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I was born in 1914, and in 1915 the war started [cf. Bulgaria in World War I] [5], which lasted until 1918, and I remember that we lived on the ground floor of the house, while some officers used to live upstairs. We had a fountain inside the house linked to the town’s water-main.
For a certain period of time maids from the [neighboring] villages used to help my mother with the housework. They were treated in a very good manner. My father even used to help them a lot, especially with their weddings when they got married.
I used to study in Gorna Dzhumaya till the fourth grade, the first and second class at the Bulgarian junior high school, and then we moved to Vratsa.
In the 1920s my father’s business started declining because after 1918 the country’s territory was re-allotted. Bulgaria lost lots of territories, which were annexed to the territories of Yugoslavia and Greece. The clientele withdrew and my father decided to change his subsistence.
Therefore he decided that we move to Vratsa where he applied to become a rabbi. At that time my mother was pregnant with Yosif – that happened in September 1925. Local people there had to find a home for us. They found us lodging in a basement, and in this basement Yosif was born.
In a year we moved to some sheds where there used to be a church beforehand. And there we lived – all in all, we spent eight years in Vratsa. There I studied in the high school, like all my brothers did. Yosif studied only in the first grade.
Generally there weren’t any anti-Semitic movements at that time. Only two times synagogues were burned – in 1910 in Vratsa and in 1903 in Lom. It was done in most of the cases by strangers [people from other villages], who were later isolated by the local people and chased away in the end.
For a certain period of time maids from the [neighboring] villages used to help my mother with the housework. They were treated in a very good manner. My father even used to help them a lot, especially with their weddings when they got married.
I used to study in Gorna Dzhumaya till the fourth grade, the first and second class at the Bulgarian junior high school, and then we moved to Vratsa.
In the 1920s my father’s business started declining because after 1918 the country’s territory was re-allotted. Bulgaria lost lots of territories, which were annexed to the territories of Yugoslavia and Greece. The clientele withdrew and my father decided to change his subsistence.
Therefore he decided that we move to Vratsa where he applied to become a rabbi. At that time my mother was pregnant with Yosif – that happened in September 1925. Local people there had to find a home for us. They found us lodging in a basement, and in this basement Yosif was born.
In a year we moved to some sheds where there used to be a church beforehand. And there we lived – all in all, we spent eight years in Vratsa. There I studied in the high school, like all my brothers did. Yosif studied only in the first grade.
Generally there weren’t any anti-Semitic movements at that time. Only two times synagogues were burned – in 1910 in Vratsa and in 1903 in Lom. It was done in most of the cases by strangers [people from other villages], who were later isolated by the local people and chased away in the end.
Location
Bulgaria
Interview
Isak Avram Levi