish, but meaning life. They chose the name of Vitaliy, since vita meant life. Thus, I was named Vitaliy, when I was born. When I turned 3, I was taken to Minsk, where my grandmother Feigala Kabakovа, the second wife of Morduch Kabakov, my paternal grandfather. She said: «Vitaliy, no way! There will be Morduch». It was the name of my deceased grandpa, her husband. Тhus, there was not Vitaliy no longer, and Morduch appeared. Morduch did not sound euphonic at that time and parents did not want to give me traditional Jewish name, so I became Mark. The name Mark Kabakov was put in all my documents. I was to be Morduch Volfovich and I became Mark Vladimirovich.

In 1927 my parents moved to Moscow and grandmother, the second wife of my grandpa Feigala Kabakovа took me to Minsk. I had stayed with her for a year. Feigala was rather religious. I do not think she was a bigot, but all traditions were observed in her house. I had never seen her fast or go to the synagogue. I meant national Jewish food, Jewish language-Yiddish. There I learnt how to speak Yiddish and learnt the language only thanks to my aunt as my parents spoke only Russian. I do not remember it vividly, but I think that on Jewish holidays such as Pesach, Rosh Hashanah etc. there was a white tablecloth and challah on the table. Candles were lit and bracha was read- the way it was supposed to. I do not remember those things, but I am convinced that it was all observed. Feiga died in Moscow in 1940. Father and his brother moved her to Moscow shortly before her death. She lived in Moscow with father and at times she stayed in the place of father’s elder brother Gersh Kabakov. She was buried in Moscow in Donskoye cemetery.

In 1928 I reached the kindergarten age and mother took me to Moscow. I went to the kindergarten in Moscow, where my mother was working. Mother started her career in a kindergarten as a nanny at night shifts. Then she became a minder and finally she was in charge of the kindergarten. I remember that every summer I spent out of town, where the kindergarten went during summertime. All children of the kindergarten staff went there.

I went to school a little later than my coevals, at the age of 8. I had a hard form of appendicitis, so I was one year lacking behind. I went to a common Russian school, not far from the house, we lived in. School premises were in three-storied building. I was impressed by first years of my studies. I had two buddies, whom I had been friends with all my life, Lyonya Volodarkskiy and Misha Kouznetsov. I made friends with Misha Kouznetsov in the first grade and kept friends with him till the end of his days. I am still friends with Lyonya Volodarskiy. I started composing verses at school. This doggerel was so useless that I even do not want to recall them. A lot of boys and girls of my age twiddled with that. There was a library on my way home. I was a regular customer there. I received my first and the last literary prize. I remember as if it was yesterday that it was the set of chess. It was written on hardboard how talented I was and about the prize I got. I was not a social activist, but I did well in studies. I read a lot at my leisure, went to the cinema, played football.

The fact that father was declared the peoples’ enemy and incarcerated was taken by me as a tragic mistake of the authorities, bringing sorrow in our family. The tribulation, opened door to trouble for me and my family as before father’s imprisonment I had mother and father and after that the family severed. As a result my childhood became joyless. I think that my childhood ended with my father’s arrest and woe was upon our family. Sometimes at night I used to dream what would have happened if father had not been behind the bars: we would have gone for a walk, he would have bought me a ball and a bicycle... The dreams looked cheerful, but the reality was sad.

When I was in the 8th grade, I found out that the first specialized marine school was to open in Moscow. Two years ago specialized artillery schools were open in Moscow. Then aviation school was open. There were seven specialized marine schools in the country, located in Leningrad, Baku, Odessa [about 1175 km. to the south from Moscow], Kiev, Moscow, Vladivostok [about 6400 km. to the east from Moscow], Gorky [about 450 km. to the east from Moscow]. I went to specialized marine school # 1. It was the only marine institution in Moscow. Nobody spurred me on, it was my idea to enter. There was a tough competition for admission. There were 5000 applications were submitted and only 500 could be admitted. 8th, 9th and 10th grades were admitted. I passed my entrance exams and went through physical test. If somebody had some sort of ailment or a slight deviation from the norm, he was not admitted.

Squads were formed from the freshers. 10 grade – 1st squad, 9 – 2nd squad, 8 – 3rd squad. I entered the 2nd squad of the Moscow Specialized Marine School. My admission was not affected by my father’s past. I turned a new leaf. We did not live in the dormitory, but at home. We were like ordinary Moscow schoolchildren, but in the uniform. Apart from the school curriculum we were taught the fundamentals of marine service. We were taught how to tie the knots, do simple work on the deck, all kinds of marine disciplines, boating and sailing. We were loaded with work. We even had dancing classes. Being the students of the school we were not conferred any military ranks. I was merely a student of the specialized school. My being Jewish did not influence my admission. There were several Jews among students. I had school friends. Many of them are dead now. Our school was founded in 1940 and it was disbanded in 1946.

Those who finished that school were sent to naval academy. Depending on the performance the students were sent to certain schools. The top-rank students had a choice of either to marine engineering academy named after Dzerzhinskiy 13, where navy engineers and mechanics were trained ( I chose this one) or naval academy named after Frunze 14, training navigators. Both academies were in Leningrad. Over 90% of all marine schools were in that city.

• During the war

In summer 1941 the 8th and 9th grades went to summer camps located at Valaam Island on Ladoga lake [about 550 km. to the north-west from Moscow]. Navy was based on that island. Torpedo boats were located there. It was the so called navy base. I remember fantastic cliffs of Valaam, bays and cloister cells. We were ignoramuses. It was raining during our stay, so we lived in the tents. We broke the walls of the adjacent cloister and took the boards to cover our tents without even assuming that the cloister was built earlier than in the 16th century. It was even worse than barbarism. We, the boys, did it under supervision of our ‘fathers’-commanders, who were adults and looked educated.  We arrived in Valaam on the 10th of June 1941, and the war was unleashed on the 22nd of June. On the 24th of June we were swiftly evacuated from there. Shortly after the war was declared, aviation of the adversary started bombing. The whole specialized school had few training rifles, which were not good for shooting. Besides, military commander had a pistol. Apart from us there were Leningrad and Gorky specialized schools at Valaam. We were bombed by Finns, who were allies of Germany as Finland was in the closest vicinity to Valaam. Several bombs were released close to us, but we were able to dig couple of trenches and hide.

Then we traveled by a ship Kremlin. There we found stored chocolate sweets and devoured them. There were the moments when our childhood and civil life were dying. We were heading to Leningrad. The ship was being bombed on our way. Then we found out that the steam-boat behind us sunk during bombing, but we got off safely. In Leningrad we stayed in academy named after for less than a day. Then we had to go to Moscow. First we did not have classes and we were prancing Moscow with the feeling that we were the first to find out about the war. Moscow had not been bombed yet. Then we went to the village not far from Moscow caked Seltsi, which stood on Oka river. Тhere were summer camps of Moscow military circuit and specialized artillery schools traditionally held their annual camp gatherings. Students of Moscow marine schools were also taken there. Boats were brought there so that we could have water training. We were to have boating and sailing practice as well as physical training. We lived in the camps and had classes.

There was village Konstantinovo on the opposite bank of the river. It was the motherland of the renowned Russian poet Sergey Esenin 15. His mother and sister were still living there at that time. The group of students, including me was sent there to help the farmers with mowing hay. We were given rye bread and milk and that was it. None of us even came to the house, where Esenin lived, to have a talk with his kin. We were not interested in that. We were good comsomol leaders. We thought that there was only one true soviet proletarian poet - Vladimir Mayakovskiy 16. Esenin, as we were taught at that time was a decadent kulak poet, the poet of profligacy and we believed what we were told without even reading his poems. Only during the war, when people came to know what was true and what was false, they really appreciated the beauty and magnanimity of that poet. It is a pity that we could not perceive what soviet regime was really like.

Then we came back in Moscow. We had studies, dug fortifications in the vicinity of Moscow, had duty on the roofs of the city during bombing, took with grampus firebombs, released by Germans, and put them in the barrels with water. We helped in the defense of the city the best way we could and consequently the entire school was awarded with the medals for the defense of Moscow. Then we left Moscow, when everybody was escaping. It happened on the 16th of October 1941, when Germans stood by the border of the city. The whole city was imbibed with the smell of ashes as the documents were being burnt in all institutions, including regional party committee. It was the only day when the metro was closed down. All specialized schools –artillery, aviation and our marine left Moscow. We were evacuated in the East. The schools got off the transport gradually upon arrival. We were traveling in the locomotives. The first stop was in Achinsk, [about 2900 km. to the east from Moscow] , wherefrom we had to take a walk to the village Bolshoy Chul, Novosibirsk oblast.

The frost was severe –20°С, -30°С, at least, but we had to walk in our military jackets and spring boots. I remember that the stevedore who took our bags, spoke German. These were those Germans, who were exiled 19 at the beginning of war. The village, where we were taken, was absolutely unsuitable for marine trainings. There was nothing there- no premises for training or lodging, no devices. We slept on the straw in the barn. We gradually became lice-ridden. We were fed only with the fish, caught in river Chulym. We had no classes there. When they were dawned that we came in the wrong place, we were sent to Achinsk in two weeks. No classes were held in Achinsk either. We had lived in the premises of some vocational school for about 10 days. We slept on double-tiered bunks. Taking advantage of the absence of studies, I went to the library. I have always been a bookworm. At that time nobody knew what to do with us. We were just given food, which was poor to boot. Soon we took a train again and headed for Astrakhan [about 1300 km. to the south-east from Moscow]. It took us a long time to get there- about three weeks.

By that time mother had been evacuated in some small town in Siberia. Unfortunately, I do not remember its name. She managed to find me in some incredulous way. Father was drafted in the army in August. He was in the lines. Before war he worked in procurement ministry. He was drafted and given military uniform. In the front he dealt with procurement of forage. He had worked there for a year, but since he was rather old for military he was sent back to Moscow, to his previous job. After war father kept working for the ministry as a clerk. I saw him couple of times, since I rarely came to Moscow. Father died of infarction in 1968 and was buried in Moscow in Vostryakovskoye cemetery.

At that time naval academy named after Frunze was in Astrakhan. Naval academy from Leningrad was also evacuated there. Training course was founded by the academy, aiming at providing secondary education. We expeditiously finished that course and were sent to Baku [about 2000km. to the south from Moscow]. The academy named after Frunze had been relocated there by that time. It was the year of 1942, one year before Stalingrad battle 20. Again we had to take the vessel to go to Baku from Astrakhan by the sea. Baku as well as entire Caucasus was in the state of siege. We were distributed to marine schools. I wanted to enter naval academy named after Dzerzhinsky, Mechanical Engineering Department as I was one of the best students and had the choice where to go. I had studied there for two years- 1942, 1943.

When the war was unleashed, they started thinking what to do with the cadets of naval academy. After war the training for tankmen were trained for three months, pilots for half a year, platoon commanders were ‘baked’ for one month. They started making likewise experiments with the future officers of Russian navy , but then they thought that the navigator could be trained for no less than 3,5 years under condition of removing all minor subjects, and training duration for mechanics was to last 4 years. It turned out that some people were to fight, and others to study. Then the minister of the navy issued an order regarding cadet’s practice. In accordance with the order, cadets were assigned to battle navy ships in summer time and studied in winter. First, in summer I was having battles on anti-aircraft ship, which was in Kaspiy.

I was assigned to the ship, but I do not remember how my position was called. Our anti-aircraft ship practically remained uninvolved in military actions. It was the year of 1943 and the front shifted to the west. There was no fire or bombing in the vicinity of Kaspiy. Though when we were in Astrakhan , the aircrafts of the enemy were bombing and we were firing at them. In 1944 I continued studying in winter and in summer my fellows and I were sent the North Navy. There we took part in convoy operations for three months. We escorted the conveys of battle vessels, which came from the east via Vladivostok and from the west via Murmansk [about 1400 km. to the north from Moscow] from England and America with the lend-lease freight [lend-lease is the system of transfer (loan or lease) of weaponry, ammunition, strategic raw materials, provision etc.; supplies in terms of lend-lease were made by USA to the ally-countries on anti-Hitler coalition in the period of the second world war. The law on lend-lease was adopted by USA Congress in 1941] for our country.

Preliminary the law on lend lease was introduced in the USA and at the beginning of the World War Two and it was meant only for England, attacked by German aviation. Soon that law was also enforced on the territory of USSR. In accordance with lend-lease USSR was supposed to get ammunition, medicine and provision from the allies. USSR was in need for that. It is hard to put in words what a long and scary voyage those freights were supposed to go for. The convoy of ships to Russia was through Artic waters. There was another route via Vladivostok, but it was next to impossible to travel all that freight to the front through entire Siberia. The first caravan came in august 1941. First Hitler did not pay that much attention to the ships, he was more interested in the land.

Though after defeat in the vicinity of Moscow, Hitler started deploying new attack. In Berlin the attention was focused on polar convoys. They decided to activate the struggle and ‘processed’ convoys from water and air. The task for German navy in 1942 was to deprive Russian of communication and assistance from the allies up to complete isolation. That navy was deliberately directed to the coast of USSR by German command. Besides, there was Hitler’s order on complete extermination of Murmansk, the port where English and American vessels were unloaded. German aviation massively bombed the city and Murmansk was in shambles.

Our heroic Northern navy stood against German navy. Our navy was of small scale, but amazing people were there. They fought in Barents Sea and many of them perished in icy waters of the Arctic ocean. When my service in the Northern navy began, the situation there was very tough. A ‘pack’ of submarines was raving Northern waters, aircrafts armada was ransacking Russian polar space. At that time 50 cadets from our naval academy were sent to Northern front, and only 42 came back. It was a true war. I was assigned to the big chaser Shturman. I was an assistant to motor mechanic. Big chaser is the class of a ship. Big chaser and small chaser appeared during Great Patriotic War. These were wonderful battle ships. They were armed with the principle ‘ plenty is no plague’. Their purpose was to fight with the enemy’s submarines. Besides, they were equipped with a large number of artillery weapons and could attack any surface ships and land targets, fire from artillery weapons, mortar guns. They also had devices for landing paratroopers etc. Sometimes convoys were attacked by aviation, sometimes by submarines. The most dangerous were submarines. The above-mentioned eight people perished during attack of the submarines. There were depth bombs, which hydro acoustic device discerned the noise produced by submarines and attacked them. Those bombs were dropped with the help of release gear and blasted at a certain distance from the surface. We had anti-aircraft guns for defense from aviation attack.

The crew of our ship consisted of 40 people. I had no fear. Of course, you are not very pleased, when you know that there is a submarine under you. One of the peculiarities of war in the sea is that you do not see the adversary. You are not like a soldier who meets the enemy from face to face in combat. The Northern seas are very rigid even in summer, not to mention spring and fall. Some of the ships could not stand the ocean waves, which often smashed the boards. Decks gave under with the load of ice. Multi-ton load of ice, solidly frozen on the forecastles could keep the careen and the ship could upturn. As per order of the commander the entire crew was on the deck to cut away the ice. During the storm the deck was full with water. The wind made antennas bend. Any human-being could not go to the deck without a rope. Any person could be easily washed in the sea during the storm. There was not a single person who could be saved after he had been washed off by the. Polar water was a dangerous thing. It ‘scalds’ you and you are frozen to the marrow of the bone. Even nowadays the medicine might be helpless in rescuing people who happened to be in the polar water.

Our task was to meet convoys of the 72nd parallel, to the north from Polar Port, by the exit from Kola bay and escort them to Murmansk. It was the operational zone of Northern front. Soviet ships and aircrafts escorted ship convoy. We, the big chasers long with patrol and torpedo boats and aviation came first to make a preliminary search for German submarines on the adjacent territories to Kola Bay. Firefighters covered convoys. There were times, when Northern front placed 40 vessels for defense. When we were to meet convoy we took certain place in escort order. The captain said over ship radio: «Attention! It is the time for defense. Be vigilant on the observation point. Do not make any unnecessary movements on the deck.’ We escorted those convoys of ships, resisting attacks of the submarines and aviation of the adversaries. Germans took frenzied actions while attacking in the vicinity of Kola Bay, when the distance to Murmansk was inconsiderable.

There were several dozens of ships in the convoy and they were escorted by couple of military ships. It was a spectacular scene. There was not way to disguise things. For instance, we had to take part in escorting convoy JW-59 (33 merchant vessels, one salvage ship, 2 escort aircraft carriers, one cruiser and 18 more battle ships). The above-mentioned were covered by two groups of English navy ships consisting one battleship, 5 aircraft carriers, 3 cruisers, 14 destroyers and several frigates jointly with the group of vessels having been transferred to Soviet Union on account of future division of the fleet of the capitulated fascist Italy (battle ships and 8 destroyers), and 11 chasers fighting against torpedo boats, acquired from the USA in terms of lend-lease. The eighteen soviet vessels met them on the operational territory of the Northern Front. Soviet fire-fighters covered us safely in the air. Germans kept a track of us and we kept track of them. We were at war, trying to outsmart each other. We were lucky. None of the enemy’s submarines was able to attack us, we were not torpedoed or blown on the minefield. When our hydro acoustic devices tracked the enemy’s submarine, we were chasing it. If reconnaissance aircraft was noticed, our anti-aircraft gunners opened fire and Germans left.
I will tell you the episode about out fight with submarines.

One day during our escort, there was a rather strong storm, when we were approaching Kola Bay. When high waves split up, the sea discovered deck cabin of Hitler’s submarine. The reaction of the captain, coxswain, miners, machinists and other people on duty was fulminant and express. The commander ordered to start depth attack. The vessel made a steep turn being hit by a billow of water. The wave crushed windshields. People were knocked down. Any minute the miners could be washed off the ship, but it did not happen. They succeeded. Twenty one mines were dropped on enemy’s submarine and it was exterminated together with the crew. The convoy of vessels reached Murmansk port and got unloaded there.
The escort of convoy did not last long, for about two or three days. The ships were unloaded in Murmansk and then went back. We did not escort them on their way back. In the interim between escorts we were ransacking the waters of Barents Sea trying to find German submarines and we generally staying on the patrol.

Staying on the observation point was emaciating and exhausting. We were hectically tensed and we could not ease that strain. Even though it seemed calm at a certain point, anything could happen in a minute. There was no way one could leave the observation point. It was provided by the rules of escort to cut the routes by zigzags, make sharp tacks for the submarines of the enemy not to calculate a proper angle for attack.

We had pretty good living conditions. The nutrition of the navy was excellent. During the period of time, when half of the country was starving, the acting navy was fed very well. We lived on the ship. There are different kinds of ships. E.g. torpedo ships are not meant for living. They are meant only to put to the sea. The crew lived in the barracks. Submarines were not meant for dwelling either. Their crew lived on the coast. Big vessels as ours have the facilities for dwelling even when they are docked. The people on the observation points were dressed in felt boots and sheepskins. The crew got necessary dosage of vodka to get warm. British crew had worse uniforms, as it was not adapted for the Northern latitude. English thought grog to be unsuitable for such rigid conditions.

The crew was given very strong rum. We communicated with the members of English and American crews, we were escorting. They were our allies. The Northern navy was contacting the allies, unlike other navies. English people were rather reserved, but Americans vice versa, they got along with us as if we were their buddies. They hunkered for our rye bread as they found it very good. We met in Murmansk at dancing clubs. Murmansk was razed. The dancing parties were arranged in the basements. Those people who knew the language, were chatting with the foreigners. We got along. Nobody stood on our way and we could communicate openly. SMERSH 21 representatives were on our ship as well as at any other vessel, but they did not mind our communication as it was the wartime and there were other things to be focused on.

For me personally the war was still not over when the act on capitulation was signed by Germany on the 9th of May 1945. I take pride in the fact that I was still involved in military actions when the war was over. In 1947, when I graduated naval academy, I was assigned an officer to the 6th Krasnoznamennyi mine-sweepers division the Northern navy. Up to 1950 I had been dealing with postwar minesweeping. Germans obstructed Northern seaway with mines. Minefields were reaching New Land Island [about 2500 km. to the north-east from Moscow]. The Northern seaway was one of the most vital arteries of Soviet Union and it was practically closed down for navigation. All navigating vessels, including the merchant ones could only go to the areas, having been tested by mine-sweepers or being escorted by them. Our task was to find the mines and exterminate them with the help of mine-sweepers.

As a matter of fact, we knew the location of the mines. There were minefields maps. We were supposed to clear them. I had worked at the mine-sweeper АБ-117 for three years after war. Our division consisted of those kinds of vessels. Mine-sweepers belong to the class of vessels, which are supposed to sweep the mines. They are equipped with the sweep-nets, containing cutting jaws. Sweep-nets are located astern the mine-sweeper. Sweep-nets are steel hawsers, deepened to a certain distance from the water surface, containing cutting jaws, which cut anchor ropes, fastened to the mines. The mines are buoyant and float to the surface. Then they were fired by the guns. There were different kinds of mines. There is even a science, devoted to that. There are contact mines, i.e. containing a fuse, and if the vessels hits the fuse, the mine blows up together with the vessel. There are mines with electromagnetic fuses, which do not react to the vessel. Even when there is no collision with the ship, mine react to electromagnetic field, which any metallic body contains, the contact of fuses are sealed in and the mine blows up. There are also acoustic mines. They contain the fuses, which react to the noise, produced by the vessel. For them to blow up there should no collision either. When the fuse ‘hears’ the noise of the propeller, the contacts are sealed up and the mine blows up. Electromagnetic and acoustic mines appeared only during the war. These were perfect mines.

The mines, set up by Germans in 1942, 1943 contained those perfect fuses- acoustic and electromagnetic. That is why the mine-sweepers we worked on were acoustic and electromagnetic. Electromagnetic sweep nets were the cables, where electric current was passed. It produce much stronger magnetic field that the one of the mine-sweeper. That it is why a strong magnetic field was not under the mine-sweeper, but astern and the mines blew up astern. We skidded the so-called ‘clatter’ ( a drum, inside of which a pellet was installed, which produced the noise muffling the noise of propellers). Again the mines did not blow up under the vessel, but behind it. The mine-sweepers are designed in a special way. They sit shallow that is why they were not touched by ground mines. Some mine-sweeper had a powerful system of degaussing band, which was in antiphase with own magnetic field of the vessel, which made the value of the magnetic field of the vessel very inconsiderable. The worst thing was that the mines, installed by Germans had ‘ship counter’. We also had such mines.

The essence of that malicious device was that the ship could pass for couple of times and the mine would not be revealing. Let’s say on the fifth time (depending on the number of times) the circuit closed in, and the mine blew up. It was done to make mine-sweeping more complicated. The maximum number of times on the counter was 12. That is why we went back and forth for 12 times. To be on the safe side we made as many trips as it was max number programmed in the counter. We had dealt with that for 3 years. Our navy had stayed in the sea the longest. It was rather far away from the ship base and military ports: Polar in Barents Sea and Archangelsk in White Sea. Thus, one voyage in the Arctic lasted for three months. Then we came back in Archangelsk, where the ship went through maintenance repair and then again headed to the sea for three months. The total time spent in the Arctic was half a year. There was no fun in that. The vessels we had were made in America.

The designers of those vessels had no idea that they would make so many trips to Arctic waters. There were no cold storages, just household refrigerators. That is why for three months of the mine-sweeping we had eaten almost everything, and our meals consisted of dried potatoes and cabbage, dried meat and rusks. Vitamins were very of big help. Nonetheless, when I was to have my teeth pulled in Archangelsk (during navigation my teeth really hurt), the dentist did it so easily that I had such a strong beriberi. We were paid very well and it was the only good thing. I, mechanic of the mine-sweeper had such a salary that it was exceeding my combined income for the entire marine service, which was pretty long– 34 years. During Great Patriotic War I was awarded with Great Patriotic War Order of the First Class 22, medal for victory in the Great Patriotic War 23 and a number of other medals.

• After the war

In 1950 I was assigned to higher courses for the officers in Moscow. Having finished them I served as a military representative at torpedo building plant in Alma-Ata [about 3000 km to the east from Moscow]. After that I had served in the Baltic navy for 6 years, then at Black Sea navy for another 6 years. Then I came to Moscow and worked for four years in scientific research institute as a military representative having the rank of commodore. I resigned in 1974. I was clad in military uniform in 1940 and resigned in 1974.

My mother lived by herself in her apartment, where we used to live before war. During some period of time she worked in the kindergarten as a minder. In the early 1950s she retired and raised my kids. They often stayed with grandmother on the weekend. During the week she met them at school, took them home and helped them with their homework. She died in Moscow in 1974. She had a severe form of cancer. She was buried in Vostryakovskoye cemetery.

Besides, I am actively involved in literary activity. My first publication was made by house magazine in Astrakhan in 1942. My first book was published in 1968. About two dozens of my books were published. Most of them are poetry, but there is also prose and journalistic genre. I was admitted in the council of writers in 1973. I have been its member for about 30 years.

It is hard to say what I enjoyed more-literary activity or military service. There are totally different and discontiguous things. I am thankful for everything I came across with. I am grateful to my commanders. They were decent people and I joyfully recall my service, especially military mine-sweeping. I am not denying anything, though I understand that the very notion of war is atavistic as now the mankind is having such state- of- the- art armament that it would be enough for some insane to push two or three buttons to produce a massive explosion. I hope people will be reasonable enough not to do anything of the kind.

For many years I personally came across anti-Semitism for a number of times like any Jew, living in Russia. In 1951 I finished higher courses for the officers. Those very higher secretive courses held in the period of time when the doctors’ plot 24 was in the full swing. At that time there were repressions against Jews, both military and civil. In 1951 5 Jews were expelled right shortly after the course commenced. The quota must have been exceeded by admission. Only 2 Jews were left, and both of them were Muscovites. Upon finishing course, neither I nor my comrade were to stay in Moscow, but we were sent in godforsaken places. My further service was in Alma-Ata. There my little sonny was teased and called ”Little Zhyd” [editor’s note: ‘Zhydy’ – abusive nickname of Jews in the Soviet Union]. He came home sobbing. I slapped one of the parents of those kids. The regional engineer of state acceptance, my boss, called me on the carpet and started edifying me that our country was multinational and there was no anti-Semitism in it. When I was in the navy, I had never felt anti-Semitism during the entire period of my service. But when I was demobilized in 1974, I was not hire in any civilian enterprise. I understood why- because I was a Jew. Then for 17 years I was not permitted to go abroad since I had an access to secret documents during my service, though those people who performed my job later and had an access to even more sensitive documents were permitted to go abroad earlier than I was. Probably KGB deemed that there was nothing more dangerous as a Jew, who had an access to secret documents.

When a campaign on so-called ‘doctors-murderers’ was launched I understood that it was fabricated and had not a slightest doubt in that. I perceived that there was anti-Semitism behind it. It was adulterated to exterminate Jews. Zhabotinskiy 25 said: “We, Jews deserved the right to have rascals amongst ours”. I can only add: “We deserved the right to have blockheads amongst us”, as there were blockheaded Jews, who believed things published in papers.

Stalin’s death in 1953 was a joyful event for me. I would never forget the lamentation on the plant yard. I lived in Alma-Ata at that time. My wife and I came home, I took a bottle of wine and we gladly drank to the death oft that rapscallion.

I met my wife Maya Zeitman in 1949 during my vacation in Moscow. I had corresponded with her for a year and then in 1950 we got married. We had lived in perfect harmony for a long time. She followed me no mater to what village or city I was sent during my military career. She made a cozy and warm home in any place we happened to be. She gave me 2 sons, whom we raised honest and worthy people, the way we wanted. Maya was a very well-bread and intelligent person. In general we were soul mates. In every stage of my life she was there for me, understanding me and giving me a hand. We traveled a lot in the country and abroad, when I finally got a permit for that. We visited my cousins in France and Switzerland, our son in Israel.

Maya was born in Moscow in 1927. Like me she finished secondary school with honors, then Moscow Higher Technical School named after Bauman [Moscow High Technical School named after renowned revolutionary Nikolay Bauman, today it is called Technical Institute]. She worked as a designer, When we lived in Alma-Ata, she taught technical drawing and resistance of materials in the institute. She died in 2002. She was buried in Donskoye cemetery in Moscow.

My wife came of an interesting family. My father’s -in-law name was Isai Seitman. He was a famous artist. Some of his pictures are exhibited in Tretyakov gallery in Moscow [the word renown gallery, one of the main arts museum of Russia, located in Moscow]. Besides, he was a very good optician. He graduated from Moscow University 26, Physics Department. Then he taught physics. The first institution he worked for was Jewish commune-school in the vicinity if Moscow in Malakhovka. The interesting thing was the fact that my father-in-law could not teach Yiddish, and the students gladly agreed to have classes in Russian. In that school drawing classes were taught by one of the greatest well-known artists Marc Chagall. 27. They did not meet as Marc Chagall had left work one year before my father-in-law came to work. Jewish commune school was founded in 1920 in Malakhovka (Moscow neighborhood) for Jewish orphans. Isai Seitman was raised in common Jewish family in the town Alexandria, located in the South of Ukraine, Kherson province [about 1100 km. to the south from Moscow]. Since childhood his artistic talent had been noticed. When he was a lyceum student, he went to the school founded by lady of the manner. She graduated from Arts Academy in Saint Petersburg and founded arts school in Alexandria. Religion was alien to my parents-in-law. They belonged to those Jews, who did not mind assimilation to the soviet regime. Everything connected with the Jewry went back to their childhood and adolescence. They live with other things, they breathed another air- international and communistic. I father-in-law was interested in Jewry merely because very many great artists were Jews and Jewish theme was reflected in their works. Neither my mother-in-law nor my father-in-law denied that their Jews, when the subjects of art was broached. In this respect they felt proud and worthy. The notion of internationalism was inherent to them. It was in their blood. They were true representatives of intelligentsia. My father-in-law was fluent in French, could read German, my mother-in-law Sofia Seitman graduated from Moscow University, chemistry department. She had taught chemistry in Moscow institutions of higher education. She was of noble-minded person with great heart.

My first son Victor was born in 1951. My second son’s name is Leonid. He was born in 1956. Victor has lived in Israel since 1986. Victor graduated from polygraphic institute. He worked as a polygraphist for a while, then he started dealing with books in Israel. Son Leonid lives with me in Moscow. He finished arts school and is currently working as an artist in Moscow art gallery. He definitely followed in the footsteps of his grandfather, my wife’s father. Children identify themselves as Jews. My wife and I always told their children that they were Jews. We talked about Jewry and about our Jewish problems. My son, who is living in Israel, the three of his children are true Jews. My Israeli grandsons’ names are Innesa, Dmitriy and Sofia. My son’s wife lights candles on Sabbath. Their family observes kashrut and that is it. They are not Orthodox Jews. My son drives on Saturday and he does not consider it a sin. My daughter-in-law talks on the phone on Saturday and does not reckon it a sin either. My granddaughter Innesa is a very gifted girl. She studied at Moscow Literary Institute, Translation Department. She finished four courses. Now she is studying at Jerusalem University, Philology Department. She got bachelor’s degree some time age. Now she is going for masters. She is fluent in Russian, Ivrit and English.  She is not like grandpa, who speaks a little bit German and English (with the help of body language).

My son Leonid has two children – daughter Svetlana and son Yuri. The are expecting the third child. Younger son became Orthodox. He is religious and he strictly observes all the rites. All my grandchildren (his children) are baptized. His family goes to the church. The family of my son Victor, living in Israel, disapproves of the baptism of Leonid’s family. Being baptized and Christian Leonid still identifies himself as Jew. The fact that Leonid and his family became Christians was calmly accepted by me. Everybody has the right to profess the religion of his choice.

I identify myself as Jew. If I address to the Creator, I picture him in Jewish apparel, though in the religion of our ancestors he is invisible and immaterial. I am proud to belong to the peoples, who gave 10 commandments to the modern civilization. Only ignoramuses and rascals can deny them.

I found perestroika 28 taken place in my country, positive. No matter what, all things incurred by perestroika were for the better as the system which could not survive, collapsed. It is strange that the system based on determent and fraud has existed for such a long time. Perestroika merely goaded the process, which was to happen. Another thing, we were lead by famous Bolshevik refrain “We will raze the world of violation…”, we insanely exterminated every we had. The collapsed systems had its accomplishments as well. We had a unique education, healthcare and recreation systems. But we contrived to do make it in accordance with the European norms and completely destroy it. My deceased wife used to say: “Knowing the depravity of the society, its existing ambiguousness, we have not made any steps to prevent embezzlement and plunder, though these who were brewing perestroika’ were not the fools As a result, you know what we got. All, having been gained within decades due to horrible exploitation (any remuneration for work was peanuts), we allowed to be so audaciously plundered. Unfortunately it is a true fact. I take it philosophically. There was a large-scale social experiment in Russia. We started building something we did not know from normal economic development. Officially it was called “From Capitalism to Socialism”. There were not precedents in the world. Thus the first time in the world Russia is going from socialism to capitalism. As a result, losses are inevitable.

I also would like to say on the state of the modern Russian navy. I think our navy is not in the best position. Though, I am prone to think that every powerful state should have something to be respected for by other countries. One of the things to be respected for is the navy. It should look nice, be spectacular and powerful. Nowadays our navy cannot be compared to the one it used to be. Navy is cost-consuming. Battleship is outrageously expensive. The expenses for building of any aircraft-carrier should be provided in the state budget, and our country does not have such money, and not expected to have in the short run.

I cannot picture how everything can be rebuilt when the foundation of the country – the social base- is exterminated. How can be plans realized without material and cultural values? That social base is made up by tens of thousands of nurses, teachers, librarians and a dozen of other social important professions, which are so vital for bringing up children and for life in general.

• Glossary:

I, Emiliya Israilovna Shulman was born on September 18th,

1931 in the city of Chechersk in the Gomel region of Belorussia.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

My family background

My ancestors, both on my father’s and my mother’s sides, were all from Belarus, from small Jewish settlements. Chechersk was one such settlement. It was a small, comfortable and attractive town, located on the banks of the Checheri River that flowed. Chechersk was considered a Jewish settlement because very many Jews lived there, especially before the war. Conversation at every step on the street, on the benches and in the market was held in Yiddish. This was especially noticeable in the market, where everyone talked quite loudly. This gave one the feeling that only Jews lived in the city, but there lived, of course, Belarussians as well. Russians were less prevalent.

Chechersk is located 60 km from the railroad, but only 17 km from the Kiev-Gomel-Leningrad highway that we called "Bolshak." However the main connection was by the Sozh River. Before the war boats traveled by the river and timber was rafter. The Sozh got shallower and the bigger boats stopped, although the timber rafter continued. Small crafts, that connected Chechersk with other Jewish "settlements" and Gomel, also continued to run. During my childhood it was a very clean, comfortable and pretty town with a wonderful climate. It was possible to go swimming in the river and to fish. In the woods there were many mushrooms and berries. All our relatives and acquaintances went there to vacation in the summer, as well as the relatives and acquaintances of other Jewish families in the city.

If one comes down from the Lesion Mountains, Chechersk would be visible like on a palm; as if it was located in a cup. To the left and right collective farm gardens were spread out. The road led to the center of the city. It was the only paved road. When the wind blew it would raise dust clouds on the roads. In the center of the city were the police, izpolkom [local administrative committee], club, library and two schools, as well as the agricultural school. The city also contained a wine factory, smokehouse, slaughterhouse, a cloth factory, the last being famous in the surrounding villages and beyond. The houses were one story and made of wood. There were a few stone houses (owned by merchants before the revolution) in which state organizations were located. The houses were drowning in gardens, having residents, and vegetable plots, maintaining herds: cows and chickens (Belarussian families also had pigs), but these were mostly those who lived in the sloboda  and Podol izpolkom [local administrative committee]. In the center of the city gardens were very small, mostly the houses were surrounded by gardens and, before each house was a small plot sown with flowers. Each house had a porch where adults and children would gather in the evenings. It wasn’t done to enter the house during the summer. There was no water piping in the city. The water was collected at ‘kolonki’ (water pumps). All comforts were “in the yard”. Each house had to have a stove, from which the heater ran. No matter the size of the house, it had to have separate sleeping quarters. The bedroom could consist of one bed and a chair. If there was a dresser, that was already a sign of wealth. Furniture was homemade. The central room of the house was called the ‘zal’ (room) and it could be either 8 square meters or 28 square meters, but it was necessary. The barn and cellar were located in the yard. The residents traveled by horse. The only cards were state-owned, transport and light ‘Emki.’ It was so before and after the war.

There was a large city park in Chechersk. Elderly residents said that it had been laid out with very interesting and rather rare sorts of trees. The park broke off at the Checher, a tributary of the Sozh. It was the place to meet people. Before the war there were two stages there. On one, amateur and out of town artists (from Gomel) would perform. On the other was a dance floor. After the war the dance floor was still whole, but the Germans burned the amateur theater stage and after the war it wasn’t rebuilt.

The entrance to Chechersk- a mountain- was named Zamkovoi [Zamok means castle in English] because the end of the central street was a ratusha [tower]. Older residents said that it was a watchtower, surrounded with defensive buildings for the defense of Chechersk against attacks. The ratusha was ancient. During the war it didn’t burn down. Besides the center, Chechersk had Podol, where mostly Jews lived, and two slobody. To the right of the ratusha, the road led to the Jewish cemetery, after which was the village of Edinstvo in which there was a collective farm. Mostly Belarussians lived in this neighborhood.

The second sloboda led to the ferry on the river Checher. The main employment of these residents was timber rafting and ship loading. There was also a timber mill and a handmade furniture factory where they made tables, stools, etc. In Podol lived mostly Jews -- craftsmen. The Jewish bathhouse was also located here. There were two for women and one for men. Next to the banya, in a large wooden house, lived the Jewish family, Plotnikov, which had many children. Many headed there after the banya, including my sister and myself. They had a very large central room or ‘zal’, with a bad floor (after the war it was difficult to repair), but there was a large table with a samovar on it. Such tea as there is now was not for sale in those days, and everyone drank tea made of dried herbs. One could always sit with the Plotnikovs, to relax after the banya and drink tea. They were very hospitable people.

One of the Plotnikov daughters worked in the library of the party office of the executive committee. Her nickname was “horse head.” She was not beautiful, but very kind. When we were finishing 10th grade and needed to find specialized literature (especially in history) that wasn’t available anywhere except at the party office, she would whisper to us when we could come by (officially this was forbidden) and she would sit up late with us. She wasn’t offended by her nickname and always made jokes about herself.

There was a band of Jewish boys in Podol that included my cousin Grisha (Uncle Miron’s stepson). They didn’t study well and didn’t act much better, therefore they didn’t study with us, but in a village across the Checher. I don’t know when they studied because they mostly wandered around Chechersk, but they did receive certificates of graduation from 7th grade. They didn’t want to study any further and they became tailors, joiners and cobblers, like their fathers. One even became a tractor operator. Grisha was drafted into the army and there learned to be a chauffeur. He was a fan of Zenith Leningrad, although while in Chechersk he knew nothing of football. He was happy when he managed to get a job working as a chauffeur for them. He drove them around in the private bus for a few years and they found him a room in a communal apartment in Leningrad.

In Chechersk, as in any Jewish ‘settlement’ we had our own famous people. I remember one such person very well. He was of small size and the whole family was focused on him. My grandmother called the family ‘kuropatok’ (chicks). Zilberg was a very talented musician even though he didn’t know musical theory. He organized an orchestra that played various musical instruments, whatever was to be found. This included a Belarussian buben [tambourine]. They were invited to weddings and other events, including funerals. These weren’t Jewish funerals and music is never part of Jewish ceremony. One day, this was in late fall, some party official died. Zilberg was invited, with the orchestra, to play at the funeral. However, before funerals one isn't fed. He had a large family where no one ever had enough to eat and his orchestra was made up of poor Jewish boys. The day was very cold with wet snow. The roads were bad, they had ‘hudaye’ (thin) shoes on, and the cemetery was rather far away. They were freezing, hungry and weren’t given anything to drink. And suddenly, instead of the funeral march, Zilberg and his crew struck up ‘Karapet moi bednii ’ [very famous folk song in pre-war Russia]. How they saved themselves from the furious relatives I can only guess, but this did help them. The nickname “karapet” stuck to Zilberg until the end of his days. Even after this incident they were, of course, invited to funerals - it was the only orchestra in town. But there was no longer a need to warn him.

There wouldn’t have been such interesting evenings in Chechersk’s club without him. He organized artistic improvisations. It would have been difficult to imagine him without the club, just as the club without him. Their house was on the border between Chechersk itself and Podol. The house was small, and how they all fit into it, I don’t know -- there were very many of them. It was, however, a very warm and friendly family, and we all helped them as much as we could.

We also had a very flamboyant photographer, Portnov. He always took several frames. Each time he said, “Attention! Shooting!” Then he would disappear into his room, come back spread out his hands and say, “Ruined!” And everything was repeated from the beginning, sometimes five times.

Growing up

Next to our school was the wine factory. The gate was always open and we loved to run in there during breaks. Large pots of cranberries stood there and we would take those cranberries. At school we didn’t’ so much eat the berries as spill them all over. Grapes didn’t grow in Chechersk and therefore the wine at the factory was made from berries (raspberries, blackberries, wild and domestic strawberries) and apples. I remember one story. There was a wine contest of Belarussian wines in Minsk and some of the product of the Chechersk factory had to be sent. A man named Lusik Berin was sent. I don’t remember who he was, either a technician or an assistant in storage. He didn’t realize that he was to bring wines of different sorts. He took one sort of wine, many different labels and headed off to Minsk. When he got there and realized that he was supposed to present examples of different wines to the committee, he bought bottles, poured his wine into the bottles and stuck different labels on each bottle, and handed them all in. The man had a sense of humor, and when he learned that the Chechersk wine factory was awarded a place in one category of wine he asked why the cranberry wine didn’t get an award. He was told that there was something not quite right. He said: “Very interesting. All the wine was from one barrel so how could one be a little off and the other not?” He was Jewish, a joker.

I remember a few more habits, for example the washing of laundry. In the winter we washed clothes in a special way. Dirty laundry was loaded into a large barrel mixed with ashes. Then large stones were heated in the oven and dropped into the barrel. This was called “buchit’ clothing”. When this laundry had been left for the allotted time, it was taken out, hung on a yoke and taken to the “pelka”. The pelka is a hole that was made in the ice of the Checher and where the laundry was rinsed in ice-cold water. It came out very clean. We didn’t iron our clothes with an iron, but with valik. This was an invention that was made up of two parts. One part was circular and resembled a rolling pin that one rolls dough out with. The second valik was large, with a handle and stripes were cut into it. All the laundry was put on the table and wrapped onto the first part while the second ironed the cloth. I, myself, often did this. I am talking about linen cloth. It could only be ironed in this way. After the war we already had irons with charcoal, but out of laziness we continued to iron with the ‘valik.’

We children also loved the city fair. There were two of them, spring and fall. The bazaar square was very large. There were many wares and all sorts of delicious things. I remember that geese and chickens were bought by the bunch. I also remember how my grandmother would choose her chickens. I don’t know how polite this will sound, but I have to tell you. She would take the chicken in her hand, lift up its tail, blow and by some telltale signs, would choose some while refusing others. Several chickens were taken at once, and then when needed they were taken to a special butcher, such as our neighbor Faberov. He would cut the chicken and then it could be used as food.

I also remember how we conserved cabbage. Usually, for this kind of work, we would invite women form the Belarussian sloboda. Lots of cabbage was salted, several barrels, and then stood in the cellar. The women would rip up the cabbage, with much laughter and many songs. In general Belarussian women did many jobs in Jewish homes. Our housekeeper Akulina was also from sloboda. I don’t remember any family in which there was a Jewish housekeeper or nanny. It just wasn’t done. We, however, did live very happily with the Belarussians. Akulina’s brother, when the war started and our house burned down, wanted to take us in himself, and my grandmother kept up a very warm relationship with her Belarussian friends from Zagore until the end of her days. Everyone respected the traditions of the other. Alas, now all has changed.

There was a synagogue and Jewish community in the city, which my grandmother Mera attended. A Jewish cemetery also existed, where our relatives that had perished in the pogrom in the village of Zagore, Chechersk uyezd [district] in May of 1922, including my grandfather Borukh, mother’s father, were buried. In the city Jewish traditions were observed, especially among the older generations. All Jews celebrated Passover. Circumcision was mandatory for Jewish boys. Weddings were Jewish. There were no mixed marriages: they appeared much later, after the war. There was a stratification of the population.

The “elite” lived in the center of the city: white collar workers at governmental institutions and the more prosperous Jews. Jewish workers lived in Podol. Podol was spread along the ravine through which flowed a stream that emptied into the Checheri. Several houses were located right on the edge of the ravine, but most were built on the spot where the ravine met the plains. There lived the shoemakers, tailors, hairdressers, carpenters, furniture makers and those who made chalk for whitewashing. Professions were handed down from father to son. There were very poor families, as well as more prosperous ones. However, if a Jewish girl from the “center” married a boy from “Podol”, it was considered an unequal marriage, and her parents were displeased.

From childhood I had heard of the tragedy that had taken place in our family before my birth, in 1922. However, I only learned the full details in 1970 from Mikhail Davidovich Bolshun, the son of grandmother’s brother David, when I was visiting relatives in Pyatigorsk. Evidently it was too difficult for both Mother and Grandmother to speak of it.   

In the spring of 1922 the Savitzky brothers’ band, former timber traders, tried to leave for Poland. Along the way the bandits would suddenly attack a village and knife the Jews with howls of, “Yid! Give us a grosz (Polish penny)!” They fell upon the village of Zagore on May 2nd.

On the eve of the pogrom, there were many guests at Grandfather Borukh’s house. Relatives had arrived from the Caucasian mountains where there was a drought and famine. With then was a young couple – bride-, and groom-to-be. Early that morning, Grandmother, along with her niece Hannah, David Bolshun’s daughter, and Miron’s wife left for the woods to “koponichit’ lyado” (to prepare a new field for planting) and to collect strochka and morels, spring mushrooms. When they were preparing to return home, Hannah noticed horsemen on the road. She said to Grandmother, “Aunt Mera! Here come riders. One of them is on your horse. And there’s the cart full of things.” The women sensed the threat and hid themselves, not going on the road.

The horsemen rode past. The women ran to the village. Already on the way they could hear screams and weeping. Around the house there was no one. The bandits had frightened the neighbors, Belarussian peasants. No one had come to the aid of the victims because the pogromists had promised to kill all those who helped the “Yids.”

When the women opened the door to the house, blood trickled out in rivers. The bandits had beaten to death with muzzle-loading guns 17 people --13 Jews and 4 Belarussians – “kombednoti” (poor people). The women were raped before they were killed, even nine-year-old Fira, Mama’s younger sister. Hannah and Miron’s first-born son, who was nine-months at that time, was put in a sitting hen’s basket and beaten with the gun, strokes in the form of a cross. Grandfather lay wrapped in the talith. He was murdered last. Before his death he prayed, watching the tortured death of his closest relatives.

The first to come and help was Uncle Misha Bolshun who had spent the night in a neighboring village. He returned to Zagore in the morning and instantly sent his Belarussian friends to warn the Jews in the village of Belyaevki. Thanks to the warning, those managed to organize defenses and didn’t let the bandits into the village. The band was forced to turn off the fields and get to the Polish borders through the woods.

Most of the peasants were terribly frightened which didn’t help their suffering neighbors. Grandmother and uncle Misha loaded the bodies of the murdered onto two carts themselves. In accordance to Jewish tradition the men and women were laid separately. In the darkness of despair, Grandmother harnessed a cow to the second cart. Thus they left in order never to return. On the road to Chechersk a crowd met them. All already knew of the tragedy and showed true solidarity. Among the group were my mother and her brother Monei. They were studying in Chechersk and stayed for the holidays with their Uncle Abram, grandfather’s brother. This saved their lives.

Miron was a member of the group of Chekists [members of the internal police, a precursor to the KGB ] that organized the pursuit of the bandits. They found the band. Under the demands of the residents, they were given the death sentence and shot. The victims of the pogrom were buried in Chechersk. Anna Vladimirovna Novikova, Hannah and Miron’s granddaughter, their daughter Sofia’s daughter, found a photo of the farewell to the victims in the archives in Minsk. She sent the photograph to my sister Anna in Gomel who, after a request from our American relatives, sent the photo to Denver. From there a copy was sent to me. In this convoluted way that photograph came to me and now to you. That was a documentary witness to the tragedy. In the foreground on boards lie the bodies of the cruelly tortured victims. Their death united those who came to display their grief and decisiveness in revenging the murderers. Above the body of Grandfather Borukh sat Grandmother in mourning (first row from the bottom, first from the left), next to her sat her children: daughter Galya (my Mama), and son Emmanuil. In the second row from the bottom, the third man from the right (with a beard) is David Bolshun, next to him with her head bowed is his daughter Galya. Miron and Hannah aren’t in the photo. Hannah lay paralyzed and Miron had left to apprehend the bandits.
Another account of these happenings was given by another of Hannah and Miron’s granddaughters (their son Yakov’s daughter), Anna Piotrovskaya, who now lives in Tver. She wrote her father’s story word for word when she was 15. According to her, she knew little, at the time, of the persecution of our nation, and this history was written down in order not to forget the details. Here is the record:

“At that time in Belarus there were many bands, including nationalistic ones. One of them was the band of the Savitzky brothers. The Savitzkys were Polish gentry. The elder was a true monster, evil, savage, without pity. His wife Yadviga was the same as her husband. The younger Savitzky was faint-hearted, completely in the power of his older brother, obeying his commands without question. There were about 40 cutthroats in the band, soulless, evil and whose sense were clouded by the glitter of gold and the need for profit which they obtained through robbery and violence. The band eliminated Jews in a brutal manner: demanding gold, they tortured the members of the homeowner’s family in front of him. There was no pity for the elderly or children.
 
This is what happened in Zagore in 1922. That day, when most of the residents were working in the forest (including Miron), the Savitzkys came into the village. In Grandfather David’s house, was Grandmother Klara Bolshun, Miron’s mother-in-law, with the 9-month-old baby, Miron’s first-born Yosif. After not getting any money from Grandmother, as there simply wasn’t any, the bandits chopped off Yosif’s head with and axe, in front of her, then they hit Grandmother in the stomach. In other houses the attacks on the residents were just as cruel. In Borukh Kosoi’s home, his daughter was raped, the household members were killed and the males were violently attacked. Borukh prayed and wept, he was tortured last. Miron said that there was absolutely nothing of worth for them to take. Everyone lived on their own work.

So, when Miron and Hannah returned from the forest (Miron was the head of a brigade in the woods while Hannah and Aunt Mera worked to make clearings for sowing), and came up to the house, they saw in the window a basket that had held a laying hen, but now held the expressionless head of their child. Hannah’s legs deserted her and she was instantly paralyzed. She lost her ability to speak. They carried her into the house between the two of them. Miron announced for all to hear that he would find the bandits and kill them with his own hands. And he left on their trail. The Savitzkys had done as follows: they robbed the post-office, tortured and killed the elderly postman. It was a miracle that his 15-year-old grandson who was present during the execution was left whole. He told Miron that the Savitzkys had commandeered a cart and left for the river in a great hurry.

Miron rode to the river. He was lucky because the man who ran the ferry, shaking from what he had just gone through, said that the bandits were planning to get to Kiev. He heard this when the brothers, not afraid to speak in front of him, had been discussing their further route. The elder Savitzky ordered his brother to kill the ferryman. After going into the woods to deal with the ferryman, the younger brother couldn’t handle the man’s pleading, pitied him and let him go. This, in the long run, led to the damnation of his brother.

And so, all roads lead to Kiev. In Kiev, in the Cheka at the time, worked a detective Legre (or Lengre, I can’t answer for the exact name). Miron came to him and told him what happened in Zagore. They then began to search for the Savitzkys. It seemed that they had stopped in the most expensive hotel in Kiev, and all three were staying in one room. They only left the room 3 times a day, armed to the teeth, including Yadviga, they went down to the restaurant to eat.

The detective, for the longest time, couldn’t think of a way to arrest the bandits, take them alive, so that they couldn’t start a shoot out and injure innocent bystanders. He was also afraid that they would unexpectedly hide the last of their travel to Poland. The detective’s plan was such: the trio always ate together, heading single file down a long corridor. The windows on the corridor were curtained. Behind the curtains Legre hid the Chekist trap and captured all three.

Miron attended the trial. The elder Savitzky conducted himself defiantly and impertinently. He blamed his brother for his capture, accusing him of faint-heartedness, saying that he had destroyed them all. He asked for permission to say some last words. Upon being given permission, he admitted the crimes and answered the prosecutor. He also said that Yadviga was completely innocent. The brothers and many members of their band that had been rounded up were shot, and Yadviga was given 25 years. The elder Savitzky was shot right in the courtyard before the courthouse. The large crowd of people was barely contained. They demanded Savitzky for themselves to deal with. In total, out of three families -- Bolshun, Kosoi and Maron -- 22 people were cruelly tortured and murdered.

For a long time Hannah lay paralyzed, deprived of speech. She couldn’t be cured. An acquaintance told Miron that he knew of a witch doctor that might be able to cure Hannah. Miron put Hannah in a cart and took her to the doctor. The doctor said that he would try to return her to life, but asked Miron not to enter the house so that he wouldn’t hear. Miron sat on the porch and waited for a long time. Finally his patience snapped and he tried to enter. However the door was well locked and Miron, even with his great strength, couldn’t open it. Then he heard a soul-rending cry. Hannah was calling for his help. Miron went mad, destroyed the door and suddenly realised: “she spoke!” He came in, Hannah was sitting up, and she left the house on her own.”

The victims of the pogrom were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Chechersk. The government paid for two memorials on their graves. The Germans destroyed the cemetery during the war, but after the war we found their place of burial: a row of birches had been planted between the two long graves and the trees were saved. When my mother left Chechersk, with the money that we received from the sale of the house, we put up two memorials of sandstone and wrote a modest epitaph: “perished during the pogrom on the second of May, 1922.” They say that the monuments are now in bad shape as limestone crumbles quickly.

My grandmother on my mother’s side, Mera, couldn’t live in her house in Zagore after the pogrom. She didn’t enter the house, not even to take some things, and slept in the attic of the barn. She sold her house to the government and it housed an elementary school for a long time -- until the Chernobyl disaster of 1986. After Chernobyl all the residents of the village of Zagore were evacuated due to the high levels of radiation. They say that Grandfather Borukh’s house still stands but has long been uninhabited.

With the help of relatives, Grandmother harvested the crop, sold it, and on the money from the house and the rye she bought a house in Chechersk. This was so that Galiya and Monya could continue their studies. In our family no one liked to remember the tragedy they lived through, but I remember that in our house in Chechersk there never were any flowers. Grandmother couldn’t look at them because at the time of the pogrom her flowers were sprayed with blood.

Life worked out in such a way, that of my grandparents I only know my mother’s mother Mera Dveira Kosaya well. She lived with us a long time. My mother’s parents, Borukh Kosoy and Mera Dveira Kosaya, lived in the village of Zagore, Chechersk province, Gomel region until 1922. Grandmother Mera was born in 1890 in Chechersk. Grandfather was born in the 80th year of last century (1880), but I have no information as to where he was born. My mother’s parents were religious people -- their native tongue was Yiddish. They observed Jewish traditions, kept up a prayer chapel where the local Jewish community met. Grandfather read the prayers himself.

There were flowers from Palestine in the house. In front of the house there was a garden, yard and many flowers. They had two horses, two cows and chickens. Grandmother was a strong-willed and powerful woman. She took care of the house and raised three children: my mother Galya, her sister Fira and brother Emmanuil. In addition, Grandmother dabbled in arable farming. She (with the help of relatives) cleared a piece of woodland and planted rye. Grandmother was very beautiful and had a reputation as a good housewife. She was widowed at the age of 32 and had suitors, but she turned them all down, saying that she could never find another such father for her children. She always trusted only in her own hands, I don’t remember her not working.

Grandmother was very kind, social and hospitable. “One needs to offer only the best,” she would say. There were always visitors in the house. For many years her former neighbors in the village would come to visit her, bringing gifts from the country and staying the night. Grandmother forgave them for their traitorous weakness during the frightening minutes of the pogrom. She showed her grief to no one, meeting all with a joke and never thrusting her opinion on anyone. She was religious, went to synagogue, and followed Jewish traditions, but didn’t demand this of Papa, who was a party worker. There was kosher food in the house, we baked matza, butchered the chickens at the shochet’s, but we also celebrated Soviet holidays. Of the religious holidays, we always celebrated Jewish Passover. I remember that on Passover the food was very delicious. Grandmother also baked very tasty hamantashen (gomentashin) [triangles of pastry filled with poppy seeds baked on Purim]. My mother-in-law in Leningrad also baked gomentashes, but not only on holidays. Grandmother said that to bake them on days other than holidays was a sin.
Grandmother was loved by everyone. On Sundays there would be a knock at the door and the question, “Does Mera Zagorskaya live here?” That was how everyone called Grandmother. They would bring her either berries, or baskets of mushrooms, bacon, or eggs. And she would give back all that she could. I remember one such incident. It was after the war. I was already studying at the university. Uncle Monya had given me the first perfume of my life. It was called ‘Elada’. Grandmother’s friend from Zagore was staying over. After a few days I noticed that very little was left in the bottle. I asked Grandmother if she had spilled some out by accident and she answered me, “I never thought that I’d raise such a ‘zleibnei’ (greedy) granddaughter. Girls of my century didn’t have such things, so let her smell it for once in her life.” Her wise advice for the future was as follows, “Go, my dear child and don’t get lost. Pick the straight road.”

Grandmother was with us during the evacuation. After the war, when Mama was imprisoned, she lived in Chechersk with Anya, my younger sister, (I was already studying at university). It was very difficult for her, but she never complained.

Our first home in Chechersk was destroyed by arson. The second burned down in a fire that caught several homes in Chechersk (the houses had been made of wood). Then Papa was given an apartment (half a house) by his work place and there I was born. This apartment also burned down, during the bombings of the war. After the war Mother’s brother Monya bought us a very small house in front of which were a little garden and a barn. We rented the barn to some organization. They kept their horses there and in return helped us with firewood. Even thought the house was small, there was a bus stop nearby. People would come asking to rest, to feed their children or to sleep over. No one was ever turned away, neither Jews nor Belarussians.

During the war the Germans burned the synagogue and afterwards it wasn’t rebuilt. The Jewish community gathered at someone’s house as a prayer chapel. Our neighbor Faberov, who was a shochet, and my uncle Miron, my father’s brother, were the leaders. Miron was invited to all the “brit milas” [circumcisions]. Jews gathered and prayed. My grandmother also attended the prayer chapel. Grandmother died in 1956 and was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Chechersk.

Grandmother’s brother David Bolshun also moved to Chechersk after the pogrom of 1922, in which he lost his wife. He worked in the timber mill and timber rafting. He didn’t marry again. He had three children who were already adults. His son Mikhail graduated from the agricultural school and was a winemaking expert. He lived with his wife in Pyatigorsk and worked as the head engineer of raw materials at a wine factory in Bishtau. His wife was a highly qualified (Party conference level) stenographer. They had no children. Galiya Bolshun was an accountant and before the war she worked in Chechersk. During the evacuation she, at first, was with us in Dourine and Moskalenka. Then she worked as an accountant in a Kazakh village. Grandfather David first stayed with us in Moskalenka, then Galiya took him in with her in the village. There he died in 1948. Misha Bolshun served in the army for the entire war. After the war he took Galiya to Minvodei. She lived in Zheleznovodsk. Grandmother Mera and David had other relatives. They lived in Belarus before the war, but I neither knew them, nor remember them.

In Zagore Grandfather Borukh worked in the timber industry, travelling and marking trees for felling and transport on the Sozh river. This work he shared with my father’s brother Miron. My grandmother’s brother David Bolshun also worked in forestry. They also lived with their families in Zagore. Grandmother and Grandfather had a large house that grandfather’s brothers had helped him build before they left for America. Grandfather Borukh's brothers, as I have already said, left for America, but one of them, Abram, returned. He died in Chechersk before the war. His son Naum was one of the first people in the Komsomol. Before the war he worked in the CK VLKSM  [Central Committee of the all-Union Leninist Communist Youth League] of Belarus, and during the war he was the assistant head of scouting for the partisan headquarters. After the war he was the head of Belbitsnaba (consumer services in Belarus) in the Ministry of Consumer Industry of BSSR [Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic]. He lived in Minsk. His son Wilem is now in America with his family. They live in Denver and we correspond with them. When one of them died, they were buried according to Jewish tradition. When my grandmother passed away Mama buried her in a grave, but observed all other traditions. How and what to do was explained to her and she followed them all (sat on the floor, didn’t turn on lights, etc). At that time most of these habits were kept up by the older generations.

I didn't know my grandparents on my father's side at all. I can only note their birthdays roughly: Grandfather Mikhail Maron - 1870, Grandmother Ester Riva Maron - 1880. I have no information about their birthplaces. I heard this story about them from my parents. Grandfather was of the well-to-do timber industrialists. He fell deeply in love with Ester Riva, who worked in their family as a servant. She was poor and without parents, but very beautiful. She was tall, stately blonde with wavy hair in a long braid. In addition she sang beautifully, but of marriage there was no question. Mikhail lost his head, stole the cashbox from his father and fled with Ester across the border. When they had spent all the money, they returned and he married her. His family disowned him from their home forever. His parents told him, "If you get hungry, maybe songs will replace your bread." They were poor, but loved each other very much and were happy. They lived in Cherven, a little town in Belarus. Grandfather Mikhail worked in timber. He died young of tuberculosis in the end of the 1920's. Grandmother Ester was a housewife who ran the household and raised the children. When her husband died she was left alone with eight children. However her family was very close and they all helped each other and "rose up the social ladder."

The children moved away, Miron and Israil (my father) lived in Chechersk, Alexander and Yevdokia in Leningrad. Evsei lived in Minsk region, Zalman and Sarah stayed in Cherven with their families. Grandmother Ester had no permanent place of residence: she lived with each of her children in turns. During the war she was evacuated to Kazan with Evsei and Miron's families. She passed away there at the end of the war, around 1943-44.

My father's parents were religious. Their native language was Yiddish. Those of their children who stayed in Cherven also, as they followed Jewish traditions. Miron also followed some of the traditions (according to my scattered memories), but those who became komsomolki and party "chieftains", as well as the younger generation, already, of course, assimilated and became atheist.

My father, Israil Mikhailovich Maron, was born in 1905 in the “settlement” of Cherven, in Belarus. He had a secondary education, finishing school in Chechersk. He was known for his unusual charm and desire to help any person in need. He might even take off his last shirt. He was a singer and dancer, taking part in a drama circle before the war (until 1939). For his role as Platon Krechet in Minsk he received first prize in a folk art contest: a bicycle. He read Apukhtina beautifully, sang songs, and was a very wise and sociable person, loved by women. He was the representative for the first agricultural commune in the village of Edinstvo, Chechersk region, and was injured by bandits.

In the end of the 1920’s the peasants sent him to Kirov for help, probably because he dealt with agricultural machines, which were made in Petersburg. He came to the audience and directed the conversation so well that Kirov offered him a place in Petersburg. My father refused, however, saying that he was needed more in the village. Kirov fulfilled the peasants’ request and even helped my father out in his personal affairs.

The fact was that my sister Bronislava was born with congenital dislocation of the hip. It wasn’t immediately noticed only when she began to walk and limp. At the age of two, Father took her to Gomel, but there they refused to perform such a difficult operation. When my parents and sister returned from Gomel, bandits set their house on fire at night. They jumped out the window, Papa, barefoot with Broni wrapped in his shirt and in his arms. Kirov gave Father an opening at the military medical academy, where they performed an operation that was, for that time, unique. Mama was there with her and slept under her bed at night. During the day Mama helped to take care of the sick, feeding them, cleaning and washing on the floor. When Bronislava was studying at the Leningrad Medical Institute, a professor told the class during an orthopedics lecture about an unique operation done in 1929 on a two year old girl named Bronislava Maron. Bronislava stood up and said that she was that girl.

After party-economic study, Father became the head of the finance department in Chechersk. He was the undisputed authority for his comrades and colleges. In 1939-40 he was sent to do party work in the city of Belostoksk Region. He planned to get settled and bring over his family but didn’t get to it, the war interfered. Four days before the start of the war, accurately diagnosing the conditions at the border, he sent Mama a telegram: “hold off your arrival.” Father perished on the very first day of the war, when he carried party archives during bombing: a bomb landed on his car. They were to have taken the archive to the Osovi fort. His co-worker, Katz, who he sent for from Chechersk, was a witness. However, a bomb also fell on Katz’s car; he was injured and captured. He then escaped and got back to our side. All those who escaped with him were sent to a penal battalion, but her was sent to Siberia. He was asked, “how could you, a Jew, have survived?” From prison he returned sick and broken. My father was listed “missing in action.”

Of my father’s brothers and sisters, we were closest to uncle Miron (1898-1973). He and Father were very good friends. His real name was Mote Maron, he changed it to Miron Goldberg in order to escape the draft during the civil war. I’m not aware of the details of this story. Miron graduated from some sort of technical school and was an expert in timber marking. He came to work in Zagore with grandfather Borukh. There he met Hannah, the daughter of the brother of my grandmother Mera. They were married and had a son, Yosif. After the evil murder of their nine-month-old first-born during the pogrom in May of 1922, Hannah was ill for a long time. Miron punished the killers, he took part in their capture. After the pogrom, they moved to Chechersk.

Miron was tall, handsome and known for great physical strength. He could lift a horse alone. All the bandits of the region were afraid of him. One day, when he was carrying wages to the forestry area, bandits in the forest set him upon. He grabbed both of them and cracked their heads together so hard that one died immediately and the other lay senseless until the police came for him.

In Chechersk Miron worked at the timber mill in the village of Krasnii Bereg. When his first wife died, Miron, left with three children on his hands, married again. His second wife, Bassya, was a miraculous person: she took the place of the children’s mother. She had a son, Grisha, from her first marriage, but she and Miron had no children together.

When the war began, Miron organized a division of self-defense in Chechersk, in which his son Yakov took part. However, when the Germans came to Gomel, the division disbanded and most of its fighters joined the partisan division. Miron ended up in the trudarmy (worker’s army) as an expert in forestry (processing and timber felling) and was sent to Kuybeishev where he worked during the entire war. Yakov was evacuated with us, and the rest of Miron’s family left even earlier for his brother Evsei’s in Kazan.

After the war Miron took his family to Kuybeishev, but he missed his birthplace and after some time he returned to Chechersk with his family. He was the director of the timber factory in the village of Krasnii Bereg. His daughter Sofia graduated from the Minsk Pedagogical Institute and worked in a secondary school in Chechersk. Yakov graduated from the Moscow Forestry Technical School and worked in the city of Kalinin (now Tver) in a forestry building expedition. Klara graduated from the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute and worked in Kamensk-Uralsuk. She still lives there, is ill and has buried her husband, son, and many relatives. She calls herself the ‘burial crew.’

Bassya, Miron’s wife, was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Chechersk according to Jewish traditions. In Miron’s family they followed tradition more than in the families of our other relatives. Sofia, Miron’s daughter, is also buried there. Miron died in 1973 in Gomel, while living with his third wife. Even though Miron and my father Israil were very close, after my father’s death Miron never helped us. Money was sent to us by Evsei, who had five children of his own. Evsei Maron (1905-1992) was the director of a boarding school for troubled youth near Minsk, comparable to the labor colony in Makarenko, before the war. After the war he was the director of a secondary school in Kazan.

I don’t know when father’s brother Zalman and sister Sarah were born. I only know that during the war the Nazis shot Zalman, his wife and two young sons as well as Sarah, her husband Nolaima and their three children in Chechersk in 1942. Father’s sister Evdokiya (1912-1976) lived in Leningrad. She had no specified education, and worked as the head of the store of artifacts from the North Pole expeditions. Her twin brother Alexander (1912-1957) also lived in Leningrad. He was an economist, taught at the Leningrad Polytechnical Institute (LPI) and was a lecturer-internationalist along with the very famous Solonniki. During each lecture two stenographers worked in order to record each word of the lectrer and answers to the questions. In 1952-53, in one of Alexander Maron's lectures, a provocative question was asked that he however answered truthfully. After this he was removed from lecturing and fired from his job. He was unemployed for a long time. In 1957 he died from a stroke.

Yanka (Anna) Maron (1902-1974) lived in Leningrad and Moscow, and she was the wife of a public prosecutor. She was uneducated, but she was a strong and wise person. According to Yakov Goldberg’s daughter Anna, when her father, in 1945, arrived in Moscow accompanied by a nurse, with a shot-up arm and shrapnel in his head, he thought, “who needs and invalid?” That was what a 20-year-old thought; he believed that life was over for him. He called Yanka and she convinced him with her humor and life strength that all wasn’t so bad, seeing as he was still alive. Her own older son, Volodya, was killed near Leningrad. “Volodya has it worse,” she said. Yakov was helped and supported as much as Yanka could. Yanka’s second son, Boris Perchanok, my cousin, now lives in St. Petersburg. He graduated from LPI and was the head of the vibration laboratory at the “Electrosila” factory. We see each other. His wife Nellie is a volunteer at Hesed. They often attend events at Hesed.

My mother, Galina Borukhovna Maron, was born in 1907 in the village of Zagore, Chechersk uyezd [district]. Her personality differed from my Father’s. She was also a very kind and charming person, but quiet, home-loving. She sewed well but didn’t take part in any sewing circles. Her looks were very modest, differing from Father. She was born into a religious family where Jewish traditions were observed. Before the revolution she and her brother studied at Hebrew school, then in secondary school in Chechersk. She graduated from the Chechersk agricultural school. She was an accountant by specialty. My parents met in the village of Zagore, where Mama lived with her parents and Papa visited his brother Miron. When, after the pogrom, both families moved to Chechersk, Mama and Papa dated there and in 1926 were married. They lived in one big house with grandmother Mera, mother’s mother. Both my sisters and I were born in Chechersk.

When the war began, Mama, along with us, was evacuated first to Stalingrad region, then to Omsk region. At the station Moskalennaya in Omsk region, she worked as head accountant for the Moskalennaya “raipotrebsoyus” (regional union of consumers). In 1947 there was a money reform. The workers of the raispotrebsoyus were mobilized to help the sberkass [the state bank] workers exchange money. One of the workers invited my mother to have some of the money that the kazakhs were bringing in, as they brought it in in sacks and didn’t count it. Mama replied that her obtaining happiness through another’s suffering was impossible. Then that woman, afraid that Mama would tell on her, accused Mama herself.

At that time, because of the request of the wife of the first secretary of the raikom [regional committee], a special commission arrived to investigate the constant drunkenness of regional workers in the cafeteria. Mama was taken in for questioning. She didn’t take part in these parties, but she was questioned because she had signed for the wine. She answered, “I’m not stupid, I know that wine isn’t poured, it is drunk.” When they arrested several people from the group who had taken part in the cover-up of the drinking in the cafeteria, Mama wasn’t taken.

She was taken (as was later discovered) after that woman’s accusation on June 18th. Papa sent a telegram in which he told us to wait before coming [to him at the border]. Mama told no one about this during the war, but when there was conversation [at work] about the fact that the money reform existed because there had been a war and there was a war because the Germans unexpectedly attacked, Mama corrected them, saying that her husband knew. She meant [that he knew about the beginning of the war], if he warned us not to come, that there were traitors in the government [this was in the denouncement]. And on that same day Mama was arrested.

This fact wasn't brought up at the trial, and therefore she wasn’t given a major sentence, but they managed to expel me from school as the daughter of politically unreliable parents. This, even though I was a ninth grader and in the komsorgom [leader of the all-Union Leninist Communist Youth League ] of the school. My younger sister, studying in second grade, wasn’t touched.

Mama was found guilty of statute 109 – negligent relationship to her responsibility at work. This charge carried 9 years in prison. She was given 8. She was put in a colony near Omsk along with political prisoners. When she returned in 1953, she told me that she had met such people and understood more of her life than she had ever before. There were very many Jews there as well. Mother’s kindness helped her even in jail. She was assigned a to a cell with criminals and was chosen as the head of the cell, as someone always kind and correct. Mother was freed during the amnesty after Stalin’s death -- she only served six years. The charges against her were dropped. She returned to Chechersk and began working as an accountant-cashier for the village shop.

Before the war there was no anti-Semitism in Chechersk. I know this form my parents and grandmother. No one even had an understanding of this. It began to appear with the war. Mama ran into it immediately. She was hired because she was well known both as a specialist and as a good person. Then the representative of the ‘raipotrebsoyus’[regional consumers’ union] changed and she was instantly fired. She was the only Jew in the group. Her colleges loved her and went to plead for her, but could do nothing. Mama said to that person in the face “you’re a fascist.” As it turns out, she was correct. Several years later he traveled to some meeting in Western Belarus and there a woman recognized him as a member of the police. Not only that, he also took part in the execution of Jews. He was immediately arrested. So Mama was right, but he had fired her and she worked in a kindergarten, and then got sick and was forced to leave her work.

Her time in jail didn’t leave her without a trace. In December 1965 she was admitted to the psychiatric hospital in Beltzei Gomeliya region. At that time she lived with her younger daughter Anna in Gomel. Mama undressed and, in one robe and felt boots on the wrong feet, went walking in the winter and began to tear up her documents. She was terrified that she might have done something to her documents and she’d be put back in prison. Mama was then put in the hospital. I, at that time, was at the sanatorium. When Anya called me to say that Mama was ill, the director of the hospital let me out with the right to return when I had sorted things out. When Anya opened the door for me, she suddenly fainted on the doorstep -- she was that scared. Mama was released in April and she left for Ust-Kammenogorsk and Bronislava. We had decided that Bronya, as a doctor, was the best one to help Mama. There were periodic worsenings of her sickness and Bronislava determined her course of treatment. Mama died in 1973. She had contracted gangrene and her leg was amputated, then she passed away. I was also sick at that time, and I wasn’t told that Mama had died for 2 years.

Mama had a sister, Fira and a brother Emmanuil. Nine-year-old Fira was murdered during the pogrom in Zagore in 1922. Emmanuil and Mama were saved from the pogrom. My uncle Monya [Emmanuil] was born in Zagore in 1910. He loved horses very much. His father often brought him along on his work in forestry. Both rode very well. Monya grew up very active and mischievous, often playing tricks and offending his quiet sister, my mother. Their father Borukh often had to ‘deal with’ his son because of this. After their father’s horrifying death during the pogrom, Mama wept and said, “ now there is no one to defend me.” And her 12-year-old brother swore to help and defend her until his very death. This promise he kept. All his life he helped his sister and her children, especially when Mama landed in prison.

In 1930 Emmanuil graduated from the metallurgy school in Gomel and in 1931 he was drafted into the army after finishing summer school. After the army service, he worked in a factory in Leningrad, then was an instructor at the raikom [regional committee] of the komsomol for Kuibeishev region. In 1938, due to a komsomol pass, he became the head of the Vkusprom light industry of Leningrad that repaired all the food production factories in the city. During the war he served in the headquarters of the aviation communication for the Leningrad front. In 1946 he wad demobilized as a major and then was the director of sewing factory #5. Because he spent his whole life helping Mama and his sister’s family, he only allowed himself to get married at the age of 42, when I was already studying at the institute. Two years later, in 1955, he died of complications of a heart attack. It turned out that he didn’t even have decent clothes for the funeral. He bought himself a winter coat only a year before his death. He is buried in the Transformation Jewish cemetery in Leningrad.

There were two secondary schools: a large Belarussian school and a smaller Russian one. I studied in the Belarussian school, which was located in the former estate of Prince Potemkin’s niece, Countess Bezobrazova. Around this lovely building there was a very well kept park.
 

During the war

When the war began at the end of August 1941, we left Chechersk on foot, as the railroad was 60 km from the city. Part of the way we traveled by horse, part we hitchhiked, even in military vehicles. The group that left was as follows: grandmother, mother, me, my sisters and Yasha, Papa’s brother Miron’s son. Papa was at this time near Belostok. We arrived at the evacuation point in Gomel, which was the goods station of the Gomel railroad, under constant bombing. There we lost Anya. She had been frightened by the bombing, sat down on the ground and hid herself in some sort of garden, between the plots. We all jumped, called for her, all around us people were yelling, bombs were exploding and it was impossible to hear anything. Suddenly we saw that some man had raised his hands up high, and in them was holding our Anya. We were so thankful! We were evacuated to the village of Dobrinka-on-Hopr in Stalingrad region. There my mother worked and we went to school. The residents welcomed us well. Yasha graduated from secondary school there, and then left for the front. When the Germans began to encircle Stalingrad, we were evacuated to Siberia, to the station Moskalenniya in Omsk region. Mama worked there as an accountant.

Grandmother and Anya, in 1948, returned to Chechersk and I remained in Moskalenniya. I lived with the parents of my sister’s friend for a year and sent Mama letters. When the trial was held in 1949 and Mama was convicted, I returned to Chechersk.

In Chechersk I was afraid to go to school, thinking that here I would also be expelled because of my mother. My cousin, Clara Goldberg, Uncle Miron’s daughter, came over one day and said that the director of the school, Dubrovskii, wanted to speak with me. During the war Dubrovskii had been the commander of a group of partisans in the woods of Belarus. He told me, “I knew your father well, and your mother. They are good and decent people. You will go, right now, to class, sit at your desk and you will study like the rest. And you won’t tell anyone anything about your mother.” And so I did. In school the kids made me feel welcome. Our group of friends was international: Jews and Belarussians. I didn’t notice any sort of adverse reactions from my Belarussian friends. There were many Jews in our group because a large number of Jewish families had returned to Chechersk from evacuation.

All the Jews that had stayed in Chechersk perished. The Germans had rounded them all up and put them in the town hall. One of the guards warned them that the next day they would all be shot, and one ten-year-old girl managed to escape. They were shot and thrown into one of the anti-tank ditches that the residents had dug for the defense of Chechersk. In a second such ditch lie gypsies killed by the Germans. Their graves are located at the entrance to Chechersk on the Lysukha Mountain. In 1943 a memorial was placed there.

The Germans burnt down the synagogue and destroyed the Jewish cemetery. The people in the town didn’t light fires, but many houses burned down during the bombings because they were made of wood. Our home also burnt down, and after the war we lived in a little house that Uncle Emmanuil, mother’s brother, bought for us. The brother of Akulina, our former housekeeper, brought us some of our prewar things: pillows, towels, tablecloths and other things. Our house didn’t burn down immediately (it burned because of other houses). We ran behind the cemetery and Akulina’s brother rode up on horseback to take us to his house. He broke down our door, went into the house and saved a few things. That’s what people were like at that time.

After the war

It was difficult to study at school after the war because there were few textbooks. All the schoolbooks were sorted in such a way that each student in the class knew at what time he was to come to class. The textbooks were handed to each other in a chain. We read quite a lot in our free time. Books were passed on in the same fashion. My favorite teacher was the literature teacher, Rykunov. He was a unique person and teacher. How much he gave to us! In Chechersk at that time it was difficult to obtain books. In those days Yesenin was forbidden - we first heard of Yesenin through him. We would gather at his home. He told us a great deal, even quoting texts from memory. He could have paid with his job and diploma for reading Yesenin’s poetry.

At that time the movement to help the elderly and those who were left alone after the war was very widespread. We helped them as much as we could. The youth split wood, in the fall they helped to harvest potatoes, and in the spring they helped to plant them. We were also sent out to the collective farms to gather the harvest. We also took part in amateur artistic performances and often performed concerts for the farmers in the fields of the collective farms. In addition to this, our class rebuilt our school, which had been turned into a stable by the Germans. We temporarily studied at the Russian school. We worked all summer on the repair of our school, traveled to the forest, and prepared building materials. We were taken to plots of land, slept in peasant houses with the residents of the village Krasnii Bereg.

In tenth grade I was chosen as the secretary of the school komsomol. As a result, many years later, in the 1980’s, I was invited to our school’s anniversary. I was told that the members of the anniversary commission were very interested in meeting with their former classmates and teachers, but the greatest gift for me was seeing Dubrovskii, who had given me a path in life. At the time of that meeting almost no Jews were left in Chechersk. Some had left for Israel, some for America and some, because of high radiation after the Chernobyl catastrophe in 1986, for Gomel (there apartments had been offered).

In 1950 I graduated from school and left for Leningrad to enter the Pedagogical Institute named after Gertzen. I wanted to continue Rykunov’s work and teach literature at school. However, in Leningrad great disappointment awaited me. Here anti-Semitism was already widespread. An acquaintance of my uncle’s, who worked as the assistant head of the publishing house of the Academy of Science, interviewed me. He explained to me that there were “conditions whereby Jews shouldn’t be allowed to university in general, including the literature department of the pedagogical institute as ‘Jews can’t teach Russian literature.” The history department was also better left forgotten, and I turned my documents in to the geography department. This was a great loss for me, but I couldn’t risk anything as Mama was in jail. On the advice of my relatives, I hid that fact, saying that I was an orphan. My father truly did die in 1941, and about Mama I kept silent. In those days there were many orphans and no one was interested in checking out the facts. My documents were accepted. The fact that I came from an agricultural settlement also played a role, as it was fashionable at that time to accept such students in the Pedagogical Institute.

A Leningrad Jewish girl, Zhenya Vilenchik, with whom I became friends at the institute, had her documents returned to her at first on the pretext that there was a serious competition! Only the resistance of her father, an honored war veteran, who went to the rector and promised to “deal with” this question in Moscow, had any effect. Zhenya was and remains my best friend. She is very small. I sat next to her and said “let’s be friends. You’re little, and I’m big. I’ll defend you.” In fact everything turned out the other way around.

Zhenya had a wonderful, intelligent, Jewish family into which I was taken as a member. There were always many visitors there, especially young people -- friends of Zhenya and her younger sister. Zhenya’s mother always placed a saucer of sweet biscuits on the table, as I remember. I also recall one conversation. One day Zhenya’s mother was feeling sorry for me as an orphan. I then told her that I have a mother, but that she had been jailed in Siberia. She sat in silence, then said, “you can tell Zhenya about this, she’ll never tell anyone anything, but better not to tell her sister about it. “ I continued to be friends with Zhenya after graduating from the Institute. I met my future husband in her home, he was one of her sister’s friends.

When I graduated from the Institute I was sent to work as a geography teacher in the city of Tikhvin, Leningrad region. It was an “out-of-the-way place” where there were many Russian devout pilgrims. At that time I had many followers, the truest of which was Sasha Nikitin, a Russian by nationality. My uncles Monya and Zhenya really wanted me to marry a Jew, and were against Sasha. Then something happened. Sasha was sent to work in Berlin. He said in Moscow that he was in love with a Jewish girl and was told that in that case his appointment was withdrawn. When I heard that, I stopped seeing him.

At this time Mark, my future husband, returned to Leningrad after finishing the Minsk Higher Military School and we once again began to date. (We had dated earlier.) We celebrated New Year’s Eve together at Zhenya’s and were soon married. We had a daughter, Emma. I followed the fate of all officers’ wives. My husband’s mother was also the wife of a military officer, and worked at the headquarters as a nurse in the hospital. She was evacuated to Kamensk-Ufimsk. Mark’s father was a soldier in the regular army. From the first days of the war he was with the navy airforce, and was demobilized in 1955 as a lieutenant colonel. He was then the director of an artisan craft factory in Leningrad.

I worked as a geography teacher, and if there was no place as a teacher, I agreed to any sort of work. I was even the head of a library, giving lectures to soldiers. In 1966 I was hospitalized with the diagnosis of terminal “necrosis of the pancreatic glands.” I went through a unique operation, but I refused the invalid status and went back to school. I worked in the school for 22 years.

Because of my husband retired from the military, we returned to Leningrad, but there was no place there for us to live. I worked as a resident advisory in a dormitory, and he at the executive committee. After obtaining living quarters, I worked as a cloakroom attendant at the “Buff” theatre. First it was a temporary summer job, but when a post opened up, the director of the theatre refused to hire me. He said that he had too many Jews working at the theatre (directors and actors). I was hired as a watchman for the administration of the Lenkomcenter where, at that time, only Jews worked. After the director of the “Buff” theatre was fired (the troupe was instrumental in this), I returned there. I retired from the theatre in 1987. I was sent off warmly and touchingly.

Now I will tell you about my sisters. My older sister Bronislava was born in Chechersk on January 4th, 1927. She graduated from the 1st Leningrad Medical Institute in 1951. She was a very good student and she was to be kept on for graduate study. However, this was the time of widespread anti-Semitism and she was turned away. The explanation for refusing her admission was given in a private conversation: nationality - Jewish. She was sent to Kazakhstan, to the city of Ust-Kammenogorsk, where she spent the rest of her life. She worked as a doctor-therapist, then as the assistant head of the department in the 1st City Hospital. She raised two sons. Her older son Igor was born in 1952 and graduated from metallurgical technical school. He works in Ust-Kammenogorsk, at a lead-zinc factory, the same factory where Bronislava’s husband worked as a metal worker/ assembler. Her younger son, Alexander, was born in 1954 and became an engineer-builder. Bronislava died in 1982 of cancer. I traveled to take care of her. When I was sick, she had taken care of me. We were very good friends. After his mother’s death, in 1996, Sasha (that is, my brother Alexander) left Kazakhstan with his family for Israel. They live in Haifa. His daughter Natasha is serving in the army.

My younger sister Anna, born in 1938, graduated from the Leningrad Technical College of Light Industry as a “mechanic”. She was sent to Gomel, where she worked at the base, Oblsnab (regional supply). She married Boris Rafaelovich Hersonskii, a welder. Her son Mikhail born in 1963 and her daughter Irina in 1969. Mikhail graduated from the Gomel Agricultural Institute and works at the Gomel Agricultural Technology factory as an engineer of safety techniques. He is divorced. His daughter and wife live in Israel. Irina is a dental technician. Her daughter Galiya is seven. She is divorced.

My daughter Emma was born in 1995 in Leningrad. After graduating from secondary school the question of where to do further studies had to be answered. I really wanted to believe, while my daughter was growing up and my husband was serving in the army, that she wouldn’t have to deal with the problem of anti-Semitism when she entered the institute, but it turned out that little had changed.

  In the upper classes of school Emma studied with a very talented boy named Igor Zaer. He won all the physics olympiads in Leningrad. But his health was poor and therefore he had lived with and had been brought up by his grandmother and grandfather until 9th grade, somewhere in the center of Russia. He had been raised to believe that justice is everywhere and that there is no problem with anti-Semitism anywhere in the USSR. He came to Leningrad believing this, and decided, after graduating from school, to enter the Leningrad State University; that was his great dream. Both his parents and his friends tried to talk him out of applying, but he answered that it was all slander. “I don’t believe it and I’ll be accepted,” he said. His documents weren’t even taken and this was a blow for him. He tried to enter somewhere else, I don’t remember where, with the same result. In the end he entered the Pedagogical Institute, but all this had broken him. He studied for 3 or 4 months, then committed suicide. He left his bag on the Lieini Bridge with his notes and a message, “I don’t want to live like this and it cannot be otherwise.” He was his parents’ only son. That the university was closed for Jews was something that he couldn’t get over. His grandmother and grandfather had raised him to believe that we didn’t have such a problem, and he turned out to be unprepared to deal with it. It was a horrible shock for all the children at that school, and not only for his class!

My friend Volodya Turzhitzkii, himself an engineer and builder, came to us at home to speak with Emma. I, at that time, was on the eve of my fifth operation and didn’t feel well. Volodya said “Emma, builder-plumber - it’s not a secret, nor is it the most popular specialty. You can enter that department and then you’ll be able to work anywhere.” And Emma entered the “engineer of plumbing equipment” major at the Leningrad Institute of Railway Transport Engineering (LIRTE), which she graduated from in 1977.

She worked for about 12 years in construction and was the head of the reconstruction department of the Medical Institute, located in Ligovka. Then she took accounting courses and now works as head accountant for the “Znanye” company, which deals with translations. Emma married her classmate Viktor Pavlov, a Russian by nationality, out of great love, but at the moment they are divorced. She has two sons: Ilya, born in 1979 and Anton, born in 1985. The children are interested in the Jewish question. Anton wanted to go to a Jewish summer camp, but he wasn’t given a permission; they said that there were few places and none was left form him. Maybe this has to do with the fact that he is Anton Viktorovich Pavlov, I don’t know. We were very bitter over this.

Ilya is a fifth year student at the St. Petersburg State University in the department of low temperature and food technology, studying to be an “engineer – technician of bread, macaroni and confectionery production.” He has dreamed of becoming a confectionery specialist since childhood, ruining much food while trying to create something unusual. He is a very talented boy. In 2001, in Krasnodar, a contest was held in confectionery mastery in which 180 Russian companies took part, including the most famous ones, Moscow’s ‘Praga’ and Leningrad’s ‘Sever’. Ilya, along with his classmates, took part from their institute and won the first place, while ‘Praga’ and ‘Sever’ won only the second and third places. The contest was anonymous, and when their envelope was opened the commission was shocked. They baked a 35 kilo cake and the commission couldn’t guess even one of its components (this was one of the requirements of the contest). The cake was unbelievably delicious, made in the shape of a piece of cheese with a mouse on the top. It was made of cheese, various fruits, souffle, etc. Their institute received the 100,000-ruble prize, and was able to buy much-needed equipment. The kids received medals and diplomas.

My younger grandson, Anton is in 11th grade now, and he will also soon be dealing with the question of applying to an institute.

How do I feel about the emigration of Jews to Israel, America and Western Europe? I think that it is the personal business of each person. I, if I could, would also have sent my daughter and grandsons there. I would have sent them to America, because she was in Israel on an excursion and couldn't handle the hot local climate. Because of her health, she can't deal with heat. Maybe she had already had thoughts about emigration. She traveled there, but when she came back she said, "Mama, I can't handle that heat." We don't have the means to move to America.

The departure of friends is the most bitter page of our modern life; it's like the departure of a part of one's self. We write to each other, call each other when we can. Two of my closest friends are now in America. My Zhenka lives in Chicago. Zhenka [Eugenia Vilemchik] is a second me. She is my conscience and my best friend since September 1st, 1950. She has always been there to help me. Her parents are buried here in the Jewish section of the cemetery to the victims of the 9th of January [1905 Revolution], and now my husband and I take care of their graves, although now my husband does this alone as I am unable to walk. We also care for the graves of our relatives that are buried in the Jewish Transformation Cemetery in Leningrad. Sadly we can no longer get to the Jewish cemetery in Chechersk.

Several years ago I fell and broke my hip, and since then I walk with difficulty, aided by two canes. I don’t leave my house and am often tortured by pain. My husband is very caring and helps me enormously. I have a small pension, 750 rubles [$27], but my husband receives a veteran’s pension because he is a retired major and he continues to work in accordance with his specialty. Therefore we have enough to live on, although I am grateful to Hesed for their care and attention. I had glasses made for me at home, they send me packages, congratulate me on Jewish holidays and send invitations to concerts. At the moment I can’t attend the concerts, but my husband and daughter do. When I could still walk, I watched the Jewish performances at the Krupsky House of Culture. All those who sat in the hall had tears in their eyes.

I am in real need of medicine; each month 500 rubles is spent on them. Hesed has been providing me with reduced-price medicine for three years now. All of this attention, care and help from a Jewish organization really helps one live and cope with difficulties.

My cousin Boris Hananovich Perchansk lives in St. Petersburg. He is the son of my aunt Yana, Papa's sister. Boris has recently become very interested in Jewish traditions. His wife Nellie is a volunteer at Hesed, and he has started to attend, interested in various questions. Last year my sister Anya came from Gomel to visit along with the family of our deceased cousin Grisha (Miron's stepson), and Boris held Passover (Pesach) for us, following all correct Jewish requirements. There was matza on the table and all that was necessary. This was all very moving. I can't say how he celebrates at home, because I don't leave my house, but Nellie, as a Hesed worker, is present at all holidays and is very interested in these aspects. 

Today, with the help of different Jewish organizations, including the Jewish non-profit center "Hesed Avraam," Jewish traditions begin to renew themselves. At Hesed they often present lectures on Jewish traditions, distribute related literature, celebrate Jewish holidays and hold Shabbat on Fridays.
 

Moisey Marianovskiy is a short thin man with blue eyes. One would never tell he is a Jew from the way he looks. 

He lives with his daughter Olga Marianovskaya’s family in a spacious and nice apartment in the very center of Moscow.
He has his own study where he keeps his books. There are pictures and photographs of his friends on the walls.
There are also portraits of Soviet commanders on the walls. One of them is Marshal Zhukov 1.
Moisey is a hospitable and sociable man. He gladly tells me the story of his life, but talking is tiresome for him.

He is busy taking part in public life, but he is often ill. It was not that easy to schedule an interview with him.

The interview took place on 26 September 2004. 
The day before he celebrated his 85th anniversary at the Moscow Union of Jewish invalids and veterans of war at the Israeli cultural center. 
We were often interrupted by his friends calling to greet him. One can tell that Moisey has many friends who care a lot about him. 

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

I was named Moisey after my paternal grandfather Moisey Marianovskiy, which was quite common in Jewish families. I was born in Novyy Bug near Kirovograd [Yelisavetgrad before 1924, Kirovograd in 1930-1934, Kirovo in 1932 - 1937, Ukraine, 250 km south of Kiev]. My father’s parents, his sisters and brothers and their families lived there and so did my parents after they got married. From what I know, Moisey Marianovskiy was a forester. I know no details, though. My paternal grandmother Bluma Marianovskaya was a housewife. My mother told me that she was a great cook and this was what my father had said. The family was doing well. My grandfather’s children were used to working hard. My grandfather and grandmother died before I was born and I don’t know their dates of birth or death. I have vague memories about my father’s brothers and sisters My father died in 1922 shortly after I was born, and my mother and the children moved to Kirovograd. After that we hardly ever saw my father’s family. I can’t even remember how many sisters and brothers my father had. I remember uncles Tula, Noah and aunt Shprynia. They passed away before the Great Patriotic War 2.

My father Efroim Marianovskiy was born in Novvy Bug town approximately in 1878. I don’t know what kind of education he got. All I know is that he died on 16 April 1922. He worked as a clock repair man and that was how he supported the family. I cannot say for sure whether my father was religious. At least I tend to think he was moderately religious. He celebrated holidays and gave his children Jewish names. My father died from a lung disease. He was buried in Novvy Bug. I don’t remember him since I was two year and a half when he died. My mother, older brothers or sisters hardly ever spoke about my father. They had to struggle for survival. Our situation was very hard. Mama had to take care of six underage children. We moved to Kirovograd where my mother’s sisters and parents lived. My mother’s relatives helped us to survive and we had closer relationships with them than we did with my paternal relatives.

My maternal grandfather’s name was Samuel Budnichenko. I don’t know my grandmother’s name, though. She was just called grandma in the family. My grandmother and grandfather had also died before I came into this world. My mother told me her father was self-educated. Mama told me her family had always strived to learn things. They were a very closeknit family. There were five sisters and one brother. They were born and lived in Kirovograd. They were Lisa Val, nee Budnichenko, Polina Zbrisskaya, nee Budnichenko, Ksenia Goldberg, nee Budnichenko. Her husband perished at the front. Mama older sister’s name was Rachil Budnichenko. We called her Rusia. My mother’s only brother’s name was Isaac Budnichenko. Mama’s parents were not religious. However, they celebrated Jewish holidays as a tribute to traditions. I remember Chanukkah, a merry and delicious holiday. We were given candy, nuts and other sweets. On Pesach we ate matzah.  We were poor and it wasn’t often that we could eat to our hearts’ content.  It’s been along time since we left Kirovograd and regretfully, I cannot remember my mother brother or sisters’ names or their dates of birth.

My mother Clara Marianovskaya, nee Budnichenko, was born in Kirovograd in 1880. She only had primary education. She and her sisters studied with a melamed  in their childhood. However, my mother was well-read as she was very fond of reading. And was an interesting conversationalist. She was a well-cultured person, though she was just a cleaning lady in her life. Mama and her sisters spoke Yiddish in the family, though we spoke Russian in our family. I do not know any Yiddish. Mama had no professional education. Like other Jewish women she was supposed to be a housewife, but life happened to be different for her and she had to get a job to support her children. Mama was a wonderful person. Even the fact that she raised all her six children and they became honest and decent people speaks for itself. She taught us to be hardworking and caring. She also taught us to love our country. We were a close family.  Mama was a heroic woman providing support to six children. We grew up to become nice people. Mama was very kind. She always wanted to help those who were in trouble. She knew how it felt when life was hard. We, her children, loved her dearly and were outstandingly grateful to her for what she did. Mama died in Moscow in 1964. She had a stroke and became bedridden for 5 years. She was paralyzed. My sister Revekka took care of her. My sister Emilia and brother Yakov lived far from Moscow.  I had my own family. My wife and I did our best to help my sister to take care of our mother. My mother was buried in the Vostriakovskoye cemetery in Moscow.

My mother had six children: two sisters and four brothers. We were all born in Novvy Bug town. My older sister Emilia Marianovskaya was born in 1903. We called her Milia at home. Emilia finished a gymnasium. She married Abram Leichtmann, a Jewish man from Moscow, and adopted his  last name. Her husband was fond of revolutionary ideas. My sister had a son named Efroim. My sister was a well-read and intelligent woman. Milia also got fond of revolutionary ideas. Her party leadership sent her to Uzbekistan in the late 1930’s. Emilia and her family lived in Tashkent [about 2900 km southeast of Moscow]. She worked in trade unions. She started her career at a plant and was gradually promoted to the republican level. She worked hard to take care of common people’s problems, trying to improve their living conditions. She also initiated construction of health care centers and rest homes. Though we lived at quite a distance from one another my sister and I had very warm and close relationships.  I visited her in Tashkent in 1970 when I went to the birthday anniversary of her husband Abram. Emilia died in 1985. She was buried in the town cemetery in Tashkent. Her son and grandchildren live in Tashkent now.

My brother Yakov Marianovskiy was born in 1906. After finishing a gymnasium Yakov was recruited to the Soviet army. He became a professional military and was transformed to Moscow. He married a Russian woman from Moscow. Unfortunately I don’t remember her name.  They had a son named Samuel. Yakov was a pilot during the Great Patriotic War. He was at the front and had many military awards. After the war Yakov finished the Moscow Air Force Academy. He was promoted to the rank of colonel. After the war Yakov and his family lived in Rostov-on-the-Don [about 1000 km south of Moscow]. Yakov had an Air Force regiment under his command.  Yakov died in Rostov-on-the-Don in 1982. He was buried in the town cemetery. He had had a surgery on the adenoma and at that time this was a very complicated operation. It happened to be lethal.

My sister Riva, Revekka Marianovskaya, was born in 1910. She and mama lived in Moscow. She never got married. She went to work at the HR department at a plant. Her management forced her to quit her job, when struggle against cosmopolitism started in the late 1940s 3. She went to work in trade. Riva died in Moscow in 1980. She was buried in Vostriakovskoye cemetery in Moscow.

The next was Shimon Marianovskiy, born in 1914. Shimon finished Moscow machine building technical school. He was foreman at the machine building plant in Moscow. He also trained schoolchildren in turner’s profession. He was mobilized to the army on the first days of the Great Patriotic War. He perished at the front line near Viazma [about 225 km west of Moscow] at the very start of the war in 1941. I said ‘good bye’ to him, when he was going to the front. I was in the army and was on my way to a military school. I happened to be in Moscow at this moment and went with him to the recruitment gathering point. Since then we’ve sent many requests about him, but the answer has been the same: “Missing”. However, we heard the true story of what happened. Shimon (or Senia, as we called him) was wounded. They were sent to Moscow by a military train. German airplanes bombed the plane. All those in the train were killed. Nobody even buried them.

I had a twin brother – Alexandr Marianovskiy, Sasha. We were born in 1919. We were the youngest in the family. Sasha died in 1926. He slid on ice, fell and hit the back of his head. He came home and said to mother: “Mama, I will die like my friend did”. Mama exclaimed: You don’t say so, Sashenka”.  He said, “I fell on the back of my head and I’ve had headache for a few days. This happened in Kirovograd. Mama told me to wait for a doctor at the gate. When the doctor came I guided him to the room. I must have sensed that grief had struck our household. I remember all details of the day as if it all happened yesterday.  The doctor stayed a few hours. Two days later Sasha died. He was buried in the town Jewish cemetery. My brother and I were very different. I am different from the rest of my family. None of my kin had a pug nose like I do. I have no trace of typical Jewish appearances. People often take me for a Russian man.  

Growing up

I don’t remember anything about the Novy Bug town. I was too young when we moved to Kirovograd. It was a nice little town buried in verdure and acacia blossom. Our whole big family lived in one room in a shared apartment [Communal apartment] 4. Most of our co-tenants were Jewish. There was a big Jewish population in Kirovograd. There was a mill factory and a buttery in the town. My older brothers went to work at this factory when they grew old enough. There were no other jobs and my brothers and sisters wanted to help mama in her effort to support the family.

I didn’t face any anti-Semitism then. I don’t think there was any and besides, nobody discussed this subject in my presence. It did not occur to me that people were segregated by their origin.  Mama worked from morning till night. I had no nanny. I didn’t go to a kindergarten either. There were no kindergartens then. My sisters and brothers looked after me and taught me letters and numbers. They also gave me common errands to do. I went to a primary school at the age of 8. This was the nearest Russian school.  I studied well. I finished 5 years in this school.

In the early 1930’s Ukraine was struck by terrible famine 5. Only God knows how we survived  this famine.  Mama had swollen legs. She always gave me whatever food she could, but I was still always hungry and even fainted from starvation. Shimon was a Komsomol member 6. He often went to villages on his Komsomol errands. He returned from there swollen from hunger telling us that the situation was even worse than ours. Employees from the town were often sent to villages to help farmers with harvesting. Many people in town were dying, though townsfolk always received minimal bread rations. Fortunately, our family survived.

In 1932 my older brother Yasha was in the army in Moscow. He became an officer. He wrote that there were better food supplies in Moscow and it was easier to find a job here. In 1933 our family moved to Moscow. Shimon went to work at the electrical plant named after Kuibyshev. He was a worker. Later I followed into his steps in Moscow.

We lived in Izmailovo district in Moscow. At that time this was a suburb of Moscow. We moved into a 19-meter room in a shared apartment. We hardly had any furniture. There was very little space. When my brother went to work  I took his place on the bed. We were very poor. Those were hard times. We hardly ever ate to our hearts’ content, but at least we did not starve. Gradually our life was improving. I finished secondary school in Moscow. I worked at the plant and studied. This was hard. I worked the 2nd shift at the plant and had no time to do my homework. .I also had to help mama about the house. Besides, I also wanted to meet with my friends, so I did have little spare time. I was glad I earned my own living.  We lived in this room in the shared apartment till the early 1940’s.

I joined Komsomol at school. I led an active way of life. We enjoyed living in Izmailovo. We used to play football and volleyball in the nearby forest. We had makeshift playgrounds and everything else, but we had lots of fun.  My friends were our neighbors’ children. Later we went to the army together. There were many Jewish families living in the vicinity, but we never divided people by nationality. There were never any demonstrations of anti-Semitism, particularly that I had no typical Semitic features. Later I became a member of a workers’ collective. My friends and my sisters’ and brothers’ visited us at home and mama always welcomed them. We celebrated Soviet and family holidays, but we did not celebrate Jewish holidays. We were not religious. We were far from observing any holidays or traditions. We were young and had other interests. We were fond of sports, went to parades and sang Soviet revolutionary songs about “how good it was to live in the Union of Soviets”.

I was good at all subjects. However, I liked physics and history more than other subjects. I did not consider continuing my education since I had to work to earn my living. Before finishing school I quit the electrical plant and went to work to the car manufacture plant named after Stalin. This plant is now named after Likhachev 7. I worked at the turner’s unit and also, worked at school. I became a candidate to the membership in the party at this plant.  I believed in the ideals of communism and honesty of the party ideas and deeds. This was a legendary plant, the pride and hope of the young country. Director of this plant Ivan Likhachev [Ivan Alexeyevich Likhachev (1896-1956). Soviet state and business activist, director of the biggest Russian car manufacture plant, Minister of medium machine building] needed workers badly. He arranged for a whole group of young workers to get a delay from recruitment to the army for a year. I was also included in this group. On 5 October 1940 I was recruited to the army.  Having being recruited to the army a year later I escaped the Finnish campaign [Soviet-Finnish War] 8.

During the war

I served in Porkhov town near Pskov [about 400 km northwest of Moscow]. In six months I was sent to a military school. At the weekend my whole platoon accompanied me to the station. This happened on 22 June 1941 [the Great Patriotic War started 22 June 1941]. Nobody in our regiment knew that the war began. I took a train to Kalinin [about 200 km north of Moscow]. The train stopped and I came to the platform. I could not grasp what was going on. Somebody was playing an accordion, somebody was crying. I asked somebody, “What’s going on?” And they replied, “Soldier, don’t you know? It’s the war.” The regiment that I had left was at the northwestern border, but nobody knew what was happening.  About one and half-two weeks before this happened the TASS (Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union) announced that there were no grounds whatsoever for unjustified rumors about Germany.  After the Molotov-Ribbentrop Non-Agression Pact 9 was signed I stopped having any doubts in this regard. Vice a versa, there was the feeling that this pact established friendly relationships between the two countries. But what happened in reality was that Hitler just cheated on Stalin. We happened to be not prepared for the war. I had served on the border with Germany, but we did not notice any movement of German troops. There were no signs of German attack. Later I got to know that 3 hours after the guys saw me off to the railway station the regiment was encircled by Germans. When I heard that the war began I rushed to see the military commandant of the station.  I asked him what I was to do next. I thought that it might well be that I had to go back to my military unit. He told me that I ought to move on to where I was assigned. I was heading to Gorky [about 400 km east of Moscow] tank school, but on my way there I was to make my appearance at the district military committee in Moscow.

My middle brother Shimon in Moscow was also recruited to the army and I went to see him off. He went to the front and I headed to Gorky tank military political school. When I arrived at Gorky I found out that all cadets were allowed a monthly leave. I also got this monthly leave, but I decided it was my duty to go to this school due to the start of the war. Before everybody else arrived I worked in the kitchen washing the kitchenware and peeling potatoes.

Later soldiers from the military units destroyed at the frontline started arriving at the school. They told awful stories about the war. It was clear the army was not ready for the war. Later it became everybody’s knowledge that this happened due to the wild policy of Stalin. Before the start of the war Stalin destroyed the officer staff and military commanders [Great Terror] 10. Over 50 thousand officers were executed for the charges of being enemies of the people 11. This weakened our army significantly and there was no doubt about it. The reequipment of the army was initiated before the war. It was never completed. There was no sufficient new equipment available and the old equipment was good for nothing.

In Gorky I saw a terrible view for the first time. We lacked air planes to ensure protection of the town. German planes acted with impunity. A German bomber dropped a 1T bomb onto the plant.  It fell between two buildings and the walls collapsed. Supervisors, however, did not allow people to leave the buildings saying that it was just panic. Hundreds of people perished. This was the first time I saw death. This happened on 25-27 June 1941.

We took an advanced course at my school. The cadets like me had already learned serving in the army. We could shoot, load and knew all other required operations that we were supposed to know. By October 1941 we were given the rank of lieutenant and graduated from the school. I was sent to tank brigade 187 and appointed a company commander. I became a commissar, [Political officer] 12 and then I got a tank company under my command. At that time commissars and commanders had equal authority. I didn’t last long as commissar. When the unshared commanding authority was introduced, I was appointed commanding officer of a tank company. There were three tank squads in the company. There were 3 tanks in a squad and 10 tanks in a company.

We did not have enough tanks at the start of the war. T-34 were the best tanks. There were only 1000 T-34 tanks available and this was certainly far from sufficient to oppose Germans in this cruel blood shedding war. There were also Т-60 and Т-70 tanks manufactured at the Gorky machine building plant. They were very vulnerable. They had easily destructive armor and automobile engines. They were weak engines and weak cannons. Our forces were in a very difficult situation at the beginning of the war. The English helped us a little providing tanks.  Their tanks were worse than our “thirty fours”. They were light “Valentine” and medium “Matilda” tanks. They had strong armor, but also one big shortcoming. They were equipped either with armor piercing or splinter shells. So, if there were armor piercing shells these tanks were inefficient against infantry, for example. Americans also supplied some tanks to us at the beginning of the war. These tanks were commonly called “a common grave for seven.” They were no good for the war. For example, they had seats with velvet tapestry inside. They might have been good when Americans struggled against unarmed Indians etc., but they were useless in the war that we fought. They also used gasoline and were often subject to self ignition. Gradually Americans modified these tanks to improve their structure.  Germans also designed powerful tanks like Tiger, Panther, etc.  However, our T-34 tank with an elongated cannon and a crew of 4 was the best tank of the Great Patriotic War. By the end of 1942 the plants manufacturing these tanks that evacuated to the Ural increased the manufacture quantities.

I was at the frontline in the Briansk and later in the Moscow direction. Our brigade did not retreat. There was Moscow behind us, there was nowhere to retreat. I was inside a tank on battlefields. I gave my commands and executed the orders I received from my commandment on the radio. We had telephones or radios. Some tanks had phones some were equipped with radios.  We supported our infantry as best as we could on battlefield. 

We stayed and slept in the woods.  In winter we installed tents or slept in tanks. We took every chance to take a nap in a tank. We did not have timely supplies of underwear and clothing. For example, at times we received warm clothing in April or May. At night we just took off our warm jackets that got wet during a day and then we got into a tank wearing these wet jackets. Tanks were not heated, of course. None of designers took into consideration that we would have to stay in tanks, when it was freezing outside. Who cared? For our military commandant the only important thing was that tanks could move and shoot. Nobody cared about people. The infantry had more chances to get warmer.  It was terrible to get into these cold steel tanks. It was really horrific. Here is what happened once. One of commandants from the division headquarters arrived  to our location. We accommodated him in a tarpaulin tent, which was supported just by two sticks. It was pouring, the tent got wet and heavy and collapsed. One stick stabbed the headquarters officer in his throat and he died. 

We basically had normal food supplies. The army did not starve, but there were hard times as well, particularly in spring, when it was difficult to deliver food products to army units. At such times we suffered from hunger. We had a field kitchen that cooked for us. We also received 100 grams of vodka.  These 100 grams were called “narkomovskaya” (narkom – “people’s commissar”) since it was provided based on the order issued by Minister of Defense. Our logistics people submitted lists of staff for vodka provisions before a battle.  The battalion went in attacks and then less than half survived, but vodka was still provided for the whole list of staff.  We always had much vodka available.

We appreciated a possibility to shave. We also tried to have some fun. We rubbed snow or poured ice cold water on ourselves and also competed in whose teeth were stronger. The one who could bite through thin wire won. 

 In spring 1942, when I was in tank brigade 187, I was wounded and sent to a hospital. After the hospital I was assigned to the 23rd Guard tank brigade. There was a patriotic movement during the war, when people bought tanks and sent them to the army. For example, a few writers and poets, laureates of the Stalin’s Award [editor’s note: it was awarded by the Soviet of Ministers of the USSR for outstanding achievements in science, literature and art. The award was established in  1939], contributed the money they received to the plant to manufacture a tank. This tank was assigned to the 23rd tank brigade where I served.

When I returned to the front after the hospital, the situation there stabilized a little. Germans were defeated near Moscow and Stalingrad [Stalingrad Battle] 13. This was the turning point and our forces started moving in the western direction. We already struggled for the Ugra and Dnepr Rivers, etc. Battles for Smolensk [about 350 km west of Moscow] began. My  units took part in the operation to liberate Spas-Demensk, Kaluga region [about 180 km west of Smolensk]. These were hard battles and I had to use my wits. I have very bright memories about how we decided to fight for a hill near the town. We decided to attack it at the night time. We lit headlights to make an impression that there was a bigger tank group attacking. The tanks were moving in circles to deceive the enemy. The Germans were scared, so we managed to cheat them. After hard and blood shedding battles we captured the hill and then the town. I was awarded an Order of Alexandr Nevskiy [Editor’s note: Order of Alexandr Nevskiy was established on 29 July 1942. It was awarded for special merits in the defense of the USSR] for this operation. This was a smart and witty operation that did not result in big losses for us, but the gains were significant.  We headed to fight for Byelorussia. There were also hard battles during crossing the Dnieper.  General Zakharov, Commander of our front, decided to attack the enemy on its flank. This operation was also successful and in 1943 I was awarded an Order of Red Banner 14 In August 1943 I was wounded in my eye and was sent to a hospital in Moscow.  After two weeks in hospital I returned to my regiment.

The hardest battles were at the Mogilyov-Minsk roadway. Some of them were outrageously savage. We managed to capture a radiogram of Hitler, who ordered commander of the Mohilyov group to head to Minsk [about 600 km west of Moscow]. Our objective was to prevent this army group from stopping our forces fighting to liberate Minsk. Colonel Yershov, Brigadier, and commanding officer of the 2nd battalion Alexandr Pogodin were killed and I was the only commanding officer left. Alexandr Pogodin was killed right before my eyes. The brigade commissar was wounded. He was transported to the rear in my tank and I moved to the tank of Alexandr Pogodin. Ivan Shtokolov was the mechanic and driver of this tank. There were hatches on both sides of the tank and we were looking through them. Alexandr sat on one side and I sat on another side in the tank. I was talking to him, when I suddenly felt something wet under my feet. I looked down – there was blood on my feet. This was Alexandr’s blood. His head was cut off by a splinter and was hanging on the tank’s armor and I was talking to his head.  We buried Alexandr Pogodin in a field in the evening and installed a wooden board with his name on his grave.

Commander of the Front ordered me to take command of the brigade, though I was very young (I was just 24 years old). We were at the Mogilyov-Minsk highway at the time. This didn’t make me feel happy, but this was what I had to do... We tried to encircle this grouping of German troops. In order to escape the encirclement Germans decided to do a horrible thing. They gathered the population from nearby villages (children, women and old people) around Mogilyov [about 800 km southwest of Moscow] and made a live shield of them hoping that we, tank men, would not shoot at them. I sent a squad commander to cut the German columns from our citizens. The people scattered around taking their chance. Of course, some were killed, unfortunately. The decisive point happened on the 6th or 7th days. Germans were constantly sending additional forces while we had to fight to the end.  We had an order to not allow Germans to approach Minsk.  In this battle our tank brigade was supported by infantry. We called them motor infantry, but in fact, they rarely had a chance to get a ride on our tanks.  There were many dead and wounded in the battle.  The situation was very severe. This was the 6th day already and the tension reached its peak.  At one moment our troops faltered. At this moment I jumped out of the tank and carried the banner of our tank brigade. When the tank men saw the banner, they started fighting to the end. Then the Germans started surrendering.  I was wounded but stayed on the battlefield. I was slightly wounded and could manage for a few hours.  Thousands of Germans surrendered in the end. When we encircled the Germans they started offering us their jewelry. There were heaps of gold and silver jewelry around me. They begged us to be merciful to them. None of us touched anything. One hour later we moved to a different area. This huge army of prisoners marched toward Moscow and then along the streets of the capital. This was a show arranged for Muscovites by the commandment and the government. They demonstrated how miserable those prisoners of war were and how our Soviet army could be victorious and also, that the end of the war was near. For this Mogilyov operation I was nominated for the award of the Hero of the Soviet Union 15  in June 1944, and I received this award on 24 March 1945.

Then operations were held one after another. After finishing one we started preparation to another. Soon we directed our efforts to liberation of Western Byelorussia. This included liberation of, Navahrudak, Grodno [over 900 km west of Moscow] etc. In Grodno Germans established a big ghetto and eliminated it before our offensive killing all inmates. I did not know about these death camps before the 1980’s, but when in Grodno, I did not see anything. We were hurrying to the Polish border heading to reach Koenigsburg, Berlin and end this war victoriously as soon as possible. One of those days I was severely wounded.

We faced particularly adamant resistance near the Osovets fortress [over 900 km west of Moscow]. This happened on 13 August 1944. I was wounded 3 times when at the front, and it always happened in August. Osovets was located in flood lands at the border with Poland. It was an old Russian fortress that Germans chose to defend their lines. I had a battalion under my command. Our Commander of the Front decided to attack and capture the fortress. We had an infantry penal company assigned to our tank battalion. The military were sent to penal units as punishment for various violations. The only way for them to serve their punishment was to either die on battlefield or get wounded which was officially called ‘washing off one’s punishment with blood’. They were dying in their majority. Almost all in this penal company died during this attack on the Osovets fortress. 

I had all tanks of the brigade under my command. The objective was challenging. The tension was enormous. The Brigadier poured me a liter of spirits before the attack! It might have knocked anybody down. I drank it, but I felt like I had just had some water.  I was in the rank of major. I can remember it as if it happened yesterday. A new brigadier was appointed. He summoned me and said: ‘Well, this is going to be an uncommon operation. The Commander ordered to attack and capture this fortress’.  It was fortified indeed. There were numerous pillboxes and one meter thick walls. No cannon balls could break them. There was an artillery preparation before the attack, but it did not help. There were swamps on one side of the fortress and ancient oak trees on the other. The road to the fortress was impassable.  I lined up the battalion and announced that I would go first and they were to follow me and be brave.  Besides everything else, the fortress was on a hill and Germans could fire at us point-blank.  Besides there was only a narrow path to the fortress and there was no way to turn left or right.  We could only move one after another. I said: ‘Guys, this is what we must do: if your tank is hit you must remove it from the path by whatever cost. You must make sure that the tank following you can move on’. And so we moved on. The fight was hard and blood shedding. The Germans could see us plainly and they fired at us hard.  A German shell hit my tank. Volodia Iudarik, commander of the tank, was severely wounded.  He had his arms and legs cut off, but he managed to get out of the tank. He died the moment he left the tank. He died from loss of blood. The driver managed to remove the tank off way. I was wounded an instant later. I was wounded all over with shell splinters. However, at the very last moment I managed to look at the fortress and saw our guys breaking into it.  However, we lost almost all battalion and the penal company. When the commanding officer heard that I was severely wounded, he gave his permission to send me to a hospital in the rear. This saved my life. For this operation I was awarded an Order of the Combat Red Banner 16.

I started a new life in a hospital in Moscow.  My ward was the ward of deadly wounded patients. Every day we were in the care of Zinaida Ordzhonokidze, a volunteer nurse and an exclusively nice person. She was very ill herself. She had swollen legs and hyper tone, but she never failed to enter our ward at 6 a.m.. Her husband was Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze. [Editor’s note: Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze (party pseudonym ‘Sergo’) 1886-1937: activist of the Communist party and Soviet Union. Red Army commander during the Civil War. After the revolution, Minister of heavy industry in the last years of life. He is thought to have been poisoned by murderers sent by Stalin.] Once it happened so that there were just the two of us in the ward. The rest of my companions in the ward had died. I said: Zinaida Andreyevna, I remember an obituary about your husband. It said that he died from a heart attack’. She looked down and relied: ‘I wish it had been true.’ I did not grasp the meaning of what she said! I believed what newspapers wrote and knew no details of the story. This was the first time it occurred to me that not everything newspapers wrote was true.

I suffered from awful pain caused by a nerve injury. The doctors gave me drugs and since the pain strong, I received a lot of them. Instead of standard 10 drops I got almost half glass to calm me down. I was exhausted and suffered a lot. The tips of my fingers ached awfully. A splinter from the tank armor injured a nerve trunk. One night I fainted. The doctors called Professor Shliapoverskiy, a Jew, a very talented doctor and an intelligent man. He asked what happened and the doctors and nurses told him the story.  He decided to operate on me. He X-rayed my hand and saw little splinters that he removed masterfully. This was a unique surgery and I started to recover. However, I never fully recovered. I was still exhausted and was became an invalid of the second grade. I spent in hospital almost two and a half years with some intervals. I was in hospital on the Victory Day as well.

After the war

On 24 March 1945 I heard that I was awarded the title of the Hero of the Soviet Union for the Mogilyov operation. On 7 April 1945 director of the hospital gave me a leave to go Moscow to receive my awards. In Moscow Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet 17  awarded me the golden Star and the Order of Lenin. 18

I was also awarded an Order of the Great Patriotic War Grade 2 19, also for liberation of Western Byelorussia, for the operation in Osovets. I also have an Order of the Combat Red Banner. In 1985 I was awarded an honorable Order of Labor Red Banner [Order of Labor Red Banner was established on 7 September 1928. It was awarded to individuals, enterprises, institutions and work collectives for exclusive merits in serving the USSR in the area of industrial, scientific, public of community activities] for fruitful educational activities in Moscow Energy College.

The military unit where I fought honors and remembers its heroes. It’s deployed in Novograd-Volynskiy. Every year on 9 May I visit the unit to meet with the soldiers of my former military unit and celebrate the Victory anniversary. These are very warm and kind reunions, but unfortunately, fewer and fewer of us manage to make it there with every coming year.  There were 4 heroes of the Soviet Union in our military unit. Our photographs are on the stand there.

I honor and bow my head before the two individuals and my military commanders at the front line. They are Bagramian [Bagramian, Ivan Hristophorovich (1897-1982), Soviet military commander, Marshal of the Soviet Union, Hero of the Soviet Union twice. During the Great Patriotic War he was an army commander, since 1943 he was commander of the 1st Baltic and 3rd Byelorussian fronts. In 1955-56 he became Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, in 1956-58 he was director of the Military Academy. In 1958-68 Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, Head of the Rear services of the Soviet armed forces.] and G. Zhukov. I served in the 33rd army under Zhukov’s command for some time. I fought at the Moscow direction and Marshal Zhukov was Commander of the Front. I have photos of Zhukov and Bagramian that they gave me personally. I knew Bagramian. He was a nice person. He invited me to his home. He lived in the Arbat Street in Moscow. We talked very frankly. It hurt to hear the panegyric speeches addressed to Brezhnev 20 who never performed any heroic deeds at the front, when we faced death and shed our blood on battlefields.

Marshal Georgiy Zhukov was a great person and a great commander. His participation in this war played the decisive role in our victory over Germany. I admire his strategic talent. During the war Zhukov was sent where the situation was dangerous. I told my students and comrades how America treated their Commander Eisenhower.  They elected him president. What did we do to our great commander? We mixed him with dirt. That was what Russia did! It’s absolutely horrible! Zhukov wrote a wonderful book about the war: ‘Memoirs and thoughts’.  They did not want to publish this book because of Brezhnev. Zhukov was told: ‘You must emphasize the positive role of Brezhnev. He replied: How can I do it? I’ve never met him before. And I’m aware ‘talents’. And they said: ‘If that’s your answer, there will be no book’. And Zhukov made a trick. He added: I’m very sorry I never met Leonid Brezhnev, when I was in the 18th army. He had left for the front line on some business’. He removed this paragraph from the 3rd edition of the book, when Brezhnev died. He also took his revenge over Nikita Khrushchev 21. He wrote in his book: ‘I remember well that when I came to the South-Western Front, Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev arranged nice dinners’. Period. He was open and honest. I keep in touch with his daughter. Now my temper fails me. I read and reread the book with tears in my eyes. It’s next to unbearable! Such talent! Such pain! And who caused it? They were nothing; Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev or Brezhnev...

After I was released from the hospital I moved into a room in a communal apartment. It was provided to me by the plant where I worked before I went to the army.  In 1946 I entered Moscow State University named after Lomonosov [editor’s note: M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, the best University in the Soviet Union, also well known abroad for its high level of education and research], The Faculty of History. I entered it immediately after the h hospital.  I was fond of history and did well at the University. Being a party member I took an active part in the public life in University.

Once a terrible thing happened. It happened in 1947 during the period of struggle against cosmopolitism. I shared my thoughts with my friends saying that struggle against cosmopolites actually meant struggle against Jews. Somebody reported on me and this became the subject of discussion at the university party bureau meeting. The atmosphere at this meeting was very aggressive. This was something terrible! I was blamed that I did not understand the policy of the party.  It’s hard to find words to describe this event! I did not agree to one single accusation of me or other people blamed of cosmopolitism. I spoke against any accusations. I held them to disgrace! I held the presidium to disgrace. This meeting was hard for me. Professor Cherniayev described this meeting in his book ‘My life and my time’. [the book was published in 1995 in the publishing house ‘International relations’ Moscow.] He also worked at the University and was also a veteran of the war, but I did not know him in person. He was at the meeting. During perestroika 22 he worked at the Central Committee of the Communist party, and now he works in the Gorbachev’s fund 23 [Editor’s note: Gorbachev’s fund is an International public fund established in 1992.] He dedicated a whole page to the problem of struggle against cosmopolitism at the University, and described how I opposed at the meeting. He also wrote: ‘Everyone kept silent’. How did Jews behave? They were mean! They were afraid of supporting me fearing to lose their jobs.  A week later they were fired. I became passionate blaming them. They were saying ‘You don’t understand the policy of the party’ and I replied ‘You do not understand the policy of the party! You organize a campaign against Jews. You! If you are against this horrible and abusive movement, you stand up and say it instead of accusing me’. I don’t remember getting home. I thought ‘Where am I?’ Because nothing like this ever happened in my battalion at the front. It didn’t matter whether one was Russian, Ukrainian, Kazakh or Jew. What mattered was to be brave and honest! I never dealt with anything of this kind at the front. That was why I was stunned. I shivered with hatred and anger. But what was important I was not defending myself but I attacked them. I said ‘You are lying! It’s a lie from beginning to end!’. I said: ‘You are cowards! You know in your hearts that this is not true.’ Cherniayev was good. Fifty years later he reproduced it exactly as it happened. There was one thing he made a mistake about. He wrote ‘He either left or was fired from University.’ He did not know the truth. I did not quit the University or the party. I had many friends and acquaintances at the University. They were much older than me and treated me somewhat fatherly. I still don’t know who was my protector. I think it was Academician Nesmeyanov [Nesmeyanov Alexandr Nikolayevich (1899 - 1980), Soviet organic chemist, academician of the soviet Academy of Sciences, public activist, Hero of Socialist Labor], an outstanding chemistry scientist, who was rector of the State University at the time. He had a great authority in our country and in the world.  He was a deputy of the Supreme Soviet. He was a decent and honest man. His follower was a lecturer at the Chemistry Faculty and secretary of the party committee of the University. I think the two of them saved me. Nesmeyanov must have taken the initiative. It worked so as if there had been no meeting whatsoever! I graduated from the University. What else is remarkable about this meeting is that all lecturers and students became aware of my Jewish identity. They could never guess it before since I looked very much like a Russian guy. I never experienced any opposition at the exams or when I defended my diploma. My examiners knew I was right, but they could not express it openly fearing for their job.

This was the first time I had doubts about Stalin’s innocence with regards to the events in the country. I knew Stalin was to blame. I came home very upset. I had Stalin’s portrait on my desk.  When I was alone I threw it away.. It was a big color portrait. I believed him and so did millions of people, but this struggle against cosmopolitism shattered me! I decided we should not have hoped that he did not know what was happening. This was naïve.  He knew and he did it with his own hands. So I bid farewell to the beloved leader.

During the period of the plot of doctors 24 in early 1953, when most Jews were fired from work, it had no impact on me. I was a post-graduate student at the university, but I felt this atmosphere, when patients stopped visiting Jewish doctors. Of course, this was abusive for me, a common and honest man. It only strengthened my opinion about Stalin.

When he died in March 1953 and the country was in the mourning, I felt relieved and even happy that he died. My eyes were open. I had no illusions though I tried to get to the Kolonny Hall to look at this dead man. This was the end of epoch. My friend, a Russian guy, who had the same attitude to the leader, and I went there. Thousands of people came to bid farewell to Stalin. The crowd crushed and many people died. We made our way there regardless. There were thousands of wreaths near the Kolonny Hall. We took our particular revenge on this demonstration of love to him. While we were trying to make our way through the crowd the horses of equestrian militia grabbed the leaves on our wreath, and we installed it among other wreaths at the front. (This was the only way to take our revenge on him. It was disgusting, this wreath, but we put it at the front. Nobody could reproach us for doing so. We just came to pay honors and who could blame us? 

I finished my post-graduate studies, defended a doctor’s dissertation [Soviet/Russian doctorate degrees] 25 and went to work at Moscow Energy College. I was a lecturer at the department ‘History of the CPSU’. I worked there for 35 years. I still keep in touch with the college and my former students.  They visit me at home. There was only one reason why I enjoyed my work. I invited my comrades, who marched the paths of the war. My students wrote reports about the war. I emphasized the war events in the history of the CPSU. I stepped aside from this policy and though my subject was History of the CPSU, I did not care. I knew but too well what kind of history this was. I resigned in 1991.

I met my wife Valentina Kisliakova at the Likhachev plant before the war. She also worked there. She waited for me through the war. We waited for one another. Valentina was born in Moscow in 1924. She was a good person. We got married in 1946. We registered our marriage and in the evening we had dinner with the family. Our first daughter Yelena was born in 1947. I called her Lenochka affectionately.  My wife came from a Russian family, but there was not sign of anti-Semitism on her family. Her father’s name was Ivan Kisliakov and her mother’s name was Marpha Kisliakova. They had two daughters besides Valentina: Lidia and Claudia. They were workers. Valentina’s sisters worked at the turner’s unit. We keep in touch with them. My wife finished a secondary school and worked as an accountant at the plant. In 1956 our second daughter Olga was born. We were a loving family. My wife and I raised our beautiful daughters to become honest, hardworking and kind people. I was not religious and did not teach my daughters any Jewish traditions. Lena and Olia know they are Jews. My wounds had an impact on my health. I was ill for a long time after the war.  My wife took care of me. I owe her my life. My wounds remind me of my health condition. My wife and I went to recreation homes and she forced me to keep a diet. I survived thanks to her care.  Valentina created the atmosphere of love and respect in our family. It stayed with us after my wife died. My daughter Olia takes care about me now. She is doing it with the same dedication as my wife did. From our room we moved into a new apartment that we received from the Likhachev plant. Lena finished the College of Economics. The happy life of our family came to an end,  when our beautiful daughter Lenochka died in 1962. She was just 25 years old. She had brain tumor. Our daughter’s death was a hard blow for my wife. She developed cancer and died prematurely in 1976. I think the grief after our daughter shortened my wife’s life. She was buried in the Vostriakovskoye cemetery. Olia finished the Law College. She works as a lawyer. She takes care of me and helps me with my pub. She has a son. He is my grandson. His name is Ivan Barashev.  Vania studies in the College of foreign languages. Olia’s husband Alexandr Barashev is Russian. He is director of a small polygraphist enterprise.

I was happy about Israel in 1947 and about the fact that we voted for it at the United Nations Organization. However, it turned out that this ‘voting’ had a background. Stalin wanted to strengthen his positions in this area. I know only but too well how he ‘loved’ Jews. He did not care about Jews, he just wanted to have a base there. He thought this state was going to work for him. But the fact that our state and army supported Arabs in the war against this state was very sad for me, particularly that Israel took every effort to protect itself. Of course, this dishonest and hypocritical policy of the Soviet Union could only raise anger in me.  I knew that our tanks were involved there and that they did not fight for the right. I was ashamed.  Why send tanks there? Why arm the enemies of Israel? Who benefited from it?

I traveled to Israel in the early 1990s at the invitation of the veterans of the Great Patriotic War. The country struck and enamored me. An amazing garden created by loving people in the stone lifeless desert! It raises admiration. I’ve never considered moving there. My roots are here. I defended this land. My followers, friends, colleagues are here. My dear ones were buried here and this is where I’m bound to be. There was an incident at the airport. We were thoroughly searched at the airport. My companions went through the electronic detector, but when I stepped there it gave an alarm. The frontier men told me to put away everything metal. I emptied my pockets, but it did not help.  The chief told me to go to an X-Ray room. I went there and took off my clothes.  There were two doctors and an X-ray man in the room. When they X-rayed me, they were horrified. There were multiple splinters in my body.  They let me go, shook hands with me and wished me good luck. On my way back there was the same shift. Their chief called them to attention and they saluted me.

I think that  our country does not treat those who had marched the paths of the war with due care. They deserve more. They lived their life in terrible living conditions for decades. They were deprived of the very primary needs.  They stood in lines and were abused and humiliated. And the Central Committee of the CPSU called this ‘modesty of a common Soviet person, veteran or invalid of the war.’ They made this formula. He cannot get an apartment and they tell him he is modest. How many of us are left?! What kind of attitude are we talking about now? Recently they increased our pension, but it was impossible to live on it! And it is the soldier who actually rescued the world from the Hitler’s plague. How should they have treated him? Germans and German veterans of the war live much better lives than those who won the victory! And the only reason is that our government has never thought about people. Never! All they care about is their career.

I received this apartment recently. The mayor of Moscow promised me to improve my living conditions and ordered his subordinates to find a better apartment for me. These officials kept leading me by my nose trying to make me agree to a new apartment in a new building in distant neighborhoods in Moscow. I’m an old and ill man and it would be difficult for me to commute that far away to do my public activities. It took a long time before they offered me this apartment in a quiet neighborhood in the very center of Moscow.  Arkadiy Gaidar 26, a popular writer, lived here before the war and then his son Timur  Gaidar lived. It was vacant before we moved in here. It looked quite abandoned and I felt like refusing it again, but my daughter thought different. We had to fix and refurbish this apartment which took a lot of money and effort, but I like it now.  It’s spacious and my daughter made it very cozy. Everything would be well if it were not for my ailments. We are a close and loving family. I have everything I need. I receive a bigger pension being a veteran and invalid of the war, Hero of the Soviet Union.

The breakup of the USSR [1991] was sad for me. Like millions of other people who marched the roads of the war shedding our blood it hurt to know that we did this for the sake of the state that broke up   Where was my consolation? I knew this would happen one way or another. It was built on the Stalin’s policy which was absurd in all respects.  So, this feeling of being hurt was mixed with the sound feelings.

I was very negative about the perestroika. This had nothing to do with perestroika.  There was a lot of chatting about it, but nobody, including Mikhail Gorbachev, knew what it was about.  They went from one extreme to another until they came to a collapse instead of perestroika. These are different things. Our country has not matured for transition to capitalism.  People need to be prepared. The majority of them have never heard about freedom of speech, press and entrepreneurship! How could a poor, badgered person understand this? They had to wait till the country matured enough for this transition. This was the only way to do it! We had nothing like this before. The country lived a bizarre life. From the scientific, technical and social standpoint the country was one of the last ones in the world. Our state focused on nuclear missiles and deference. It needs to be said that the people were working hard for it living in poverty and being paid 12 kopeck of each earned ruble.   Nobody respected this country. The world and every honest value turned away from us. They turned away from us seeing that we had nothing in common with the values that we declared. 

 Of course, I identify myself as Jew. My parents were Jewish and I was born into a Jewish family. I’ve never kept the fact of my Jewishness a secret. We did not celebrate these holidays, but this was the life we lived, all in this country were raised atheists.  There were other things concerning us besides religion.

I happen to take an active part in the Jewish life in Russia. I have been at the head of Council of the Jewish War Veterans and invalids [Moscow Council of the Jewish War Veterans: It was founded in 1988 by the Moscow municipal Jewish community. The main purpose of the organization is mutual assistance as well as unification of front-line Jews, collection and publishing of recollections about the war, and arranging meetings with the public and youth.] for 12 years. I’ve actually been at its head since the date it was established. There were rumors that Jews had never been at the front during the Great Patriotic War staying in the rear spread in Russia. They used to say ‘fought in Tashkent’ [Editor’s note: Tashkent is a town in Middle Asia; it was the town where many people evacuated during the Great patriotic War, including many Jewish families. Many people had an idea that all Jewish population was in evacuation rather than at the front and anti-Semites spoke about it in mocking tones]. This was a widely spread and abusive rumor. I think these rumors were spread by our ‘glorious’ bodies: NKVD 27, KGB 28. These were probably the first steps before of persecution of Jews in the late 1940s-early 1950s.  I’ve always believed it was my duty to oppose those slanderers. It was not by hearsay that I knew about the war. Our Council was established to put an end to these rumors. After I retired I got involved in this life. I spoke out and suggested creating a Book of memory to list the names of all Jews who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War.  This was my initiative. I do believe this to be very significant and great thing to do. Ukraine and Byelorussia took up this idea and started publishing these books in their countries.  They make use of our data and search for the names of their citizens who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War.  One cannot hold back tears reading the feedback from relatives in response to this book. This book is like a message from their children and fathers whom they had lost. I included the name of my brother Shimon Marianovskiy in the 2nd volume of this book. It’s very difficult to publish these books. Hard to find money to publish them. Besides, thousands and thousands of Jews have left the country. Some are in Australia, the others are in Canada or Israel. Where can we find them? And we need to find them all. They have documents with them, the death certificates. We need to include the names based on the archive documents. Our archives have no information about those who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War. No such names. I’ve never dealt in the book publishing business. As I imagined, we would go to the archive and that will be it. Nothing of the kind! Firstly, our archives are just terrible. It’s humiliation of the dignity of the deceased. Meeting with the English or Americans I told them we have no book of memory. They could not believe it. ‘You mean, no book of memory?. I said ‘Right, we have no book of memory’. It’s hard to organize this. Now we’re finishing the 8th volume. There is a Grave of the Unknown Soldier in the center of Moscow, the symbol of the war and our victory. This is where the survivors of the war, members of the government and the visiting VIP’s come to honor the memory of those who paid their lives for the victory, but this is very wrong! The memory of each person who gave his or her life, the most valuable thing that they had, must be cherished in the hearts of citizens of the country they protected.

Glossary:

Saratov, Russia 
Interviewer: Svetlana Kogan 
Date of interview: July 2003 

Faina Gheller is a big woman with a sporty figure. She was born in Saratov. 
She lives with her husband in a three-bedroom apartment.

Their sons and their families also live in Saratov not far from their parents. 

Faina is a pensioner, but she still works as director of the club for elderly people in Hesed.

We met in Hesed. 

Faina was glad to share her life story with us. 
Faina is very sociable and creative: she composes poems, writes screenplays, and organizes celebrations and concerts.

She knows how to work with people and involve volunteers in the Hesed activities.  

• My family background
• Growing up
• During and after the war

• Glossary

• My family background

My paternal grandfather Israel Zelvianski and my paternal grandmother Rochl-Beilia Zelvianskaya lived in Grodno [in Belarus, over 1000 km from Moscow]. I have never been there or seen my grandparents and I have no information about the town. My grandparents were born in 1870s and were killed in 1920s, during the Antonov uprising [Antonovschina – uprising of peasants in Tambov and Voronezh regions against the Soviet power (1920-1921). They struggled for freedom of trade. This movement was called after its leader A.S. Antonov. It was suppressed by the Red army under command of M. Tukhachevskiy.

The leaders of this uprising were executed.] in Tambov region. Regretfully, I don’t know my grandmother’s maiden name or her family. My father told me very little about her.  My grandmother and grandfather’s sisters and brothers died before I was born.  My father told me that grandmother Rochl-Beilia wore customary Jewish clothes: a long skirt and long-sleeved dresses. She wore a kerchief, but no wig. My grandfather Israel wore beard and a hat. He wore a shirt, vest, trousers and boots. I would think my grandfather was a tailor since my father Naum Zalivanski (my father changed his surname during the Civil War 1, most likely for more common sounding; he was Zelvianski before), was a tailor. Grandmother Rochl-Beilia was a housewife. They spoke Yiddish and knew Polish.

My father told me they lived in a wooden house with three small rooms. Their biggest value in the family was a sewing machine.  There was a well in the yard from where they fetched water. Here was a wood stoked stove in the house. They didn’t have a garden, but there was a shed where they kept chickens. They were not wealthy. The family wasn’t religious.

They observed Jewish traditions, but it was most likely their tribute to traditions and provincial way of life.  They went to the synagogue on Friday and on Jewish holidays. They celebrated Sabbath, but didn’t follow kashrut. They celebrated all holidays at home. My grandfather Israel Zelvianski had progressive opinions, he was a Soviet person believing religion to be something obsolete and disappearing, something that was on the way of life and progress, but he never joined any political parties or public or cultural organizations.  

There were 5 children in the family. My father’s older brother whose name I don’t know was born in Grodno in 1898. In 1917 he emigrated to Canada. From there he sent one photograph and there was no more information about him.

The rest of my father’s brothers and sisters were born in the following sequence:  My father’s brother Isaac Zalivanski (during the Civil War he changed his surname to Zelvianski for more common pronunciation) was born in Grodno in 1903. During the Civil War he was in the Red Army. He was a communist and a Party official. He had a number of jobs. He had two children:  his daughter Mirah Nosovich, nee Zalivanskaya, and son Boris Zalivanski who works as chief doctor in Lipetsk [about 400 km from Moscow]. We didn’t have contacts with them. Isaac died in Tambov [450 km from Moscow] in 1986.

My father’s brother Boris Zelvianski was born in Grodno in 1914. After his parents died he was raised in a children’s home in Moscow . Then he lived in Tambov and was a tailor. He died in Voroshilovgrad [Lugansk at present, about 1000 km from Moscow]. He has a daughter named Nelia. She is an obstetrician in Lugansk. We didn’t have contacts with him. He died in Voroshilovgrad in 1995.

My father’s sister Bella Zelvianskaya in Grodno in 1916. She was raised in a children’s home in Moscow. She married Grigori Levin, a Jew, a major in the Red Army, and stayed to live in Moscow.   She worked in the department for the Party personnel inspections in the Central Committee of the Communist Party. She had a son named Victor Levin. He is an electrician and lives in Moscow. Bella died in Moscow in 1999. We didn’t have contacts with her or her son.

My father Naum Zalivianski was born in Grodno in 1900. His mother tongue was Yiddish, but he could also speak Russian, but he could hardly write in it.  He studied three years in cheder in his town.  He could not continue his studies. He had to go to work to help his parents to support the family. He accepted the [October ] Revolution of 1917 2 enthusiastically.

During the Civil War he and his brother served in the Red Army. He volunteered to the Red Army. He was a private in the 10th infantry regiment. His regiment was deployed near his town. After another attack of White Guards gangs 3 his neighbors decided to rob his parents’ home. Someone informed him about their intentions and he managed to protect his parents. However, there was another time when he couldn’t do anything to prevent attacks and that time only his younger brother and sister survived and were sent to a children’s home in Moscow.

The other members of the family were killed by bandits.  He found his brother and sister in Moscow and supported them until they grew old enough to take care of themselves. My father demobilized in 1921 and returned to Tambov where he worked as a tailor: he cut fabrics in shops and also worked at home to earn more. In 1930 he married a Jewish woman named Rosa (I don’t know her maiden name). In 1931 their daughter Mirah was born. In 1933 they moved to his wife’s relatives in Saratov [about 900 km from Moscow]. Shortly afterward his wife died. He lived with his deceased wife’s relatives before he met my mother.

My maternal grandmother Basia-Yonta Weisman was presumably born on the outskirts of Kamenets-Podolsk in Ukraine [about 1500 km from Moscow] in 1879. She came from a family with many children. As I understood from what my aunts and mother said she was the only daughter from her father’s first marriage and the rest of the children were her stepbrothers and sisters. I don’t know when or for what reason her mother died.

My mother was a small child and could hardly remember her mother.  My grandmother’s father must have remarried shortly after his wife’s death. My grandmother’s stepmother was a Jewish woman. They began to have their own children. The family was poor and to get rid of my grandmother her stepmother made her marry the first man that proposed to her: he was a lame redhead Jew that came from Austria.

I don’t know any details about how my maternal grandfather Mendel Weisman, born in 1873, moved to Russia from Austria.  One way or another he occurred to be there and my grandmother married him at the age of 16. They treated each other with respect. My grandfather was 6 years older than my grandmother. He was a shoemaker in Kamenets-Podolsk.

In 1913 he was authorities forced him to move to Saratov for some suspicions that they had, but I think he was sent there due to his Austrian origin rather than any revolutionary ideas.  I don’t think he had any revolutionary ideas. He was a common shoemaker and a deeply religious man. From what I know my grandmother didn’t have any contacts with her family afterward and I have no information about them, therefore.

In Saratov they lived in Nemetskaya Street (nowadays it is a pedestrian avenue in the very center of Saratov). I don’t know whether they had a house or an apartment, but they didn’t have any garden, that’s for sure. Grandfather had a small shoes repair shop in his street. He was a skilled shoemaker, but they his family lived from hand to mouth.

My grandmother wanted to raise his children religious, but he couldn’t afford to give them good education. However, his children were taught to read and write and read religious books that they had at home. I saw my grandfather saying a prayer every morning with his tefillin and tallit on. He took a prayer book and kept swinging to the tune of words that he pronounced. He always had a tzitzit under his jacket. He wore a hat. He had a big red beard, but no payes, I think.

My grandmother wore long skirts and long-sleeved dresses and a kerchief. She was an exemplary Jewish wife. She followed kashrut and observed all Jewish traditions. Once I attended seder in my grandparents’ home.  There was a long table in their house. My strict and serious read bearded grandfather sat at the head of the table and the rest of the family were sitting by their seniority. My grandmother brought in a bowl of nicely smelling chicken broth and other dishes…

Their attitude toward the revolution of 1917 was quiet. They accepted it as something inevitable and it didn’t change their way of life. People needed to have their shoes fixed regardless of the regime and besides, their family had nothing to lose.  

During the Great Patriotic War 4 they lived in Saratov. Mendel and Basia-Yonta Weisman also  resided in Ufa [about 1400 km from Moscow], Chernovtsy [about 1200 km from Moscow], Zastavna [about 1150 km from Moscow] and Kuibyshev, present Samara [over 800 km from Moscow] with their daughter Chava. They moved to their children’s families to help them with raising their grandchildren. My grandfather died in Kuibyshev in 1959  and my grandmother died in Chernovtsy in 1955.

They had eight children. One of them, born in 1916, died in infancy. Their children were raised in the religious environment and were taught to observe all Jewish traditions and rules. Their mother tongue was Yiddish. All boys were circumcised and went to cheder. Girls also studied at cheder for girls 5. When they grew up and received secular education, and also, considering that they lived in the socialist countries, my mother’s brothers and sisters, like the majority of Jews of their generation in the USSR gave up observing Jewish traditions.  Their families did not celebrate Jewish holidays and none of them went to the synagogue.

My mother Bertha Weisman was born in Kamenets-Podolsk in 1903. She was the first child in this family. My mother’s sister Chava was born in 1904. She married Michael Gaitner, an Austrian Jew that sell things at the market.  They lived in Kuibyshev. Chava was a housewife. They had two children: their first daughter Tatiana Lanzman (nee Gaitner) was a dentist, her husband Michael Lanzman – was a foreman at the bearing plant in Samara, they have a daughter named Evgenia Baskina (nee Lanzman);  second daughter Manya (nee Gaitner), husband Kim, daughter Lilia, I don’t remember the surname.

The next was Michael Weisman, born in 1906. He lived in Leningrad, finished a Mining College and worked as an engineer. He perished during defense of Leningrad during the Great Patriotic War in 1941. He was single.

In 1908 Faina (her Jewish name was Feigele) Weisman was born. She married a Jewish man named Chaim Chait and moved to some place in Ukraine. She worked as an accountant, I don’t know where. My grandfather and grandmother lived with her. During the Great Patriotic War she evacuated to Saratov with her family and her parents. From there her husband went to the front when she was pregnant expecting their first son.  After the war her husband returned from the front and they moved to Chernovtsy in Western Ukraine [about 1200 km from Moscow]. I don’t know for what reason they moved. Some time afterward Faina divorced her husband and went to work as an accountant in Zastavna village near Chernovtsy.  She moved to this village with her children and my maternal grandparents.

In 1987 she moved to America with her children.  Faina died in America in 1990. Her sons Nathan (Natsik) Chait, born in 1942, and Efim Chait, born in 1946, live in New York, America. Nathan is married and they have a son named Garik Chait. Nathan is a cabinetmaker. He works in a carpenter workshop. Efim wife’s name is Raisa Chait. They have two daughters: Ludmila (nee Chait) married a man from Chernovtsy; as for their younger daughter, I don’t remember her name. We do not have any contacts with them.

My mother’s brother Alexadr (Jewish name Shneer) Weisman was born in Saratov in 1914. He finished an affiliate of Moscow College of Railroad Transport in Saratov in 1935 and was chief of Saratov railroad. In 1937, during the period of mass arrests [Great Terror] 6 he was arrested after an accident near Saratov railroad station. He was accused of sabotage, but released half a year later since his guilt was not proved. As far as I know my other relatives didn’t suffer during this period. 

In 1940 he married Faina (Feigele) Gorelik, a Jewish woman. She finished a medical College and got a job assignment in Ufa. I don’t know what Alexandr did for a living. Shortly before the war in 1941 they returned to Saratov. When the war began he worked as an engineer at the ‘Cracking’ refinery. He was released from military service.

In 1942 their older son Michael Weisman was born. He lives in St. Petersburg. His wife Galina is a Jew. She works as a programmer. Their son Ilia Weisman is an attorney. Their son Alexandr, Zalman Weisman, born in 1951, lives in Saratov. He was deputy director of Gasatomatika institute and now he is a private entrepreneur, a grain dealer. His wife Bella Falikova, a Jew, is deputy director of a music school and their daughter Irina Weisman is a postgraduate student of the Philological Faculty of Saratov State University. Alexandr Weisman died in Saratov in 1988.  Photo 6

My mother’s sister Bella (nee Weisman), born in Saratov in 1918, finished an accounting school and married a Romanian Jewish man. I don’t know his name. In 1943 their son Michael was born. In 1950 their family moved to Chernovtsy. My maternal grandmother and grandfather moved with them. During the Great Patriotic War Bella was in Saratov. She worked as an accountant. Her son Michael is chief of construction trust in Saratov. His wife Larisa is Russian. We do not have any contacts with them. Bella died in Chernovtsy in 1983.

My mother’s brother Arkadi (Jewish name Abram) Weisman, born in Saratov in 1919, finished a Construction College. During the Great Patriotic War he was an air force mechanic at the Leningrad Front. In 1947 he came to Saratov and in 1950 he moved to Chernovtsy with his family. His first wife Bella is a Jewish woman from Bessarabia 7. They adopted an orphan child from a children’s home, but divorced shortly afterward. His second wife Tunia Weisman, a Jew, was a secretary. She had a son from her first marriage. Tunia and Arkadi had a daughter named Darina. She lives in America. Arkadi died in Chernovtsy in 1986.

My mother Bertha Zalivanskaya finished three years of cheder for girls in Kamenets-Podolsk. This is all education she got. She was the oldest child and had to help her mother about the house.  Her mother tongue was Yiddish. She spoke poor Russian. At the age of 16 she married Michael Rabinovich, Jew and a communist. They were introduced to each other by matchmakers and grandmother and grandfather, therefore, gave their consent to their marriage. My mother also got fond of revolutionary ideas.

In 1920 they moved to Tsaritsyn [renamed to Stalingrad, present-day Volgograd, about 1000 km from Moscow], where Michael Rabinovich held an important Party position at a plant. My mother was a housewife. She observed Jewish traditions in secret from her husband. She lived with her husband for about 10 years. They didn’t have children. He died of consumption that developed from his stay in tsarist prisons when he was young.

After Michael Rabinovich died my mother returned to her parents in Saratov where she worked as a seamstress in a shop. For her outstanding performance she received a room in a former two-storied merchant’s stone house in Nizhniaya Street. The house was divided into cells of rooms. There was a window and a half in my mother’s room. My mother was an activist and spoke at meetings on Soviet holidays, although I don’t know who could understand her poor Russian with a strong Jewish accent.  She wore a red kerchief that was in fashion at that time.

In 1934 she married my father Naum Zalivanski. They met through matchmakers that was quite a custom with Jews at that period of time.  They registered their marriage in a registry office. They were Komsomol members 8 and activists and they didn’t have a Jewish wedding. They invited their closest ones to a small wedding dinner. They didn’t have any photographs of the wedding. My father had a daughter from his first marriage. Her name was Mirah. My father and Mirah moved into my mother’s 16-square-meter room in Nizhniaya Street.  There was a 12-square-meter kitchen with no windows.

My stepsister Mirah was born in Tambov in 1931 [800 km from Moscow]. She finished a Russian grammar school for girls. She glued inner soles at the shoe factory. She got married through matchmakers in Vilnius in 1953. Her husband’s name was Meyer Vilenchik. I don’t know what he did to earn their living. Mirah was a housewife. The family of Meyer Vilenchik was shot in the ghetto in Vilnius in 1942. He was the only survivor. A Lithuanian woman rescued him when he was a boy. His hair turned gray after he witnessed the shooting.  He saw many terrible things.

When he married my stepsister he was eager to move to Israel.  He left Russia in 1955. They moved to Poland with their daughter Malka and adopted Polish citizenship and from there they had no problem with moving to Israel. Their daughter Lisa was born there. Lisa lives in a kibbutz in Neheva and Malka lives in Petah Tikvah. Malka works as a medical nurse in a hospital. They can speak very poor Russian. Mirah died in Israel in 1968 at the age of 37.

My mother didn’t have children with her first husband and she believed she couldn’t have children at all. For this reason she married a widower with a child. They didn’t marry for love, but they respected each other. My mother loved her stepdaughter. Then my parents got three children of their own. After they were born my mother quit the factory and became a housewife. My father was the breadwinner in the family.

My older brother Israel Zalivanski was born in Saratov in 1935. According to customs he had brit milah on the eighth day. My brother finished a grammar school for boys in Saratov in 1952 and then he finished Saratov Electric Engineering College in 1956. In 1961 he married a Jewish girl from Tambov. He met his wife Bronislava, nee Deivt, through matchmakers. He was assistant shop supervisor in Saratov radio equipment plant. She worked as a teacher of mathematic at school.

They had two daughters. Their older daughter Marina Novikova (nee Zalivanskaya), born in 1963, works as a teacher of mathematic at the Jewish school in Saratov. Her husband Alexei Novikov is a TV camera operator in Saratov. They have two children: son Ilia, born in 1987, a pupil of the Jewish school, and daughter Vera, born in 1992, studies in the Jewish school.  Their younger daughter Nadezhda Khezron (nee Zalivanskaya), born in 1966, lives in Petah Tikvah in Israel. She is a programmer and her husband Yuri Khezron is electrician. Their daughter Yulia Khezron, born in 1990, studies at school. In 1992 Israel died of a stroke in Saratov. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery in accordance with the Jewish tradition. 

My sister Lisa Zalivanskaya was born in 1937. She died in 1951 at the age of 14: she drowned in the Volga. She also studied in a grammar school for girls.

• Growing up

I, Faina Gheller, was born in Saratov on 30 April 1941. We lived in the street that led to the synagogue. Saratov was more like a big village than a town.  Its center was near the Volga and we lived near the Sokolova Hill on the outskirts. Before 1937 the synagogue in Saratov was in Gogol Street. This was a beautiful two-storied building with nice interior and a gallery. Soviet authorities closed the synagogue during the period of struggle against religion 9. Then Jews collected contributions and bought a wooden house in Posadskogo Street and made it a prayer house that became a synagogue further on. I lived near that synagogue. There was a Sennoy Bazaar at the end of the street and this was the end of the town. Mr. Gorelik was acting rabbi and shochet. There was no mikveh. There was also a Jewish school in the town, but I didn’t go there. 

My mother often went to the synagogue. She and other women cleaned and washed the synagogue before holidays. Sometimes I went with my mother. My father didn’t go to the synagogue.  My mother ad old religious books. Se didn’t give me to read these books and didn’t teach me Yiddish. Although her Russian was very poor she only spoke Russian to me. My mother wrote her sisters in Yiddish.

Once a week my mother went shopping to the market. It took her all day long. Mother went there in the morning and came back with loads of things. As my father said: she wouldn’t come home until she bargained with everyone. There were few markets in Saratov where farmers were selling their products. Before Jewish holidays mother bought live chickens and fattened them well for some time.  

There were always 3-4 chickens in a cage in the yard. Before Pesach all Jewish housewives came to the market to buy chicken and there were Jewish intonations heard all across the market.  They bargained for each chicken taking a close look at it to put down the price. Live chickens were taken to a shochet. I remember my mother turning a chicken over our heads and recited a prayer and then took the chicken to a shochet and he slaughtered it according to the rules [Editor’s note: here the interviewee mix two different tradition, one is the kapores and the other is taking alive chickens to the shochet.] There was a long hallway in the shochet’s house where Jewish women were waiting for their turn. They discussed their families, children and recipes in Yiddish: a common women’s talk. I understood what they talked about a little.

We had Russian, Mordvinian [people living in the Far East of Russia], Tatar and German neighbors, but most of our neighbors were Jewish.  We got along well with our neighbors. Our neighborhood used to be an inn in the past. We lived in a two-storied brick house and other houses were wooden one-storied buildings. There were tenants even in basements. They escaped from occupied territories during the Great Patriotic War. There were no conflicts. We celebrated holidays together: Soviet holidays, Christian Easter and Jewish holidays.

My mother always treated our neighbors to traditional Jewish food. Purim was the merriest holidays. All Jewish housewives made hamantashen and other pastries. In the morning we ran around with shelakhmones. Housewives never disclosed what they were going to make to make a surprise. It was the most delicious holiday, particularly enjoyed by children. I also remember Chanukkah. Everybody gave us Chanukkah gelt. My mother took me to the synagogue on holidays.  Jewish housewives took their most delicious treatments to the synagogue.  We didn’t celebrate Sukkoth, perhaps, because it occurs in middle fall, when it was usually cold where we were, and it rained. Only reently I got to know about this holidays. 

Pesach was a special holiday. My mother had a special soup bowl and a dish for gefilte fish. She bought live pike at the market to make gefilte fish.  One day I went to the market with my mother.  Early in the morning at the Peshiy Market all Jewish housewives were waiting for Russian fishermen chatting among themselves. The fishermen sold their fish right from their boats. We put this live fish in a basin with water and at night gefilte fish was made.  And then finally this beauty appeared on the table: exclusively delicious!

My mother also made kneydlakh, kugel and matzah, of course. We had special plates for matzah. It was covered with a nice napkin. Matzah was made at the synagogue at all times. I remember that my mother brought a big pillowcase filled with matzah from the synagogue. She didn’t let us eat it before the time came.  She used to hide it, but we found it anyway and stole little pieces. Matzah was very delicious. We didn’t eat any bread through 8 days of the holiday.

For some reason I only remember a delicious part of the holidays. Perhaps this was the main part that we observed, at least, I don’t remember any rituals, prayers, blessings, and adults never told us anything about religion. This was more like a festive event, an occasion to eat heartily, invite guests and go out. This was overwhelming gluttony.  We were not made to fast at Yom Kippur, and I don’t think the adults fasted. Probably for this reason I don’t remember major holidays. 

Jewish families lived in their neighborhood near the synagogue. I would say that our street was a small Jewish town. Jews were craftsmen (shoemakers and tailors) and tradesmen. There was electricity, but there was no running water in the houses. We fetched water from pumps in the street. There were toilets outside. We had a big Russian wood stoked stove 10 in the house.

Our father installed a partial in our room. There was a bed where behind the curtain where my two sisters and I slept.  My brother had an iron bed. When my brother grew bigger he had to curl up in this bed. My parents slept on a squeaking bed with knobbles.

• During and after the war

I have dim memories about the Great Patriotic War. Soviet troops stopped Germans in 300 km from Saratov. I remember that the ‘Cracking’ refinery was continuously bombed. I only remember one air raid when I took hiding under the sewing machine. There was an air raid alarm howling and our neighbor boy Semyon was gathering splinters on the roof. There were many plants evacuated to Saratov. They were out of the town and were continuously bombed. During WWII my father was released form military service. He made uniforms for the front and my mother was at home with the children.

Life after the war was hard. Our parents worked as much as they could to support us. Sometimes I woke up at night and saw my parents sewing.  In the evenings we stood in lines to buy bread.  Even at night we had to go for a call over in the line. Everybody, including babies, had his number written with a chemical pencil on the palm. Once my sister Mirah lost bread cards [the card system was introduced to directly regulate food supplies to the population by food and industrial product rates.

During and after the great Patriotic War there were cards for workers, non-manual employees and dependents in the USSR. The biggest rates were on workers’ cards: 400 grams of bread per day]. My mother cried a lot and then took everything she could sell to the market. She bought a loaf of bread, but when we cut it there was a cloth inside. My mother cried again. Then she sold a piece of her jewelry and bought a can of oil. We had a little oil with onions and a little bread in a saucer for dinner. My father worked in a garment shop that made uniforms. He received food packages for workers.

At lunch my older sister and the other children went to the checkpoint of his shop. My father came out and gave us a bag with his food package trying to be unnoticed by the guard since it was not allowed to take food outside the shop. We ran home where my mother divided all food products equally between us and we also got a little bit of American chocolate milk.

My parents didn’t have anything left for them from this food ration. There were stables in a neighboring street where they delivered oilcake and we went there to steal or beg it from stablemen. My mother cooked it and we had a meal. There was an oil factory in our street and its compassionate guards packed our pockets with sunflower oil seeds. 

My brother Israel went in for free-style wrestling and was fond of billiards. He had many friends at school. They spent summer vacations together. My brother trained me as his sparring partner. My sisters and I helped my mother about the house. We embroidered, made dresses for our dolls and made our dolls. I got along well with my sisters. I had many friends that often came to play with me at home.  We arranged a New Year party for all my friends at home.

I went to kindergarten at the age of 6 in 1947. Before this I stayed at home with mother or, if mother was busy, my older sister or brother looked after me or I was taken to my maternal grandmother who lived in Saratov at that time. We, children, made fairy tale performances and concerts in the yard. We made costumes and stage scenery ourselves and invited adults. We even made tickets and gave them to adults. We were a big success. I played with boys for the most part: we played ‘highwaymen’ and football where I was a goalkeeper. 

There were nice dogs living in our yard. One of them, a black dog named Tsygan [gypsy] always lounged about a bakery standing on her hind legs begging for bread. What was really amazing about it was that it didn’t eat bread, but brought it to the shed where we, kids, got together. The dog gave us bread probably thinking that we were its puppies. Once the dog even brought us a pie.

Once I began to beg my parents to buy me a musical instrument. Our neighbors from upstairs were German. Irina of this German family was very good at music always playing the violin or mandolin or guitar and she played beautifully. I got so obsessed with the idea of learning to play that I kept asking my father to buy me an instrument. My mother was a theater-goer. She loved music and she never missed a single performance in the town.  She adored violin. My father liked romances.

When working he always hummed something in Yiddish or Russian. So I kept egging him to buy me the violin. He saved some money and one day he said ‘O’K, let’s go to the store and I will buy you an instrument that you will chose’. I don’t know why I set my eyes on a mandolin. I was trying to play it. Once I was trying to fit a key for ‘Amurskiye volny’ [Russian romance ‘the waves of the Amur’, a complicated piece of music], but I couldn’t find the tune and I threw this mandolin so hard that it broke to pieces. This was the end of my musical efforts.

We were very poor. I went to school in 1948 wearing the dress that both of my sisters had worn before me. My mother patched it and my father made me a bag. Life was poor, but interesting. We had plain food, but it didn’t get better in the 1950s.

I went to the Russian grammar school for girls. When I was in the 6th form schools for boys and girls merged and I was transferred to a different school.  I had many friends at school, but only one girl was half-Jew in my class. Her name was Lida Gheller. Boys teased her, but I stood for her and fight with the boys.  My best school friend was Rita Sukhanova. She lives in Kazan now. We’ve become lifetime friends. We exchange phone calls and every now and then we see each other. I had many friends beyond school. I went in for sports: skiing and volleyball in winter and racing bicycle in summer. I spent all my spare time in a gym. I took an active part in public life at school. I was chairman of a pioneer unit council, chairman of the school pioneer unit council, head girl of my class and chief of Komsomol unit. I was a strong girl and had authority in my class.

My favorite subject at school was mathematic. It was difficult at the beginning. Our teacher didn’t like her subject or children. I don’t remember her name. At home my father taught me counting on pins. He was a tailor and we had many pins of different colors at home. My father told me to put together red and blue pins or deduct green pins. Our classes at school were dull and we couldn’t learn much. In the 6th form we got a new teacher of mathematic Boris Ivanovich. He was a lieutenant and a veteran of the war. He treated us like we were his equals and his mathematic classes were very interesting and we really fell in love with mathematic and with him.

Few years later I became the best in mathematic, attended mathematic clubs and took part in Olympiads in mathematic. Many years later, at the 25th anniversary of our graduation I met with Boris Ivanovich and thanked him a lot for inspiring love to mathematic in us. This helped me much in life and career. Then a teacher of physics came to work in our school. He was also a veteran of the war.  Then physics began one of my favorite subjects. I attended a club of physics. I liked making detectors and other things.

Our Russian teacher was a little weird, but he loved his subject. We often teased him. The Russian language was very difficult for me. My Russian spelling was terrible. We didn’t have books at home. My parents didn’t go to the library and didn’t buy any newspapers. When I was a senior pupil a new teacher came to teach in our class and I began to like literature. This teacher told us stories with passion. She gave us her books to read: Russian and foreign classics and Soviet authors. I liked poems most of all. We discussed books in class. I read round the clock. The power was cut off at night and I read with a kerosene lamp burning or candles. We received valenki boots, free lunches, cod-liver oil and vitamins.

There were parades on Soviet holidays. We sang patriotic revolutionary songs putting our souls into this singing. We understood that we were signing about our country, our Motherland, our leaders. We imbibed this feeling of patriotism with our mothers’ milk.

I spent my summer vacations in pioneer camps.  This was wonderful time. We were taken out of town near Saratov where there were wooden summer houses on the bank of the Volga. There were 6-7 groups of children in the camp, 20-25 children of the same age in each group. We went hiking played sports games, has track-and-field contents, gathered around fire in the evenings, baked potatoes and sang songs.  We visited relatives and I spent a lot of time in the Glebuchev Ravine. There were poor ramshackle houses in this wide and deep ravine stretching from the Volga to Sennoy Bazaar.

Our parents didn’t ‘shepherd’ us and nobody counted us. We left home in the morning and they thought we were OK if we had our breakfast. Thank God, there was something to eat at all. We always played outside. In summer we played a ‘tag’ game, football or other games. In winter we skated. When it rained a lot in summer and Glebuchev ravine was filled with water we went there with planks and built a crossing.

Chapayevskaya Street leading to the Glebuchev ravine was a descend and it turned into a stream. We ran there and when somebody needed to cross the street we were at hand with our boards and arranged a crossing for them for a small fee. It was our small business: 10 kopeck each crossing. After the rainstorm we also searched for small change that someone might have lost in the street and then bought ice-cream for our savings. 

Our parents rarely head vacations. Sometimes my mother went to a health center for trade union arrangements and my father stayed home with the children. Once my father took a trip to the south. We often spent summer vacations with my maternal grandfather and grandmother in the Ukraine or with my father’s relatives in Tambov. When I was in the 4th form we went to visit my grandfather and grandmother in Zastavna [near Chernovtsy in Ukraine, about 1150 km from Moscow]. We went there by train and this was the first time I traveled by train. We traveled via Moscow and Kiev and I was impressed with Moscow metro.  

There was no anti-Semitism at school. I didn’t even know the word. Our teachers never segregated us by national origin. Even more than that, when I fought with the boy who called me ‘Jew’ once our teachers took time to explain to him that there were 16 republics in our country and that all citizens have equal rights. 

In my childhood I rarely faced anti-Semitism. Of course, I happened to hear ‘zhydovskaya morda’, [abusive – ‘Jewish mug’] but I always fought back. We had neighbors: the father of the family was an official from consumer cooperation and there were three daughters. One of them called me names and always provoked me for a fight. This annoyed me so much that I always ended up grabbing her by her hair. When I had my first fight I came home crying and complained to my father. He hit me hard and said ‘You better take care of your situations. Don’t complain to me. I shall not fight for you’. From then on I did take care of my situations. I had fights with that girl every single day. I got along well with other children. They didn’t call me names and we were friends. 

My childhood passed during the Stalin’s times, but about arrests and the postwar anti-Semitic campaigns, struggle against rootless cosmopolites 11 and the doctors’ plot 12 I only learned after the 20th Congress of the CPSU 13. This didn’t change my attitudes toward that period of time since it was my happy and joyful childhood. I didn’t care about politics at that age. I know that we were doing very well. At least, they took good care about the children that had gone through the wartime. 

After finishing school in 1959 I entered the Faculty of Energy in the Polytechnic College of Saratov. After finishing this college I worked as production engineer in the electric engineering shop, then operations engineer in a design institute and then I became a designer. My Jewish identity had no impact on my studies or career, though I never kept it a secret. The only details that I kept to myself was that my sister moved to Poland in 1955 and from there she moved to Israel. I had to keep silent about it since I was working at a military plant.

When in the 1960s relationships between Russia and Israel terminated I was very concerned. My sister and nieces were there. I couldn’t write them directly and we corresponded through our relatives in Vilnius. When in 1968  my sister died there were no more letters. The children were small and I just lost them. When in the late 1980s democratic changes [Perestroika] 14 came to Russia I began to search for my relatives in Israel immediately. I found my nieces. When a friend of mine and her husband moved there they went to see them.  I received a letter and an invitation to visit and meet them. At the time when my sister was leaving her older daughter was 1 year old and her younger daughter was born in Israel and I never saw her. In 1995 my family and I went to Israel. I had never traveled abroad before. I had unforgettable impressions about this trip. I liked Israel very much. Everything breathes with history there and my roots are there.

My parents were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Saratov. My father died in 1964 and was buried according to all traditions. Two old women stayed through the night in our house to make cerement without any knots.  A gabbai from the synagogue conducted the ceremony in place of rabbi.  There was a minyan and a prayer was recited.

The story of my acquaintance with my husband was traditional and customary for the time. We met through matchmakers. Shadkhanim existed in all times. They worked secretly in synagogues. Some people liked to make others happy and despite all prohibitions they collected information about young people to make matches of young people. Of course, they kept these activities in secret, but all Jews knew that they could get this service for a small fee at the synagogue. Several times people from the synagogue came to offer me an acquaintance. It was a routinely matter since my mother was Jewish and she believed this was the only way to arrange marriages. She addressed this matter to the synagogue and they brought a bunch of fiancés to be whom I didn’t like whatsoever.

My future husband Mark  Gheller, a Jew, came to spend vacation with his brother who lived across the street from our house. At first we became friends and didn’t make any plans for the future. My mother wanted me to meet a Jewish boy. At the age of 17 I was seeing a Russian boy named Slava and he proposed to me. I was very happy and ran to my mother to tell her ‘Mother, I am marrying Slava!’ She replied very calmly: ‘First, let this Slava write his parents that his fiancée is a Jew and secondly, if you marry him and one day he call you 'zhydovskaya morda' don’t you complain to me. You will have what you’ve chosen’. 

Thought it over and then I asked Slava to write his parents in Rzhyschev. When he received a letter from there I asked him ‘Well, what do they write ?’ He waved his hand and said ‘What do we care? We are getting married, aren’t we ?’
It became clear to me. It meant that his parents were flatly against a Jewish daughter-in-law. And it never came to my Russian wedding.

My mother made every effort that I married Mark . Mark  was in no hurry to put an end to his bachelor’s life. We got married few years after we met. Mark  served in the army three years and then returned to Saratov. He went to work and we continued seeing each other two more years. We registered our marriage in 1966. We didn’t have a chuppah at the synagogue. We began to live with my mother.  

My husband Mark  Gheller was born in Baryshi village Ulyanovsk region [over 700 km from Moscow] [This village does not exist today. It might have merged with a bigger town or may have disappeared for some other reason] in 1941. His parents came from Belarus. My husband’s family was not religious. They didn’t observe any traditions. They didn’t even know Yiddish. They were Soviet people and Party members. His father Solomon Gheller was the 2nd secretary of the regional Party committee in Verkhnedvinsk [about 450  km from Moscow].

When Germans approached Verkhnedvinsk he sent his family to the rear with one of the last transports. Germans bombed the transport. My mother-in-law Nina Gheller, pregnant with my future husband and with three other children survived. All other people perished, but she survived. She managed to get to Soviet front troops from where she evacuated to the Ulyanovsk region  where she gave birth to her son Mark  in November 1941. Solomon Gheller was commanding officer in a partisan unit. He heard rumors that the transport had been bombed and he decided that his family perished. He fought with Germans desperately thinking that he had nothing to lose. He was lucky, though: he didn’t get a single abrasion.

Once his unit got in the encirclement. His partisans were captured by Germans. Germans did not particularly know who they were and didn’t quite watch them. As a result, during their first night in captivity all partisans escaped and ran to nearby villages. Solomon Gheller found shelter in the house of a Russian woman that told authorities that he was her husband. He had false documents issued where his surname was written as Ovsiannikov. Thinking that his family had perished he began to live with this woman and they even had a son. Solomon continued to fight in the partisan unit. He became chief of shot firers. He used to spent hours lying in the snow waiting for a train. Mines did not always explode on time and their efforts were wasted. These hard conditions had an impact on his health: he got emphysema of lungs. His military documents are kept in the museum in Minsk.

After the war Solomon Gheller became director of a kolkhoz 15 and began to search for his family hoping that there might be survivors. They were not on the lists of deceased. He found his family in Baryshi village of Ulyanovsk region. He went to see them. Not all of them were there. His older son Boris Gheller turned 18 in 1944 and he went to the front at the very end of the war. He perished in his first combat action in 1945.

Solomon Gheller saw his younger son for the first time. He was my future husband Mark  Gheller. They also had other children: Efim Gheller, born in 1928. He worked at the equipment plant in Saratov and now he is a pensioner. His wife Anna Gorelik, daughter of a shochet and gabbai in the synagogue in Saratov, is also a pensioner now. Their children: Serafima Kats, teacher, lives in Israel, Tatiana Nosova, economist, lives in Saratov, and Clara Gheller, born in 1936. She is single and lives in Babruysk [about 500 km from Moscow] She was an accountant and is a pensioner now. 

Solomon Gheller took his family to Drissa village, present-day Verkhnedvinsk, in Belarus, where he was chairman of a kolkhoz. He reunited with his family, but he also supported the woman that had rescued him and their son.  His wife showed understanding of his efforts. She died at the age of 50. My father-in-law died in 1983. He was buried in Babruysk and I think he was buried in the Jewish cemetery.  

I have two sons: Dmitri Gheller, an older one, was born in Saratov in 1967, and in 1974 my second son Albert was born. When my first son was born my mother insisted that we named him Naum after my deceased father, but Mark  wanted to name him Dmitri. My mother went to the synagogue where she asked to register the baby as Naum, but they said the boy had to be circumcised that Mark  rejected flatly. So my son didn’t get a Jewish name, but his grandmother called him Naum for a long time.

My older son Dmitri learned his identity in the kindergarten at the age of 5. One day he asked me ‘Mom, what is ‘zhydovskaya morda?’ I asked him where he had heard this and he replied ‘our nanny said so’. Of course, I explained to him that he was a Jew and we were Jews and there was nothing to be ashamed of in it. On the next day I went to see the tutor of my son’s group (the nanny had a day off) and said ‘Margarita Sergeevna, please tell this nanny that if I hear that she calls my son ‘zhydovskaya morda’ ever again I won’t complain to higher authorities, but I will come and literally beat her mug up like I did it in my childhood’. On the next day this nanny greeted me as if I had been her best friend. Well, she got the message, then.

My younger son Albert went to a pioneer camp when she was in the 2nd form. I went to see him once and he told me that other children called him ‘Armenian’ and ‘Jew’. I told him that it was true that he is a Jew. He said that no, he was Russian. He was young and I told him who he was and where Jews came from.

We lived with my mother in my parents’ old apartment for along time. One year after I got married in 1968 my mother died. I already had a son and 7 years later my second son was born. Our older son slept behind a partition and our younger son slept on a folding bed. There was not enough space in our apartment for all of us. 

My life was always in full swing. I read many books and periodicals and went to the theater or cinema. I tried to spend as much of my free time with children as possible. I made a rucksack for my younger son and in winter I carried him and my older son was on skies and we went to the woods on Sunday. In summer we went to the beach: my younger son in the rucksack and my older son holding me by my hand. Later I worked as a tutor in summer camps and they stayed in a camp with me a whole summer.  

When I turned 45 we received a three-bedroom apartment. My older son had finished school by then and my younger son finished his 3rd form and we moved to Octiabrskiy district.  My son entered the Automobile faculty in the polytechnic College. After he finished his second year he had to go to the army. It was during the war in Afghanistan 16. Thank God, he didn’t have to go there. He served in internal forces in Kalinin, present-day Tver [250 km from Moscow].

The younger son entered the College of Agricultural Mechanization, but then he got a transfer to its extramural department that he hasn’t finished yet.

One of the most interesting events in my life was when in the late 1980s gabbai Brook decided to restore old traditions with young Jewish women, this was happening during perestroika, when religion was allowed.  At first I was reluctant to get involved in this process, but then I even began to enjoy it. He asked me to make teyglakh for Purim. He even bought kosher utensils for this occasion and food products. There were few other young Jewish housewives that brought their pastries to the synagogue and it was a wonderful celebration!  I was very proud to have taken part in this celebration. I attended the synagogue and studied Ivrit. Then I brought my children to the synagogue to have bar mitzvah. My younger son turned 13 and the older one was already 20, but he had a tefillin on and repeated payers after the others.

This Brook also convinced my husband Mark to have this ritual. However, they refused to have brit milah, but they identified themselves as Jews, anyway. Before Pesach all Jewish boys came to the synagogue to bake matzah. They made matzah from morning till night and occasionally they even had to stay overnight. There was a big stove in the synagogue. Mr. Brook designed a dough kneading machine and I helped him to assembly it.  Only men and boys were involved in making matzah. Women were not allowed to be there. My children were not raised religious, but I went to the synagogue with them on holidays and my younger son went with me more often.

We celebrated Jewish holidays with the family and even invited our friends of different national origin. I prepared something different for each holiday. I remembered how my mother prepared celebrations and tried to follow what she did.  I basically remembered a gastronomical part of the holidays. At Purim I made hamantashen and treated all children to them. However, we also celebrated Christian Easter, had Easter bread and painted eggs.  I didn’t go to church, of course, but I liked to make Easter bread.

Religion interested me from a scientific point of view. I know a little about all religions. I find it interesting. Since there were Tatar families in our neighborhood I learned few Tatar recipes and I also know dishes of other cuisines. We never followed kashrut in our family. I had many friends of various nationalities. I’ve never chosen friends for national or religious beliefs. I didn’t discuss issues related to Judaism or relationships between Russia and Israel with my friends. 

My sons are married. My older son Dmitri Gheller has a son named Alexandr, born in 1991. His wife Elena Gheller, nee Sorkina, is a Jew. My younger son Albert Gheller has a daughter named Alina, born in 1999. His wife Anna Gheller, nee Tsypina, is a Jew. They identify themselves as Jews, but they do not observe any Jewish traditions. 

My relatives lived in various towns and I rarely met with them. My only relatives in Saratov were my uncle, my mother’s brother Alexandr (Shneer) Weisman , his wife Faina Weisman and their son Zalman Weisman. We often got together.

I retired from the position of leading designer in 1997. In autumn that same year I came to work in the Hesed in Saratov. I was a volunteer at first.  Now I am director of the club for the people under patronage of Hesed. We talk about Jewish traditions, celebrate Sabbath and holidays or just socialize. Basically my husband, our friends and I were the products of the Soviet rule. We never joined the party, but we believed in communist ideals dreaming that our children were going to live during communism and all difficulties were temporary and it was going to be no problem to overcome them.

We’ve always been patriots of our country. We’ve never considered emigration. How could we leave our home, the graves of our dear ones to go to the unknown. We couldn’t imagine living in another country, with different way of life, different traditions and the language that we didn’t know. I didn’t think bad of those who were leaving, people had to think about their life themselves, but my family and I were dedicated to our country. I still think that life was good in the USSR. There was free medicine, free education, no unemployment, everybody could afford theaters, cinema, libraries, we were confident that nobody would throw us into the street or fire from work. Tell me, is there anything bad in this? Now there are so many children having nothing to do since their parents cannot afford to pay for their organized, old people are miserably poor, I didn’t think democracy was like this.

The only positive thing that democracy gave me is a possibility to feel my integrity with my people.  This is all thanks to Hesed. However, even before Hesed I strove to my roots.  When I got an opportunity to work in the Jewish charity center I had not a single doubt that I had to do this work.  And that’s what I am doing. The Jewish life does not prosper in our town as yet. Most important is that the life of Jewish young people is not in its full swing. Young people are mainly concerned about earthly needs rather than spiritual. This delays development of the Jewish life. There is work to do.  

• Glossary:

1 Civil War (1918-1921): The Civil War between the Reds (the Bolsheviks) and the Whites (the anti-Bolsheviks), which broke out in early 1918, ravaged Russia until 1921. 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 1921 Russia was ruined and devastated. In 1920 industrial production was reduced to 14% and agriculture to 50% as compared to 1913.

2 October Revolution of 1917: In early October 1917, Lenin convinced the Bolshevik Party to form an immediate insurrection against the Provisional Government. The Bolshevik leaders felt it was of the utmost importance to act quickly while they had the momentum to do so. The armed workers known as Red Guards and the other revolutionary groups moved on the night of Nov. 6-7 under the orders of the Soviet's Military Revolutionary Committee. These forces seized post and telegraph offices, electric works, railroad stations, and the state bank. Once the shot rang out from the Battleship Aurora, the thousands of people in the Red Guard stormed the Winter Palace. The Provisional Government had officially fallen to the Bolshevik regime. Once the word came to the rest of the people that the Winter Palace had been taken, people from all over rose and filled it. V. I. Lenin, the leader of the Bolsheviks, announced his attempt to construct the socialist order in Russia. This new government made up of Soviets, and led by the Bolsheviks. By early November, there was little doubt that the proletariats backed the Bolshevik motto: ‘All power to the soviets!’

3 White Guards: A counter-revolutionary gang led by General Denikin, famous for their brigandry and anti-Semitic acts all over Russia; legends were told of their cruelty. Few survived their pogroms.

4 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.

5 Cheder for girls: Model cheders were set up in Russia where girls studied reading and writing, and also had some religious instruction.

6 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.

7 Bessarabia: Historical area between the Prut and Dnestr rivers, in the southern part of Odessa region. Bessarabia was part of Russia until the Revolution of 1917. In 1918 it declared itself an independent republic, and later it united with Romania. The Treaty of Paris (1920) recognized the union but the Soviet Union never accepted this. In 1940 Romania was forced to cede Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina to the USSR. The two provinces had almost 4 million inhabitants, mostly Romanians. Although Romania reoccupied part of the territory during World War II the Romanian peace treaty of 1947 confirmed their belonging to the Soviet Union. Today it is part of Moldavia.

8 Komsomol: Communist youth political organization created in 1918. The task of the Komsomol was to spread of 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.

9 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.

10 Russian stove: Big stone stove stoked with wood. They were usually built in a corner of the kitchen and served to heat the house and cook food. It had a bench that made a comfortable bed for children and adults in wintertime.

11 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 antisemitic 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’.
12 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.

13 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.

14 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.

15 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.

16 Afghanistan war: Conflict between anti-communist Muslim Afghan guerrillas and the Afghan government, supported by Soviet troops. The conflict started by the coup d’état of the the marxist-leninist People’s Democratic Party and the establishment of a pro-Soviet communist government. In 1979 another coup provoked an invasion by the Soviet forces and the installation of Babrak Karmal as president. The Soviet invasion sparked Afghan resistance; the guerillas received aid from the USA, China, and Saudi Arabia. Although the USSR had superior weapons, the rebels successfully eluded them. The conflict largely settled into a stalemate, with Soviet and government forces controlling the urban areas, and the guerrillas operating fairly freely in mountainous rural regions. Soviet citizens became increasingly discontented with the war, which dragged on without success but with continuing casualties. By the end of the war 15,000 Soviet soldiers were killed and 37,000 wounded. The Soviet troops pulled out in 1989 leaving the country with severe political, economic, and ecological problems.

Blyuma Isaacovna is an intelligent 89-year-old woman.

She has a perfect memory, she remembers her forefathers and is very proud of them.

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary 

My family background

I was born in 1912 in a settlement called Yanovichi in Vitebsk region. It is Belarusian territory now. My paternal grandmother’s name was Genya and grandfather’s name was Chaim. They were born in Belarus. I don’t know the exact dates and places of their birth. Grandma raised the children – there were a lot of them, I don’t know exactly how many, and I don’t know any of them by name – and ran the big household. They lived not far from the ferry across the Dvina River. Grandpa was in charge of that ferriage across the Northern Dvina, ten kilometers from Vitebsk.

My brother Aron loved Grandpa very much. He visited him often when he traveled home via Vitebsk, talked to him about Jewish history. Grandpa also loved him a lot. I’ve never been to their house. I was born tenth in our family and I was the youngest, so I never met any of my grandfathers or grandmothers. I lived together with my parents, my brothers and sisters near Vitebsk, but opposite to where Grandma and Grandpa lived. According to my brother Aron, Grandpa Chaim was very pious and literate and he spoke Yiddish and Russian. Unfortunately, I know very little about Grandma and Grandpa and there is no one to ask, because I am the only one from our family who is alive. My grandparents were very beautiful people, they were very good-looking. Grandpa wore a beard and Grandma covered her hair with a kerchief. I was told that I resemble my grandma. I am not tall, just like she was.

Grandpa and Grandma Perlstein were very religious and celebrated all Jewish holidays. Grandpa recounted the Torah and the Jewish history to his children and grandchildren. Two of his elder sons helped him with his job, but when they grew up they left for America, so I never met them. Grandma died before Grandpa, in 1914. Grandpa lived for 98 years and died in the 1920s.

Before the Revolution 1 people were very anti-Semitic, whole crowds organized and participated in Jewish pogroms 2. Grandpa had very good relations with the municipal officials, with the village constable and other people. [Village constable – lower rank of district police in pre-Revolution Russia. The position of village constable was introduced in 1878. They were accountable to the attachment police officer and executed supervision over the elective sotsky and desyatsky (charge-hands).] Grandfather was a respected man. In the course of one such pogrom, when the crowd was supposed to pass Grandpa’s house, the village constable came to his place, sat on the house porch and when the crowd wanted to attack the house, he told them: ‘Everything’s fine, there’s no one here, pass by.’ So Grandpa’s house remained untouched and safe. 

I’ve never met my forefathers on my mother’s side and unfortunately I know nothing about them. They had lived and died long before I was born. My maternal grandfather’s name was Leiba Pakson and that’s all I can tell about him.

The Yanovichi settlement, where I was born, was located 30 kilometers from Vitebsk. It was a very cultural place, since literate and intelligent Jews and Russians lived there. Before and after the Revolution all children, both Jewish and Russian, went to school together and I never heard the word ‘anti-Semitism,’ because we all lived in friendship. Only the Kolonitsky family stood out. It was a Russian family of intellectuals and three people from this family were our teachers: two women and one man, Alexey Yakovlevich, thanks to whom we have the possibility to remember Yanovichi, looking at pictures made from his drawings.

The Kolonitsky family had a big stone house with a huge fruit garden. They even had wonderful ‘antonovka’ [type of apple] in winter, which they stored in the attic. Alexey Yakovlevich’s brothers and sisters worked a lot; they had a very big garden. They made everything with their own hands and never hired any assistants. After the Revolution their household was ravaged by the ‘Reds’ 3 and communal sites were arranged on Kolonitsky’s former land. One by one the Kolonitskys left Yanovichi. These very intelligent and good people taught my sisters and brothers. Alexey Yakovlevich also taught me drawing, history, mathematics and physics. He lived the last years of his life in Moscow. My brother Aron also lived there and they kept in touch with each other. Alexey Yakovlevich gave all the pictures made from drawings, which he drew in Yanovichi, to my brother. My brother Aron died in 1977 and I inherited all these pictures.

Our family at first lived on Porechskaya Street, behind the bridge. The streets were rather poor, paved with cobblestone and the houses were mostly inhabited by workmen. You can see a hill in the background, there was a Russian cemetery. All buildings to the left were wooden. This street led to the road to Vitebsk.

The two-storey building of the school was situated on the outskirts of Yanovichi, on Unishevskaya Street. The school was old, several generations had studied in it. School teachers were mostly local intellectuals, however, during my and my brother Aron’s school years a lot of newcomers taught us. They lived in an extension of the school building; you can see it in the picture [I have] as a single-storey corridor. The school owned a big plot of land, there was a vegetable garden located in the yard. I studied at this school for seven years. The school was very good with a distinguished teachers’ team, who taught us a lot. Since the school was situated outside of town and the cobblestone street ended there, a planked footway was constructed to the school entrance along the school fence. 

The fire-depot was located in the center of the borough near the river. It was very well equipped with fire-engines and a fire-brigade, in case of fire they immediately arrived to extinguish the fire. A local theater group began its practice in this particular fire-depot. It was easily understood that a theater was located there, since there was a sign on the building. Their first performance, ‘On the way to business,’ was staged in 1911.

In June 1917 a Public House was constructed in Yanovichi, so this local theater group moved there to stage their performances. [Public Houses in pre-revolutionary Russia accommodated a library, a lecture/theater hall, a Sunday school, a canteen and a book store. The first Public Houses were opened at the end of the 19th century by major manufacturers and had a significant cultural effect on the population thanks to their libraries and theatrical performances. Bolsheviks made good use of Public Houses to promote their revolutionary propaganda and organize mass meetings. After the October Revolution of 1917 Public Houses were substituted by Educational Clubs and Houses of Culture.] The Public House can also be seen in the picture [I have], there is a small house with two windows to the right. Through this small house one could get to a big auditorium with a big stage, decorations and comfortable benches for the audience. The walls and ceiling were wooden. Very often actors from other places came on tour to our borough. A Jewish troupe also visited our place. When Soviet times came, school gymnastic groups acted on stage and performed in evening shows. This small house had a room where the pioneer organization 4 was based after the Revolution of 1917. A single-storey building with a hall was located to the left. Behind the small house there was a barn and in front of the house there was a small flower garden.

There was a beautiful Russian Orthodox Church in the middle of the settlement close to the market square. It was used for weddings and prayers. Sometimes children came inside to watch a wedding or some other ceremony. The settlement, the market square and nice houses, where not very rich but well-to-do and rather prosperous people lived, were located around the church. There was also a big park not far from it. A big wooden bridge led to the church across the Vymnyanka River. There was a street which led past the estate of the former Polish landowner, ex-owner of the Yanovichi borough, to Vitebsk. After the Revolution this manor served the Yanovichi population. A kindergarten was arranged in one of the buildings. I attended that kindergarten. Mostly craftsmen lived in that street behind the bridge. Every evening young people gathered on the bridge to spend their free time, especially on holidays and weekends. We had real fun.

There was a market place in Yanovichi. Among the market rows there was a two-storey building with a store on the first floor and a sewing shop on the second floor. It was set up after the Revolution. Later the Soviet Power expropriated the sewing-machines from the shop. Stores were arranged in the market rows. During holidays and days off people from neighboring villages came to the market square and brisk trade was built up. Peasants offered everything for sale: cattle, food products, fruit, hay, clothes.

There was a big three-storey mill in Yanovichi, which provided the big district with flour. Flour was also sold outside Yanovichi. The mill was located on the bank of the Vymnyanka River. In spring there was flooding so there was a dam in front of the mill from the side of the river bank. In order to protect the mill from the floating ice there was a paling in the water to the left. Normally when there was no flood it was possible to walk to the mill along the dam. The dam, which forced the water wheel, sustained the stable water level. Water passing through the logs and leaving the big pieces of ice behind, fell from a rather big height and set the mill wheels in motion. There was another steam mill behind the water mill, but it didn’t always work, mostly the water mill was used. The mill was surrounded with a high wooden fence.

There was an old public bath-house 5 on the bank of the river. There was a high chimney on the banya roof and a well, from which water was taken. The banya also had an extension, used for household purposes. The banya operated only on certain days; there were women’s days and men’s days. The mikveh was inside the banya. We went to the banya together with our mom.

There was a big open square for horses near the school, it was called the Horse Square, and was situated close to the central market square. A big building near the school was the borough council. There was an office in the council building, where the council employees based their borough administration. There was a drugstore in a small corner house to the left, at the beginning of Lyaznyanskaya Street.

My mother, Chasya-Ita Leibovna – we called her Chasita – was born in 1871 in Yanovichi borough of Vitebsk region. She learnt only the Yiddish language and knew it very well. She had big prayer books in Yiddish and she always read prayers to us. Mother spoke mostly Yiddish and a little Russian, since we lived close to Russians. But she couldn’t write in Russian. Mom didn’t wear a wig, she only wore a kerchief. 

Mom’s elder brother Mendel-Chaim Pakson [1865-1941] also lived in Yanovichi with his family and worked as a carter, delivering food products. He was executed by the Germans. His daughter Genya was a housewife. Genya’s husband, Lev Shaikevich, lived next door to us. Genya and Lev had two kids. In 1941 the entire Shaikevich family was executed by the Germans in the neighboring Akhryutki village.

Father [Isaac Chaimovich Perlstein] was born near Vitebsk in 1868. He found out about my mother somehow, came to Yanovichi, married her and stayed with her in Yanovichi. Mother was one of the beauties in our borough. They had their wedding in Yanovichi with a Jewish chuppah according to Jewish tradition. There was no borough council at that time, so they invited a rabbi from Vitebsk. A lot of guests came. My parents purchased a house and set up a small household store. Dad worked in that store until 1919.

My parents led a typical Jewish way of life, observing all customs and traditions, separating dairy and meat products. The children were also raised in this atmosphere. We lived in comfortable circumstances, not poor and not rich. There was a small plot of land attached to the house, where Mother kept a small vegetable garden, she grew vegetables for our own consumption; we had a cow, a cow-shed, a hay-loft, a pantry and a barn. The house consisted of two rooms and a kitchen. It was very cozy. There was an entrance-room, a Russian stove 6, which was used for cooking and where it was possible to get warm. There wasn’t much furniture, just the most necessary things: a table, chairs, a wardrobe and beds. There was a stove-bench.

Mother baked bread herself – it wasn’t available in stores – and cooked. She was a very good housewife. We didn’t have any water supply system; there was a well outside in the yard, which we used for the cattle. Drinking water was supplied from the river in barrels. We cooked on the stove and heated the house with it. There was a special department in the stove which was stoked for the purpose of heating the house.

The children helped with the household. There were eight of us and we all helped our mother with the household. There were various books at home, both religious and common literature. Father played the violin. Before I went to school, my elder brothers taught me, so I learnt to read, write and draw at an early age. I had five brothers and two sisters: Lev [1890-1954], Yuda [1894-1950], Aron [1900-1977], Iosif [1902-1979], Grigory [1910-1999], Rasya [1898-1941] and Sofia [1906-1942]. They were all born in Yanovichi borough in Vitebsk region.

My elder brother Lev left Yanovichi for Petrograd [later Leningrad, today St. Petersburg] and served in the Imperial Army of Nikolai II 7, in a musical detachment of a small military orchestra, which accompanied governmental ceremonies. He took part in World War I. He was a very experienced watch-maker. Lev worked in Petrograd as a master at the ‘Electropribor’ plant. He spent a lot of time on inventions. His wife was a Jewish woman, her name was Anna Epstein. She gave birth to two daughters, Esfir and Irina. They are both retired now. Esfir, or Fira, now lives in Israel. Irina lives in Slavyansk. During the war Lev was in evacuation in the Urals. He died in 1954 in Leningrad.

My second brother Yuda left home right after my elder brother. He lived and worked in Lugansk [today Ukraine], then in Kharkov [today Ukraine] in the Hunters and Fishermen Union as a chief accountant. He had two sons, Yonya and Lyova. Yuda died in Kharkov in 1950.

My other three brothers, Aron, Iosif and Grigory, joined the military. Aron, the eldest among them, was a pilot and worked as an instructor in the Crimea, not far from Simferopol, and later as head of the Aircraft School in the cities of Poltava and Kherson [today Ukraine]. In 1938 he was arrested on a false accusation of sabotage. He spent almost a year in prison, later he was acquitted and transferred to Moscow to the Gosaviakhim Administration. [Gosaviakhim – a club, a voluntary defense society of air force friends.] He took part in the Great Patriotic War 8, was at the front and died in Moscow in 1977, holding the rank of colonel. His wife was Jewish, her name was Arshanskaya. They had two children, son Evgeniy and daughter Vera.

My brother Iosif graduated from a military topographic school and the Military Land-surveying Academy, faculty of land-surveying. He worked in Kiev [today Ukraine] and in Moscow. The last rank he was conferred was lieutenant colonel. He also took part in the Great Patriotic War. He had a [Jewish] wife, her name was Serafima Baskina, and daughter, Inna. Inna studied in Moscow and worked as a journalist in Tallinn [today Estonia], at the editorial staff of the ‘Soviet Estonia’ newspaper. Her son, Yuriy Gati, worked as a TV presenter at the Leningrad TV. Iosif died in Tallinn, Estonia, in 1979.

My brother Grigory left Yanovichi for Leningrad after Father died. He stayed with my brother Lev in Leningrad and worked as a foreman at a candy factory. Later he graduated from the Leningrad Aircraft Military School and was assigned to Novocherkassk 9, where he worked as a mechanical pilot. During the Great Patriotic War he served in the North. After the war, in 1945, he returned to Novocherkassk and continued working as a foreman at the factory. In 1970 he retired and moved to Moscow with his family. His wife’s name was Yelena and they had three daughters: Inna, Arsha [Asya] and Larisa. Grigory died in Moscow in 1999.

My sister Raisa, or Rasya, lived in Yanovichi borough and was a housewife. Her husband Sigalevich-Grigoryev and son Isaac were murdered by the Germans on 10th September 1941 [in Yanovichi]. Only her son Lev managed to escape the massacre and remained alive. He got into the military school and served in a tank unit. He retired holding the rank of lieutenant colonel.

My sister Sofia worked in Leningrad at the ‘Electropribor’ plant. During the war she was evacuated with her children – together with the plant – to the Urals. She died there in 1942 of stomach cancer. Her husband’s name was Yefim Gofman and they had two children: daughter Polina and son Alexander. 

Growing up

I was born in December 1912 in Yanovichi borough, Vitebsk region. I was the youngest in the family. I was born tenth, but two of the children died, so I may be considered eighth. All my brothers and sisters were grown-up already and I was spoiled a bit. I went to a kindergarten for one summer, which was located in the former estate building. It was necessary to walk through the whole borough to reach the kindergarten. Being the youngest in the family, I hardly had to help my mother, since I had two elder sisters. Sofia was four years older than me and Rasya was a fourteen-year old bride when I was born.

My brothers went to school, we had textbooks and books at home, so with their assistance very early – when I was five years old or even earlier – I learnt to read and write. I even tried to use the drafting instruments. I went to the only seven-year Russian school, though there were Jewish schools. My parents considered it better to send me to a Russian school. We had wonderful teachers. My brothers and sisters went to the same school before me. I advanced in all subjects very well and liked algebra most of all. I also liked literature and read a lot. Our teacher of literature, Mikhail Vasilyevich, called me out when it was required to read something aloud for the class; I was his assistant. I read a lot of works of literature aloud. He even thought that I had a gift for literature. We also had a remarkable relationship with our teacher of physics and drawing. Radio was just introduced and we dismantled a crystal receiver and drew a lot. I even keep drawings which we made in our physics classes. I drew and designed a lot at home, so there are a lot of drawings in ink left. This teacher, Alexey Yakovlevich Kolonitsky, whom I already mentioned, was a real Yanovichi patriot. We had a sports group at the school which I attended. Sometimes we performed on stage at the Public House, showing sports pyramids and dances.   

My parents were religious and both attended the synagogue. There were two synagogues in Yanovichi. My parents attended one of them. We always celebrated Sabbath and cooked some special meat meals on these days. We also celebrated all Jewish holidays. Those days remain the brightest days of my childhood. I remember very well – approximately from the age of six – how we celebrated Pesach. We were all believers. Before Pesach everything was cleaned, the apartment was tidied up and washed. We put away kitchen utensils which we used daily and solemnly took out the Pesach utensils. I still remember the matzah stock: a huge basket of cylindrical shape, I think, one meter wide, which stood in the room.

Inside the house, at the entrance from the kitchen to the room, there was a prayer on the wall, covered with a tin, which was called ‘Matseiva’ [mezuzah]. Every Jewish family had one in their house. My parents were not members of any political organization. My parents were educated people; Father could write in Russian, too. They read only Yiddish books. Since there were a lot of boys in the family, we had a small Russian library at home. We knew no anti-Semitism, living in the borough. There were both Russian and Jewish houses mixed up, Jewish houses were not separated. We lived in friendship both with our Russian and Jewish neighbors. Mother had a very good temper. She said that when children scuffled with each other and parents ran to her complaining about it, she calmed them down saying that there was no use to interfere, the children would settle the quarrels. Later, when at school I became a pioneer, I still believed in God.

My parents didn’t pay visits to anyone; they were too busy with our big family. However, they visited our relatives and some friends on holidays. We lived in a big family only until the children grew up. When they became grownups they left for different places, got married and had their own families.

In 1923 Father shut down his store in Yanovichi and following my brother Yuda’s advice, who served in Kharkov, joined him there. He found a job in the Hunters and Fishermen Union at the gunpowder warehouse. In the course of unloading, one of the loaders lit a cigarette, an explosion occurred and Father died in the accident. It happened in 1923. My parents loved each other very much and I never saw them fighting.

When I was a schoolgirl, I remained alone with my mother and lived together with her until I finished school in 1926. After I finished school we left for Kharkov where at that time a trial regarding the pension for my father’s death took place. It was my first trip in a train. We were adjudged a pension in Kharkov for losing our family provider. It was 60 rubles per month, 30 rubles for me and 30 rubles for my mom. It was a decent amount in those years, but later this amount was never increased and it turned into a very small payment. My brothers supported me and my mother with money. My brothers lived in different places. Our family was very united.

When we lived in Leningrad – we came to Leningrad in 1929 to live with my elder brother Lev – Mom remained pious, she prayed all the time and never ate any non-kosher food. When she had to go to the synagogue during holidays, I accompanied her if possible and carried her prayer-books. Mother strictly observed all Jewish holidays, kept kosher, though she cooked everything for us. She stopped eating the day before Yom Kippur, spent all day at the synagogue and continued eating only after the first star appeared in the sky. She definitely believed in God and was sure about her way of living. All Jewish holidays were celebrated in our family while Father was alive. After finishing school all children were members of the Young Communist League 10 and pioneers, so Mom remained alone with her faith, since we didn’t approve of her beliefs anymore. But she continued to observe all holidays.

I studied for one year in Kharkov at a special technical school. Later I left for Leningrad with my mom. My elder brother Lev lived there at that time. I went to a nine-year Soviet school between 1928 and 1931. There was a contract signed with our class by the Aluminum-Magnesium Institute, so after finishing school we all came to work at that Institute. In 1935 several of my schoolmates entered the correspondence department of the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute. Being a third-year student I transferred to the full-time study department of this institute. We were accepted for the position of a laboratory assistant [medical field of activities] and developed our careers very quickly. I worked as a senior lab assistant in that institute.

I knew my husband, Yuriy Ilyich Khaitlin, since my childhood, since my first years at school. He also lived in Yanovichi and we went to one and the same school but to different classes. My husband was born in 1912. He was a Jew by nationality 11. He knew Russian and Yiddish. After we finished school we left for different places: he went to Moscow and I went to Kharkov, later to Leningrad. We kept in touch though. Yuriy graduated from the economic faculty of the Moscow Financial and Economic Institute. Yuriy worked at the navy engineering department in the position of a chief accountant. In 1936 we got married. We just registered our marriage, there was no big wedding and Jewish chuppah, it was impossible in those times 12. In 1937 our daughter Adel was born. 

During the war

Yuriy worked at the civilian navy engineering department between 1936 and 1941. Later he became a soldier and obtained the rank of commissary officer. We weren’t aware of the oncoming war and sent our daughter to my sister Rasya’s place in Yanovichi for the summer in 1941. When the war broke out, Adel stayed with Rasya until the fall of 1941. We weren’t able to get her out because of the military situation in the country. She perished in 1941 together with Rasya’s family and her grandmother, my husband’s mother.

About my husband’s parents I can say that they were Orthodox Jews, like my parents. My husband’s father, Ilya Khaitlin, was an expert on flax. He was a manager of a flax receiving station. He died in Vitebsk. His wife remained alone and during the war she moved from Vitebsk to Yanovichi, where her granddaughter, my daughter Adel, lived. They all perished there in September 1941.

I have a picture of graves of executed men and women in Yanovichi. They were two separate pits. Our fellow countrymen, who live in Moscow, Vitebsk and Leningrad, collected funds, got together, found the place of their burial and managed to arrange a small cemetery there. Our fellow countrymen visited these graves annually. However, I don’t know who visits them now. But the cemetery is safe and we were told that the borough council takes care of it.

I have a note here, a piece of newspaper, which is a notification about the death of my daughter and my sister’s family. It is just a scrap of paper, but it states clearly that the Yanovichi borough council received a letter from me and sent a reply to it: ‘Your relatives, Raisa Sigalevich, her husband Sigalevich, their younger son, your daughter Ada and Ada’s grandmother, your husband’s mother, Chaya-Isya, were executed by the Fascists on 10th September 1941. Lev Sigalevich is alive, he is a Red Army officer.’ He is the only relative of my husband who survived. I keep this note. I received this letter, a reply to my inquiry, from the Yanovichi borough council chairman. The letter is written in legible handwriting. They even wrote: ‘We grieve about the death of your family.’ The letter was written on a piece of newspaper and sealed up in the form of a soldier’s triangle. Looks like they didn’t even have a clean piece of paper, because this happened right after the liberation of Yanovichi from the Germans.

Between 1939 and 1942 I worked as an engineer at the institute. My mother died a natural death in 1941 in Leningrad of blood poisoning; penicillin was not invented yet in those years. We worked at the Polytechnic Institute during the war, from 1941 to 1945. We served in a hospital under our patronage in besieged Leningrad 13. I was the secretary of a Young Communist League cell. I joined the army at the end of the blockade and served between July 1942 and February 1945 in a construction battalion of the Baltic Naval Depot in the position of a platoon leader commander assistant. I also worked as a library manager and by the end of the war I held the rank of headquarters clerks’ master sergeant.

I returned home from the army in 1945. Our unit was stationed near Leningrad and it wasn’t difficult to get home. I saw that somebody had tried to break into our apartment. I asked our neighbors about it. They were very decent people. They saw that someone had tried to break into our apartment and said that they were responsible for it, so the housebreakers left. They were janitors and house-manager employees. They wanted to do it by the order of the headquarters in charge of guarding servicemen apartments. My apartment remained safe. My neighbors were Russian Orthodox, very decent people. They behaved nobly both before and during the war. We continued our friendship after I returned from the army. Everything in my apartment remained intact and secure owing to my neighbors.

I was demobilized on the grounds of pregnancy. I served together with my husband in the same unit. I served in the attached battalion for the navy engineering department and he served in the administration of that department. When our Research Institute, where I worked, got evacuated to the Urals, I, having lost my elder daughter, didn’t want to follow them and joined the army voluntarily. I hoped that my daughter would be found, but it was in vain. When our forces liberated Belarus from the Germans, we received the official notification about the death of my daughter and my sister’s family. 

After the war

At the end of the war our daughter Sofia was born and Raisa was born a year later. The engineering department, where my husband worked, was transferred to Tallinn and I followed him there with our baby. We lived there for three years. My husband fell ill there. Our second daughter Raisa was born near Königsberg. The doctors examined my husband and detected a malignant tumor. He stayed in hospital for a long time in Königsberg and later in Leningrad. Yuriy died in 1947 in Leningrad. He was transferred to a hospital there from Pillau, where he had worked at a navy engineering department. It was a real tragedy for me. I remained alone with my two little daughters. I moved back to Leningrad with my children. I couldn’t work because of the children, so I stayed without a job for several years and lived on a pension. My relatives supported me.

I didn’t really face anti-Semitism in my life. I began to feel it only after the war [1948-1953] 14. We all knew that Jews were refused jobs and those who returned from evacuation weren’t registered at their previous place of residence 15. It was all owing to Stalin’s personal anti-Semitic feeling, as well as owing to the increase of anti-Semitism in the party machinery. Jews were fired from cultural and educational institutions on various grounds and Jewish literature editions and printing houses were shut down. Stalin took revenge on Jews for their perceived lack of patriotism: [The State of] Israel was being established at that time and Jews supported the idea very much. A lot of Jews were subject to repressions. KBG 16 officials visited various enterprises, even factories and plants, hunting Zionists, especially among the management and engineers.

I personally experienced anti-Semitism twice. The first case happened when my elder daughter Sofia came back from elementary school, crying. She told me that a pupil accused her of always getting high marks and he explained it was due to the fact that she was a Jew, as was their teacher. My daughter always got excellent marks, so she was very much offended by such words. She cried bitter tears when she came home. The second time was the Doctors’ Plot 17. I was registered at the party cell as a housewife, since I had small children and didn’t work for several years. At one of our studies a woman raised an issue about Jews, alleging that the Jews had saved themselves far in the East, had not worked and had not participated in the war. I couldn’t bear to hear that. I took the floor and said that it wasn’t true. I couldn’t prove anything to them there and then, but I promised to bring all materials for the next study. I talked to an experienced person and the next time mentioned facts about Jews: Great Patriotic War heroes, and how many of them were awarded medals. I also told them that there had been no unskilled Jewish workers and that they all sat in workshops because there were no illiterate Jews. They were all literate in a Jewish way and were capable of working properly. My speech provoked a scandal. They tried to shut me up, but I told them everything I wanted to say and defended the honor of our Jewish warriors.

I never wanted to immigrate to Israel. All my relatives, as well as the graves of those who died, are in Leningrad, so I didn’t want to leave. A lot of my friends left, but it happened later. Two of my nieces left with their families and live in Israel now. When my children grew up, I started to look for a job, since my institute couldn’t give me employment. My job involved business-trips; I didn’t know what to do with my children. Someone suggested that I work as a teacher of physics, which I did. I attended the teachers’ retraining courses and started work at a workers’ school. Thus I was able to work and raise my kids. They went to school already at that time, it was 1954.

I worked as a teacher of physics until I retired. There were no conflicts at work connected with my Jewish identity. I had a rather quiet job and I was respected. When Jews got permission to leave for Israel, my elder brother’s daughter’s family, the family of my niece – her husband, her children and herself – left Leningrad. Aron’s daughter, my niece, and her family left Moscow. Before her departure her son had left for Israel. I keep in touch with them, we correspond and even meet sometimes, they come to visit us. I’ve never been to Israel, they wanted me to come very much, but I didn’t take the risk of going, especially in the state I am in now.

My daughters didn’t have a Jewish upbringing. Their grandma, my mother Chasya-Ita, had died before they were born, and I, being a member of the [Communist] Party, deviated from the Jewry. However, they do identify themselves as Jews and support the Jews. It was very well seen when the Jewish organization ‘Yeva’ started to work in 1993 in Leningrad. ‘Yeva’ [Eve] is a name of a Jewish woman, in honor of who our organization was called. I don’t know the details. They began to supply us with various parcels and helped in other ways. This organization has its own club, adult’s and children’s choir. Two of my granddaughters attend the children’s choir. I keep contact with this organization through my daughter Raya and her children. I cannot walk anymore, so my daughter Raya became a volunteer in this organization instead of me. My grandchildren and Raya celebrate all Jewish holidays in ‘Yeva’ and understand very well that they are Jews. Unfortunately, I cannot visit the place anymore. 

Glossary:

Sarina Victor Chelibakova

Plovdiv

Bulgaria

Interviewer: Svetlana Avdala

Date of interview: May 2006

Sarina is like the wind – with a distinct flair and presence, dynamic and sociable. Our meeting was arranged very fast. For me the life story of Sarina is an example of how nothing good can be born using force.
Sarina opposed the will of her parents; they disagreed over an exaggerated ambition, which they felt was out of touch with reality. Her parents wanted her to follow their will unquestionably. But Sarina is strong, and succeeds not only because of this, but also because she is able to create and preserve the world and life around her. She not only wins new friends and followers, but also continues Jewish traditions at a new level.

I speak Bulgarian, a little Ladino and Ivrit.

I am married to a Bulgarian. His name is Todor Chelibakov and he is now a pensioner. He was an economist and worked as head of the supply department at the ‘Patni Stroezhi’ [Road Construction] company. [Editor’s note: The company was founded on 1st March 1950 to oversee road construction. At first it was a state unit at the Ministry of Construction and Roads.].

I am a Sephardi Jew 2 both on my maternal and paternal side. My grandparents on both sides were moderately rich, but my mother’s family, Katalan, was better off. My maternal grandfather was Yako Katalan [? – 1937] and was born in Plovdiv. I don’t know what he graduated in and what education he had, but he was a bank director. I don’t know the name of the bank he was in charge of. His wife, Zelma Katalan, nee Natan, was also born in Plovdiv.

Their house was nice and large and it was also an example of their wealth. It was on Svetoslav Street and had a very nice garden. Later they sold a big part of it and the yard got very small. Yes, the house was large and the attic floor was also suitable for living in. When I was young, Uncle Isak, Uncle David and Aunt Marga were still single. Uncle Isak got married in 1942 to Vizurka from Dupnitsa and they moved to Sofia. In 1946 Uncle David married Veneziya Sarafova and Aunt Marga married Mordehay Natan.

They also had a refrigerator with ice. At that time the first refrigerators didn’t freeze water. There were people who sold blocks of ice, which were put into the refrigerator. They received ice every day.

Both the bathroom and the toilet were inside the house. There was a bath and a shower in the bathroom. Water was heated by a geyser with boiler tubes. The bathroom had a sink and the toilet was downstairs.

In the winter they heated the rooms with stoves, built inside the walls with enormous grates covered with beautiful nets. In the evenings when the fire was going down, we would open the grate and the only thing lit would be the embers and the sparks. It was warm and cozy everywhere. They had big rubber plants in the rooms. The furniture was elegant. It was much cozier than in my other grandmother’s house. The garden and the fireplaces made it very comfortable.

Nowadays the house still exists, we sold it in parts. In the 1950s we sold one of the floors to one of the brothers and later the other floor. The lower floor was sold in the 1970s when my aunt died. She lived in the house until her very last day and when she died, they also sold the lower flat. The attic floor was sold ten years earlier.

She was often sick; she had heart problems. When she had a heart attack, they would call for the family doctor, who was a cardiologist. They also had another family doctor, who specialized in internal diseases, Dr. Moskona. Unfortunately I don’t remember his first name. I remember that he would put leeches on people to lower their blood pressure. My grandmother’s heart pressure often increased. When I was a child, I didn't know that her blood pressure was the cause of her heart attacks.

He had a secondary education and worked in the ‘Phoenix’ Insurance Company 4. He died when I was six years old. I remember his funeral, which followed all the Jewish rituals. I remember that the synagogue brought little black tables, at which we, the closest relatives, ate for seven days. [Editor’s note: It is customary to openly mourn the death of a close relative for seven days, during which those who are ‘sitting shiva’ – ‘shiva’ is Hebrew for ‘seven’ – sit on low chairs and their family and friends take care of all their physical needs]. The rabbi cut our underwear with a pair of scissors. [Editor’s note: At the funeral, an outer item of clothing, usually a shirt or cardigan, is torn as a sign of one’s mourning.]

I remember the horses, which carried the coffin away. They were dressed in black coats decorated with gold threads. I know from my relatives that at the cemetery there is a special room where the deceased is bathed and dressed in special clothing called ‘mortaja,’ a shirt and underwear, which the family had prepared.

My grandmother Sarina Molho, nee Eshkenazi [? - 1965] was born in Vidin. My grandfather Yosif and Sarina had two children: my father Victor and his brother Shelomo. The three of them, my grandfather, my father and his brother Shelomo worked in the ‘Phoenix’ Insurance Company, which was owned by my grandfather. My uncle Shelomo was divorced, he didn’t remarry and didn’t have any children. He died in 1965 in Plovdiv.

My grandparents and uncle lived in the apartment where my husband and I later lived. My uncle was a very shy man and mostly talked to my grandmother. She told me tales in Bulgarian and spoke to me in Ladino 5, she sang songs to me and indulged me in every way. I learned Ladino from her, because my mother didn’t allow us to speak Ladino at home. She thought it would prevent us from learning Bulgarian pronunciation and spelling well.

My parents and I lived separately in rented accommodation. My mother didn’t want to live with her mother-in-law, because she thought it wasn’t suitable. Working-class people lived there, not the classy aristocratic society she was striving for. That’s why we paid rent.

We had a living room, guest room, bedroom, kitchen and a bathroom and toilet combined. Then we went to live elsewhere on the same street, 13 Bolyarska Street. Afterwards, we moved into this house, in which we still live. We own it. My grandmother and my uncle lived in one of the apartments and we let out the other one. We lived in the one which we let out. We moved here because according to the Law for the Protection of the Nation 6 one couldn’t let out his or her own apartment; the authorities took either the rent or the apartment. The people who lived in our apartment went to live in our former house on 13 Bolyarska Street.

My uncles had graduated in Strasbourg, which meant a lot then. She herself studied in the French College in Ruse, which she didn’t graduate from because of the high Catholic influence there. Her parents didn’t want her to be swayed in that direction and she left college before graduation.

My mother’s ambition showed in everything she did. She was a perfect housewife, who kept the house tidy and clean; she knitted, sewed, made wonderful desserts and dishes. She also wanted us to rise in society. We were educated not to stand out from the crowd, rather to do the same as everyone else, but to do it better. That’s why we didn’t speak Ladino at home, only Bulgarian. She didn’t allow us to go to the Jewish school, which she disapproved of. She enrolled us in the elite junior high school ‘Kiril and Methodii’ and then we graduated from the elite junior high school ‘Carnegie’, which my aunts and uncles had gone to.

We had a very large library at home. My mother subscribed to the fashionable magazines ‘Zlatni Zarna’ [Golden Seeds] and ‘Mozayka’ [Mosaic]. She also received the magazine ‘Domakinya’ [Housewife]. [Editor’s note: all these magazines started coming out after the end of WWI. The last one was one of the best and included articles on culture, science, fashion and cooking.]

She was a very dedicated Zionist. She said she would never allow us to marry Bulgarians, although my brother had a Bulgarian girlfriend. Maybe that’s why she wanted us to leave the country so badly. She and my father thought that if I married a Bulgarian, I would have five or six children and he would leave me, or be drunk all the time and so on.

He worked in the ‘Phoenix’ Insurance Company, although he had graduated from a teaching college. He didn’t have fixed working hours. We would always wait for him to sit at the table. He liked to say, ‘While I am head of this family, we will all dine together.’ So I always had to be at the table at eight thirty in the evening. Dinner was always served on a white starched tablecloth with a piece of embroidery put over it.

We celebrated the traditional Jewish holidays at my paternal grandmother Sarina’s house. The first evening we would always meet in this living-room we are sitting in now. The other days we visited the other relatives, my grandmother Zelma and so on. I remember that for every Purim my mother would knit a purse for the presents with a satin lining. The purses were different every year [it is customary on Purim to give gifts of food to one another]. People sold ‘mavlacheta,’ enormous letters in white and pink. They also made sweets: Burakitas del Alhashu, Tishpishti etc. We also had purses for Tu bi-Shevat, but they were larger.

Then we went to listen to the shofar in the synagogue and hurried to sit at the table. Dinner was started by breaking the taanit with a morello cherry syrup, followed by a light soup and gradually we started the main course. Slowly, slowly. For Pesach we were bought new clothes, patent leather shoes with a button, nice socks and new dresses.

Since our family was well-off, we could afford to go on a holiday in Velingrad. [Editor’s note: a town in Northwest Rhodope Mountains. It is a popular spa center, home to the biggest Karst spring, Kleptuza.] We didn’t go to the seaside. Even these days I don’t like going to the seaside. We would spend about a month and a half in Velingrad. There we would rent a house, but we carried with us a lot of our belongings. That is why the preparation for the holiday took a long time. We sewed pillows and bed linen. We put everything in big bundles together with kitchen utensils. We traveled using a narrow gauge railway.

I have always had a very strong relationship with my brother Josef Victor Molho [1936 – 1998], not only during my childhood, but also later on when he was in Israel. We were together all the time, because my cousins were born much later. We played in our grandmother’s yard. He would always come along when I went out with friends. I would even tell him he’s like a tail of mine. He was the quieter of the two of us. I played jokes on him a lot, pretending I was dying and so on.

My brother was a unique man, the Bohemian type. He got along very well with my mother. I, for example, couldn’t overcome her unyielding character and strong ambition. Later, when they moved to Israel, he helped her financially, but in such a way that she didn’t feel dependent on him. He looked after her in every way but didn’t talk about it. He bought her an apartment, which was written in her name, so that she would feel it was her own. He also helped my family in the same way.

As I said, my mother was against my studying in a Jewish school. I was an excellent student in both junior high school and high school. My favorite subject was literature. I wanted to study Bulgarian Philology, but after 9th September 1944 9 my parents fell into poverty and couldn’t afford to support my studies in Sofia.

When the war started in 1939 10 I was six years old. We usually played on the streets in the neighborhood. Once we heard that the German army was coming. It must have been 1941 or 1942. [Editor’s note: the passing of the German army through Bulgaria took place on 5th March 1941. On 1st March 1941 the Prime Minister of Bulgaria Bogdan Filov signed the protocol for the country’s accession to the Axis.] The people in our old neighborhood took flowers to welcome the German tanks. My brother and I decided to go and welcome them too. We went home and asked my mother to give us some money. She simply said, ‘But, children, they don’t bring good times for us…’ She let us go because we were very insistent. She also gave us money for flowers.

The men were put in labor camps 11. My father was mobilized to the labor camps in the villages of Mihalkovo [that labor camp corrected the bed of the Vacha River] and Devin. He would come back very exhausted and haggard. He wasn’t cut out for manual labor, his usual work was very different and that was naturally reflected in his health. After the camps he had problems with his blood pressure and got diabetes. I don’t remember if he told us any details about the camps because I was young then, only 13 years old.

We witnessed the events during fascism. We had an enormous map of Europe at home and every evening my father would open it and follow the information, which was passing from house to house. In 1941 the radio sets were sealed and later confiscated. My father would mark on the map the advances of the German and the Soviet armies. We knew everything that was happening although we were only allowed to go out for two hours each day. Blockades were set up. Our street was regularly closed and our houses searched by policemen.

There were also boys from today’s Greek territories who were mobilized into Bulgarian labor camps and whose relatives were deported 12. My family decided to give shelter to such a boy. His first name was Ilialu, I can’t remember his family name. He had a brother who went to live with another Jewish family. Ilialu lived with us from 1943 to 1946. He ate with us, my mother washed, ironed and sewed his clothes. He worked as a tailor, I don’t remember where. He was already demobilized then. At first we spoke to him in Ladino, but he gradually learned Bulgarian.

People were talking about the concentration camps in Europe. When 10th March 1943 [Plan for deportation of Jews in Bulgaria] 13 came, we knew that we would be deported. On 9th March we were at my grandmother’s; there was no bathroom in our apartment and we used to go and have a bath there. We always stayed there for a while before we went home. Isak Katalan, my uncle, was a member of the communist party. He came home in the evening and told us, ‘Sit down and listen to me. Jews are about to be deported. There are lists made. Probably not everyone will be deported, but you never know. Now, when you go home, prepare a suitcase or a small bag for each one of you.’ And really, on 10th March the deportation started.

Later I understood from my grandmother that she did everything she could to prevent them from taking her family out in the dark. She tried to slow things down. She went from policeman to policeman saying, ‘Do whatever you want, but wait until the morning so that the Bulgarian citizens of Plovdiv will see what you’re doing.’ My grandmother was an intelligent woman, despite not having any formal education. Thanks to her the family was led out at seven thirty with much effort from the policemen. The houses belonging to all the Jews who were taken to the school were sealed.

My aunt was taken to the school on 10th March and gave birth to my cousin Rozi on 16th March. The delivery was normal, but the baby was born prematurely. I don’t remember if she gave birth in a hospital or not.

All our family survived the Holocaust. No one was sent to jail, although my uncle Isak Katalan was a communist and before that a member of Maccabi 16 and the UYW 17. Our property was also preserved, because we lived in these two apartments and we had nothing to confiscate and nationalize. But life was very hard financially. We had to live very frugally.

My mother remained a housewife. So did my grandmother Sarina. She lived in the neighboring apartment together with my uncle Shelomo, who also worked in the State Insurance Institute like my father. My other grandmother Zelma and my aunt Marga with her husband Mordehay Natan left for Israel in 1948.

My other uncle David Katalan remained in Plovdiv and worked as a lawyer. He was a member of ‘Zveno’ 20 and the Fatherland Front 21 in Plovdiv. He married in 1946. His family remained in Bulgaria; they have two daughters, Rashel and Zelma, who now live in Sofia. Both my uncle and his wife died in Bulgaria.

I made a lot of friends there, some of whom I still keep in touch with, for example, Kleri Madjar, Beka Benaroyo. Kleri and I were like sisters. We went to the cinema, to concerts and parties. We gathered on various occasions, but my mother didn’t let me out often. As I said, she was a very ambitious woman, who was also very strict. Once the young men from He-Halutz Hatzair decided to organize a party for New Year’s Eve. They came to ask my mother to let me go but she firmly refused. She didn’t let me go on many of the school excursions. She always wanted me to be beside her.

In 1948-49 all the members of the organization left for a kibbutz in Israel with the youth aliyah movement. Suddenly Plovdiv felt empty. I lost all my friends. In 1949-50 I graduated from high school and wanted to go and study in Sofia. But my parents couldn’t support me there. Then I wanted to study in the Agro-economical Institute in Plovdiv, but my parents said, ‘This isn’t a suitable job for you.’ I didn’t enroll in the institute and I was forced to start work.

At that time I was friends with a Jewish boy, who also wanted to make aliyah. His name was Marko Semov. We had a very strong relationship. He was studying engineering in Sofia and I met him in He-Halutz Hatzair. He had friends in the older groups and came to see us and that’s how we met. My parents approved of his family. His father was a sarafin, a money dealer and lived in the neighborhood. At the time of the youth aliyah in 1948-49 he wasn’t able to leave because he was still studying in Sofia. He took two terms simultaneously so that he would be able to graduate and leave, because he knew that I wanted to leave too.

I very much wanted to leave for Israel but my parents didn’t agree. His parents had also decided to leave with him. They came back home and told my parents that they wanted to take me back to Israel with them, but my parents refused. My father’s words were, ‘Out of sight, out of mind.’ Not that they were against us, they approved of our relationship, but they weren’t sure if our feelings after two years away from each other were still the same. They were afraid that I might find myself alone on the streets in an unknown country. So I remained here.

That was where I met my future husband, the Bulgarian Todor Petrov Chelibakov. He was also a member of the Youth Union, and led the theater group. We met there and also saw each other at parties and birthdays. He sang very well and was a very direct and sociable person, the Bohemian type.

My mother-in-law raised Todor by herself. It was very hard for her; she worked as a seamstress at home to earn some extra money. They lived very poorly, but he managed to graduate from high school. My husband has always worked in construction companies as a supplier. He retired in the ‘Patni Stroezhi’ company as chief of the supply department.

I insisted that this time I wouldn’t listen to them, ‘I obeyed you about not making aliyah with my friends in 1948. I obeyed you about not leaving you alone on graduating from high school. Marko’s parents came and you didn’t let me go. I wanted to study in the Agro-economical Institute and you didn’t allow me once again. This time I’m doing what I want!’ I think they wanted me to do only what they decided was good for me.

Todor always said, ‘I haven’t chained her to myself. If she decides, I am ready to do anything for her, but I can’t keep her by force.’ Todor is a very tolerant man. He reacted calmly to the attitude of my parents towards him and towards Bulgarians. You can rarely meet such a man. He didn’t feel angry towards them. He would only say, ‘They are your parents, this is what they think is right for you. We have no right to judge them.’

I had a wonderful mother-in-law. From 1952 to 1965 we lived very poorly in the Kyuchuk Parizh quarter [the Small Paris in Turkish]. We came to live in this apartment when my father died. It was a small house with an external staircase, which was covered in ice in the winter and we had to sprinkle ash on it. We had no water at home, we had to bring it in in pitchers. The toilet was down in the yard and the water there also froze. We lived very poorly but we were happy. Upstairs in the kitchen we had a closet where we kept the wash-tub and the sink. We had a tin container, which we filled with water and used as a sink. I, who always had maids as a child, who had Persian rugs, accepted the new living conditions without complaint. I swear. We lived so happily.

My mother-in-law even studied Jewish cuisine so that she would be able to cook Jewish dishes such as agristada, apyu, anginara. She learned to make a wonderful Kebap de merandgena, baked unpeeled aubergines, which are placed still warm in salty water. Then they are peeled and returned to the water. Afterwards, they are minced. The meat is cooked in oil and the aubergines are added to them. The dish is then boiled at a moderate temperature.

There was an external staircase, reaching a landing, from which you entered a small room. We constructed a small entrance hall over the landing. In the next room we put a small glass case, a table, a refrigerator, the bed my mother-in-law had given us and the TV. Our first TV set was an Opera. We also had a kitchen where Tosho’s [Tosho is diminutive for Todor] grandmother slept. We slept in the bedroom. It was also used as a guest room because there was a sofa and when we had guests, we always invited them there. We had a lot of friends, Bulgarians and Jews.

My daughter, Ema, was born in 1953 and lived here while studying in junior high school. We lived together for 25 years. In the summer we went to the seaside, Primorsko, Nessebar, Pomorie and to the mountainous Velingrad. My daughter was raised to feel Jewish and we celebrated both the Jewish and the Bulgarian holidays at home.

They have two children: Victor, born in 1976 and Robert, born in 1980. Victor studies macroeconomics and Robert studies management. They are both very active in the Jewish community. Victor is already engaged to a Jewish girl, Eva Mashiyah.

For ten years my daughter Ema contributed to the activities of the Middle Generation in Plovdiv. She was a member of the executive board of the Consistory in Sofia and member of the board in Plovdiv. On 15th March 2002, she and her husband took part in a collective religious wedding organized by the Joint 25. Five more couples from Sofia and Plovdiv participated. They had already got married in a registry office but not in accordance with the traditional Jewish laws. The event took place in Pancharevo. Ema and her husband Isak were married by a registrar in 1975. Some of the other participants in the ritual were Yosif and Mati Madjar, Victoria and Mois Benbasat from Plovdiv, Reni and Robert Djerasi, Morits and Rozi Mashiyah and one more couple from Sofia, whose names I don’t remember.

My grandchildren are very active in the Jewish community. Robert writes for the ‘Evreiski Vesti’ [Jewish News] newspaper and takes an active part in the camps in Kovachevtsi. I influenced my family to participate in Jewish communal activities. I’m not bragging, but in 1988 when I took over the leadership of the Jewish community in Plovdiv, I insisted on everybody taking part. And they all did quite willingly. My husband Tosho is very respected in our family. Everyone loves him. On holidays such as birthdays, Christmas and Easter all my grandchildren come and we celebrate them together at home. It has always been that way.

My mother even took the books from the enormous library, put them in big boxes and loaded them on their ship. They didn’t need these books at all. But that was her way of punishing me. The only book she left me was [Margaret Mitchell’s] ‘Gone with the Wind.’ Later, when we visited them in Israel, we found the books still unpacked in the big boxes and we took out some of them to read. Later, she gave all the books to a library.

After papa died in 1966, she started babysitting. It was very hard for her because she was no longer young but she never thought about returning to Bulgaria. She was a firm Zionist. She always believed that there was no better country than Israel. My brother managed to make a career in Israel. He took part in the Six-Day-War 27 and was wounded. I remember that my mother was visiting Bulgaria at the time and she received a telegram from her daughter-in-law that he was wounded and in hospital.

We could also have left for Israel but my husband didn’t want to, because he believed that although we had a lot of friends, they wouldn’t be able to help us in the beginning. He was afraid that he would feel out of place, blind and dumb. I don’t know how I would have felt, but as a woman I think I would have got used to the new environment more easily.

I have been to Israel ten times. Because of the official policy of Bulgaria to Israel, we traveled separately until 1989 28. Our family wasn’t allowed to travel together to Israel. In 1963 I went there with my daughter, then my husband went with our daughter and I stayed here. In 1972 I went alone.

The first time we went to Israel together was in 2000. After that we traveled to Israel a lot. I learned Ivrit during my first visits to the country. I usually spent three months with my brother’s children, who didn’t know Bulgarian. I spoke to them using basic words in Ivrit and gradually learned to speak and write it.

My father died in 1966. He was buried in Israel according to tradition. In 1998 my brother died of leukemia at 62 years of age. I went to Israel to attend his funeral and spent one month there. On 23rd August 2001 I received a telegram from my sister-in-law that my mother had suffered a stroke and they needed me. I left for Israel on 5th September and stayed there for sixty-five days to look after her in the hospital in Kaplan. Then we moved her to a private senior home and I continued visiting her and taking her out on walks. On 15th October I returned to Sofia. She died on 24th December of the same year.

My active participation in the Jewish community started on 1st February 1988. That year I retired and on 1st February 1989 they invited me to become a secretary of the Jewish community. I worked as a secretary and deputy chairperson of the organization for twelve years. I started on 1st March 1988 and occupied that position until March 2000.

I was a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party 29 from 1966 until 1988. I had leftist beliefs but I would say that my way of life and education were more in line with right-wing ideas. Deep in my soul I knew that if I became a member of the party, my daughter would have some benefits in her studies. In the plant ‘Petar Chenegelov’ where I worked, I became chairman of the inspection commission of the party committee. I organized and taught courses on Stalin’s biography or the interpretation of the decisions of the Central Committee of the BCP. [Editor’s note: During communist rule it had the power of a Ministry Council, all decisions were made by the Central Committee and then voted and approved by the Ministry Council. That was formulated in article 1 of the old communist constitution (before 1991) about the leading role of the party.]

We looked forward to the events of 1989 31. We listened to Express Radio at that time. My children and grandchildren were at the barricades. [Editor’s note: In 1997 the country was governed by the government of the Bulgarian Socialist Party led by Zhan Videnov. In January 1997 it was overthrown by the massive protests of university students, transport workers and citizens.] They were angry at us for staying at home. This was a very hot topic for my daughter. She was very extreme, while her father was more moderate. He comes from such a family. His father was a colonel in the Ministry of the Interior and a member of the party. Besides, he was calmer and quieter. But then the disappointment came.

We spend our days doing house-work and participating in the events at the Jewish organization. We are members of many clubs. My husband is also a member of the Shalom and Haverim [Friends] Club. Every Friday Jewish men gather together to drink a rakia 32 before lunch. I am a member of the Health club. [The Health club in Plovdiv is 12 years old. Its members listen to health lectures, do exercises and go on excursions]. We are both members of the Golden Age club. [This is a cultural center for elderly people. They listen to lectures, concerts, meet cultural figures, musicians, poets, writers.] If it weren’t for the Shalom, I don’t know how I would bear my retirement. I am a very sociable person.

Tamara Koblik
Kishinev
Moldova
Interviewer: Nathalia Fomina
Date of interview: June 2004

Tamara Koblik is a tall slender lady with thick short hair and fine regular features. Her movements are quick and she has a sharp tongue. She has excellent memory and her story is full of interesting details. Though she was operated on cancer recently, she looks very well. And only a bit later one can see that her physical condition falls behind her spiritual energy that nature generously endowed this charming lady with. Tamara gets tired and grows pale. She coughs, but she doesn’t want to stop telling her story. As for me, I felt like listening to her for eternity.  Tamara and her husband live in a three-bedroom apartment in a 5-storied apartment building in a picturesque neighborhood in Kishinev, on the bank of an artificial lake, a favorite recreation area with the townsfolk. Tamara’s husband Monia, an intelligent and gentle person, a hospitable host, is devoted to his wife. He also had a surgery, but neither of them makes an impression of a sickly person. Their comfortable apartment is stylishly furnished, and this, for sure is an accomplishment of the hostess: nice furniture in the living room, many books in bookcases, a nice china set and a beautiful carpet of dim shades. One’s attention is attracted by a silver menorah displayed the cupboard. Tamara is a hospitable and creative person: she offers an assortment of jams that she has made herself. The one of white sweet cherries  with lemon peels has a great taste. 

My family background

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

I’ve never seen my paternal grandmother or grandfather. My paternal grandfather Gedaliye Podriadchik lived in Soroki [according to census of 1897 there were 15,351 residents and 8,783 of them were Jews. In 1910 there was a synagogue and 16 prayer houses in Soroki] in Bessarabia 1. I don’t know what my grandfather did for a living, but he provided well for the family. My father’s mother died in 1915, when he was 11-12 years old. I don’t even know her name. My grandfather remarried. The stepmother did not love her stepchildren. I don’t know how many he had. I’ve only heard that my father had a brother. He lived with his family in Soroki. I remember that my father and his brother had a dispute about an old and a new houses. This must have been about my grandfather’s property or something. We had papers for these houses with us in evacuation during the Great Patriotic War 2, I remember the folder well. After the war mama visited Soroki. The houses were ruined.   I have no information about what happened to my father brother’s family. My paternal grandfather Gedaliye died in the early 1930s. Mama told me that my father wanted to name their son, who was born then, after my grandfather. 

My papa Elih Podriadchik was born in Soroki in 1903. Papa was gifted and studied well – the family could afford to pay for his education. He wanted to become a pharmacists, but after his mother died – he was 12 – he was sent to study tailor’s business. He stayed with his father for some time, but his stepmother was such a witch that she charged him for doing his laundry. When he grew a little older, he moved to Floreshty. Some time later he managed to get his own tailor’s shop. He met my mother in Floreshty.

My mother’s parents lived in Rezina [a town in Bessarabian province, Orgeyev district, according to the census of 1897 there were 3 652 residents in Rezina, 3 182 of them were Jews]. People called my maternal grandfather ‘David fin Kishinev’ – David from Kishinev in Yiddish. I think my grandfather moved to Rezina after the Jewish pogrom in 1903 3.  My grandfather married my grandmother way after 40. He had six children from his first marriage: Leib, Berl, Haim, Leika, Riva and Golda. I think my grandfather’s second marriage was prearranged. My grandfather was a decent man. He owned a shoemaker’s shop. He and grandmother Sura had five more children. Grandfather David Trostianetskiy died in 1920. He caught cold during the ceremony of circumcision of his first grandson, Leib’s son Itzyk-Moishe. My grandfather David was buried in Rezina. My mother went there every year, as we say – to ‘keyveres’ [Yiddish for graves], till the end of her life.

I remember my maternal grandmother Sura Trostianetskaya a little. She came from Rezina. I don’t know her maiden name, but I know that her mother’s name was Tema. Grandmother Sura got married, when she was very young.  My grandmother’s sister Enia married my grandfather David’s older son Leib. The father and the son married two sisters. However, it took Leib and Ania some time to obtain a permit to get married. They visited several rabbis until one of them decided that they were not too close relatives and it was all right for them to get married.  He only told them that their successors could not have any relationships of this kind since this would be incest. When my grandfather died, his and my grandmother’s children were still small. Keila, the oldest, was just 14 years old, my mother was 12, а and Isaac, the youngest, was 8. They went to lie with their relatives, which was a customary thing with Jewish families. After my grandfather died my grandmother began to bake Friday bread for Jewish families in Rezina and gained great respect of all Jewish housewives in Rezina. I remember visiting my grandmother in Rezina with my mama and my older sister Sheiva. Grandmother Sura was short and pretty – my mother was like her very much. There was a bunch of small children messing around her. I will never forget the way grandmother said: “Come here, I will make some the ‘supa de legume’ for you’. This word had so much magic in it for me until I got to know recently that it means ‘vegetable soup’ in Romanian.  But it sounded do beautiful!

My mother’s stepbrother Leib, who was married to my grandmother’s sister Enia and was my mother’s uncle, therefore, had eight children: sons Itzyk-Moishe and Yasha and daughters Beila, Haika, Sosia, Gitl, Pesia and Tamara. Leib was a shoemaker. He owned a shoe shop where he made individual shoes. His older son Itzyk-Moishe worked with him. Leib had his permanent clients: wealthy and respected people in Rezina. Leib’s family lived in a nice two-storied houses. They had a ‘casa mare’ [this is how Moldavians call the largest room in their house].  Leib’s youngest daughter Tamara and her sister Pesia made beautiful dolls. They bought dolls’ heads, made their bodies and fancy gowns for them. They were single before the war. Both sons of my uncle Leib served in the Soviet army during the Great Patriotic War. The daughters and their father were in the ghetto in Rybnitsa. After the war they returned to their house in Rezina. 

My mother’s stepbrothers Berl and Haim moved to Palestine before I was born, they must have been the chalutsim . All I remember is that there were some letters from them, also something about the property. Uncle Berl was said to be rich. My mama, papa, Sheiva and I got photographed to send him our photo to Palestine.

Now about Leika. Leika married David Portnoy. They lived in Kipercheny. Her husband was a baker. She had five children: Dora, Pesia, Gitl, Rivka, Tsylia.  Aunt Leika and her family evacuated to Central Asia during the war. After the war they returned to Moldavia.

In 1918, when Bessarabia was annexed to Romania, my mother’s stepsister Rivka was visiting in Rybnitsa. When Rezina became Romanian and Rybnitsa became Soviet, she could not return to. Rezina. She stayed in Rybnitsa where she married Fishl Kushnir. He was a shoemaker. Rivka was a shoemaker. They had sons David and Fima and daughter Genia. We didn’t see her before 1941. In 1940, when Bessarabia was annexed to the USSR, we still failed to meet her and then the war began.  Riva’s older son David was at the front where he was promoted to the rank of an officer.  Riva and her family were in the ghetto in Rybnitsa. All of them survived. Aunt Riva died in Rybnitsa in the 1970s. Her children lived in Chernovtsy. 
My mother’s stepsister Golda was mentally ill. She lived with grandmother Sura and I was a little afraid of her.  

My mother’s older sister Keila also lived with grandmother. She divorced her first husband for his drinking problems and then she remarried.

My mother’s sister Eidl got married and moved to Beltsy. Her family name was Priest. During the war, during evacuation her two children were burnt in a railcar, when a bomb hit their train.  She arrived in Central Asia where she found her older daughter Rita, who survived the air raids and was taken to a children’s home from where children went to beg for food in the streets and at the railway station. Aunt Eidl recognized her there. Rita said that Eidl approached her, lifted her dress –Rita had a birthmark on her leg: ‘You are my daughter’. She took her to the place where she lived. Rita had burn scars for the rest of her life and she was lame - - the war!.. After the war they moved to Rybnitsa. Later Rita got married, moved to Tiraspol and my mother moved there to live with her. Rita finished two forms at school and earned her living by sewing. She was a good housewife. She was a nice and open-hearted person. Her family was poor.  Aunt Eidl died in Tiraspol in the 1980s. I went to her funeral. There was me and my mother’s sister Sonia at the funeral. Of course, if aunt Eidl had been rich, it would have been different… I saved money to install a gravestone on her grave.

My mother’s sister Sonia, born in 1910, married Grisha Gandelman from Tiraspol. He was a tinsmith. They lived in Orgeyev. During the Great Patriotic War he was at the labor front in the Ural since Bessarabians were not regimented to the army. [Soviet power did not trust the former Romanian citizens] During the war my aunt was with us in Makhachkala and Bukhara at first, but then she moved to her husband in the Ural where he worked in a mine. Her daughter Mania was born there. After the war they returned to Orgeyev.

My mother’s younger brother Isaac was born in 1912. He was a barber. He had a wife and two children: David and Genia. His wife Lisa was a beautiful plump woman, very cheerful and joyful. Isaac was recruited to the Soviet army in 1941. His wife and two children evacuated with Lisa’s family. Uncle Isaac came as far as Berlin with his troops and was wounded twice. After the war they returned to Orgeyev. Uncle Isaac had black hair, and there was a gray streak where a bullet had passed. He was handsome, always friendly and cheerful and much loved in Orgeyev.

My mama Beila Podriadchik was born in Rezina in 1907. She was the second daughter in the second marriage of my grandfather. Mama was just 12 years old, when my grandfather died, and her ‘feter’ [uncle in Yiddish], he must have been my grandfather’s brother, took her to his home in Floreshty. ‘Feter’ taught her his tailor’s business. He said: ‘she will work for me, and I will save for her dowry’. She was a poor relative, and she had to fetch water to their house for the period from 13 to 20 years of age. She was booming with health, a very pretty girl. Boys were gazing at her and bothering her. Once one of them asked her: ‘Girl, how many buckets of water does one have to fetch to become a dressmaker?’ Mama looked at him and replied: ‘As many as one is destined to fetch’. Another rascal intending to make a joke and said even a worse thing: ‘I’d rather lie with you than with typhus’. Mama felt very hurt, but she held back her tears and replied: ‘No, I’d rather have typhus’. Mama’s first love was in Rezina. His name was Ehil Spivak. He returned her feelings, but Ehil was the only son in a wealthy family. He was spoiled, and besides, his parents did not appreciate his connection to mama.

My mama met my father in Floreshty at the age of 20. He liked her at once, so pretty she was. They began to see each other. From what my mama told me, they walked to dancing in the neighboring village of Markuleshty, 3 km from Floreshty. Mama loved dancing and long walks didn’t bother her at all. When papa proposed to her, she only had 17,000 lei of dowry while the standard amount of the dowry was 20 thousand. Papa said: ‘I will add the remaining amount so that people cannot say anything about you having less than a girl is expected to have’.  They got married in 1929. Papa rented his shop facility from Petru Turcan, the owner of an inn in Floreshty. He was Moldavian. Mama and papa lived in a room in this shop. My older sister Sheiva was born in 1930. Mama told me that when she visited Rezina a year later, she bumped into Ehil. There was so much pain in his eyes as he looked at her: ‘I’d rather Keila had this baby’. My mother’s sister Keila didn’t have children as yet. Mama loved him her whole life. She didn’t love papa.

Two or three years later mama had a baby boy, born in winter. There was a lot of snow and snowstorms. Grandmother Sura could not even visit mama. Mama wanted to name the boy David after her father, but papa wanted to name him Gedalie after his father. He said: ‘Your mother didn’t even come to the childbirth – we shall name him after my father’. Mama had a dream that night: a man in a hood, a very tall man, came into the room, approached her and began to throttle her. Mama screamed in Yiddish: ‘Don’t throttle me, I am giving names’. Next day the boy felt ill and died. This is what mama told me.

Growing up

I was born in 1935. I was named Tamara. Uncle Leib had a daughter. Her name was Tamara and she was a lot older than me. There is nobody left to ask, but I think we were both named after my maternal great grandmother Tema.

We lived in the very center of Floreshty. We had two rooms: papa-s shop was in one room – he had 5 or 6 young employees and his clients visited him in his room. Papa made men’s clothes.  His employees were young Jewish men and women. We spoke Yiddish at home and Moldavian – with our neighbors. There were sewing machines and big coal-heated irons. There was also a stove in this room. It was stoked with husk.  Remember the box filled with husk. We had a portable steel stove on four legs where mama must have cooked our food. There was a rid on top where mama roasted eggplants and paprika. Mama also baked chicken liver on live coals. The Jewish rules require having blood removed from meat, and mama baked it on oiled paper. We surely followed kashrut. There was a door to a big box room in the corner. Actually, there were two doors, probably for heating saving purposes. There was some space between the doors.  I remember that when mama made cookies for Sabbath, I stole some to eat them in this space, so that mama didn’t know. There was another big room, our bedroom. There was my parents’ bed, my bed, but I don’t remember where my older sister slept – probably on a little sofa.

There were two big stores across the street from our house: one was a fabric store owned by Dorfman, a Jew. There was an inn next to it owned by our landlord Turcan. Next to the inn was a photographer’s house on one side, and on another side – Ivanikha’s house. I can’t remember whether this was her surname or whether her husband’s name was Ivan, but I remember well that she had a nice big garden with beautiful flowers. I liked going there. Mama said I was a lovely child, and all neighbors liked me. Mama told me how Petru Turcan’s daughters taught me walking in autumn. One girl held a bunch of grapes teasing me and another supported me on my back. At some instant she let me on my own and I walked. They ran to tell my mama: ‘Your Tamara is walking’ – ‘How come? This can’t be!’ Mama ran outside to take a look and they showed her again. Then my father came home and we walked again. Well, I did eat lots of grapes then.  

I was a lively child. Once I feel hitting my chin on a hot iron. I had a big burn. It was cold in winter. Mama wrapped me in warm clothes and allowed me to stand by the front door to breathe in fresh air. Chief of police was passing. Seeing my red chin he came to my mama and asked: ‘What’s the matter with your pretty girl? What’s up with her chin?’  Mama proudly told this story afterward: the very colonel, chief of police, came by asking about her daughter. 

On Sabbath papa’s room turned into a fancy room. The sewing machines were covered with white cloth. Mama covered the table with a white fancy tablecloth. On Sabbath and Jewish holidays we celebrated in this room. Papa went to the synagogue on Sabbath. When he returned home, we had dinner sitting at the festively served table. Mama always lit two candles. She also covered her head with a lace shawl and prayed. 

I remember Pesach well. Everything was cleaned and polished and checked for chametz. All everyday crockery was taken to the box room and a big box with fancy crockery was taken out of there. I remember little glasses with little handles – keysale. I also remember a ‘kara’  for matzah to be hidden on the first seder. It was like a round pillowcase. I’ve never seen any again. It was made from red satin, trimmed with fringes and decorated with inscription in Yiddish.  It also had a lining. Mama had it with us in evacuation. When we returned to Bessarabia, mama gave it to a rabbi from Beltsy. On Pesach mama made a pudding using her own recipe, on chicken fat adding chicken liver. I have dim memories about the first seder: we were dressed up and sat at the table. Papa sits at the short end of the table telling us about the Exodus of Jews from Egypt. The candles are burning, and there is a glass of wine for Elijah the Prophet on the table. The door is kept half-open for him to come in.  I cannot remember asking papa fir kashes, perhaps, Sheiva did this, being older than me …

I don’t remember the Sukkot at all. On Simchat Torah we, kids, carried little flags with apples on them. Boys played with nuts with a board, from which the nuts slid hitting other nuts on the ground. The winner was the one who hit the most nuts. 

On Chanukkah we played with a dreidel.- a whipping top.  Also remember the Chanukkah gelt. I remember that my sister and I got coins and I was very proud of having my own money. Then Sheiva suggested that we changed our coins for a smaller change. Oh, how disappointed I was – Sheiva got more coins than I!  How I cried, when I came home!  How hurt I felt! Now I always give all my grandchildren the same amounts on Chanukkah.

Mama made hamantashen on Purim. We took shelakhmones to our neighbors, and our neighbors brought us theirs. Our relatives from Rezina also sent us shelakhmones. On the last Purim before the Great Patriotic War [1941], we received a parcel from uncle Leib and grandmother Sura with oranges, fluden, hamantashen and handmade lace for my mother, my sister and me. Mama made us dresses and nightgowns. I had lace with one rim, mama – with three and my sister Sheiva – with two rims. Purim was a joyful and noisy holiday. Boys ran around with rattles – gregor. I also remember papa’s apprentices making a performance for us once. Mama didn’t want to let them in, because I was too young, but my sister and I convinced her to let them in.  They were a merry bunch wearing masks and fur jackets turned upside down. I burst into tears and couldn’t compose myself till they took odd their masks and I saw familiar faces. Then I joined their dancing and singing. 

Another bright childhood memory. Mama’s niece  Gitl, the daughter of her stepsister Leika, was getting married in Kipercheny in the middle of a winter. There snowdrifts on the ground, but my parents decided to go to the wedding – they just couldn’t miss it. Sheiva and I went with them. Also mama cousin sister’s family of the Roitmans was with us.  They also lived in Floreshty.   We got lost on the way. The Moldavian cabmen went ahead trying to find the way. And they probably decided to scare a little these ‘Jidani’ [derogatory term for Jews in Romanian]. They turned their coats upside down and ‘attacked’ from a snowdrift. However, someone in our group guessed the trick and we had lots of fun instead of getting scared. It took us a lot of effort to get to Orgeyev and from there – to Kipercheny. We were 24 hours late and arrived on the second day of the wedding. We were served some wine, snacks and water, when all of a sudden I burst into tears: ‘mama, this is no gas water, this is plain water’. Everybody felt confused.

During the war

In 1940 the Soviet power was established. At this moment papa was at the training in the Romanian army. Mama dressed me and Sheiva fancily and we went to the railway station to meet papa every day. When he arrived, he told mama that the Romanian military told them: ‘Don’t worry, we will be back a year from now’. Papa had education and was offered a position of director of the Center for domestic services. Papa went to work there. Mama turned his shop into a nice living room: she decorated it with carpets and nice curtains. Our neighbors came in to look at it, and the fabric store owner’s wife used to say: ‘Beila’s home is more beautiful than mine’. In 1941 I turned 6 and boasted that I would go to the pre-school kindergarten. Sheiva studied at school and I was awfully jealous. I couldn’t wait till I went to school.

In summer the war began. Papa, mama, Sheiva and I evacuated. We had our bags of luggage with us and traveled on a freight train. When we were crossing the Dnestr, an air raid began. I remember well how the train operator tried to maneuver: forward-backward, forward-backward … Mama covered Sheiva and me with blankets. It was light, though it was already evening. We arrived at Rybnitsa on the opposite bank. Mama said her sister Riva lived here whom she hadn’t seen since 1918, but the train passed without stopping. We arrived at Krasnodar. From there we were taken to the kolkhoz 4 ‘Verniy put’ [The right way] in Kropotkin district by truck. Mama’s niece Zhenia and her daughter Dora were with us, but I don’t remember, when they joined us. A beautiful young Russian woman, whose husband, a lieutenant, was at the front, took us to her house. She had no children.  Mama went to work in the field. On the first day she burnt her hands in the sun and they were covered with blisters. She had a short-sleeved dress on. Papa went to work as a shepherd. I walked about the village looking for mama. Some drivers gave me a lift and then I could go back, if I felt like having a ride or a drive. I was pretty and plump and everybody liked me. I also remember the kittens that our landlady drowned in a bucket of water. I don’t remember whether I cried or not, but I could never forget this. Sheiva studied at school. She had a topographic map where she marked the frontline. 

Few months later Germans approached the Krasnodar Kray [Russian administrative division]. Chairman of the kolkhoz told us: ‘You’ve got to leave. Germans are close, and you are Jews’. They gave us wagons and we rode to Krasnodar. From there we took a freight train to Makhachkala. We were to cross the Caspian Sea to Krasnovodsk. There were crowds of people. We were accommodated in a hostel where we met mama’s sister Sonia Gandelman and her daughter Haya. One night militia came to check our documents. They took papa with them. Later mama got to know that he was charged of deserting: he was supposed to obtain a necessary military permit in Krasnodar.  

At that time we moved to another hostel since where we stayed was overcrowded. Sheiva and Haya were taken to another hostel and I stayed to watch out belongings. Mama and aunt Sonia were taking the luggage to the new hostel. I remember the corridor: there was an old woman lying on chairs, some other people and there was me watching our things. A man approached me and said in Yiddish: ‘Your mama sent me to take up your luggage’. I said: ‘Go ahead’.  He took two bags, gave one to his companion and they left. When mama returned, I already realized what happened and ran toward her: ‘Mama, did you send somebody to pick up the bags? – I didn’t’. Mama began to scream and cry. There were our warm clothes in these bags. A militiaman came in, mama went to his office with him and made a list of our belongings. Mama and aunt Sonia cried all night through. Next morning she went to the militia office. They ushered her to a big room where there were heaps of clothes: ‘Take yours from out there’. She found our clothes.   The militia happened to follow these thieves for a while. However, our documents were gone. I had a new birth certificate issued for me, but they wrote that I was born in 1933 instead of 1935.

Mama said we would not leave Makhachkala till she found out what happened to papa. Aunt Sonia and she rented a room and mama went to work to support us. We stayed there 5-6 months. Mama was trying to find out what happened to papa. Later she was told he was to be under trial as an ‘enemy of the people’ 5. Papa was to be tried by the military tribunal. Mama managed to get to the court building. When papa came out of the building he managed to tell her in Yiddish: ‘Take care of the children. I am finished’. He gave her his watch and some money he had with him. Papa was sentenced to eight years, but I don’t know whether he had to serve his sentence in jail or in a camp. He was sent to Nizhniy Tagil. This was the last time we saw papa. 

Mama and aunt Sonia worked at a factory. It was getting colder. Sheiva got pneumonia. She was 12 years old and she died. Makhachkala was a horrific town. I lost my father and my older sister there. Two years later Sonia’s daughter Haya fell ill and died, too. Later mama found out that the climate in Makhachkala was particularly hazardous for children: there were over a thousand evacuated children were buried in a short time. Some people told my mama: ‘If you have children, you have to leave this town’.  Mama, aunt Sonia and I headed to Baku [Azerbaijan] to proceed to Krasnovodsk from there. There were thousands of evacuated people in Baku. There were people everywhere in the vicinity of the port in Baku, it was like on a big beach in Odessa. One night during an air raid there were searchlights turned on to blind the pilots. It became as light as day. We buried ourselves n the sand, so scared we were. I’ve never again saw anything like that in my life. It was autumn, but it was terribly hot. Mama took her wedding watch and some more things and she and aunt Sonia went to the town to exchange them for some food. Mama came to a watch shop where the repair man said to her: ‘Your watch needs to be repaired. Come back tomorrow’. When mama came back, this man pretended he had never seen her. So they took away mama’s watch. However, mama managed to sell a beautiful Moldavian carpet for one hundred rubles and three loaves of bread. It was hard to get water: mama sent me to nearby houses where they poured me a little water and I paid them. We finally took a boat to Krasnovodsk. From there we moved to Bukhara where Sonia husband’s brother Moisha Gandelman, his wife Fania and their son Buma had evacuated.  

We went by train, but I don’t remember the trip. In Bukhara we settled down near the Gandelmans. Moisha was a tinsmith, Fania was a housewife. My mama went to work at the knitwear factory. We lived in a small room that we rented from an Uzbek family. There was a bed on bricks, there was a box full of dried apricots and a little table on shaky legs. There was a niche in the wall where we kept our clothes. Mama didn’t send me to school: I was to watch our belongings, but I think mama was reluctant to let me out of the house after the loss of her husband and daughter. I was her only treasure. I occasionally visited the Gandelmans. Fania was giving Buma bread with a butter persuading him: ‘Have another bite for papa, one more for mama’. Once somebody called Fania, I grabbed one slice, and ate it later. I was very young, it was hard for me to stay alone and I asked mama to bring me some color pieces of cloth to play with them. She decided to bring me a cuff from a sweater. She had it on her wrist – workers wore long gauze sleeves to protect their arms from the heat. Mama was halted at the check point. They told her to come and see her boss next morning. Mama came home in tears. She and aunt Sonia began to sort out my clothes. Mama was afraid that she might be arrested and wanted to have everything prepared for me to stay with aunt Sonia. She didn’t hope she would keep her freedom. However, next day she returned home. She wasn’t arrested, but she lost her job.   She went to work in a tailor’s shop. She was good at making trousers. She used to help papa. I don’t remember any Jewish traditions in Bukhara. Not once did I see matzah there.  Cannot say whether mama fasted on Yom Kippur. We starved all the time there.

I was left alone in the room. I entertained myself moving the ‘furniture’: I put the box with dried apricots where the ‘table’ was, and moved the table to the center of the room. Our neighbors were Jewish families from Minsk, there was one Jew from the former territory of Poland [Annexation of Eastern Poland] 6, there were many Jews. They came to see me: ‘How have you shuffled the furniture this time?’ Aunt Sonia moved to her husband in the Ural. We didn’t hear from papa. Mama had a yellowed paper where the word Nizhniy Tagil: this was the only document associated with my father. Mama worked in the shop few years. I was 9 years old (12 according to my new birth certificate), and I asked my mother to let me go to school. In September 1944 I went to the first form of a Russian school for girls. I could speak Uzbek by that time, and I didn’t have any problems with picking Russian. I studied well. I remember my first teacher Valentina Sergeyevna: she was plumpish, very kind and nice. Though I was already nine years old, I was very tiny and mama even thought I might be a Lilliputian.

In spring 1944 Soviet troops began to liberate Bessarabia. There were many Jews from Bessarabia in Bukhara. Rezina sent a letter to Bukhara addressed to ‘Jews from Bessarabia’ calling them to come back to Bessarabia. The letter was signed by chief of the passport office Tamara Trostianetskaya, mama brother Leib’s daughter.  Mama wrote Tamara. In her reply letter Tamara wrote that Leib and his family, grandmother with Keila’s family and Golda were in the ghetto in Rybnitsa. In late 1941 grandmother and Golda and Keila's family were moved to Transnistria 7 along with a big group of other Jewish inmates. On their way there, in Gvozdavka [Odessa region], they were shot – about 500 people perished there. Uncle Leib and his children stayed in Rybnitsa and survived. Tamara wrote she would send us a permit to go back to Kishinev as soon as it was liberated. When mama heard that Kishinev was liberated, she said: ‘They’ve sent us the permit’. This was true – we received it two weeks later. During this time Jews from Bessarabia – most of them were doctors, arranged for two railcars to take us back home. Mama managed to make arrangements for us to go with the rest of them, though she had to pay that person, who could organize for us to take this train. These were freight railcars that on our way were attached to various locomotives moving to the west. 

On the way somebody mentioned that it was a good idea to buy salt in Central Asia to sell it to the benefit in Kharkov. Mama bought a bucket of salt. When we were approaching Ukraine, mama and our co-passenger got off the train to get food cards by which we could get bread and some food at railway stations. They missed the train. Can you imagine the horror my mother felt considering that I was the only one she had in the whole world? Two days later we arrived in Kharkov. People were selling salt and somebody turned to me: ‘Tamara, you’ve got salt?’ They helped me to sell my salt. Our train stopped at the freight station and mama and her companion found me there. She walked over a pedestrian bridge over the railroad track – there were thousands railcars around, and mama was trying to find me. Somehow she said to her companion: ‘I’ll find my Tamara here”. And she saw me, when I was stepping out the railcar. She ran towards me. Somebody said: ‘Tamara, look who is here.’ This was my mama!

We finally arrived in Kishinev. There was a sanitary check point in the vicinity of the railway station. We gave our clothes for disinfection and received a bar of coal-tar soap. We washed away all lice: we had been in freight railcars for over two weeks, and mama and I had thick long hair. Kishinev was ruined: no trams, no cars, we could only ride on ‘caruta’ [Romanian for horse cart].  Mama went to the market trying to find a wagon to Rezina. One man, chief of a poultry farm in Rybnitsa, agreed to give us a ride to Rezina.  We rode via Orgeyev and stayed overnight in Kipercheny. In Rezina uncle Leib and his daughters Tamara, Pesia, Gitl, Haika and Sosia met us. Sosia was with her husband, the rest of them were single. They lived in their prewar house. They gave us a warm welcome and invited us to stay with them. Mama said: ‘I’ll go to Rybnitsa to see Riva and then I’ll decide where we will stay’. Aunt Riva and her husband also gave us a warm welcome and convinced mama to stay with them. Mama also went to Floreshty to take a look at our house. She needed a sewing machine. There was nobody left there – our former landlords Turcans had moved to Romania. This was the last time I visited Floreshty. Mama went to work at the tailor’s shop. At that time mama met a man, (or did it happen in Bukhara?) he was in jail with papa in Nizhniy Tagil. He said they released papa after they finished their investigation of his case, but papa fell ill with dysentery and died in 1942. In 1945 mama was 40 and she was very attractive. Our relatives began to look for a match for her.

They arranged for mama to meet Shabs Uchitel from Rybnitsa. At the beginning of the war Shabs, his wife and their sons Senia and Boria were taken to the ghetto. Later they were taken to the terrible camp in Varvarovka [Nikolayev region, in Transnistria]. They escaped one night from there. Guards with dogs were chasing after them. They managed to get to Moldavia where a Moldavian family gave them shelter some place in the vicinity of Rybnitsa. Then they returned to the ghetto on their own. Every morning inmates of the ghetto lined up to go to work: those who had a craft, stood on one side and those who didn’t – on another. Shabs was a hat maker, but when he stood in the group of hat makers, they told him: ‘You go away, you are no hat maker’, there were such rascals there. When the Soviet troops liberated Rybnitsa, Boria and Senia were taken to the army. Boria was wounded and taken to the hospital. When Shabs’ wife heard that her son was wounded, her heart failed her – she suffered from heart problems - and she died.

After the war

Mama and Shabs got married in 1945. Few years later Shabs adopted me, and I adopted his surname – Uchitel. He was good to me, but if this happened now, I would rather keep my father’s surname. We rented an apartment. We were poor, but mama tried to observe Jewish traditions. Mama’s relatives joined us on Pesach. I remember the first Pesach celebrations in Rybnitsa were interesting. Mama had special crockery for Pesach.  She had her own recipe to make keyzele. She made matzah observing the proportion between flour and water. Two-three women got together to make matzah at home. Later the synagogue began to make matzah and mama made an order for matzah in January. There is a mourning day before Rosh Hashanah. Mama went to the grave of her father David Trostianetskiy in Rezina on this day. Mama fasted on Yom Kippur.

I went to the second form at school, but I didn’t know or understand anything. A week later I was assigned to the first form where there were other overgrown children studying, according to my birth certificate, I was born in 1933. I remember that my classmates were big boys and girls. I was the youngest and the tiniest one. I was told to sit at the first desk.  We were studying multiplication by ‘three’ and the teacher asked: ‘How much is 3 multiplied by 5?’ I raised my hand and said: ‘3 x 5 is 15, and 15 divided by 5 is 3’. ‘Look, a little body often harbors a great soul!’ – somebody exclaimed from the rear. So I excelled at the very beginning. Later bigger children went to study in an evening school [secondary schools for working young people in the USSR]. I caught up other children in my class soon. I studied well. I was particularly good at mathematic. I also attended an embroidery and a dancing groups in the house of pioneers [pioneer club].  I liked dancing. I took an active part in school activities. I was a member of the students’ committee at school. I remember that we listened to the pupils who had bad marks. My schoolmate Vilka Kogan (a Jewish boy), whose father was director of a plant, had all bad marks. I remember having a strong position against him: ‘Let’s vote to expel him from school! Why making so much fuss about him?’ Then I joined Komsomol 8. At first our school committee admitted me and then, when it was time to go to district committee, I got scared all of a sudden: ‘I don’t know much. I lack education’. And I ran away from there. Later they admitted me anyway. I finished the 7th form, when Senia Uchitel, my stepfather’s younger son, returned to Rybnitsa. He was to get married in autumn. I didn’t have a dress to wear at his wedding and I decided: ‘I shall enter a medical school, receive my first stipend and have a new dress made for me’. [students of higher educational institutions and vocational schools received monthly stipends in the USSR]. Of course, this was a very ‘reasonable’ idea!

When I picked my documents from the school, our teacher of mathematics came to see my mama: ‘Tamara is very good at mathematics, the  best of all in her class, don’t do this’, but I was so eager to go to the medical school that mama decided to leave things as they were. I entered the medical school, but later I cried for three years, because my classmates went to the eighth form. I said they would finish school and enter colleges, and I will be a medical nurse for the rest of my life and would be taking out the night pots. However, I liked studying there and was good at practical trainings, but still, I felt hurt – why did I have to be a medical nurse? I cried a lot. Mama and my stepfather could not afford to support me. My stepfather retired, mama received 250-300 rubles in old currency [Tamara means the monetary reform in 1961, denomination of the ruble in the USSR]. Mama began to feed pigs to sell pork to save money for a new house.  She managed to buy a small house.

At school I made friends with Yeva Tsatsa. Yeva and her family were in the ghetto in Rybnitsa during the war. Her father was an invalid, and her mother was making some wadded robes. While I had some kind of a coat before the war, but Yeva wore a ‘fufaika’ jacket [a dark cotton wool wadded jacket]. They were very poor. However, during our third year at school Yeva and I managed to get some new clothes for the stipend that we received. Yeva’s surname now is Swartzman, she lives in Israel. We are still friends with her.

I was hysterical, when Stalin died in 1953. Of course, I thought of Stalin like the majority of our people at that time. Our father! Soldiers went into attacks with his name, and we won! In our family we didn’t know anything about what was happening in 1937 [Great Terror] 9. My relatives were craftspeople, far from politics. I believed that what had happened to my father was a tragic mistake. On that day I was walking to school tear-stained, when I bumped into Yeva’s mother. She got so concerned about me. She came to our school and called Yeva: ‘What happened to Tamara?’ Yeva said: ‘Stalin died’. But I need to confess – there was something else that upset me so. According to the Jewish calendar, I was born on the eve of Purim. One time the Purim occurred on 6 March and since then the family had celebrated my birthday on 6 March. Stalin died on 5 March, and this day was announced as the day of the mourning in the country. And I started crying on the early morning of 6 March: ‘I am so miserable, I will never again have a birthday, and the mourning will never end in my life, terrible, it’s a nightmare!’ Mama showed me my birth-certificate which stated that I was born on 10 February. Since 1953 I’ve celebrated my birthday on 10 February. 

I finished my school with honors. Yeva and I received job assignments 10 in Teleneshty. We went to Teleneshty. All of a sudden I receive a cable from home: ‘come home immediately – you have to go to Kishinev’. One of my co-graduates, Galina, a Moldavian girl, she also finished the school with honors, found out that graduates with all excellent marks were admitted to the Medical College without exams. Galina went to the ministry [Ministry of secondary and higher education of Moldavia] and obtained a request for two people. She and I collected all necessary documents in one day. Next morning we hailed a truck hauling some food products to Kishinev. We submitted our documents and were admitted to the Pediatric Faculty of Medical College. When we returned to Rybnitsa there was a buzz around the town: ‘Tamara’s mama paid 25 thousand for Tamara’s admission!’ This was 1954. This was the first postwar graduation in Rybnitsa. Only three other graduates, besides me, entered colleges. They had finished our school with medals [The highest honors of school-leavers in USSR]. 

All I had to make my living was my stipend. Occasionally mama sent me jam that was actually my basic food. One of my senior co-students used to say: ‘Tamara, you won’t last long on jam’.  I had to spend many hours studying in college. It was easier a little with special subjects that I studied at the school, like anatomy, but I had to spend more time studying general subjects, like physics and chemistry. I had particularly big problems with physical culture. My teacher was a ‘fascist’. He forced me to pass some sports standards to him after I had passed all of my exams and credits in the main subjects. Probably I already had poor lungs then since I just failed to follow the standard requirements in physical culture. I never missed one physical culture class through four years in college. This Fyodor Fyodorovich gave me my credit. Anyway, this was wonderful time and I enjoyed studying in my college. I lived in the hostel and was an active Komsomol member.   

During the period of the ‘doctors’ plot’ 11 I was just a girl and didn’t understand much, but when it came to the 20th Congress 12 in 1956, and they published Khrushchev’s 13 speech denouncing all Stalin’s deeds, I was  shocked. However, I was still actively involved in the Komsomol activities. I went to work at the virgin lands twice: in 1955, after my second year in college, and in 1956 – after the third year. [In 1954-1960 Khrushchev's Virgin Lands program began - the intensive irrigation of the Kazakh steppe, Siberia, the Ural and the Volga region to develop agriculture. 41.8 million hectares of land were newly ploughed.  Komsomol members took an active part in this work.] When there was the popular in those times song ‘Zdravstvuy zemlia tselinaya’ [Hello Virgin Land] on radio – my mama used to cry, when she heard the words of this song, her heart was tearing apart.  We went to the Pavlodar and Petropavlovsk regions in Kazakhstan. We worked hard there. We worked at the grain elevator constructing the grain dryer. I was a group supervisor in our crew. Young workers often cursed there. We, girls, tried to teach them better: ‘If you curse, we won’t work with you’. They promised to improve, but then failed again, cursing, when running out of the mortar, or bricks… They came to apologize: «’But, girls, we are not to blame, our tongues just slip, we don’t even follow..’ But we actually heard the real curse language, when Vasia, a 60-year old man, old and thin, came. He spoke such dirty language that we could not bear to hear it. We fought one day, then another, and he didn’t come to work on the third day. He said to his crew leader: ‘I cannot work with those girls. They will put send me to prison’. 

In the evening we arranged dancing parties with local girls and boys. We particularly liked Sasha Dubrovskiy, a local boy. After finishing the 10th form he went to work at the truck shop. His father helped him to get this job. This shop sold soap, toothpaste, tinned food, stationary, envelopes, all kinds of small items. Sasha also brought us our mail from the post office. In the evening he came there with his friend, who played the accordion, and we danced. There was a popular song ‘Moscow evenings’ and we sang ‘Kishinev evenings’, and the locals sang ‘Kazakh evenings’. We occasionally received parcels with fruit from Moldavia. Sasha was born and grew up in Kazakhstan and had never tried pears. The girls decided: if one of us received pears, we would give them to Sasha. Somebody received two pears and we gave them to Sasha to try. 
Once one of our girls felt severely ill, and I accompanied her to Pavlodar. I took her to her train and went to the market where they sold grapes – 25 rubles per kilo. I asked 200 grams, gave the vendor 5 rubles and she gave me 20 kopeck change. I wore a cotton wool jacket and tarpaulin boots like all virgin land workers. I took this bunch of grapes and threw away few rotten grapes. The vendor looked at me and said: Girl, where do you come from that you eat grapes like this?’ I replied: ‘Two weeks from now I will buy two kilos for 5 rubles, 2.40 rubles per kilo, and will get 20 kopeck change. – Ah, I see’.  After my first time in the virgin lands I was awarded a badge, an official one, with a certificate and I have a medal for the second year – ‘For opening up the virgin lands’. I bought a coat for the money I earned during the second trip there.  

When I was the 5th-year student mama sent me a parcel and 100 rubles from Rybnitsa. Monia Koblik from Rybnitsa, who came to Kishinev to buy some medications for his mother, delivered the parcel to me. I knew, who he was: in Rybnitsa people knew each other. Monia graduated from technical College in Odessa, specialization in refrigerators. All of a sudden he suggested: ‘Let’s meet in the evening!’ We did. He bought tickets to the Russian theater . In the morning he had to go back to Rybnitsa. It was his vacation. He said before saying ‘good bye’ to me: ‘I will come back in two weeks. Let’s do the same program’. We began to see each other. My mother said to me right away: ‘Don’t be a fool. He is a good guy and comes from a nice Jewish family’. My mother was concerned that I would jump into a marriage and give up my studies from the very beginning, and she was also afraid that I might marry a Russian guy. Later, when I was in the third, fourth and fifth year in college, she began to worry that I might remain single: all girls were getting married, but not me.  She even cried at night. She worked near the church in Rybnitsa and told me afterward: ‘Every time there was a church wedding I cried, because my daughter was not getting married’. I was just looking around: this guy was not good for me, and that one didn’t suit me.

My husband Monia Koblik was born in Rashkov in 1928. Before the war the family moved to Rybnitsa. His father David Koblik was director of a store. His mother Etia Koblik was a housewife. His mother was a nice lady. He has an older brother – his name is Mikhail, and a younger sister – her name is Fania. During the great Patriotic War they evacuated to Kazakhstan. His father died there in 1942. After the war they lived in Rybnitsa. Mikhail worked as an accountant. His wife Mania was a teacher. He has two children: Galina and David. Fania was a chemical engineer. Her husband Valeriy Lastov was chairman of the Jewish community in Rybnitsa. They have two daughters: Irina and Mila. They live in Beer Sheva in Israel. The house where Valeriy and Fania lived in Rybnitsa is a community house named ‘Rachel’ after Valeriy’s mother. 

We got married in Kishinev on 25 April 1959, when I was finishing the 5th year in college.  On this day four of my co-students had their marriage registered.  My group came to the registry office. This was at the time of a lecture in psychiatry that we all missed.  After the civil ceremony we made a party for our friends in Kishinev, but we had a big wedding in Rybnitsa on 2 May. My relatives, and of course, my mother’s older brother Leib from Rezina came to the wedding. Mama wanted me to have a chuppah, but I was a Komsomol member, an activist, and a member of the Komsomol committee of my course in college. I said: ‘No chuppah!’ Mama took quite an effort to convince me: ‘Uncle Leib says he has never seen a Jewish wedding without a chuppah’. I was inexorable: «’Then let him leave!’ Mama didn’t tell him what I said, of course, but what was I to do?  All in all, there was no chuppah, but as for the rest of it, it was a beautiful Jewish wedding. There were more than 100 guests, and a good orchestra. The guests danced and had fun: we arranged the wedding party in the firefighters’ office in Rybnitsa.

After the wedding we lived in Kishinev. We rented an apartment and paid for the whole year from the amount that we were given at the wedding. I got pregnant at once. I was 25 and being a doctor I knew this was about the time I had a baby. For me having children was more important than getting married: we often talked with my co-students that we would have children even if we never married. In winter I was already in the 6th month of pregnancy, I was having practical classes in the hospital in Rybnitsa. This was a big hospital. Once our chief doctor Zonis, a Jew, invited me to his office: ’Tamara Alexandrovna, Polischuk failed to come to his night shift, so you will take it. Go take some rest at home, take our ambulance car, and it will pick you up to take here later’. I stayed overnight. I was afraid of night shifts – you never know what patients to expect. At night a young guy from a hostel was delivered from a hostel: he had high fever, a terribly red foot. I immediately diagnosed erysipelatous inflammation, had him taken to a box in the hospital. In the morning Zonis came to work: he was an infectiologist.  This was a rare diagnosis and as hard to identify. He examined the patient and said at the morning meeting: ‘A young doctor was on duty, she managed the situation well, diagnosed the disease, isolated the patient and prescribed the treatment correctly’. So he praised me. I worked in the hospital until the last day. I remember an old woman, a patient in the hospital, approached me. She didn’t know I was having a practical training since we worked like real doctors: ‘Doctor, dear, you are at work, when your belly has lowered’.  On 16 March in Rybnitsa my older daughter Ella was born. 

After the training I returned to Kishinev with my baby. At first Monia’s sister Fania stayed with me to help around, then my mother stayed with me. I passed my state exams and obtained a diploma of a children’s doctor. My husband worked in Odessa construction department. They were building the first 100T refrigerator in Kishinev. When the construction was over, he was offered to stay to supervise operation of this refrigerator since Moldavia didn’t have any operations experts available. They promised him an apartment in Kishinev. The Minister of Meat and Dairy Industry of Moldavia wrote a letter to the Minister of Health. He wrote that since Monia Koblik was a highly qualified expert and Moldavia didn’t have any refrigerator operations experts available, requesting to help his wife to find an employment. However, only a year later I was offered a position of a doctor in a kindergarten. 

My husband did not receive an apartment right away either. We rented a room for 20 rubles per month, when his salary was - 90 rubles and we didn’t have any other income. Life was hard, but we managed. When I went to work, I left Ella in a nursery school near where we lived.  We actually lived in the ‘Red corner room’ of the meat factory, the room was 28 square meters in area.  There was a stove to heat it, but the temperature never went above 14 degrees.  Ella was often ill. In 1964, when I was pregnant again, we received a one-room apartment with all comforts. In 1962 my stepfather died in Rybnitsa. He was buried according to the Jewish ritual, in a takhrikhim, and mama invited a rabbi. I always recall Shabs with gratitude, he raised me, and gave me a chance to get education, he was a good father. Mama sold her house in Rybnitsa and moved in with us in 1964. In summer my second daughter Sopha was born. Two years later we received a big three-bedroom apartment in Zelinskogo Street. Ella went to a kindergarten, and Sopha was in a nursery school. After my maternity leave I didn’t go back to my previous job. I wanted to work in a hospital. I went to work as a district doctor in Skulianka in the suburb of Kishinev. In any weather – in the heat or cold, rain and thaw I had to make the rounds of my patients: I had up to 30 calls per day. To take a short cut, my accompanying nurse and I often went across the reed bushes on the edge of the suburb. There I had my first pulmonary hemorrhage in 1967. I managed to get closer to the road where some people found me. Later these hemorrhages repeated. I went to the Institute of pulmonology in Moscow to consult them.  They didn’t make the final diagnosis, but they ordered me to avoid exceeding cold or stress and take a mandatory rest in the south of the Crimea, when it’s not too hot there  [the Crimean climate is favorable for people with lung problems]. I was 32 years old, I had two small children, and my goal in life was to live as long as 50. I begged the Lord to let me lie till I turned 50 for my children to have no stepmother. We spent all our savings for the Crimea. I went to recreation homes each year, or my husband, my daughters and I went there and rented a room. I had to take up a less tiring job: and I went to lecture at Kishinev Medical School.

When Ella went to school, Sopha still went to the kindergarten, and then Sopha went to school.  They both went to a nearby school. They studied well: they were neat and disciplined girls. I attended parents’ meetings at school and spent time with the girls. They were sociable and had many friends of various nationalities. Like me, they never segregated people by their nationality. I enjoyed arranging my daughters’ birthday parties. They invited their classmates and neighbors.  Mama and I made cookies and cakes, bought sweets and fruit. There was particularly plenty of fruit on Sopha’s birthday: she was born in summer, on 2 July. I made fruit cocktails for the children: these were the first cocktails in Kishinev, they were new to the people then.  I asked Monia to buy me a mixer as an 8-March [Women’s Day] present. I bought tall glasses for cocktails – Czech glasses with musketeers on them. Cocktails were the high spot of the parties: somebody wanted a pink one, another wanted an orange cocktail, with cherry jam or apricot jam. I enjoyed those celebrations no less than my daughters and their friends.

I also liked, when my friends visited me. We celebrated birthdays and Soviet holidays: 1 May, October holidays [October Revolution Day] 14 and New Year, of course. According to our family tradition, we also celebrated Jewish holidays. My mama, who lived in Kishinev then, went to the synagogue, and had a seat of her own there. Each Jews is accustomed to have his own seat. On Rosh Hashanah they bring money in ‘schisl’  [basin, Yiddish], and mama always made a contribution. On Yom Kippur she stayed at the synagogue a whole day fasting. My girls and I came to take her home from there. My girls recalled after she died: ‘mama, do you remember how we accompanied grandma?’ I remember the synagogue was always overcrowded, when we came for my mother, but after 1989 there were few Jews attending it – many Jews had moved to Israel. One couldn’t fail to notice this. On Pesach mama bought a chicken at the market and took her to a shochet. She made a special liqueur and took out her Pesach crockery. She had a beautiful dish to serve pudding in it. On Chanukkah we gave Chanukkah gelt to our girls. I told them this childhood story of mine, when my sister and I got different coins. I always gave my daughters the same amount of money. On Purim mama and I made hamantashen. So my daughters knew all Jewish traditions. 

In the 1970s, when Jews started moving to Israel, many of our relatives went there. My mother sister Sonia’s niece Mania Duvidzon was one of the first ones to move there, her husband and aunt Sonia went with them. Leib’s children moved to Israel: Itzyk-Moishe, Beila, Haika, Sosia, Gitl, Pesia and Tamara. Yasha, the youngest, moved to America. He lived in New York. Uncle Leib died in Rezina back in 1961. Aunt Riva died in the 1970s, and her sons Fima and David moved to Israel. Her daughter Genia moved there in 1991. My mother’s sister Leika, brother Isaac and many nephews and nieces were in Israel. Mama was eager to move there, but my husband and I decided against it since my daughters didn’t want to go there. So, it never came to it with us.

Ella studied well, but she had stomach troubles, and after she finished the 8th form I decided it was not necessary for her to have a higher education. She was beautiful and charming and I thought it was not to be long before she got married. Ella entered the Accounting Faculty of the Industrial and Economic Technical School. After finishing it she went to work at the design institute of meat and dairy industry. She was a smart and industrious employee. She held the position of senior engineer, but she needed a higher education to keep it. So we decided: ‘Ella, since you are not getting married, go to study’. She entered the Faculty of heating engineering of Dnepropetrovsk College of railroad transport. She studied by correspondence. 6 years later she defended her diploma brilliantly. She continued her work in the institute of meat and dairy industry. She was beautiful, she was smart, well educated, decent and neat. She had the reputation of the most educated girl at the institute, but she wasn’t married. 

Sopha finished the 10th form with honors in 1981. Her father decided she had to enter the Mechanical Faculty of the Agricultural College that was believed to be the most difficult in Kishinev. I accompanied her to the exam in physics. There were eight groups, 240 exam takers. She was the only girl in a crowd of strong guys. Most of them had served their term in the army. Sopha went to the exam in the group of the first 6 applicants. She came out an hour later: ‘Four’. [here was a 5-point marking system in the USSR]. – Why ‘four’? – Mama, there were five ‘2’s before me’.  She had ‘5’s in the rest of her exams. Sopha enjoyed her studies and had no problems with them whatsoever. Her co-students often got together visiting her. From the very beginning I noticed Victor Klochko, a handsome Russian guy in their company, - he particularly cared about Sopha. They got married before they were to get their diplomas and moved to Sokoleny where they had their job assignments. In 1987 Sopha’s daughter Yulia was born and they returned to Kishinev.  

In 1988 I retired after turning 55 according to my documents [women retired at 55 in the USSR]. I continued to lecture part-time in the school and also worked as a tourist guide. In summer and winter vacations I guided tourists to different towns in the USSR. So I visited Kiev, Leningrad, Crimea and the Carpathians. I enjoyed being a pensioner, when in 1989 doctors diagnosed a terrible disease of my older daughter, she was 29. Three days later she had a surgery, and had two thirds of her stomach removed. The Professor told me everything was to be well, that there were no cancer cells left, but 29 years is the age, when things grow fast and I, being a doctor, realized how shaky the situation was.

Perestroika 15 began, the situation in the country was very unstable. I decided I had to take Ella to Israel to rescue her, but in early 1990 my mama fell severely ill. She died in July at the age of 83. Mama was buried in the Doina [cemetery in Kishinev], in the Jewish section of it. We observed the Jewish ritual. I invited a man from the synagogue, my relatives arrived from Rybnitsa, whoever stayed in Moldavia. The man from the synagogue had a beautiful service for mama. Mama was covered with a ritual cover that he took with him after the service. Then we sat Shivah for 7 days. Everything was arranged in the Jewish manner.

That year, when mama died, on Rosh Hashanah I said: I will do Rosh Hashanah and Pesach like mama did’.  On Pesach I bought a chicken for 45 rubles at the market – this was a lot of money then! – and went to the shochet at the synagogue. There was a line for matzah at the synagogue. I was pressed for time, I had to go to my class at school. I asked him: ‘Please slaughter my chicken, I’ve got to go, you know, I have no time’. There was a long line, and he was the only one to serve them. I shouted: ‘You know, I cannot wait here, there are thirty people waiting for me at the lecture, I am going home!’ I couldn’t possibly be late and tell my students that I had been at the synagogue to have my chicken slaughtered. The shochet apologized to the others, went to his room where he slaughtered my chicken. So, I made everything like mama for Pesach: keyzele, mendele, everything according to the rules. Since then I’ve always done what is required. My grandson Maxim also loves this holiday. When he visited me on the new year when he was small, he asked: «Grandma, will there be candles lit tonight?’  explained to him that this was not a specifically Jewish holiday, but a general one, for all people.

In 1991 my husband, Ella and I moved to Israel. We stayed in Rehovot and went to study Ivrit in an ulpan. Then I had to take an exam to obtain a license to work as a doctor since I was 58 [in Israel women retire at 60]. Our professors of Israel were my examiners. I had to take the exam in Hebrew. I answered their questions and passed the exam successfully and obtained the ‘rishayon’ – a permit (in Ivrit). At this very time my husband and I were offered a job of taking care of two old people having marasmus. We were to stay in Tel Aviv. Their sons, very wealthy people, invited us for an interview and I agreed to work one month for them. Later they sent their old folks to an elderly people’s home, but one month later one of the sons called me: ‘Please come back. Papa doesn’t want to be there. Papa is crying all the time’. My husband and I discussed this and returned to this job. We worked for them for two years. 

We paid the rent for the apartment in Rehovot where Ella stayed.  She felt worse or better, quit her job and found another, but se never had a job by her specialty. In January 1995 Ella had metastases growing. My husband and I returned to Rehovot. Ella had four surgeries. During this period I visited Kishinev where Sopha was to have another baby. In spring 1995 Sopha’s son Maxim was born. One week before my departure I broke the neck of femor – I was taken to Israel on stretches and had a surgery there. After recovery I looked after Ella and never left her again. Shortly before Ella died Sopha, Yulia and 8-months-old Maxim visited us in Israel.  In January 1996 my Ella died. Of course, we buried her according to Jewish traditions. My daughter, and her two children and her husband were there. We sat Shivah. A year  after Ella died we returned to our younger daughter in Kishinev. Every year I went to Ella’s grave in Israel. The person lives as long as he/she is remembered. When I went to Israel I called my relatives and 15-20 of them got together: relatives, friends and neighbors.  We laid the table and recalled Ella. In 2002 I visited Israel for the last time. I was to go there in 2003, but I had an acute attack of cholelithiasis and I had a surgery. In 2004  had a surgery on my lungs at the oncological institute. I must go to my daughter. I haven’t been there for three years. I promised her to come there each year. 

At first my daughter Sopha’s family was having a hard time after perestroika in the 1990s.  Sopha grabbed any job she could: she knitted, looked after some children of the same age as Yulia and Maxim, picking them from school and helping them to do their homework until Sopha’s husband opened a small BMW repair shop. This is their family business. Sopha works there as an accountant and Victor sister’s husband helps with repairs. My granddaughter Yulia has finished school this year and will continue her studies. Maxim will go to the fourth form.  My husband and I are very attached to them and they return our feelings. My grandchildren visit me on Jewish holidays and I try to teach them what I know about Jewish traditions and the history of our family.

The Jewish life in Kishinev is very interesting now, as long as one gets involved in it. I attend many activities. Yesterday in the Jewish library we celebrated the 10th anniversary of the pensioners’ club. We have gatherings each month in this club. We listen to lectures on the Jewish history and culture and concerts of amateur artists. On Jewish holidays we listen to the history of each holiday and a traditional meal is served: whether it is Pesach or Purim. Our women’s club Hava also works in the library. This is a nice club – there are intellectuals there, of the same age, four-five doctors, and the rest of its members also have a higher education. We bring our treatments there: ice-cream and fruit. We agree in advance whatever each of us is bringing. Recently we had an interesting competition: ‘my mama’s dishes’. I made keyzele, a matzah pudding adding a little chicken fat and liver, like mama made it. I became a winner. We also have a Jewish Educational University [Community lecture course], working every second Sunday. 50-60 people attend it. We listen to great lectures on various subjects: music, literature, Jewish history and holidays. I am a permanent member of the Yiddish club. Ehil Schreibman, our classical writer of Kishinev, conducts it. He conducts classes in Yiddish. I know and love Yiddish, but there is nobody to talk to. The last time I spoke Yiddish was with my mama.

Hesed 16 Yehudah helps s a lot. We receive monthly food packages with chicken, cereals, sugar, tea, etc. They pay for our medications and occasionally give us clothes: I’ve got slippers and two sport suits from them. When I was in the hospital, the long-sleeved warm jacket from the suit happened to be very handy – it can be unzipped easily, which was particularly convenient when it was time to replace bandages. My former colleagues remember me. Recently director of the medical school where I taught brought me a huge bouquet of flowers and a gift  on my jubilee.

Glossary

Bella Chanina
Kishinev
Moldova
Interviewer: Nathalia Fomina
Date of interview: March 2004

Bella Semyonovna Chanina is a short plump woman with a sweet round face, thick silver-gray hair that she wears in a knot. Bella Semyonovna wears trousers and loose shirts, which make her look young. She has a pleasant deep voice that becomes commanding at times. She is very fond of the public work she does. Bella Semyonovna is the mistress of ‘the Warm House.’ One can tell that she was a lively and vigorous character in her youth. Bella Semyonovna buried her husband a few months ago. She hasn’t recovered from the loss yet, and when she tells me about her life, tears often fill her eyes. Bella Semyonovna lives in a cozy two-bedroom apartment. It is furnished with 1970s furniture: a living room set, a low table and chairs. She serves me tea and a cake that she has made herself. 

My family backgrownd

Growing up

During the war

After the war

Glossary

My family background

My maternal grandfather, Yoil Rosenthal, was born in the 1860s and lived in Telenesti [According to the census of 1897 this shtetl had 4379 residents, 3876 were Jews], in Bessarabia 1. My grandfather had two brothers: Lazar who lived his life in Odessa [today Ukraine] and we didn’t know him, and Srul, a handsome old man with a big white beard. I knew Srul Rosenthal, he was the father of my mother’s cousin brother Zalman, my mother’s big friend. Srul had two sons: Mordko and Yakov. Mordko and his family were killed in Kalarash during the war [Great Patriotic War] 2, and Yakov disappeared at the front. Srul died in evacuation. I didn’t know grandfather Yoil; he died in 1891. We had a big photographic portrait of my grandfather on the wall: in a white shirt, a small narrow tie in the fashion of the time. He looked like an intelligent man. I don’t remember a beard, but if he had one, it was small. I can’t tell what he did for a living. When we evacuated, we left the portrait on the wall and this was his only photograph.

My grandmother Ester Rosenthal was born and grew up in Telenesti. I don’t know her maiden name, but I know that my great-grandmother’s name was Beila since I was named Bella after her. At the age of 28, Grandmother Ester became a widow with four children, the oldest of whom, Gedaliye, was eight years old and the youngest, Iosif, was just a year and a half. I remember my grandmother well. She was short, round-faced, always wearing modest dark clothes and a kerchief. She lived with us before the war and sometimes went to stay with her younger son in Soroki. My grandmother wasn’t fanatically religious, but observed all the Jewish traditions. She lit candles on Sabbath and when she was with us, before Pesach she had all our utensils and crockery koshered. And I also remember – they don’t do it now – that my grandmother placed all tableware – knives and forks, into the ground in flower pots. She probably koshered them in this manner.

My grandmother Ester believed that the sons had to study, while the daughter had to help her about the house. My mother’s older brother Gedaliye graduated from the university in Odessa. He was a mathematician before the war and worked as a director of the Jewish school in Tarutino in Bessarabia. Uncle Gedaliye was a dandy, he liked nice clothes. When he visited Kishinev, he had suits made for him here. My mother always went to fitting sessions with him; I remember he didn’t leave her alone till she gave up what she was doing to go to a tailor with him. Uncle Gedaliye and his wife Sophia had an only son, Yuliy, born in 1926.

During the war they lived in Aktyubinsk in Kazakhstan, where Yuliy studied in a railroad school. In the last months of the war Yuliy volunteered to the front without saying a word to his parents. He was at the front till the end of the war and then served until the end of the term of his service. After demobilization Yuliy finished a law school and entered the Law Faculty of Lvov University. Uncle Gedaliye died in Lvov approximately in the 1960s. His wife Sophia died at the age of 92-93, many years later. I often visited Yuliy, who lives with his family in Lvov, and we went to my uncle’s grave at the Jewish cemetery.  

The next child in the family after my mother was Mordko, who lived in Moscow. I always knew him as Max, maybe he changed his name because the previous one was too Jewish. He had a higher technical education, but I don’t know where he studied. During the Russian Revolution of 1917 3 Uncle Max lived in Tbilisi and then moved to Moscow. My mother corresponded with her brother, but he rarely wrote to her. Max worked in the Ministry of Heavy Industry, where he was chief of the planning department. During the war the Ministry stayed in Moscow and so did Uncle Max and his family. His son’s name was also Yuliy – it was a tradition in my mother’s family to call older sons by the name of Yuliy after grandfather Yoil. Uncle Max died in 1969. Yuliy died in the 1980s, and his wife Nyusia lives with the family of their daughter Bella in Jerusalem. I’m not in contact with them.

My mother’s younger brother Iosif lived in Soroki [Soroca in Moldovan] before the war and after the war he moved to Kishinev [Chisinau in Moldovan]. Uncle Iosif didn’t have a higher education. He had different jobs and in his last years he was an insurance agent. His older son Yuliy studied in the Agricultural College. In his childhood he fell seriously ill and had heart problems. Yuliy died at the age of 20, before graduation from the college. Uncle Iosif died in the 1970s, he was buried at the Jewish cemetery in Kishinev. Two younger children of Iosif, Max and Ida, and their families, moved to the USA in the early 1990s. They live in Boston.

My mother Sarah Rosenthal was born in 1887. When she was four, my grandfather died. My grandmother Ester raised her to be a future Jewish wife. My mother learned to cook and sew and knew Jewish traditions well. However, my mother was eager to study. She had a strong character and ran away from Telenesti at the age of 16. She went to study in the Jewish grammar school. After finishing it she got a certificate of a teacher. My mother moved to Tiflis, that’s what Tbilisi was called at the time, to her brothers Max and Gedaliye. I don’t remember under what circumstances they had left there. She worked as a teacher.

When she was in Tbilisi this was the period of genocide against the Armenian population in Turkey in 1915-1916. [In 1915 the Turkish government issued an order for the forced deportation of Armenians from Eastern Anatolia. About 3 mln people were subject to deportation. Only one third of them survived]. My mother told me that in Tbilisi a committee was organized to provide assistance to Armenians and she worked in this committee. She said when Armenians came to talk to her, they complained, ‘You are a Georgian and you provide more help to Georgians,’ and vice versa, when Georgians talked to her, they said, ‘You help Armenians more than Georgians.’ They never guessed that she was neither Georgian nor Armenian, but a Jew. My mother helped Georgians and Armenians equally.

In 1917 my grandmother fell ill in Telenesti. My brothers decided that one of them had to go there and of course, it was to be my mother. She went to her mother and stayed in Bessarabia. This was at the time when Bessarabia was annexed to Romania in 1918 4 and the border was closed. My mother moved to Kishinev and was a teacher of Hebrew in a lyceum for boys. 

My father’s father, Moisey Fichgendler, lived in Yampol Vinnitsa region [today Ukraine]. [Yampol was a district town of the Podolsk province. According to the census in 1897 there were 6,600 residents including 2,800 Jews.] I can’t tell what he was doing there, but some time in the 1900s the family moved to Soroki in Bessarabia, since my grandfather couldn’t find a job in his town. I remember my grandfather Moisey. When I was born, he and Grandmother lived in Kishinev. My grandfather was a very modest quiet man with a gray beard. He always wore a yarmulka [kippah]. My grandmother was short, busy and sweet. She always wore dark clothes and covered her head. They lived in the lower town, the poorest part of Kishinev. I remember dimly their small apartment, very modest, two small rooms, and the front door led directly to one of the rooms.

My grandmother and grandfather were religious, but I don’t remember them going to the Choral synagogue [the largest synagogue in Kishinev, where besides the cantor there was also a choir], where my parents went. They probably went to a smaller synagogue. My grandfather died in Kishinev in 1930. He was buried according to Jewish traditions, wrapped in a takhrikhim, and there were candles on the floor. I was seven years old, and remember his funeral well. After my grandfather died, my grandmother Rosa moved to her younger son Boris in Soroki. During the war Grandmother Rosa and Boris’ wife were taken to a ghetto somewhere in Ukraine. They were killed there in 1941 or 1942.

My father had three brothers. I don’t know the names of two of them. One of them moved to America in 1910 and the second one drowned in the Dniestr at the age of about 20. My mother told me about it. I only knew my father’s younger brother Boris. After the war he lived in Beltsy. Boris was a worker at a plant. He remarried after his wife’s death in the ghetto. I met his second wife, with whom he lived after the war. They had no children. They visited us occasionally. They’ve both passed away.

My father Semyon Fichgendler was born in Yampol in 1888. When he was ten or twelve, his family moved to Soroki. I don’t know where my father studied, but he knew Russian and Yiddish well. He probably finished an agricultural school. He was an agronomist, a vine grower. I don’t know exactly, when he moved to Kishinev, but in the 1910s he was working in a Jewish children’s home in Bayukany, a district in Kishinev. Boys were kept in the children’s home till they reached the age of 14. My father was an agronomist, teaching the boys gardening. He lived in a small room in this home. After my father died, one of his pupils wrote to me, telling me how my father accommodated him in his room in 1912, when the boy had to leave the children’s home. He shared food with him and took him to work in surrounding villages and helped him to stand on his own feet in life.

My father was known for his qualifications beyond Bessarabia. Landowners offered him to work for them. My father told me that he got to know by chance what one of them wrote in a letter of recommendation for my father: ‘You know how much I dislike Jews, but I do recommend you to employ Fichgendler, he is a wonderful specialist.’ I know that my father was having problems with obtaining the Romanian citizenship since he wasn’t born in Bessarabia. We had a document that I gave to the museum, a special verdict of the court about granting the Romanian citizenship to my father.

My parents met in Kishinev, but I don’t know any details. We never discussed this subject. When my mother was his fiancée, my father bought her a French enamel brooch. It has been miraculously preserved till now. I don’t know, maybe my mother had it on her clothing, when they evacuated. Now this brooch is a rarity, but I don’t dare to sell it, though I need money very much. My parents got married in 1922.

Growing up

I was born in the Jewish hospital in Kishinev in 1923, and was registered in the rabbinate book. When after the war I needed to obtain a birth certificate since the original was lost, they found the roster of 1923 at the synagogue and found an entry about my birth there. Following the family tradition, my mother wanted to name me Yulia after her father, but the others talked her out of it: ‘What if you have a boy one day.’

When I was small we often changed apartments. Probably, my parents were looking for a cheaper one. I know the addresses, but the last apartment before the war was on 8, Teatralnaya Street, two blocks from the central street. We lived in a two-bedroom apartment on the second floor: one bigger room – a dining room, and a smaller room – my parents’ bedroom. I slept on a couch in the dining room behind a screen. There was a bookcase with books in the dining room. We didn’t have fiction, but my father had a big collection of books on vine growing, mainly in Russian. During the war this collection was gone. Later I often found his books – they had his facsimiles – in the house of agronomists in Kishinev, but I don’t know who brought them there. There was also a big desk in the dining room, but I did my homework in my parents’ bedroom, where they had a small table. There was also a small hallway and a kitchen in the apartment. My mother cooked on a primus stove.

Our family was rather poor. I remember that my mother had one fancy dress of black silk, very plainly cut. I don’t remember my parents going to the theater, but they were often invited to charity parties arranged by the Jewish community. My mother wore her only fancy dress and pinned her brooch on it. If she lost weight she draped the dress on her side and pinned it with this same brooch. My mother was beautiful, had expressive black eyes and always looked nice in her outfit. Men couldn’t help liking my mother, but my mother was not soft. She was strict and imperious. My mother knew Russian literature well and read a lot in Russian. When guests came she liked to recite poems by Lermontov 5: ‘Tell me, the branch of Palestine, where you have grown. Where have you bloomed? What hills, what valley have you adorned?’

My father was soft and kind. He traveled to surrounding villages on business a lot. I remember that when he came home, he always had rakhat-lukum [Turkish delight] for me. I adored it. At times it was very hard from being stored for a long time, but my father just had to give me my favorite sweets and I have bright memories about it.

My father had an acquaintance who was an agronomist. His name was Fyodor Fyodorovich Pozhoga, he was Russian. He lived in the upper town in a cottage with a big yard where he grew flowers. On my birthday at dawn my father brought me bunches of flowers from there. When I got up in the morning I didn’t know to what corner to look first. There were flowers in vases on the floor and in vessels all over the room. I was born in June, when there are always many flowers.

I invited my friends from school to my birthday and my mother arranged a party for us. The hit of the parties was ice-cream. My mother borrowed an ice-cream maker. I remember a metal cylinder with another one inside and there was ice to be placed between them. Then it was necessary to turn the handle of the inner cylinder for a long time to make ice-cream. My mother made it in advance and put it on ice in the cellar in the yard. Once my dear Papa, who also had a sweet tooth like me, took a spoon going somewhere in the yard. Mama asked him where he was going and he said, ‘I’m going to taste the ice-cream.’

My mother cooked dishes of the Jewish cuisine: chicken broth with kneydlakh, sweet and sour meat and gefilte fish on holidays. My mother made noodles, cut and dried them. She was good at making pastries, but I haven’t any of her recipes left. My mother bought food at the market where she took me with her. The market in Kishinev was very picturesque. I particularly remember the rows with fish. The counters were plated with tin sheets. The vendors often wiped them and they shone in the sun and were very clean. We always bought lots of vegetables: tomatoes, red paprika and eggplants. My mother preserved tomatoes for winter. She had her own method to make preserves in bottles. My mother baked egg plants, put them under a press, tore them in pieces and placed them in a bottle. When the bottle was full she corked it, put the bottles in a big washing pan to sterilize them. She also made tomato preserves in bottles, adding aspirin to them. She also made gogoshari [a popular sort of sweet red paprika in Moldova]: she baked them, removed the thin transparent peel, placed them in a clay pot and added sunflower oil. She kept it in the cellar during the winter and the oil turned red and spicy and my mother used it in her cooking. We also ate lots of water melons. We usually bought a few dozens of them. The vendors delivered them to or home. My mother bought chickens and took them to a shochet to slaughter. My mother bought dairy products from certain vendors. Of course, we followed the kashrut at home.

My parents always celebrated Jewish holidays. I remember well that on holidays my father put on his black suit and went to the Choral synagogue, the biggest synagogue in Kishinev, with my mother. My father had a small tallit that he put on on holidays. Sometimes they took me with them. I sat on the balcony with my mother. The synagogue was very beautiful and there were many people in it. The rabbi of the Choral synagogue, Izhak Zirelson, was a public activist. He was a deputy to the Romanian Parliament. I saw him, but I don’t remember what he looked like. Zirelson perished in the first days of the war. They said, a bomb hit his apartment. I also remember that there was a very good cantor at the Choral synagogue.

On Pesach we visited Grandfather Moisey and Grandmother Rosa, my father’s parents. There was only our family there, no other visitors. My mother was the best connoisseur of Jewish traditions in the family. She conducted the seder. We reclined on cushions at the table. There were traditional dishes and wine on the table. Everybody had a wine glass and there was one for Elijah ha-nevi, the Prophet. My mother opened the door for him to come in. I am not sure, but I think it was I who asked di fir kashes [the four questions], there were no boys. My mother put away the afikoman, a piece of matzah, and I had to steal it unnoticed. 

On Rosh Hashanah my parents also went to the synagogue, and then we had a celebration. I remember apples and honey. On Yom Kippur we fasted and spent a whole day at the synagogue.

On Chanukkah I had a dreidl, beautiful, painted all over and big. I used to play with it for hours, sitting on the floor. My mother made doughnuts, sufganim. However, I don’t remember being given any money. I also remember how my mother lit another candle every day on Chanukkah. On Purim my mother made hamantashen, triangle little pies with delicious filling.

We didn’t have guests often. My parents were friends with the director of the children’s home, Kholonay. He was a doctor and his wife was a housewife. We often visited them. They had old dark wood furniture and very beautiful crockery at home. There were no children at their home. Perhaps, their children were away – Kholonay was much older than my father. We also kept in touch with our numerous relatives in Kishinev. The parents of Sophia, Uncle Gedaliye’s wife, lived on Kharlampievskaya Street. My mother often visited these old people. The parents of my uncle Iosif’s wife from Soroki also lived in Kishinev. But my mother’s closest relative was her cousin Zalman Rosenthal, the son of Srul Rosenthal, my grandfather Yoil’s brother.

Zalman was born in Telenesti in 1889. He was educated at home, gave private classes of Hebrew, worked in a pharmacy. Then he finished a grammar school in Odessa, as an external student. In 1923 he started to work as an editor with the daily Yiddish Zionist newspaper ‘Undzere Tsayt’ [Yiddish for ‘Our Time’] in Kishinev. Uncle Zalman was a Zionist. My mother and he often talked about politics and I often heard the name of Jabotinsky 6, it didn’t mean anything to me at the time. Zalman went to Palestine and bought a plot of land there. He wanted to move there, but his wife was against it. In March 1938 the Romanian government closed ‘Undzere Tsayt.’ In 1939 he went to work in the Zionist organization Keren Kayemet 7 in Kishinev as an instructor for collecting funds. When in 1940 Bessarabia was annexed to the USSR 8, he was arrested on the charges of Zionism and exiled farther than Arkhangelsk [today Russia] in the North.

I remember well the Kishinev of my childhood - lying out like a chess board: you could see the end of a street lined with trees, when you were standing at its beginning. The central Alexandrovskaya Street sort of divided the town into two parts: the wealthier upper part and the lower poorer town, closer to the Byk River. There were wealthy houses and apartments in the upper town: the rich Jews Kogan, Shor, Klinger lived there. There were many shops on Alexandrovkaya Street owned by Jews. I don’t remember whether they were open on Sabbath. I remember the jewelry and watch shop of the Jew Nemirovskiy. His two sons, young handsome men, worked in the store. When I turned 13, my parents said they didn’t have money to organize a party for me, but that we would buy me a watch. They bought me a wristwatch at the Nemirovskiy shop that served me many years. After the war Nemirovskiy’s older son worked as a watch repair-man in the Kishinev service center. He was excellently good and I took my watch to him for repair. He remembered me since I was a girl.

I went to a Romanian school at the age of six and then went to study in the lyceum for girls. When my grandmother lived with us, we spoke Yiddish at home and when my grandmother was not with us, we spoke Russian. Since my mother was a Hebrew teacher in the 1920s, she tried several times to teach me Hebrew, but I didn’t move farther than ‘Alef, beth’ [Hebrew Alphabet]. My mother was very strict about my studies at school. She even asked the teacher to be strict with me. I remember that I wasn’t happy about it. My mother taught me to recite poems and I performed at school concerts, but on the condition that she left the hall, or I got confused, feeling her strict look on me. We all wore black uniform robes of the same length. We lined up and the teacher measured the length with a ruler – they had to be 30 cm sharp from the floor. There were white collars and aprons, black nets to hold hair and a black velvet ribbon on the neck. There were Jewish, Moldovan and Russian girls in the lyceum. There was no anti-Semitism.

My closest friend Bertha Geiman was a Jew. I remember our class tutor reprimanding Bertha: ‘You and Fichgendler are friends. Why don’t you study as well as she does?’ A tragedy happened in Bertha’s family. Her older brother, a grammar school student, fell on the skating rink and hit his head. He must have had a concussion, but he didn’t pay attention to it. That same evening he went to a party where he felt ill and died. Bertha’s mother was grieving a lot after her 15-year-old son. She went to the cemetery almost every day. When the war began and there was the issue of evacuation, she said, ‘I shall not leave my son’s grave, I shall stay here.’ When I returned from the evacuation in 1944 I ran to Bertha’s house in the upper town. Their neighbors told me that Bertha and her mother were shot in 1941, at the beginning of occupation, during the mass action.

I was good at all subjects at school, but my favorite teacher was the teacher of Geography, whose surname was Mita. Mita is a ‘cat’ in Moldovan. She was a beautiful tall brunette. Somehow I remember the class where we studied the USSR. I was always interested in the USSR, since my mother’s brother Max lived in Moscow. She told us, ‘Imagine moving into a new apartment. Of course, your apartment is a mess, but gradually everything gets in order: furniture pieces, things and carpets. Of course, there was no order in the USSR after the revolution, but gradually things will be getting in order and it will be all right.’ She talked about it almost sympathetically.

There was a tradition in Kishinev grammar schools. 100 days before finishing school a class from the girls school made arrangements to celebrate this with a class from a grammar school for boys at somebody’s apartment. We called it a ‘100-day party’. In 1940 our class celebrated this ‘100-day party’ with students of the commercial school for boys on Mogilyovskaya Street. We danced, sang and got photographed. I don’t have a photograph of this party. After the war I met some people who attended this party in the streets of Kishinev. After finishing the lyceum I wanted to continue my education. Jews usually went to get higher education abroad: in France, Germany, Italy. There was only the Religious Faculty of Iasi University and Agricultural College in Kishinev, but my parents didn’t have money to send me abroad. What were we to do? There was no answer to this question. 

At that time Bessarabia was annexed to the USSR. I remember well this summer day [June 28th 1940]. We lived almost in the center. I plated red ribbons in my hair and went to Alexandrovskaya Street in the afternoon. The town was empty. I returned home. Later that afternoon I went out again. Somebody was making a speech from the balcony of the town hall, but I don’t remember what he said. There were few people and it was quiet. Later there came rumors that wealthier people were deported. Once, somebody knocked on our door at dawn. I opened the door and saw a young man wearing a summer shirt. He said the name of our neighbors. I showed him the door and ran to the window in the kitchen. It was high and I stood on the table to see what was going on in the yard. There was a truck and our neighbors were loading their things on it. They had everything well packed. Then they boarded the truck with NKVD 9 officers. They returned a few years after the war.

This summer I entered the Faculty of vine growing and wine making of the Agricultural College in Kishinev. My father wanted me to become a doctor, but there was no Medical College in Kishinev, and to send me, their only and beloved daughter to Uncle Max in Moscow was too much for them. There were Russian and Romanian groups in college. I went to the Romanian group. I became a Komsomol 10 member in the college. I knew a lot about my future profession from my father and I liked studying. I finished the first year.

During the war

In summer 1941 Germany attacked the USSR. We knew that Germans were killing Jews and many Jews were leaving Kishinev. Only those who had illusions regarding Germans and Romanians were staying. The sovkhoz 11 where my father was working provided horse-drawn wagons to Jews. My father was told we were expected in a sovkhoz in Kakhovka district, Kherson region [today Ukraine]. My mother, my father, Grandmother Ester and I left in the direction of Dubossary. We left the key to our apartment on the shelf by the door, as usual. We didn’t think we would be gone for long. We reached the town of Kriulyany on the Dniestr. The bridge across the river was destroyed and the army troops were making a bridge of boats before nighttime. There were many people and equipment on the bank. The army troops were the first to pass. At dawn the bridge was removed for the day. Our turn was on the third night. We reached the eastern bank in complete darkness. We didn’t know where to go and turned left. All of a sudden a silhouette of a soldier emerged before us. I can still see it: a short thin soldier with a rifle, its bayonet sticking over his head: ‘Where are you going, there are Germans there!’ He made us turn around. Wouldn’t one believe in miracles after this? If he hadn’t turned us around, we would have gone directly to the Germans.

We moved to the East for two weeks. We stopped to take a rest in the town of Voznesensk. My parents had a discussion and decided that my father would go to the sovkhoz in Kherson region, and my mother, grandmother and I would go to Uncle Max in Moscow. My father left on the sovkhoz wagon. My mother wasn’t feeling well and needed some medications. The owners of the house, where we were staying, told me the way to the pharmacy in the main street. Round the corner there was a steep descent to a bridge across the Bug River. I looked at the bridge, bought the medication and went back. On the next day the front advanced so much that we had to take a prompt leave. The owners of the house were evacuating with their office and couldn’t take us with them. My mother ran about the town the whole day, trying to obtain a permit to board the ship with a hospital on it. She finally got one, but the chief of the hospital said, ‘I can take you and your daughter and you will work for us, but I cannot take the old lady – we shall need this place for a patient.’ My mother refused to go – we couldn’t really leave my grandmother.

An evening and then night fell. Demolition bombs began to be dropped on Voznesensk. We left the house and were walking along the central street without knowing where to. There was a truck with some soldiers moving in the opposite direction to where we were going. The driver asked us from the cabin: ‘Where is a bridge?’ How fortunate that I knew where the bridge was! ‘Take us with you and I will show you the way!’ They pulled Grandmother in by her hands and my mother and I got in. Near the pharmacy I pointed to the right. We crossed the bridge and drove up the steep bank, when we heard an explosion. We turned back and saw the bridge burning. At dawn we had to get off – they couldn’t allow us to stay in the truck – they had ammunition in it. I remember that the soldiers offered us bread and something else, but we refused and didn’t take anything. We were too shocked by everything. We got to Novaya Odessa [Nikolaev Region] walking on the dusty road in the unbearable heat. I was exhausted and remember lying down by a clay fence. Military trucks were driving by, we were trying to stop one, but they didn’t stop until finally somebody picked us up. They drove us to Melitopol, where we met a middle-aged Jewish man. When he heard we were from Kishinev he took us to his house. He turned out to be the director of the town bookstore. He had a comfortable apartment and his wife treated us to a meal.  

We decided to go to Rostov [today Russia], where our good acquaintance Fyodor Nikitich Tifanyuk, director of the Champagne factory, had evacuated with his enterprise. We got to Donetsk in a train with other refugees and from there we went to Rostov. Fyodor Nikitich helped us to get a job in the Reconstructor vine growing sovkhoz in Aksaysk district near Rostov. They gave us a little clean room, my mother and I went to gather crops of grapes and my grandmother stayed at home. It was the beginning of September. One day, when my mother and I came to lunch, we were told that somebody from the factory in Rostov called us and told us to go there immediately. We went to Rostov with Grandmother. How happy we were, when Fyodor Nikitich gave us a card from my father! My father wrote to him that he was in the village of Grigoropolisskaya in Alexandrovsk district, Stavropol region, and that he had lost his family. Fyodor Nikitich gave us money for the road and we went to Papa.

Papa had lost hope to see us and was so depressed when he came to the village that he didn’t tell them that he was an agronomist and was handling sacks on the threshing floor. Later he got a job as an agronomist and earned more money, so we managed to save a little. We needed winter clothes. Winter was coming and we had lost all our clothes that we took from Kishinev. One morning my mother left for Armavir, located on the other end of Kuban. My mother went to the market there and in the evening she returned with her purchases. She bought a dark blue coat with a rabbit collar, a big size soldier’s gray overcoat and some other clothing. We made the overcoat shorter and I wore it for many years after we returned to Kishinev from evacuation. From the remaining cloth I made a sleeveless vest and knitted sleeves to it.

When they heard in the village that I had studied at the Agricultural College for a year, they offered me a job as an agronomist in a neighboring village. I agreed. The chairman of the kolkhoz drove me to the field. He explained, ‘These are winter crops, this is a stubble field.’ I had no idea what this was all about. To cut a long story short: I returned to my parents and stayed there quietly. In Grigoropolisskaya I took three months’ training for combine operators at the Mechanic School, and after finishing it I began to work in the equipment yard. It was a cold winter. Huge sheds with tractors and combines. There were hardly any tools, but grips and files sticking to hands from the cold. I wrote a letter to the Ministry of Higher Education asking them where our college was evacuated. It was just incidental that the director of our college, Nikolay Vasilievich Nechaev, was chief of the department of agricultural college at the ministry at that time. I received their prompt response that my college had evacuated to Frunze [today Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan] and that if I wanted to continue my studies there, they would send me money for the ticket. They sent us money for the whole family. This was July 1942. The front line was approaching our village and German troops were on our tails when we reached Mineralnyye Vody and then Baku [today Azerbaijan]. From Baku we went to Krasnovodsk [today Turkmenbashi in Turkmenistan] across the Caspian Sea and from there we took a train to Frunze.

In Frunze we rented a corner in a room from one family. My father worked as an agronomist in the trade department. I was in my second year of college and my mother didn’t work. Uncle Max came by to take Grandmother to Moscow with him. In Frunze we received bread per bread cards 12. My mother had a card of a dependent and I had a student’s card. My father supported us: he went on business trips to sovkhozes that had bakeries. My father used to bring us bread. I remember it – flat gray loves of bread. Once my mother bumped into Uncle Zalman Rosenthal’s father-in-law, sitting on a bench in a park. It turned out that Zalman’s wife Betia, their daughters Tsyta and Musia were also in Frunze. Betia told my mother that Zalman was still in the camp. The girls studied music and often came to where we lived on their way from music classes. My mother always gave them at least a piece of bread. Of course, we didn’t observe Jewish traditions when in Frunze. We were starving and following the kashrut was out of the question.

On vacations students were sent to the construction of the Chuiskiy channel [one of the irrigational channels in Kyrgyzstan]. There was a lack of drinking water and we licked the water dripping between the slabs of the walls of the channel. As a result, many students fell ill with enteric fever. I also contracted it. I was taken to Frunze, where my mother brought me to recovery. I was young and wanted something nice to wear. I made a dress from bandage strips sewing one to another. Then I colored it with ink. I also made summer shoes. We bought rubber pieces at the market and I made soles and sewed some canvas on them. However, I couldn’t do anything of this kind now – I wouldn’t remember how. In fall there was a celebration of the 25th anniversary of the college. ‘What do I wear?’ I thought. My mother removed a silk lining from her coat that she had from Kishinev and made me a dress. She decorated it with lace from a night slip and a lace collar. I felt like a queen in this dress!

Soviet troops liberated Kishinev on 24th August 1944. I returned to my hometown with my college before my parents came there. We were accommodated in a hostel and first thing in the morning I ran to our yard. Our apartment was half-ruined, there was no furniture left. I climbed the ruins, imagined the dining room and the bedroom. Where there was a cupboard I found broken pieces of our dinner set, with purple flowers. I found my baby bathtub with a missing bottom and an old kettle. My mother and father returned a few months later, receiving a letter of invitation from Fyodor Nikitich Tikhanyuk. Papa went to work at his Champagne factory. We stayed in the ruins of our house, gradually fixing the roof and building up the walls. The town authorities reimbursed our expenses for the restoration of our house in part. For a long time there were no comforts [toilet and bathroom] in this apartment. Only many years later water piping was installed to supply water.

After the war

In the late 1940s Grandmother returned to Kishinev from Moscow. She was missing Moldova. She died in 1950. We buried my grandmother at the Jewish cemetery, and, as required, she was wrapped in a takhrikhim. My mother didn’t allow me to go to the cemetery: those whose parents are living should not go to the cemetery. I remember my mother grieving: ‘How far away we buried Granny. Oyfn barg’ [‘To grief’ in Yiddish]. There was a flat area and then a slope in the cemetery. Nowadays my Granny’s grave is by the entrance to the cemetery, since the former area of the cemetery was given to a park in the 1960s.

Our classes in college began in the winter of 1944. In spring we went to have training in the college yard in Bykovets station of Kalarash district. On 9th May we, girls, worked in the vineyard and the guys were in the field, when border guards came by riding their horses: ‘Girls, the war is over!’ Of course, we dropped what we were doing and went to the hostel in the village. On our way there, we picked bunches of field flowers that we took to our room! When the guys returned to the hostel after work and saw this beauty they couldn’t understand for a long time what happened, till we told them that the war was over. I remember an employee of this yard brought us a bucket of wine to celebrate the victory.

After finishing the college I received a diploma of a vine grower and wine maker. The dean of our faculty, a renowned wine maker in Moldova, Ivan Isidorovich Cherep, offered me to be a lab assistant at the department. It didn’t seem interesting to me and I still regret it. I went to work in the Winemaking Industry Department. In 1950 there were incredible crops of grapes. It was really disastrous, there were not enough boxes, fuel for transportation, barrels and big containers for wine. All department employees were sent to sovkhozes to help them resolve problems. I was in Kamenka. Once I went to the chief of our department in Kishinev and said to him that I wouldn’t leave till he gives a direction for me to get fuel. All of a sudden, a tall swarthy man with an aquiline nose stepped into the office from the balcony. He was wearing a tight-neck jacket and high boots, imitating Stalin’s style like many bosses did at the time. He must have heard our discussion. ‘Give her as much as she needs’ – he directed.

It turned out later that this was the chief of the Department of Wine Industry from Moscow, Azarashvili, a Georgian man. During that visit of his he made tours to all wineries, including my father’s. He liked what my father was doing and they became friends and Azarashvili visited us at home. He suggested that I should go to postgraduate studies in the Agricultural Academy in Moscow. I found this idea attractive and submitted my documents to the institution, but they refused without any explanation, but in those years it was clear that the reason was my nationality. This was when the campaign against cosmopolitans 13 began. I remember the much ado about the ‘Doctors’ Plot’ 14. It didn’t touch upon me directly, but I remember meetings at work with ridiculous accusations against Jewish doctors. Everything ended with Stalin’s death [1953]. So many people around were crying, but I kept silent. I didn’t go hysterical. In my heart I was hoping for changes.

After Stalin died uncle Zalman returned from a labor camp 15 in 1954. He had been kept there for 14 years and returned a broken ill man. He wasn’t released, but sent to reside in Kishinev, which meant that he had to make his appearance in the KGB office 16 in Kishinev every week. His wife and daughters finally saw him. Zalman went to work at the Aurika garment factory in the suburb of Kishinev. The former editor began to stamp tags for garment products. At one o’clock on Sunday he came for lunch with us. I remember that he sat beside Mama. One Sunday he didn’t come. This was unusual to us. What happened? We went to see him. He was staying in bed. He had had a stroke. Two days later he died. This happened in 1959. Zalman Rosenthal has never been rehabilitated 17. His older daughter Tsyta lives in Germany now, in Aachen, his younger daughter Musia lives in Jerusalem, Israel.  

I met my future husband Grigoriy Chanin at work. Shortly afterwards he invited me to the cinema. I took a colleague of mine there. We began to meet. He courted me for over a year. I introduced him to my parents. His parents had died before that. His mother, Sophia Chanina, died in 1946 from diabetes at the age of 56; his father, Wolf Chanin, who was a commercial man before the war, and a pensioner after the war, died in 1957. His sister, Nora Borenstein, was the first of his family whom he introduced me to. Nora and her family, her husband Izia and their son Slavik treated me like their own. Our friendship lasted for many years till they moved to New York, USA, in the early 1990s, where Nora died in the late 1990s. Izia danced wonderfully, and I loved dancing with him on our family gatherings. Grigoriy’s sister Rosa was an accountant. She died in the 1980s. Her daughter Rina and her family live in Israel. There were two brothers living in Kishinev: Rivik, who died in 1966, and Alexandr who moved to USA with his son’s family in the 1990s. He died there in 2003.

In 1958 Grigoriy and I got married. There were no big wedding parties in those years. Everything was quiet. We had a small wedding dinner with our relatives: his and mine. Grigoriy was five years older than me. He was born in Kishinev in 1918. When the war began, his parents, sisters and he evacuated. On the way he was mobilized to the Soviet Army. He took his first baptism of fire during the defense of Zaporozhiye. There was a power plant, the dam was blasted and the Dnieper flooded the town. Grigoriy couldn’t swim and many others couldn’t either. The water was neck deep and they were grabbing tree branches to survive. Grigoriy was wounded in battles for Zaporozhiye and sent to a hospital in Armavir. After recovery he participated in the Stalingrad battle, then he finished a school of intelligence studies and received the rank of lieutenant. Along with other Soviet officers who knew Romanian, Grigoriy was sent to the Romanian units formed in the USSR at the end of the war to fight against Fascist Germany. They were instructors to Romanian officers. He fought till the end of the war. When victory came, he was in Hungary. After the war he served in the registry office in Vadul lui-Voda district and demobilized from there. Grigoriy started work and entered the evening department of Kishinev Polytechnic College, the Faculty of Economics. When we got married, Grigoriy was finishing the college. I was helping him, went to exams to write notes for him. I also helped him to write his diploma thesis. Our room was full of sheets of paper all around, that were sections of his diploma thesis. He even placed them on the floor and to walk in the room I had to maneuver between them.

We lived with my parents. After my father retired, he received a plot of land out of town: one and a half rows of vines. He was growing grapes, tomatoes, cucumbers, anything one could imagine. My husband and I went to help him. Grigoriy made a kolyba [Moldovan] hut for Papa from some planks to serve as a sun shelter. There was another pensioner working on the adjoining plot of land, from the Caucasus, either a Chechen or an Ingush, a very strong old man. They became friends. The neighbor watched my father working and followed his example in everything. He admired him: ‘he is a magician.’ My father always had good crops of grapes, and he sold some. One year he bought me a golden watch for the money that he made selling grapes; I still wear it in the memory of my father. My father always liked spoiling me.

After the first heart attack in 1966, my father grew weak and suffered from this very much. Once I came home from work: he was lying down crying. ‘I can’t work and if I don’t work, I will rot.’ But he always had an amazing memory. My mother helped me about the house. She also did the cooking. She died in June 1971. My father asked me to have her grave not too far in the cemetery so that he could go there. Actually, he didn’t have much time left. He died in 1973. They were buried near one another at the Jewish cemetery, but not according to Jewish traditions. I didn’t observe the traditional Jewish mourning, when they sit on the floor for seven days. I just wore black clothes.

From the mid-1950s I began to work in the Republican Statistical Department. In 1963 I was appointed chief of the Department of Agricultural Statistics. Jews weren’t given such positions usually. Chief of Department Ivan Matveyevich Vershinin had to obtain the approval of the Central Department of Statistics in Moscow, and of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Moldova. The Central Committee wouldn’t have approved a Jew for this position, and this was their policy. Ivan Matveyevich played a trick: he obtained approval from Moscow and they issued an order of my appointment for this position and then he notified the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Moldova of the fact. There were about 150 employees in the department, but one could count the Jews on the fingers of one hand. This was the result of state anti-Semitism. I worked in this position for 16 years till I retired. I had good records. We were a team in my department. We only had one man, Semyon Naumovich Litviak, a Jew, he worked with us till he retired. He was a very good employee. After him we didn’t employ men to our department. I thought they were not as good employees as women. The department of which I was chief was called a factory of chiefs of departments. Many of my former colleagues became chiefs of departments later. I let them quit willingly, but with a big regret.

I worked hard and often had to go on business to district towns. My husband and I tried to rest well on vacations. We went to health centers. We’ve been in Kislovodsk 18 a few times. Once, during our trip to Kislovodsk we traveled to Armavir, my husband wanted to find the hospital where he stayed during the war, but unfortunately, we failed to find the former employees of the hospital in Armavir. Like a drunkard loving to have a drink, I loved Kislovodsk. I liked walking the mountainous paths. There are specially developed routes in the mountains – a terrain course. Once, Artyom Markovich Lazarev, the former pro-rector of Kishinev University, my husband’s comrade, offered us a trip to a students’ camp on the Black Sea. We stayed in a tent at the seashore, bathed and lay in the sun, and my husband was fond of fishing. I made fish soup, but I made my best fish soup ever on the bank of the Dniestr.

Our department of statistics had a rest center on the bank of the Dniestr. Our employees and their families used to spend their weekends there. By the end of Friday our bus took all those who wanted to go there to this center. On Sunday evening this same bus brought us back. There were double rooms in the building there. In every room there were two beds, a table, chairs, a fridge and kitchen utensils – everything one might need for a good stay. There was a big kitchen with gas stoves. This was free for our employees and their families. One day in July, on the Fisherman’s Day [one of the professional holidays in the USSR], we decided to celebrate this holiday. Our men liked fishing and thought they were related to this profession. They went to a neighboring sovkhoz and brought a lot of fish from there. We decided to make fish soup for the celebration. There was a big metal container with boiled water in the kitchen. We poured this water into smaller pots. There was a little tap in the container that we removed and corked the hole. I was the chef. Our employee Masha Tatok made the rounds of the room collecting everything we needed for fish soup: greeneries, spices, laurel. A whole team of assistants scaled the fish. We took all tables to the yard to make one long table. We had fish soup for the first course and served boiled fish in garlic sauce – mujdeiin in Moldovan – for the second course. Children and adults stood in a long line waiting for their turn and I poured the fish soup into their bowls, but the funniest thing is that I didn’t even taste it. On Monday they discussed this fish soup in the corridors and in all offices for the whole day.

In 1975 my husband and I moved into a two-bedroom apartment in Ryshkanovka, a new district in Kishinev. It’s beautiful here: it’s very green and there is a big park near the house. We had many friends: my husband’s comrades and my colleagues. We often got together. We had friends of many nationalities. My husband’s comrade Petia Katan was Russian, his wife Anya was a Jew. Their daughter Luda lives in Canada now and their son lives here, in Kishinev. My friend Lilia Glushkova was Russian, we worked together since 1953. My mother used to say: ‘I like Lilia, she eats well.’ Lilia adored my mother’s little pies with cherries. Our friend Yasha Weinstein was a Jew, and his wife Mila was Russian. Mila was a doctor at the tuberculosis institute. We celebrated New Year with them. They moved to Germany in the 1990s. When Jews began to emigrate, my husband was thinking about it. It was my fault that we stayed, or I don’t know whether it was a fault at all. I was against moving away. I like this land. When my husband and I had discussions of this kind, I used to walk the streets of Kishinev gazing at each tree: can it be that I will never see it again? How can I leave the graves of my parents? I was born here and I have grown up here, and every little thing here is dear to me.

In 1979, when I turned 55, I began to receive a personal pension of the Republican significance. Considering my Item 5  19 line this was a great accomplishment. It wasn’t a lot more money, but it meant many benefits. For example, I paid 20 percent of the cost of medications for any medications and any quantity. I also paid 50 percent of communal utility fees for the apartment, power and telephone. Once a year I was allowed a free trip to any health center in the Soviet Union. Once I also received an allowance equal to my one and a half pension. Besides, I could have medical treatment in the republican polyclinic for governmental officials. As a pensioner I continued working in an ordinary job for a few years. My husband was very independent and proud and often changed jobs for this reason, though he was a very good economist, so he got a smaller pension than I had.

The life of pensioners became much worse after perestroika 20. Personal pensions were cancelled, and I lost all the benefits. We spent a bigger part of our pensions on our apartment fees and medications, as we were growing older and sickly. However, freedom was granted that didn’t exist before and we can talk about the rebirth of the Jewish life in Kishinev. At first we started a Jewish library and now it is our community center. There was a club of pensioners opened in the library and I became one of its first members in 1993. I also began to work as a volunteer in Yehuda, a charity organization in the Hesed. In 1997 I became mistress of the warm house. I am fond of this work. We celebrate all the Jewish holidays and I try to do everything in accordance with Jewish traditions. For example, on Pesach I put on the plate of each attendant four pieces of matzah, with a napkin between them, an egg, horseradish and potatoes, everything that traditions require. Young people from the Hillel, an organization for young people, visit us. Considering my age, it’s getting harder to manage my duties of the mistress of the warm house, but this activity supports me a lot. A few years ago I went to the synagogue on Sunday afternoon. There was a club conducted by Rabbi Zalman-Leib Abelskiy. The club is still there, but I can’t attend it due to my health condition. Hesed delivers a food package to me every month. A few months ago my husband died. It was his will to be buried at the Jewish part in the cemetery ‘Doina,’ but not according to the Jewish ritual - and so I did it.

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