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When Ovsei was released in 1946, he came to live with us in Kirov region. Inna, Samson’s wife, gave birth to a son in late June 1941 and left Tallinn just in time before the Germans came there. She even managed to find us in Kirov region. But my mother stayed in Tallinn although she had an opportunity to leave. We don’t know why she stayed and how she died. In 1991 the Estonian Record Office issued a certificate saying that Haya Ginovker, a Jew, was killed on 18th November 1941.
Perhaps, a friend of hers, who was born in Vienna, persuaded her to stay. She would always say that Germans were polite, well-mannered, decent people. Many Estonian Jews thought so. Besides, after the mass deportations conducted by the Soviet regime, they feared communists more than they feared Nazis. I think that deportation saved our family, otherwise all of us would have stayed in Tallinn and died because we didn’t believe that civilized people could commit such atrocities. Until 1944 we knew nothing of what was happening in German-occupied Estonia. We truly hoped that our mother was alive. In the fall of 1944, after Estonia was freed of fascists, we heard that all the Jews who had remained there had died. The news had a very negative effect on our father; he fell sick and died at the end of October 1944 in Kilmez. We buried him in the only cemetery in this small Russian town; everyone regardless of religious affiliation was buried there.
Perhaps, a friend of hers, who was born in Vienna, persuaded her to stay. She would always say that Germans were polite, well-mannered, decent people. Many Estonian Jews thought so. Besides, after the mass deportations conducted by the Soviet regime, they feared communists more than they feared Nazis. I think that deportation saved our family, otherwise all of us would have stayed in Tallinn and died because we didn’t believe that civilized people could commit such atrocities. Until 1944 we knew nothing of what was happening in German-occupied Estonia. We truly hoped that our mother was alive. In the fall of 1944, after Estonia was freed of fascists, we heard that all the Jews who had remained there had died. The news had a very negative effect on our father; he fell sick and died at the end of October 1944 in Kilmez. We buried him in the only cemetery in this small Russian town; everyone regardless of religious affiliation was buried there.
Period
Location
Talinn
Estonia
Interview
Leo Ginovker