Rimma Leibert’s father Boris Leibert

Rimma Leibert’s father Boris Leibert

This is my father Boris Leibert. This photo was taken in Tbilisi in 1935. My father was photographed in his uniform of an officer of the Red Army for the memory. My mother kept this photo her whole life. I don't know anything about my father Boris Leibert's parents. All I know is that my grandfather's name was Iosif. They said my father, his brothers and sister grew up in a children's home in Odessa. My father didn't tell me anything about it. My mother mentioned once that grandfather Iosif was a craftsman. I don't know how the children happened to grow up in the children's home. Aron, born in 1903, was the oldest in the family. The next was Sima, born in 1905. My father Boris was born in 1907, and Mikhail, the youngest, was born in 1911. I don't know my father brothers or sister's Jewish names. I give their names as I heard them from my mother. It goes without saying that these children did not get any Jewish education. I don't know whether the boys finished cheder since I don't know at what age they became orphans. After the children's home they went to the army, finished military schools and became professional military. They were members of the Communist Party and were far from religion. This was the best way possible for the poor and orphaned: they were provided meals and uniforms in the army. Besides, they had a place to leave since after the children's home those children hardly ever had a place to go to. So, the army came to my father and his brothers' rescue. My father Boris Leibert finished a political military school and served in Tbilisi, Georgia, where he was chief of political department of the garrison in Tbilisi. In 1932 he went to a military recreation house in Odessa. He met my mother and proposed to her almost two weeks after they met. My mother returned my father's feelings. They went to grandfather Abram in Kerch where they had a small wedding. They registered their marriage in a registry office in Kerch. My father didn't even want to hear about any Jewish wedding or traditions: he was a convinced communist. After the wedding my father and mother went to Tbilisi where my father was on service. However little I was I remember how my father went to the front in 1941. Of course, these are dim memories. I remember us all going to the railway station in a car. Many people came to see my father off. My father never returned. He perished during the liberation of Western Ukraine on 16 August 1944.
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