Tag #106683 - Interview #88491 (Emanuel Elbinger)

Brzesko was a borough. It had once had a city charter, but before the war [WWII] it no longer did. Before World War I there had been Russians in Brzesko [3], a Russian garrison was stationed there, and there was an Orthodox church. It was in the Russian partition, and the border was along the Vistula. Nowe Brzesko was the Russian side, but beyond the river was Galicia [4], that was Austria. As I remember from childhood, Nowe Brzesko was buzzing with life, because I think the Jewish community was more… a bit more lively than the Poles. Nowe Brzesko was a town where a large proportion – well, not large, but there were quite a few Jews living there. There were maybe 100, 200 – so everyone knew each other. Ten percent of the town [Editor’s note: in 1939 there were approx. 2000 people in Nowe Brzesko. The Jews made up approx. 20% of the population]. The Poles didn’t necessarily all know each other, because it was quite spread out.