Gisya Rubinchik's father Evsei Lapis

This is my father Evsei Lapis. The picture was taken in Shklov in 1913. My father came from Shklov. He was born around 1885. I don't know anything about his education. When he was young, he worked with his father in a mill, which stood on the bank of a lake, above the Dnieper river. He served in the army from 1914 to 1918, participated in World War I, and then in the Civil War. He was a very strong person, strong-willed and brave. He didn't join any party and stayed away from politics. He was awarded a St. George Cross for his service at the front. It was a very rare award for Jews. Father returned from the war as an invalid: he lost a leg and one eye. He was treated in a hospital in Petrograd. My father got married soon after he returned from the front. So my mother married an invalid. She was only one year younger than my father. Mother and him loved each other very much and had known each other from childhood, because they were cousins. That means that my grandmothers were sisters. We lived with my father's parents. Grandfather Yankel's home was a one-storied wooden house, but rather a large one. A part of the house was later taken away from him, when the so-called dispossession of the kulaks 5 began. We lived in terribly poor conditions. Father was an invalid and couldn't earn much. He worked in a company for the handicapped as a cutter of footwear. It was very difficult for him to walk. His artificial leg was of poor quality. He got wounds from wearing it. He was always sick because of these wounds. When I was small, I enjoyed it when father took me in his arms and told me episodes from his military life. Unfortunately, I can't remember any details of his stories any more.