Tag #149154 - Interview #95820 (Tamara Koblik)

In spring 1944 Soviet troops began to liberate Bessarabia. There were many Jews from Bessarabia in Bukhara. Rezina sent a letter to Bukhara addressed to ‘Jews from Bessarabia’ calling them to come back to Bessarabia. The letter was signed by chief of the passport office Tamara Trostianetskaya, mama brother Leib’s daughter.  Mama wrote Tamara. In her reply letter Tamara wrote that Leib and his family, grandmother with Keila’s family and Golda were in the ghetto in Rybnitsa. In late 1941 grandmother and Golda and Keila's family were moved to Transnistria [7] along with a big group of other Jewish inmates. On their way there, in Gvozdavka [Odessa region], they were shot – about 500 people perished there. Uncle Leib and his children stayed in Rybnitsa and survived. Tamara wrote she would send us a permit to go back to Kishinev as soon as it was liberated. When mama heard that Kishinev was liberated, she said: ‘They’ve sent us the permit’. This was true – we received it two weeks later. During this time Jews from Bessarabia – most of them were doctors, arranged for two railcars to take us back home. Mama managed to make arrangements for us to go with the rest of them, though she had to pay that person, who could organize for us to take this train. These were freight railcars that on our way were attached to various locomotives moving to the west.