In 1931 my parents heard about the Jewish Republic that Stalin was establishing in Far East and decided to go there. We sold our furniture and moved to Birobidzhan [4]. Actually, there was no town built yet and we were accommodated in a wooden barrack in the taiga. My father became a cashier. He went to the bank to receive salary for all employees on a tractor with a tractor driver. My mother was very concerned that he might be killed for money. There were many convicts in the area. My mother worked as a milkmaid. Life was very hard. The hardships were beyond our parents’ expectations.
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Displaying 50161 - 50190 of 50504 results
Malea Veselnitskaya Biography
Neither father nor mother could find a job and our father decided that we had to go back to Romny. He went there alone to find a lodging and a job and later we joined him. We moved to Romny in 1933, but our situation did not improve. There was terrible famine in Ukraine [5]. We gathered potato peels in dump pits, fried and ate them. There came agents from a neighboring sovkhoz offering work in the field and payment with bread. My brothers, being 13 and 9 years old went to work there. At the end of their first week Semyon and Ruvim received one eighth of a loaf of brown bread with addition of straw. My mother’s brother Aron sent Yuda few dollars from America. Mother bought me a brown sateen dress, cotton pants for brothers, a shirt for father and something for herself in Torgsin stores [6]. Our father had a job where his salary was 360 rubles per month, but it wasn’t paid in timely manner. There were lines to buy bread and at times we had to stand all night through to get bread. 20 loaves were supplied to a store for the whole district and sometimes we had to stand in lines few days to get some bread.
In late 1933 our family moved to Kremenchug. It was easier to get a job in an industrial town. My mother’s cousin brother on her mother’s side Yakov worked at the tobacco factory. He was a member of the Party and chairman of a housing cooperative. He helped us to receive a 14 square meter room where we lived: my father, mother, Ruvim, Semyon and I. We stoked the oven with wood: there was no coal. We stored wood in the corridor. My father and brothers fetched water from a pump 4 houses away from our house. They paid 4 kopecks to the owner of the pump and he turned on the tap. We fetched water for washing the floors from a neighbor living across the street from us. She had a pump that took a long while to pump water. Our mother liked to have the room clean. She brushed the floor with a brush until it gained a color of an egg, washed with water and then dried it. There were white rugs on the floor. We had white starched gauze curtains on the windows. Our bed lien was always clean. We had quilted blankets and pillows and mattresses stuffed with down.
Our mother was a great cook. She knew many Jewish recipes. She made gefilte fish, bean soup, stew and pancakes from matzah. She also made delicious farfelakh. To make it she ground matzah, whipped it with eggs, made thin sausages, cut them in cubes and fried in goose or chicken fat. We had them with broth or without. Mother made delicious pastries on every Jewish and Soviet holiday: little pies, rolls and bagels. To do the cooking on Pesach mother had chicken fat stocks in ceramic jugs.
Our parents observed kashrut, but we didn’t strictly observe all religious rules in our family. Father and mother went to the synagogue on holidays. They didn’t take children to the synagogue and didn’t force us to fast. Our father didn’t eat any food or didn’t smoke on Day of Atonement [Yom Kippur] and our mother only fasted half a day due to her health condition. Our parents spoke Yiddish to one another and Russian to us.
Rita Vilkobrisskaya Biography
His wife Milia and daughter Tamara evacuated few hours before Germans entered Minsk. They were in evacuation in Olevsk Altaysk region. After the war they lived in Kharkov. We were not in contact with them after the war.
Max, born in 1906, was recruited to the army on the 2nd day of the Great Patriotic War. He vanished. His wife and daughter stayed in Minsk and must have perished, too. This is all I know.
My mother’s sister Sophia, born in 1903, lived in Smolensk before the Great Patriotic War. After finishing a medical school she worked as medical nurse. Sophia married a Russian man, I don’t know his name.
Her first marriage broke before the war and she remarried Nikanor Kabachkov after the war. During the war she was recruited to the army and worked in a hospital. After that Sophia settled down in the town of Dmitrov near Moscow. Sophia was a member of the Communist Party. I don’t know when she joined the Party. Her second husband was Russian, his name was a Nikanor Kabachkov.
, Russia
My mother Bertha Eishynskaya, the youngest in the family, was born in Lubcha town in 1907. From 1917 she and her brothers Efim and Max was raised at a children’s home in Minsk where she got a lower secondary education.
After finishing school in 1924 my mother went to work as envelope maker at the envelope factory in Minsk and later went to work at confectionery factory. In 1925 she joined Komsomol [7] and in 1928 she became a candidate and then a member of the Communist Party.
In Minsk my father met Maria Eishynskaya, my mother’s older sister, I don’t know how or where they met. They got married and in 1923 their son Ilia, was born, he was named after his grandfather. Maria died of galloping consumption in 1926. Before she died she demanded that my father promised her to marry her younger sister Bertha. She also asked Bertha to agree to marry my father. She wanted him to be well set and cared for.
My mother was an active and cheerful girl. Her friends were her schoolmates of various nationalities. Nationality was an issue of no importance at that time. She had many friends in Minsk and Smolensk where she went to visit her sister Sophia. Therefore, when her older sister Maria asked her to marry her husband before she died, this suggestion was a complete and quite undesirable surprise for my mother. My mother didn’t love my father, but grandmother Hasia said ‘Bertha, marry Michael for Ilia’s sake’. In 1929 my mother married Michael Vilkobrisskiy. At that time he had an important position in Minsk aviation regiment. They had a civil ceremony at a registry office and a wedding dinner at home in the evening. I guess, at that time my father was more like a friend to my mother. She wasn’t in love with him, but she had to follow her sister’s will. However, in due time she fell in love with him while he just adored her. The more my parents learned about one another the closer they became. They lived their life in love for 25 years.
My mother was an active and cheerful girl. Her friends were her schoolmates of various nationalities. Nationality was an issue of no importance at that time. She had many friends in Minsk and Smolensk where she went to visit her sister Sophia. Therefore, when her older sister Maria asked her to marry her husband before she died, this suggestion was a complete and quite undesirable surprise for my mother. My mother didn’t love my father, but grandmother Hasia said ‘Bertha, marry Michael for Ilia’s sake’. In 1929 my mother married Michael Vilkobrisskiy. At that time he had an important position in Minsk aviation regiment. They had a civil ceremony at a registry office and a wedding dinner at home in the evening. I guess, at that time my father was more like a friend to my mother. She wasn’t in love with him, but she had to follow her sister’s will. However, in due time she fell in love with him while he just adored her. The more my parents learned about one another the closer they became. They lived their life in love for 25 years.
I, was born on 28 October 1930. I got a Jewish name of Riva at the time of birth, but was always called Rita months after I was born my father was transferred to study in Leningrad [St. Petersburg at present] and we moved there: grandmother Hasia, father, mother, my half brother Ilia and I. My father studied at the Military Political Academy named after Lenin.
My mother went to work at a big printing house and in 1932 she went to study at Rabfak school [8] at the printing house.
In 1934 upon graduation from the Academy my father was transferred to Eysk town near Rostov-on-the-Don (in Russian it sounds ‘Rostov na Donu’, it stands on the Don River) in 1000 km from Leningrad. My father was a commissar of a navy air squadron. My mother also went to work as organizer at this same unit: she taught young mothers housekeeping, childcare, cooking while grandmother took care of her own home. My mother joined the Party at this unit. We stayed in Eysk maximum half a year.
At the beginning of 1935 the squadron was transferred to Krasnaya Rechka town near Khabarovsk in the Far East in 7500 km from home. We lived in the neighborhood for families of the military – there were few two-storied buildings there. We had a two-room apartment in a two-storied building. There was no running water and we fetched water from a pump nearby and washed ourselves in a basin in the room. Grandmother did all housekeeping and my mother, as usual went to work at the women’s division of the military unit. My mother had a lot of energy and talent. She organized various clubs and concerts. She liked dancing and singing. She organized a dancing club attended by almost all officers’ wives danced Russian national and modern dances. They often rehearsed at our home preparing for celebration of 7 November [9] or 1 May. There were parties and concerts that my mother organized on Soviet holidays. Officers’ wives and children performed singing patriotic Soviet songs, reciting poems and dancing. This was a nice entertainment. We lived a life full of joy. We didn’t celebrate any Jewish holidays, I don’t know whether there were other Jews around us, it didn’t matter. I guess my grandmother that grew up in a small town where there was a strong Jewish community celebrated Jewish holidays before the revolution of 1917 [10], but after the revolution she probably was afraid of damaging my father’s reputation of devoted communist since he was a commissar of a big aviation unit.
Grandmother Hasia spoke poor Russian and home my mother and father spoke Yiddish with her. I wasn’t taught Yiddish, though and Hasia tried to speak Russian to me.
My father loved me dearly. He was very busy at work and came home late after work, but he always found time to go for a walk with me at weekends and I always looked forward to his returning home. He took me out of town where we could enjoy beautiful views walking. Father bought me candy and toys, took me to the cinema and in winter we skied and tobogganed. Once my grandmother and I went hiking in the hills out of town. I saw a plane and a man with a parachute jumping out of it. I screamed ‘That’s my father flying there!’ It happened to be my father, indeed. This was his regular jump with a parachute, but it was unsuccessful: his parachute didn’t open and he landed with a reserve parachute and injured his arm and face. This was his last jump – he never did it again.
We lived in Krasnaya Rechka for over a year and in 1936 we moved to Khabarovsk where my father got his next job assignment. We got an apartment in a two-storied building inhabited by families of military.
I went to a kindergarten. I can’t remember whether it was in the kindergarten or in the yard when somebody called me ‘zhydovka’ [11] I didn’t know the meaning of the word, but I felt it was an abuse. I didn’t tell my mother or grandmother about it, but in the evening I told my father. I cried and asked my father why they called me so. My father told me that I was a Jew and that evil people didn’t like Jews and abused them. He told me that I should always remember that Jews are ancient people that gave this world many famous people and that I should be proud of belonging to this nation and pay no attention to any abuse. I believed him and never forgot what he said.
In 1937 I went to a Russian school. I was the only Jewish pupil, but there were Russian, Ukrainian, two German and one Uzbek child in my class and there was a Chinese girl that was my friend; I didn’t think about nationalities then. No one ever abused me again, but I remembered that first time I felt so hurt.
In summer 1938 I went to a pioneer camp near Khabarovsk. In few days after I arrived the director of this camp came to see me and told me and few other children to pack our things. We were put on a truck and sent home. I cried all the way home. We didn’t get any explanation, but I had a feeling that something went very wrong. At home my grandmother was crying when she met me. Ilia was lying on the sofa with his face turned to the wall. My mother was not home. My grandmother and I sat at the table and she said ‘Your father is under arrest. He is accused of being an enemy of the people, but you need to know that your father is a devoted communist. He is innocent’. ‘I’ve never forgotten what my grandmother, an ordinary Jewish woman, told me. This is all I was told then, but only much later I got to know the details of this period in the history of the country – the period of repression [12]. Our life changed dramatically. Members of few other families in our building were arrested. We had to move to another house that was called ‘Round Tower’. This was an old round-shaped building with one big room – it was like a gym - where many families lived behind partitions made from sheets. There was no furniture and we slept on the blankets that we brought from home. Our main food was bread and we fetched water from a well. The only thing that united all those people was the mischief that happened. There were no conflicts or even arguments in this building. My mother went at night (since there were lines of relatives and parcels were only accepted from 7 till 8 am) to stand in line with other officers’ wife to leave a parcel for my father with dried bread, cigarettes and soap. Sometimes the jail warden didn’t accept a parcel and mother came home in tears after standing in line for half a night. My mother was pregnant and was afraid that all these happenings were too much for her and the baby to bear.
She worked at the timber trust where she was involved in public activities – same as before: organization of cultural events. After my father was arrested mother was expelled from the party. She was accused of anti-Soviet propaganda and that she had been involved in it since we lived in Krasnaya rechka and that the dancing club that she organized was just another blinder to hide the essence of her activities. Her accusers demanded that she divorced from my father and acknowledged that he was an enemy of the people, but she kept saying ‘my husband is an honest man and cannot be a traitor …’. Some other officers’ wives gave up to the pressure and acknowledged their husbands guilty. Fortunately, my mother was not arrested. I believe, this was because she was in the last months of her pregnancy. My mother’s boss happened to be a very decent man. He didn’t fire her and even gave us a room in a communal apartment, even though my mother was accused of anti-Soviet activities and expelled from the Party. I remember a long hallway with doors in this apartment. There was a huge kitchen with kerosene and primus stoves. After the ‘Round Tower’ this room seemed beautiful to us. There were other children in my class whose parents were repressed, but this was not discussed and attitudes didn’t change.
She worked at the timber trust where she was involved in public activities – same as before: organization of cultural events. After my father was arrested mother was expelled from the party. She was accused of anti-Soviet propaganda and that she had been involved in it since we lived in Krasnaya rechka and that the dancing club that she organized was just another blinder to hide the essence of her activities. Her accusers demanded that she divorced from my father and acknowledged that he was an enemy of the people, but she kept saying ‘my husband is an honest man and cannot be a traitor …’. Some other officers’ wives gave up to the pressure and acknowledged their husbands guilty. Fortunately, my mother was not arrested. I believe, this was because she was in the last months of her pregnancy. My mother’s boss happened to be a very decent man. He didn’t fire her and even gave us a room in a communal apartment, even though my mother was accused of anti-Soviet activities and expelled from the Party. I remember a long hallway with doors in this apartment. There was a huge kitchen with kerosene and primus stoves. After the ‘Round Tower’ this room seemed beautiful to us. There were other children in my class whose parents were repressed, but this was not discussed and attitudes didn’t change.
In April 1939 my father was released. He was lucky. In 1939 after Minister of State Security Ezhov was arrested [14] for exceeding his authority and new minister Beriya [15] was appointed some prisoners were released under the verdict to Ezhov about unjustified repression. My father returned home very ill and thin. He had furuncles all over his body. He didn’t tell me or my brother anything. He only said that he was accused of espionage for many countries including Japan, but he didn’t sign one single paper. I guess he told my mother about endless interrogations, tortures and what he had to endure: everything that became known after denunciation of the cult of Stalin.
My father regained his membership in the Party and so did my mother. My father got back his job and we received our apartment back. Our life continued as if there had been no arrest.
The story of birth and youth of my father Michael Vilkobrisskiy is tragic. I don’t know his parents. All I know is that my grandfather Moisey Vilkobrisskiy was a coachman in the town of Wilno [present Vilnius – the capital of Latvia].
My grandmother (I don’t know her name) died shortly after my father was born. I don’t have much information about what happened afterward. All I know is that my grandfather left the child. My grandmother Hasia, my mother’s mother, told me about it. She heard this from some acquaintances of hers. My father never told me anything about it – he couldn’t stand any mention of his father whom he had never seen.
My father was adopted by the Jewish family of retail grain merchant, their family name was Ioffe, Ioffe’s family moved to Odessa. Childless families used to adopt orphan children. I guess, they moved to avoid any talks about adoption. They didn’t want their boy to hear that they were not his parents.
My father was adopted by the Jewish family of retail grain merchant, their family name was Ioffe, Ioffe’s family moved to Odessa. Childless families used to adopt orphan children. I guess, they moved to avoid any talks about adoption. They didn’t want their boy to hear that they were not his parents.
In 1906 adoptive father Ioffe died and his widow and my father moved to Vitebsk, in Russia, where her relatives lived. I don’t know the name of the woman that raised my father. I only know that she went to work after her husband died. My grandmother Hasia told me that the woman became a traveling agent that was not a typical women’s job. She traveled to other towns selling commodities of a company.
My father never observed any Jewish traditions, although he knew Yiddish. He went to primary school and in 1912 - 1915 he studied at High School in Vitebsk.
My father began to work at the electro technical shop of Mr. Mendelson, a Jew, in Vitebsk. He was an apprentice and finally became an electrician. He worked there until the end of 1918 and at the beginning of 1919 he got fond of revolutionary ideas and went to work at the factory of agricultural machines that belonged to the Unemployment Committee [1].
This was the period of Civil War [2], and on 15 October 1919 my father volunteered to the Red army. He became a private in reserve rifle battalion. This battalion was formed in Kazan. On 13 December 1919 my father became a member of the Communist party and then their regiment was sent to fight with the white guard units [3]. My father took part in battles with General Wrangel [4] units. There were military from various parts of the country. They were mainly workers and peasants that believed in the ideas of communism. My father told me that they had sufficient food and uniforms. They lived in barracks that they built themselves. Their living conditions were far from good. In 1920 my father was severely wounded and stayed a long while in hospitals until he was sent to an advanced training course for professional military in Minsk, Byelorussia, in January 1922. He was eager to study and willingly went to Minsk to study aviation.