Table of Contents Next Page »

Sketch of trees, by A. Argaman	5
Kremenets, 1869	37
Kremenets, 1869	38
Teaching staff of the High School of Commerce	39
R' Nachum Grinberg	40
Shmuel Bezpoysnik	42
Manya Bat	42
Barukh Shteynberg	43
Tsipora Bar-Tana (Litvak)	43
Yakov Shafir	46
Bunim-Simcha Spektor	48
Dr. Mikhael (Mikha) Litev	50
Leon (Liova) Goldenberg	51

Almog, Yehuda (see also Kopelevits, Yehuda)	8
Apter, Shimon	55, 64, 65
Argaman, Avraham	i
Aronson, Kotsha	62
Atsmon*, Dora (née Leviten)	67
Ayzenshteyn*, Dora (née Yakobson)	66
Bakimer, Bunim	49
Barats, Yehoshue	67
Barats, Yitschak	67
Barshap, Eliezer	41
Barshap, Leya	41
Bar-Tana*, Tsipora (née Litvak)	43, 43 (photo), 66, 67
Bar-Tana, Tsvi	43, 66
Barushek, Yenta	62, 64
Bat*, Manya	42, 42 (photo)
Bat, Shmuel	42
Bat family	4
Belohuz, Shmuel	65
Benderski, Yukel	64
Ben-Hari*, Bina (née Blit)	66
Ben-Hari, Tsvi	66
Berenboym*, Nechama (née Kucher)	58
Berenboym, Shmuel	35
Berenshteyn, Bumek	64
Berenshteyn, Tsvi	i, 65, 67
Berenshteyn family	22
Berger, Dvora	67
Bernshteyn, Aleksander	67
Bernshteyn, Riva	47
Bezpoysnik, Ben-Tsion	42
Bezpoysnik*, Chava	42
Bezpoysnik*, Hela	41
Bezpoysnik, Shmuel	42, 42 (photo)
Biberman, Feyga	55, 56
Biberman, Moshe	3
Biberman, Yisrael	59
Bilatski (priest)	34
Blit, Bina	66
Bodeker, Avraham	67
Brodski, Tsoni	65
Bronfeld*, Malka (Manya) (née Lerner)	45
Broytman, Yasha	29 (photo)
Budyoni, Marshal	35
Burshteyn, Yosef	34, 52
Byk (photographer)	26
Byk, Clara	27
Byk, Fred	26, 27, 28, 65
Byk, Munia	27
Byk, Sonia	27
Chamtsuk	35
Chasid, Avraham	3, 34, 67
Chasid, Yakov	29 (photo)
Chasid, Zev	3
Chazan, Matus, R'	10
Czacki, Tadeusz	24, 36
Czackimyos, Tadeusz	38
Czartoryski, Adam, Prince	36
Dagim, Avraham	67
Desser, Mark	65
Desser, Max	i
Desser, Norman	65
Dubkirer, Eliezer	66
Eini, Ayal	57
Eini*, Merav (née Yaron)	57
Epelboym, Sender	64
Eydelman, Yitschak	3
Eydis, Frits	47
Fayer*, Chana	61
Fayer, Chayim	61, 64
Fayer, Enrike	61
Fayer, Hinda Etil	61
Fayer*, Mari	61
Federman*, Dozya (née Rubinfayn)	67
Feldman*, Adeyla (née Yergis)	62
Feldman, Isak	62
Feldman, Moshe	62
Fiks*, Sara	67
Fink, Moshe	64
Fishman (brother)	15
Fishman (sister)	15
Fishman, Manya	64
Fresman, Ita	67
Fridel, Naomi	49
Fridman, Blume	31
Fridman family	31
Frishberg, Aleksander	35
Fuks, Sam	65
Gal*, Mira (née Holinski)	57
Gal, Oren	57
Gal, Yakov	57
Galperin, Tsipora	57
Garber*, Fanya	64
Gindes, Tovye, Dr. (see also Hindes)	23
Gindis, Misha	35
Gintsberg, Pinye	29, 30
Gintsberg, Tsila (Tsirel)	43, 66
Gintsburg, Yosef	29 (photo), 49
Gitelman, Binyamin	67
Gluzman*, Chaya	42
Gluzman, Eliezer	42, 52, 59
Gluzman family	4
Golberg	40
Golberg, Betsalel	67
Golberg*, Mira	57
Golberg, Yehoshue	8, 57, 65
Golbert*, Lili	65
Goldberg, Arthur	52
Goldberg*, Dorothy	52
Goldberg, Kitsya	57
Goldenberg*, Chana (née Gurvits)	52, 59
Goldenberg, Lion (Liova)	51 (photo), 51-53, 66
Goldenberg, Manus	i, 9, 10, 12, 20, 29, 29 (photo), 43, 46, 48, 51, 54, 59, 66
Goldring	47
Goldsher, Ilya	64
Goltser, Meir	67
Gordon, Y. L.	34
Gorinshteyn, Azriel	29 (photo)
Gorngut	47
Gotvirts, Aharon	58
Gotvirts*, Bunya (née Koyler)	58
Gotvirts, Moshe	58
Grinberg, Nachum, R'	40, 40 (photo)
Grinberg, Uri-Tsvi	55
Gurvits, Chana	52, 59
Haven (baker)	27
Hindes, Tovye, Dr.	3
Hofshteyn*, Feyga (née Biberman)	55, 56
Hofshteyn, David	55
Hokhberg*	66
Hokhberg, Leon	66
Holinski, David	57
Holinski*, Karmela	57
Holinski, Mira	57
Husid family (see also Chasid)	27
Ikhilov*, Chana (née Teper)	57
Ikhilov, Dana	57
Ikhilov, Lihu	57
Ilan (son of Shoshana Mandelblat)	57
Kagan, Velka	65
Kantor, Ehud	57
Kantor*, Batsheva (née Levitin)	57
Kantor*, Rachel	57
Kantor, Roni	57
Katz, David	38
Katz, Marcus	i
Katz, Mordekhay	64, 65, 67
Katz*, Tsipa (née Roytberg)	59, 64
Katz*, Volke	15
Kesler, Yitschak	67
Kindzior, Dina	58
Kindzior, Gedalyahu	58
Kindzior*, Shulya	58
Kiperman*, Chaike	61
Kiperman, David Yechezkel	61
Kiperman, Nuta	61, 64
Kitay, Eydi	13
Kitay, Y.	49
Kogan, William	i
Koka, Rachel	67
Kopelevits, Yehuda (see also Almog, Yehuda)	8
Kornits	47
Kotkovnik, Gitil	64
Koyler, Bunya	58
Kozlovski, Hela	57
Kozlovski*, Mira	57
Kozlovski, Yakov	57
Kranik family	31
Kremen, Berel	66
Kremenchutski, Sima	57
Kremintsutski, Moshe	66
Krop, Moshe	10
Kucher*, Aliza	58
Kucher, Leybush	58
Kucher, Nechama	58
Kucher*, Yehudit	58
Kucher, Yoav	58
Landsberg*, Anya	15
Landesberg family	22
Landsberg, Bozye	47
Landsberg, Yashke, Dr.	15
Lantsitski, Chayim	58
Lantsitski*, Dina (née Kindzior)	58
Lantsitski, Eli	58
Laybel, Yisrael	64
Lebrov	34
Lelewel, Joachim	36
Lerer*, Ester	15
Lerner, Malka (Manya)	45
Levinzon, Yitschak Ber, R' (RYB”L)	20-25, 27
Levitan, Arye	67
Leviten*, Batya	57
Leviten, Dora	67
Leviten, Ilana	57
Leviten*, Irit	57
Leviten, Moshe	57
Leviten, Yehuda	57
Levitin, Batsheva	57
Levitin*, Batya	57
Leviton*, Ester	44
Leviton, Dora	44
Leviton, Lionya	44
Leviton, Munya	44
Leviton, Pinchas	44
Libman, Eli	64
Libman, Moshe	64
Lifshits, Nechama	55
Litev, Mikhael (Mikha), Dr.	50 (photo), 50-51
Litev, Pesach (see also Litvak, Pesach)	50
Litvak, Dr.	24
Litvak, Pesach (see also Litev, Pesach)	44
Litvak, Tsipora	43, 43 (photo), 66, 67
Litvak family	4
Lokakh*, Chaike	61
Lokakh, David	61
Lokakh*, Grasiela	61
Lokakh, Mario	61
Lubman, Yankel	64
Lyubkin	35
Malakhi, Tsvi, Dr.	28
Man, Yonatan	58
Mandelblat*, Bela	57
Mandelblat, Munya	57
Mandelblat, Shoshana	57
Manusovits, Shmuel	67
Margolis, Yisrael	24, 39
Medler, Morris (see also Melamed, Moshe)	10, 11, 65
Melamed, Moshe (see also Medler, Morris)	10, 11
Melamed, Shimon, R'	10
Mendel, Yisrael	13, 15
Meyler, Avraham	15
Mochan, Shmuel	67
Moti (husband of Ilana Leviten)	57
Nadir*, Rachel (née Otiker)	67
Napoleon III	37
Nudel, Chayim	64
Nusman, Aleksander	67
Oks, Velvel	64, 65
Olizer, Narciz	37
Oser, Mr.	66
Osovski, Chanokh	57
Osovski*, Galila	57
Osovski*, Tsipora	57
Otiker, Leyb, R'	10
Ot-Yakar, Mordekhay	i
Ovadis, Chayim	25
Ovadis, Niosha	29, 30
Pak, Bravtsye (Berta)	62
Pak*, Miryam	62
Pak, Moshe	62
Peker*, Freyda	61
Peker, Meir	64
Peker, Moshe	61, 64
Pesis*	15
Petliura	34
Pikhovits, Yurek	67
Pinski, Dr.	23
Poltorek, Adalya	48
Poltorek, Shlome	48
Portnoy, Yitschak	67
Prilutski, Tsvi	22
Pundek, Shmuel	3
Pundik, Shimon	29 (photo)
Rabinovitsh, Misha	59
Rapoport*, Chaya	45
Rapoport, David	31
Rapoport, Meir	31, 32
Rapoport, Ts.	45
Rapoport, Yeshaye	45
Rayzman*, Ela	58
Rayzman, Fayvel	58
Rayzman, Ilana	58
Rivak	34
Rokhel	67
Rokhel, Yitschak	i, 3, 6, 66
Roykh, Avraham (Adolfo)	62, 63
Roykh, Frola	62
Roykh, Gershon	62
Roykh, Gladis	62
Roykh, Lota	63
Roykh, Neli	62, 63
Roykh, Yisrael	62, 63
Roykh, Zeylik (Luta)	62
Roykh, Zlate	62
Roytberg, Tsipa	59
Roytman, Shlome	55
Royt-Shikhman, Manya	64
Rozenfeld, Avrasha	29, 30, 35
Rozenfeld, Ite	30
Rozental, Itka	66
Rozental, Leybke	23, 26
Rubinfayn, Dozya	67
Segal, Beylk	64
Sela, Aharon	67
Shafir*, Chanulya	47, 58
Shafir, Tsivya	58
Shafir, Yakov	46 (photo), 46-48, 67
Sher	29 (photo)
Sher, David	63
Sher, Ester	64
Sher, Reyzel	63, 64
Shikhman, Chana	64
Shnayder, Malke	62
Shnayder, Sore	62
Shnayder, Taye	62
Shnayder*, Tsipa	62
Shnayder, Vulf	25, 65
Shnayder, Yankel	62
Shnayder, Yoske	34
Shnayder family	4
Shnitser, Nachman	67
Shpak*, Chaike	61
Shpak*, Ester	61, 62
Shpak, Yitschak	61, 62, 64
Shpargel, Avraham	64
Shpinke (baker)	15
Shrentsel, Avraham	67
Shtern*, Itka (née Rozental)	66
Shteynberg, Barukh	43, 43 (photo), 66
Shteynberg*, Sara	58
Shteynberg, Moshe	58
Shteynberg, Nechama	58
Shteynberg*, Tsila (Tsirel; née Gintsberg)	43, 66
Shumski, Mikhael	39
Shvartsapel, Yosef	29 (photo)
Shvartsman, David	64
Sichuk*, Atara	67
Sienkiewicz, Karol	36
Sirayski	34, 52
Skolski, Shlome	i
Skoropadski, Hetman	34
Slobodiuk	8
Slovatski, Yuliush	36
Sonya	8
Sopozshnik, Chaike	61
Spektor*, Naomi (née Fridel)	49
Spektor, Bunim-Simcha	48, 48 (photo)
Spektor, Hershel	48
Stoler, Barukh	58
Stoler*, Nechama	58
Stoler, Shimon	67
Stoler*, Yehudit	58
Stoler, Yosef	58
Studinker, Leyb, R'	10
Takar, Yisrael	64
Tal-Or (husband of Shoshana Mandelblat)	57
Tamri*, Chava (née Taytelman)	46
Taytelman, Aba	46
Taytelman, Chava	46
Taytelman, Milek	46
Taytelman, Sara	46
Taytsher, Chayim	65
Teper*, Chana	57
Teper, Fishel	57
Tetler, Markus	65
Toren-Feldman, Dvora	67
Trumpeldor, Yosef	4
Tsenin, Mordekhay	55
Tshudnovski, Katya	64
Tshudnovski, Riva	55
Tsizin, Yakov	3
Tsukerman, David	67
Vakman, Yitschak	10, 48, 65
Vargos, Avraham	64
Vayner, David	67
Vaysberg	35
Veksler, Sioma	29 (photo)
Verthaym	47
Vilderman*, Leya (née Barshap)	41
Vishnier, Max, Dr.	66
Vishnier, Neti	66
Vodonos (brothers)	15
Vysotsky, Brigadier General	34
Yadeshliver, Yesha	64
Yakobson, Dora	66
Yanovski, Zsharsh	62
Yaron, Merav	57
Yaron*, Sima (née Kremenchutski)	57
Yaron, Yizhar	57
Yergis*, Freyda	62
Yergis, Adeyla	62
Yergis, Avraham	62
Yisrael ben Yakov Hakohen	32
Zeliane*, Bravtsye (Berta) (née Pak)	62
Zinger Shapira	67

This 15th booklet appears in the 30th year of Israel's independence. We celebrate this distinguished occasion with the nation. Quite a number of Kremenetsers arrived in Israel before its establishment as an independent state and, each through his own skill, had a hand in establishing and developing the nation. For that reason, we feel that it is fitting to recall the first emigration from this town to Israel and the way people adjusted to and established themselves in the Land. The first section of this booklet is dedicated to the third wave of immigration, the first in which our town participated.

A few months ago, a new immigrant arrived in Israel directly from Kremenets to settle here. We talked with her at length and have printed the contents of the conversation in this booklet for our readers.

We received a booklet written in Polish in which we discovered that, at the beginning of the 19th century, Polish immigrants from Kremenets settled in Paris. The reasons for their immigration, their lifestyle there, and their struggles are recounted in “Kremenetsers in Paris during the 19th Century.”

Kremenets emigrants, both in Israel and in other countries, remember the town where they were born and grew up, and miss the past that is no more.

Two 80-year-old Kremenets natives met in the United States and reminisced with longing, and they relate those memories to us.

Not to be overlooked, of course, is the regular Argentina section, which comes from the most active Landsmanschaft. In addition to contributing printed information, they have immortalized the memory of some members in our Memorial Book, the fruit of our member Tsvi Berenshteyn's initiative.

As a result of high printing costs and the large amount of material, we have decided to print the Mosaic section in Yiddish only at this time.

In addition, there are the usual sections, which we have not reviewed above; readers will not fail to see them even if we have not pointed them out.

Last but not least, our clubhouse, which is located at the Kibbutzim College, is 14 years old and was in need of improvement, and, indeed, the college shared in the expense of renovating the building that houses the clubhouse. The layout of the pictures and photos, which have all been framed, has changed. Members are invited to visit the clubhouse during the annual memorial and on any other holiday to experience memories of Kremenets.

[Page 3]

Now that we have reached the 30th anniversary of the establishment of the state of Israel, it is fitting to review the involvement of Kremenetsers.

Kremenets emigrants in the Land today number about 400 families, or about 1,000 people. They arrived in stages and waves. In particular, the third wave of immigration (1919-1923) laid the foundation for the following waves.

In the first wave of immigration, from 1882 to 1902, only one person immigrated to Israel. This was Dr. Tovye Hindes, who arrived in 1893 and settled in Jerusalem, where he worked as a physician until he contracted malaria and was forced to leave. He settled in Vienna. He was therefore the first immigrant from Kremenets.

In the second wave of immigration, from 1904 to 1914, there were no immigrants from Kremenets. However, four boys were sent by their parents to study in Israel: Yitschak Eydelman, Zev Chasid, Shmuel Pundek, and Avraham Chasid. Two young men, Moshe Biberman (who lives in Moscow today) and Yakov Tsizin, worked as hired agricultural laborers in the settlements and returned to Kremenets before World War I.

Immigration 1 lasted about 20 years and brought approximately 25,000 Jews to the Land. Immigration 2 lasted about 10 years and brought approximately 35,000 Jews.

In the third immigration, 35,000 arrived over five years. Jewish settlement in the country grew 60 percent, but we have to note that the number of returnees from the first two waves was very large. There were also many older immigrants who came to live here during their last years and find peace in the Holy Land. The third wave of immigrants had a completely different composition: most were young, unmarried men and women – of the most desirable age and family situation for a country under construction, fit and able to work and defend. The Balfour Declaration of 1917 gave rise to a wave of enthusiasm, and the best Jewish youth readied themselves for immigration and tried to immigrate at the first opportunity.

After that, it was not the movement of a few, but a mass of immigrating Jews. Their goal was not only the conquest of workplaces in the settlements but also the establishment of a homeland. The trademark of the third wave was that it was organized in large part by Pioneer, which trained its members, in body and spirit, for their destination in the Land.

[Page 4]

The large concentration (for those days) of laborers, never seen in the Land until then, broadened horizons, strengthened solidarity, and nourished ideas about labor. The large contract jobs that the laborers received demanded a collective organization. Certain jobs were given to organized groups; the hundreds of laborers who worked on paving roads formed small and large groups. Everyone aspired to a collective lifestyle, and the conditions were right to fulfill their aspirations.

First in size and productivity was the Labor Battalion named after Yosef Trumpeldor, which was formed in 1920. It started with the Tiberias-Tsemach road and in time branched out into several platoons: Rosh HaAyin, Jerusalem (Ramat Rachel), Tel Aviv, Kfar Giladi, Ein Harod, and Tel Yosef. The battalion members understood that it was important to combine defense with labor and that the most efficient way to achieve this was through a kibbutz lifestyle. The article “Row 4, Tent 6” is about the atmosphere in the Labor Battalion, particularly the Rosh HaAyin platoon, where Kremenetsers occupied an important place (in quantity and quality).

The first group of pioneers from Kremenets included 12 people. In time, additional members joined them. From 1922 to 1924, 15-20 pioneers per year came from Kremenets, as did other groups of middle-class immigrants, such as those from the Dubno^[1] and Vishnevets suburbs. We can assume that the total number of immigrants from Kremenets – pioneers and families – during the third wave of immigration reached 150-200. At the beginning of the third wave of immigration, people from the same town established several agricultural settlements: Gevat by immigrants from Pinsk, Kiryat Anavim by immigrants from Kamenits Podolsk, and so on. The number and strength of the people from Kremenets was insufficient to establish their own settlement, but they took an active part and much initiative in the establishment of several settlements and enterprises: in the early period of the Labor Battalion and its platoons and afterward in the establishment of Tel Yosef, the Binyan company in Tel Aviv, which built the housing for the homeless (today Bugrashov Street) that was conferred on those evicted from Jaffa because of the 1921 riots. That company and the Avodah Company eventually formed the Solel Boneh Company. Kremenetsers helped establish Herut in Jerusalem, a plumbing cooperative, and many other projects. In later years, the pioneers who immigrated from Kremenets were concentrated in Kibbutz Yagur and Kibbutz Givat Hashlosha, and their effect is seen even today. It should be noted that some of the pioneer youth and middle-class families in the third wave of immigration, such as the Shnayder, Litvak, Bat, and Gluzman families, as well as others, helped establish the town of Afula.

[Page 5]

This is the history of the third wave of immigration from Kremenets, an immigration that was not large in numbers but stood out in its quality in many areas. Here they went through a blessed process of productivity, settled in the Land, and are playing a large role in building and developing the state of Israel.

Immigration to Israel from our town started with very few – only a dozen daring individuals, and now we are a mass of a thousand townspeople whose influence is seen in many areas.

[Page 6]

Our company was like a nomadic troop, a camp that moved from place to place with its tents and its meager possessions. The first place we stayed was by a brook at the ancient Antipatris fortress on the top of the hill in Ras-el-Eyn (Rosh HaAyin, near the Petach Tikva settlement), though we did not stay there long. After the May 1921 riots, our platoon moved to another place near Petach Tikva, also in tents.

Our job was to pave a narrow railroad track from Rosh HaAyin to Petach Tikva. The letterhead on the official correspondence read “Yosef Trumpeldor Labor Battalion, Railroad-Track-Building Company,” as if to say we were constructing not one track but many. One day it was a short, narrow track, just a few kilometers long, and the next day, it was a different one – wide and large. In addition, the Labor Battalion had various companies. Ours was but one of them, and the construction of railroad tracks was our permanent occupation.

Everything was new, romantic, and glowing; we were young dreamers who had come to our dream Land with fierce yearnings. On the ship, we sang, “When the Lord restored the return to Zion, it was as if we were in a dream.”^[3]

Those were not just empty words; there was no division between talking and doing, between dream and reality. With every step and deed, we wanted to see the dream fulfilled. We did not impose demands.

We did not feel hardship. We accepted everything as part of the new Israel's reality and adjusted easily to all hardships.

Before daylight, we got up for work, had a cup of cocoa and a slice of bread, shouldered our tools, and went out to work. The walk on the lanes among the orange groves by the village Mir at sunrise was pleasant; the charming view, the intoxicating aroma of the groves, and the leisurely and friendly talks all bestowed the sense of a dream fulfilled on us.

Most of the men had never tasted labor, not to mention the construction of railroad tracks, and before long, they tired. It was embarrassing to admit weakness – we had taken it upon ourselves to build the Land with our hands, so we had to go on with our mission and not bow to obstacles. They worked in the burning heat up to the limits of their strength, nearly fainting, but did not give up; with perspiration, aching backs, and buckling knees, they persevered and succeeded. Indeed, before long, the children of Jewish towns turned into true laborers; the palms of their hands hardened, their muscles stretched and strengthened, and their backaches disappeared. Work turned into part of their nature, as if they had come from generations of laborers, railroad construction workers always.

[Page 7]

When evening fell, we would march home in a long line, feeling satisfied and tired but undefeated. We were building the Land, just as we had said, with our own hands. Even in one day, we advanced the building of the Land a little, we did as much as we were able, and the satisfaction was great. In the evening, there was dancing until midnight, and on Sabbath eve, until daylight. Our hearts were full of yearning and emotion and with longing and dreams, and sometimes doubts gnawed. We were overwhelmed by all the happiness bubbling within us, our mouths tired from proclaiming, and unwinding was a necessity. Breaking into dance brought release. The circle inflamed and swept everyone up; we danced “El Yivne Hagalil,” “Shivkhu Shivchey Tsedek,” “Di Mame Kokht Varenikes,” “Shir Bli Milim,”^[4] and many other dances, again and again, endlessly, until the point of exhaustion.

With the arrival of the Sabbath came rest: getting up late, stretching out and lolling in the tents, reading, talking, visiting friends in other tents, visiting the adjacent settlement of Petach Tikva, or just roaming around the area.

One of the guys had an “attack” of homesickness. He took a Pentateuch out of his suitcase and after some hesitation (worrying that his friends made fun of him), he started reading the weekly portion aloud in the traditional melody of his town's reader. His friends did not make fun of him; indeed, silence fell in the surrounding tents. Lying on their beds, hearts pounding, they listened. Then, one by one, the guys came up to the tent, stood by the opening, and listened to the reader. He lifted his eyes, saw the “minyan” around him, and was embarrassed, but he continued to read with more power and self-assurance.

Then it was time to write home; each one reread the letter he had received during the week and got ready to reply. In his mind's eye, his parents' home stood before him as if it were real. Affection and longing reawakened in his heart – and sometimes even hidden anger, because they had tried to prevent him from immigrating and now were trying to persuade him to return. The letter to dear father and mother flowed, describing all the news in the Land, all that was good and beautiful in it. “How good I feel, how good!” He tried to describe this new life in a way that would be understood “there,” but it was difficult because reality here was different from reality in the village. In particular, it was hard for him to describe the kibbutz and the battalion. “It's something like a labor collective, but at the same time, it's also a contractor, podriatshik, for the railroad. But we are not working for the podriatshik but for ourselves. In short, the battalion is a sort of a very large business, but with many partners, and I am one of them. True, we live in tents, but they are organized inside and out, standing in rows with paths between them.

[Page 8]

“My address is Row 4, Tent 6. Don't worry. We will build houses yet! But in the meantime, this is how to address letters to me: Railroad Building Platoon, Row 4, Tent 6. This is my place. This is my address in the Land.”

Hebrew was spoken during meetings and in the dining room; the village people adjusted quickly to the new language, but the Russian-speaking Kremenetsers had a hard time adjusting. They, too, spoke Hebrew, but their speech was ludicrous, like a non-Jew speaking Yiddish. Among themselves, they spoke Russian and sang Russian songs. In the shower, the others followed their example, and Russian was dominant there. The women loved Russian and the tall and daring men who spoke it and sang in it…

There were veteran workers among us – not many, only about half a dozen, but their influence was felt, and everyone admired them: their spoken Hebrew was natural and spiced with Arabic idioms, they worked confidently and well, and they were suntanned. Because they were veteran workers, we saw them as models and examples. We made an effort to emulate them, to follow in their path. However, sometimes they were haughty, speaking with a touch of mockery about the pioneers (ridiculing their imperfect accents), but we accepted their mockery with forgiveness – they were allowed, they had been first, they had preceded and paved the way for us. In the evening, we listened to stories about their early days: the Galilee and the collective farms, the Watchmen^[5] and their white horses, the Bedouins and their ways, the Arabs and their customs, the owners of the orange groves and their behavior, the pretty farmers' daughters, what was and what never was. And legend was woven into reality.

The office was housed in one of the tents. That was where you found Yehuda Kopelevits (Almog) and his friends, the leaders of our community. That was the location of the administrator, the treasurer, the person in charge of the job roster, and others in charge of roles or assignments. Obviously, the work couldn't have been done without these jobs, but, among us, this was indolence, all that business and writing. So Yehuda Almog had to work hard to persuade one of the guys to take on one of those jobs. Deep inside, the guy saw his office job as a betrayal of his pioneering destiny.

It was a new world, an evolving world, but not chaos. Indeed, there was organization and order in the camp's work and life. The rows were set, and the young pioneer's place in the camp was Row 4, Tent 6.

[Page 9]

Sometimes I meet my friend When in the bright yellow of the sun and the blue of our sky. So the heart gives a tug To a gray day and a simple Yiddish word; __ . __ To the swish of leaves and a golden fall, To the divine aroma of blooming gardens, To a cool night in Elul, To the quiet sadness of voices saying penitential prayers; __ . __ To the squeaking cold of the deep snow, To the velvet blue of the distant woods, To the gentle ringing of bells on a sled On distant paths, over white fields; __ . __ To a long winter morning By a still bright night light, The sweetness of Papa's psalm recitation And Mama's cool hands on my hot forehead; __ . __ To everything that my eyes will never see again; To my family, my friends, my all That was so dear, so loved, During days of work and on peaceful holidays, Sabbaths; __ . __ To my city, to its last days; In the horror, the terror of anticipation; To their depths on their final way, To my clever mother's final thoughts; __ . __ In my old home nothing but ruins and empty streets; Black crows caw, announcing aloud, Resounding empty news To a deaf world, to orphaned generations.

[Page 10]

In one of his letters, “our Manus” [Goldenberg] wrote that when I travel to Arizona for a rest, I should not forget to meet with our landsman Moshe Medler, who lives in Tucson, Arizona. He sent me the address. Soon after my arrival in Tucson, unable to find Medler's name in the telephone book, I wrote him a note and asked how I could find him. After four days, I got his number, and we decided that he would visit us on Sunday. We should have had a camera to capture the joy of Shimon the teacher's son. He embraced me, kissed me, and wept; and time after time, these two Jews, blessed be God, in their 80s, regarded each other with tears in their eyes and saw their old home, the city of Kremenets, which was surrounded by mountains, just as the city of Tucson is surrounded by a chain of mountains. I knew his father, R' Shimon. But I had forgotten that he was a grandson of R' Leyb Studinker, may he rest in peace, and was a good friend of my brother-in-law, R' Manus the cantor, may he rest in peace, because both were Oliker Hasidim and he used to stay with my brother-in-law every December 31. They would drink a toast and wish each other a good year and recite the verse, “The Lord will inscribe in the register of peoples that each was born there. Selah” [Psalm 87:6]. And know, too, that R' Leyb Otiker, may he rest in peace, was with them. Medler said that many of R' Leyb's grandchildren are now in Israel.

Medler talked about his life in Israel for many years and about his visits to Israel. Speaking thus brought us back to Kremenets–“Do you remember Moshe Carp?” he asked me. “All week he worked as a water carrier. But on Thursday he would buy a large carp. He would put it in a big pot of water. With the fish he would go around and sell numbers. Early Friday a number would be picked.

[Page 11]

The winner would happily cart off the fish. People on the street regarded him with envy.

We also recalled Mekhele the Galoshes Maker.

In winter, going onto his steps, one could break one's foot. His room was a jumble of galoshes, and he, that little man, with his always-red eyes, rubbed the galoshes and smeared the holes with glue. One had to wait for the glue to set. In the meantime, one had a bit of tea and a little bread. His wife, still a young woman, tall, with a child every year, cursed without stopping.

He never responded, and he went on with his work. And after these memories, more memories came to mind. We recalled the song “How do you remember your youth, Moshe my friend!” That song leads to a natural yearning to be young again. I thank you, dear Manus, who brought me together with my old friend–Morris Medler (Moshe Melamed). Together we exchanged pages of the past with painful feelings.

Let us hope for good times for all of Israel–wherever they are, and especially in our holy land.

[Page 12]

Two months ago, we were informed that a woman had immigrated to Israel directly from Kremenets. This is the first and only such case since the Germans were ousted.

Yehoshue Golberg and I went to meet her at her temporary residence, her uncle and aunt's spacious home in Hadera. We were received cordially, and soon Sonya entered, carrying a bundle of books and notebooks under her arm as she returned from the ulpan^[6] where she had been studying for the last two months.

Sonya sat at the table, her bright eyes watching us with joy and trust. She seemed much younger than her age of 50, her movements exuding abundant energy. Her speech, in Ukrainian and Russian, was full of charm and humor. It was hard to think that this woman had suffered so many dangers and troubles in her childhood and youth.

She was 13 when she escaped from Mizvoch^[7] village near Rovno, after her parents and family had been killed along with all the Jews there.

In the village next to Mizvoch, none of the residents would let her into their homes. She decided to return to Mizvoch. On the way, she saw a caravan of farmers' wagons loaded with looted goods returning from her village, so she knew there was no point in going back. Very thirsty, she dared to approach a farmhouse at the edge of a village (it, too, was close to Mizvoch) to ask for water. Much to her surprise, she found that a schoolmate and her family lived in the house. She also found a few more Jews from Mizvoch. After she had lived in that house for a week, she was transferred to the house of a different farmer, by the name of Slobodiuk; he and his family were members of the Evangelist sect called Shtundists in our area. The Banderovtsis^[8] later killed this farmer. That family hid Sonya on top of their oven for 18 months. When the neighbors found out that a Jew was hidden in the Slobodiuk house, she was transferred to a different Evangelist's house, where she hid for a month. One day, a wagon carrying monks passed through the village on their way to the monastery in the large village of Zahaytsi, near Kremenets. The farmer told them that a Ukrainian orphan girl was staying in their house and asked them to take her to her uncle in Zahaytsi. This pretend uncle was the leader of the Evangelists there.

Still a long way from Zahaytsi, a gang of Banderovtsis stopped the monks' wagon, ordered Sonya down, and prepared to check her identity.

[Page 13]

Sonya told them that she was an orphan from Mizvoch who was on her way to see her aunt in Zahaytsi. When they asked for her name, she gave them the name of a Christian girl in her class. To her bad luck, the Banderovtsi commander was a resident of Mizvoch and knew the girl. It was obvious to him that a Jew was in front of him, and no doubt, her end was imminent. But fate continued to protect her this time, too: it happened that sometime before, her interrogator had killed a German in the barbershop of a Jew who worked for the Germans. That barber hid him and helped him escape. In return, the Banderovtsi promised him that he would rescue the first Jew he happened upon.

This was his opportunity, and he let the girl pass. The monks, who had been worried about the results of the girl's interrogation, had become frightened and left before she was released. When they arrived in Zahaytsi, they told the “uncle” what happened. The “uncle,” who knew that Sonya was to arrive soon and had been waiting for her, understood that he would never see the girl.

Sonya continued her journey on foot. On the way, she met a group of boys who were herding animals. One of the boys brought her to his home, where she was taken in as a Ukrainian girl, one of the abandoned children wandering the roads. That family was Polish and very scared of their enemies, the Banderovtsis. They let her stay overnight in their home, but early in the morning, they took her in their wagon to Shumsk^[9], where she met some Shtundists who advised her to leave immediately for Zahaytsi. On the way, she stopped at a secluded farm, where the owners let her stay and work as a herder. After some time there, she contracted a severe case of hives and was sent to Zahaytsi, her original destination, for treatment. That is how she reached the home of her “uncle,” who together with a few other Shtundists took care of her and cured her. They knew that she was Jewish and gave her special attention.

For five years, 1943-1948, Sonya lived in Zahaytsi. During that time, she was very active in village society and was the soloist in the choir. The Banderovtsis were still looting in the area for some time after the Russians entered, but they never touched Sonya. While in Zahaytsi, she completed her studies in the School of Commerce through correspondence, with help from her workplace and the Sol Soviet.

In 1948, equipped with the proper documents, Sonya moved to Kremenets, where she got a job in the government's business office. In Kremenets, she met her future husband, whose father had worked for a long time – until the German invasion – in Eydi Kitay's tile factory. Her husband, his father, and their family were ardent Shtundists.

In Kremenets, Sonya made contact with, and became very close to, the few Jewish families that survived there, particularly with the family of Yisrael Mendel, of blessed memory, the keeper of our walls. Mendel and his previous family, which had been murdered by the Nazis, had lived in Zahaytsi until the Germans arrived.

[Page 14]

By now, some members of this group of survivors have passed away, and some have moved to other towns in Russia and Poland. Their children, including Sonya's, live in large cities far from Kremenets.

A few years ago, Sonya requested an exit permit to movie to Israel. Her uncle (her mother's brother), who lived in Ternopol^[10], the district capital, did this for her. She had to travel there a few times to find out the result of her request, as each time it was denied for various reasons, mostly family reasons. Her husband and two sons decided not to emigrate, uncertain that they would be permitted to leave the country and worried that they would lose their jobs. When Sonya's coworkers found out that she had started procedures to immigrate to Israel, their attitude toward her became so hostile that she was forced to resign.

When she finally received notice that her request had been granted, she divorced her husband and received his and her sons' written approval of her departure. Armed with all those documents, she traveled to Ternopol for the last time. She returned to Kremenets with her exit visa.

Before her departure, she said farewell to the four Jewish families there, who were not very encouraging, but her final parting from her Ukrainian friends, particularly the Evangelists, was very heartfelt, and they talked to her of their sentiments toward the Holy Land. “My husband's last words,” Sonya said, “were, 'when you reach Israel, kiss its holy earth.' I kissed the pavement when I deplaned, because there was no earth there.”

Two days after Sonya's arrival in the Land, she received a congratulatory telegram from her husband in Kremenets. “When I read the telegram,” her aunt told us, “I started to cry. Sonya has been in Israel for only two months, and when we met her, she had already received several letters in Ukrainian from her husband. They were full of affection, longing, and happiness for her that she was among her relatives in the Holy Land.

Sonya had been in the Land for almost two months and already had quite a vocabulary. All evidence showed that we were in the presence of an excellent student at the ulpan, and we were sure that she would find a home here – thanks to her optimism, willingness to work wherever she found a job, and God-given sense of humor.

[Page 15]

Sonya told us that after the passing of Yisrael Mendel, of blessed memory, our martyrs' common grave had been neglected, and the neighborhood children had started to pull boards out of the fence. But a few years ago, a sugar factory was established near the grave, and next to it, a trade school. So a guard was put on the grave, probably by the town government. On Memorial Day, the students march to the grave and lay wreaths there, as do the Evangelists and some Ukrainians. Each year, some of our fellow townspeople who live in Rovno, Lvov^[11], Ternopol, and other towns arrive there on that day to commune with the memory of their relatives and friends.

Nowadays, 30,000 people live in Kremenets, all Ukrainians, as well as three widows of Kremenetsers: Volke Katz, Mendel, and Pesis. Also living there are Avraham Meyler, Shpinke the baker, Ester Lerer, and Anya Landsberg, Dr. Yashke Landsberg's widow. Their two sons live in Leningrad. The Fishmans, the brother and sister from Kagon-Kendel, live in Ternopol, and the two Vodonos brothers live in Rovno. That's everyone from our Kremenets.

[Page 20]

When an important guest would come to Kremenets–a writer, a party leader, or a messenger from the Land of Israel, and stay over the Sabbath, people would take him to Mount Bona. In the mystery-filled darkness, people would lead him through the old castle ruins until they arrived at the top of a hill. Suddenly a wonderful picture appeared before the guest: deep below, the whole city was spread out. A thousand Sabbath lights twinkled in all the windows. And there almost all the guests involuntarily recited the verse, “How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, your dwelling places, O Israel.”

And now, when, after long travail, one of us who lives in Russia or Poland comes to Kremenets and leaves the station at the monastery, he sees a horrible picture. He stands there as if turned to stone. All the houses have disappeared, as has the Great Synagogue, every bit that belonged to Kremenets' Jews. The Nazis took care to destroy it all, either through the Jews themselves or after the ghetto was burned. In the spot where Jewish Kremenets was, a park has been developed.

But at the edge of the town, at the beginning of the Vishnevets gate, the poor, crooked Levinzon house, the house that Levinzon's biographers more than a hundred years ago described as about to collapse, still stands. It makes one consider the symbolism of this remarkable phenomenon. This poor, weak house, from which R' Yitschak Ber Levinzon's teaching went out to all corners of Russia, with its rich human and Jewish value, has outlived the dangerous Nazi regime and seen its destruction.

[Page 21]

In my childhood years, my grandmother, may she rest in peace, a religious Jew and a kosher soul, whose Yiddish chumash and Kav haYashar [a moral treatise by R. Tsvi Hirsch Kardanover[ were moistened with her tears, would take walks on cool summer evenings outside the city. Passing by Levinzon's home, she would spit three times and say, “May his name and memory be blotted out!” This was almost 50 years after his death. When he was alive, she was still a young girl.

My grandmother's behavior was strange to my childish eyes, because as a child, I found that the solitary house at the city's edge aroused my curiosity. In autumn and all summer, deep, heavy mud covered the entrance stairs to the house. And throughout the year the basement was full of water. Through the always-open door on the street that led to the cellar, we used to throw sticks and boards that would float on the water.

I later came to understand my grandmother's attitude and that of many other Jews toward Levinzon. I understand that this was the recompense for those who swim against the stream and try to change reality. And the Jewish reality against which our great fellow citizen took a stand was quite sad.

Kremenets, which had a reputation in the 16^th and 17^th centuries as one of the most important Jewish communities in eastern Poland, whose commerce flourished and whose rabbis and scholars were renowned, was totally destroyed by Chmielnitski's hordes. The few survivors rebuilt the community, but it never regained its former stature.

And in those days of sorrow and dejection there appeared, like a bright star in the dark Jewish heavens, the Hasidic movement. The flame of devotion and religious ecstasy of the Baal Shem Tov and his followers seized the Jews of Kremenets and its neighborhood, as it did everywhere else. But the movement's sunset began at the beginning of the 19^th century.

[Page 22]

The grandchildren of the Baal Shem Tov's true students, having agreed to attract more Hasidim, each created a rich court with servants and carriages for himself. The Baal Shem Tov and his Hasidim's Torah was replaced by a cult of personality, superstition, rough youth, impracticality, and external splendor.

Levinzon stood up boldly against these developments. His biting satires against the “rabbis” and their ignorant, misleading “holy sheep” aroused hostility in the city's masses. He was completely isolated by them. Excommunicated. Nevertheless, the number of his followers among the Enlightened in Kremenets grew. Several prominent and wealthy families in the city protected and supported him. These were the Landesbergs, the Berenshteyns, and others. They also provided him with the books he needed. Those few young men who secretly dared to look at Levinzon's work were called “Teudkes” by the Jews, after the name of his important work Teuda beYisrael [Testimony in Israel]. They were persecuted, but the number of people looking to Levinzon increased. Also, the working class slowly came to the idea that the man who lay sick in bed with great suffering was fighting their fight. In Yiddish manuscripts, they read his pamphlets, in which he sharply delineated the exploitation and injustice that community leaders imposed on the masses. He brought up the superstition and inefficiency that ruled there for shame and mockery.

In Y. B. Levinzon's aforementioned work, Teuda beYisrael, were the fundamentals of his teaching, which revolutionized the thinking of a great part of the Jewish settlement in Russia. In this work, the Jews were called on to change, exchange their worthless professions for productive work, own land, and cover themselves with the honor of labor and workmen. He also calls there, as he does in his other works, for Jews to learn Hebrew and its grammar as well as the local language (in this case, Russian), science, and mathematics.

[Page 23]

From numerous reports in the Jewish press of that time, we know how effective this was with Kremenets' Jews: 56 Jewish families registered to settle on the fruitful soil of Kherson province. The number of study hall students who learned basic Hebrew in secret increased. Some were among the founders of the Lovers of Hebrew movement in Russia as well as the Lovers of Zion movement. Among them were the future editor of Moment, Tsvi Prilutski, the then-famous Zionist leader in Poland and Russia Dr. Tovye Gindes, Dr. Pinski, and others. From Kremenets, articles were sent to the Hebrew and Russian newspapers of that time. They illustrate the growing cultural level of the Jewish inhabitants, including women, who freely spoke Hebrew (then a rare thing among Jews) when in the city a government Jewish-Russian elementary school was opened, and there was an outcry in the city that Jewish children would be led into apostasy. Levinzon calmed them down and called on the children not to be afraid to go to the school. An interesting curiosity by Leybke Rozental, of blessed memory, that appeared in the Kremenitser Shtime was told by his grandmother and relates to Levinzon's activities. One beautiful morning, people brought Levinzon out of his house on a cot so he could lie in the sun near his door. Sitting there on his cot, he suddenly heard wailing. Soon a Jew appeared with his hands stretched toward the sky. He cried aloud for his son to be rescued from being brought to apostasy in the “school.” A number of crying children followed the man. Levinzon called the children to him and gently said that the Russian government had done them a favor by opening the school. There they would learn different things, the country's language and their people's history.

The children, who gathered near him with sympathy, listened guiltily, and their fear of the school disappeared. Among those children was Rozental's grandmother.

[Page 24]

Levinzon's activities were multifaceted. Aside from his literary and research work, he conducted a rich correspondence with different government and high officials, including members of the czarist court. Through them, Levinzon's activities became known and appreciated. Czar Nicholas I was very interested in him and awarded him a prize of 1,000 rubles for the work Teuda beYisrael. An emissary from the czar brought the prize to him on his sickbed. Also on his sickbed he received the highly placed guests who often visited him, among them Tadeusz Czacki, founder of the Kremenets Lyceum, which was known throughout Poland. He and his aides used to bring the books Levinzon desired from their extensive library. His guests often found him wrapped in a prayer shawl, because Levinzon, the “heretic,” always observed the commandments.

In this connection, it is related that one time a Jew, a Hasid, making a toast with his friends in a Krakow study hall, said that it was his wish to see a Jew who was a real heretic with his own eyes. The Hasidim advised him to go to Kremenets. There lived one Levinzon, who would show him what a heretic was. How astounded that man was when he crossed the threshold of Levinzon's prayer house and saw Levinzon wearing a prayer shawl and phylacteries and saying the morning prayers.

Levinzon died in 1860. On the day of his funeral, all the businesses and workshops were closed. Almost all the residents accompanied the body. At the head of the sad procession, people put all his works into a special container.

The Enlightened of Kremenets tried for years to establish a suitable memorial for their great fellow citizen. Decades passed, but they were unable to do so for various reasons.

Only after the civil war, at the beginning of the 1920s, did some Kremenets Enlightened ones, led by Dr. Litvak, Yisrael Margolis, Chayim Ovadis, L. Rozental, may their memories be blessed, and others joined up with central ORT in Warsaw.

[Page 25]

Together they built the ORT school that bore the name of Y. B. Levinzon. The Lyceum directors generously provided the building materials. This was a continuation of the support and friendship that the Lyceum's founder and his aides had extended to Levinzon a hundred years earlier. Also, in the center of the Jewish working-class area, a street was named after him. That street was destroyed by fire, together with the whole ghetto. There is nothing in Jew-free Kremenets that recalls Y. B. Levinzon.

The Kremenets Landsmanshaft Union in Israel, at the urging and with the help of our prominent landsman, scholar of Levinzon and his era, Volf Shnayder in America, as well as the Kremenets landsmanshaften in New York and Buenos Aires, has taken on the duty of memorializing our great landsman, Yitschak Ber Levinzon, father of the Russian Enlightenment. This has taken on a scope that exceeds the borders and possibilities even of the international landsmanshaft.

Much will be related about Levinzon's teaching and his era in the two yizkor books that Kremenets landsmen published after the Holocaust in Israel and in Argentina. About the aforementioned memorializing activities of the Kremenetsers, much is written in the 15 issues of Kol Yotsei Kremenets in Israel that have appeared regularly in Israel over 11 years.

It should be noted that in Tel Aviv, in one of the industrial and business centers, a street bears the name of Yitschak Ber Levinzon. The street is near HaMasger Street.

[Page 26]

October 11, 1977^[12]

Dear friends,

I thank you for asking me to express my thoughts of the past and outlooks as to the future, in writing. By looking back to my past, I find that our people always looked with pride and our enemies with shame. Perhaps, we in many cases were the sheep and they named themselves as lions but this was only in the physical sense and not in the moral, intellectual or spiritual. We will forever remain the people of the Torah and Talmud.

[Page 27]

I look at my past as nil in comparing to those who have not lived through the last holocaust and to see a 2000 years dream cone through with the birth of the land of Israel. As long as there is a breath of life in us, we will always remember them. I do not think that the life of my sister Sonia who was hung on a tree in the complex of the jail or my brother Munia who was tortured in Lwow carrying rail tracks on his bare shoulders in the peak of the hot summer where he was destroyed, or my younger sister Clara or I my parents who were buried alive is more important than other 14,000 destroyed landsmen. But learn we must from their experience that no Galut is safe for us.

Yes, it was good to read your article about the Husid family who I knew and remember so well. After all, they were our next door neighbors. Or the Levinson house from which I used to pick up home baked bread by Haven the bakern. In those days this was just another house but today we find it as being a shrine of importance to that man who will always be singled out. Since he left a memorial of thoughts and rich values put in writing that will be cherished by some and remembered by all as Levinson, the father of the Russian Haskala.

You, who pioneered this beautiful land and live in, know how difficult was the struggle to liberate yourselves from the mandate of the British. So was my journey hard from Warsaw with Hitler in 1939-40 to Kreminetz and from 1942 to 1945 from Kreminetz through many places on the European and Asian continent where I spent until 1947, from where I landed here in one of the better Galut lands. It was a difficult journey with many frightening and dangerous experiences. I remember the night when the sound of the German canons were heard. I asked my family “let's leave everything and go East”, but they, like most of our Landslite, with clear conscience, replied “who will touch us, we never did any wrong to anyone.” “We are a liked and respected family.”

[Page 28]

Everyone knew “BYK the photographer” as a fine person. After all this was the thinking of all of our people. This last generation decided to protect these qualities with force and the results are here to see for all humanity.

Now we, this little branch of that beautiful blooming tree called “Israel”, have this Holy obligation to inshrine the name of Kreminetz with her 14,000 destroyed sisters and brothers in every possible way, so that the future generation shall read and learn from these experiences. Yes, you, being the roots of this beautiful blooming tree with us the branches all over this planet, make me feel assured that our children and their will always have that address of Israel and that the bloodshed by our dear ones was not in vain.

May we have the blessing of peace upon us always.

Fred Byk

Dr. Tsvi Malakhi, head of the Institute for Research in Hebrew Literature, wrote to us as follows:

To the editors of Voice of Kremenets Emigrants,

I received booklet 14 of Voice of Kremenets Emigrants with pleasure and was glad to read about your widespread activities in Israel and the Diaspora.

I am glad to have been privileged to take part in the cooperation between our institute and your organization in the area of Hebrew literature research. In these materialistic days, creative activity in the fields of intellect and literature is an infusion of life-giving breeze.

I hope that the foundation we have laid will be strong and prosper and that we will continue to perpetuate Hebrew culture in general and the heritage of a generation of Kremenetsers in particular.

With honors and blessings for a good year,

Dr. Tsvi Malakhi
Katz Institute for Research in Hebrew Literature

[Page 29]

It happened at the end of July 1922, on a cool evening.

Religious Jews had gone to the afternoon and evening prayers. Others sat around after a hard day's work. Suddenly they were all struck, as if by lightning, by the shocking news that wo young men, Niusye Ovadis and Pinye Gintsberg, had drowned that day while boating on the river in Shumsk.

With them was Abrasha Rozenfeld, who was an outstanding swimmer. When their boat capsized, he tried to save them; and although this disaster happened near the shore, he was unsuccessful. Neither of the two could swim.

Standing, right to left: Yasha Broytman, of blessed memory; Azriel Gorenshteyn, of blessed memory; Yakov Chasid, of blessed memory; Sioma Veksler, of blessed memory; Sher, of blessed memory; Shimon Pundik, of blessed memory Sitting, right to left: Manus Goldenberg; Yosef Gintsburg, of blessed memory; and Yosef Shvartsapel. All were killed in the Holocaust except for Yakov Chasid, who died in Israel, and, long may they live, Manus Goldenberg and Yosef Shvartsapel, who live in Israel.

[Page 30]

All three belonged to distinguished families in Kremenets. Niusye was a prodigy in school. Pinye was a capable student and a good soul. Their home was a center for us, their school friends. Abrasha was the only son of his mother, the widow Ita Rozenfeld-Ras. He did not avoid his two friends' fate. For three years he studied chemistry in Germany. And when, as an engineer, he was to return home to his longing mother after three years abroad, a telegram from the rabbi of Marseilles brought her the tragic news that her son had drowned in the sea. From details that came later, we learned that one day before his journey to Poland, the romantic Abrasha had rented a boat and gone swimming in the stormy sea.

A few days later the sea brought the boat to shore, but Abrasha's body was never found.

A year after my release from military service, I organized a few school friends and we went in a specially hired wagon (the only means of transportation between Kremenets and the surrounding towns at that time) to Shumsk to be united with our tragically killed friends.

Niusye, Abrasha, and Pinye were my best friends.

May this short account serve as a monument to their memory.

[Page 31]

August 1914. World War I. From the surrounding towns and villages came hundreds of hooligans with white badges, “recruits.” They filled Kremenets' streets to conduct conscription. Jewish young men were also conscripted. Among them was my beloved uncle Meir, my father's younger brother. Uncle Meir, a generous young man of 21, had a stall at the market where he sold a variety of spices, herring, smoked fish, and candies. He lived with us in the second-floor apartment on Vishnevets Street near Balnitsa, near the well because of which a gentile had killed a whole Jewish family–our neighbors. All the area residents contributed to digging the well. The gentile refused, so people said that he could not fetch water from the well. In the middle of the night he came with an axe and killed the Fridman family–a man, his wife, and their two children. He was arrested and sent to Siberia. After the revolution, he returned to Kremenets, minus a foot.

Our home was also a welcoming point for contractors and peasants who came to the market.

In a small side room of our house lived my grandmother Blume–a righteous soul who on Sabbath would take challahs and give them as secret gifts to the city's poor.

Late at night, Uncle Meir would come home from his stall in the market, bringing candy and smoked fish. He would take me from my bed to sleep with him. When he went to the army, I went with him to the train and wept as if my heart were telling me that I would never see him again.

[Page 32]

He consoled me: “Don't cry, Duvidl. The war will end, and I'll come back so we can be together.”

In the army, Uncle Meir was sent to the people's orchestra. He wrote to us to say that he played the saxophone.

At first, we received frequent letters, but after several weeks the letters stopped. Months later we received a notice that he had fallen in battle against the Germans. Until this day we do not know where he met his end.

1915. The war had intensified and the czar needed more soldiers. My father was mobilized. With his long beard, he looked like an old man to my 10-year-old eyes, although he was only 33.

My father refused to serve the Russians, so he deserted.

In the horse barn behind our house we dug a deep hole in a corner, and he hid there. He lay in that hole for entire days and nights, covered with straw and hay. But it was not long before someone betrayed him. Police guards dragged him from his hiding place and led him to the jail at the Dubno gate. It was winter. There was ice. There was snow. There were blizzards. Twice a day we brought him food because he would not eat the non kosher jail food. For a bribe of a few kopeks, the guard would bring him the cooked food.

[Page 33]

Often antisemitic officials would forbid the guards to bring the food, and we would spend hours standing by the fence of the jail and yelling toward the window on the upper floors so that Father could see us, see that we were there. But the young hooligans who were inmates did not allow him near the large window. For weeks we did not see him except when he was taken to the latrine in the courtyard.

So we would stand there with the cooked food until it became cold. When we got home, we watered it with our hot tears.

Once, after he had been in prison for seven weeks, people came running to tell us that they were taking him to court.

We–my mother and her eight children–ran quickly to Sheroka Street to see Father, the prisoner. Father, his hands and feet shackled, was in the middle of the street surrounded by four horsemen with drawn swords on their shoulders. Seeing Father in chains, we began to yell, “Father! Father! Father!”

Our father said, in a broken voice, with tears in his eyes, “Children, go home!” The sidewalks were crowded with people who had come to see this terrible wonder, the procession of the deserter Yisrael ben Yakov haKohen in chains–a significant person in the Kazatski study hall.

The horsemen with their swords came onto the sidewalk to disperse the crowd and began to shout, “Back! Back!” After his six months in prison, my father was sent to be a soldier.

I once saw him with his long beard in a long military coat with a large scarf and a white fur hat on his head, like a Don Cossack. My father always liked to boast that once when he was standing guard on a bridge, a carriage came along. He raised his rifle and called out, “Halt!”

A general emerged from the carriage and complimented him: “Well done, old man!”

[Page 34]

The Red Army first conquered Kremenets in May 1919, right after Petliura's rule, which began in Ukraine after the defeat of Hetman Skoropadski – who was under the Germans' protection when they were invited to help him impose order in his area. Petliura's reign was short, but long enough for many pogroms in Jewish settlements. Well remembered in particular is the slaughter in the town of Proskurov^[13] (3,000 Jews were murdered in one day). The Kremenets Jewish community was lucky to have been saved from this holocaust when the Red Army entered the town before the Ukrainian rioters reached it. No wonder many young Jewish men rushed to volunteer for the Red Army, with a strong desire to take revenge on the murderers. But the unit that conquered Kremenets, the Fifth Trachian Brigade, was composed in part of riffraff and rabble who did not know order or discipline and even participated in robbery and looting. In addition, their supplies were in very poor condition, so the soldiers had to find food wherever they could. Many of them raided churches and synagogues. After the looting, some were seen wearing red velvet uniforms made from the drapes taken off the Holy Arks and from the sofas of the “bourgeois.” As in other places, civilian rule was in the hands of the Revolutionary Board, headed by Comrade Rivak, who gave fervent, fiery speeches predicting the downfall of the West and prophesying a shiny future for Communism. His second was Lebrov, the interior administrator. To our great surprise, we soon discovered that he was Yoske Shnayder, then about 19, my childhood friend and classmate in Burshteyn and Sirayski's first Hebrew school, who liked to recite the poems of Y. L. Gordon.

Now he was busy organizing the new regime's institutions, before he became a strict, heavy-handed disciplinarian. The army was already involved in nationalizing private enterprises and confiscating equipment in the district's villages. Soon rebel forces gathered in the villages against the Bolsheviks under the leadership of Brigadier General Vysotsky, but they, too, did not abstain from robbery and looting – possibly even outdoing their predecessors. There was worry that they would start pogroms, as the Christians believed that all Jews were Bolsheviks. When Vysotsky realized that he couldn't restrain his rebel gangs, he organized a delegation and went to the Galician border, where the Polish legions already held the reins, and hurried to invite them into the district. Indeed, they accepted and came – among them was the Catholic priest Bilatski, who stayed in Brody^[14] as a refugee for a long time – and the town's representatives welcomed the Poles with bread and salt. Their days were numbered, however.

[Page 35]

The Red Army reorganized under the command of Marshal Budyoni, and on May 3 – Poland's Constitution Day, which was celebrated with en masse by the population on Mount Bona – they conquered the town again. The Poles escaped in time. This time the Red Army was better organized and disciplined, so order and discipline were enforced in the district.

Now, the Communists came out from the underground and worked on the Revolutionary Board. Among them was Shmuel Berenboym, who showed up with a fiery, brilliant speech (at the marketplace near the Lyceum) describing the Communist regime as a Garden of Eden. But unlike during its first conquest, the regime's heavy hand was fully felt from the very beginning. A supreme tribunal was established, a branch of the Cheka took up residence in the Armitage Hotel, and arrests and executions by firing squad began. Among those arrested was Aleksander Frishberg, a shoe store owner, who was accused of speculation – hoarding merchandise instead of handing it over to the authorities. He was sentenced to prison and assessed a large monetary fine. His imprisonment and sentence were publicized in large posters throughout the town, for all to know about and be aware of.

Among the active Communists, we also remember Lyubkin, who held an important position in the regime and until that time was known to have been a devout observer of the commandments who was a regular at prayers in the Hasidic Study Hall.

Youth meetings were held in Sheftin's hall and in the primary school, where political activists gave speeches and called on the young to join the Komsomol. A chorus was organized among the pupils of the schools under the leadership of the Ukrainian teacher Chamtsuk. In discussions at the youth meetings, some young people also tried to express criticism. Avrasha Rozenfeld and Misha Gindis were even threatened with imprisonment. Some “followed the way,” mainly members of the Jewish Social Democratic Workers Party and the Bund, such as the student Vaysberg from the Jewish Social Democratic Workers Party, who announced publicly that he had joined the Communist Party. And he was not the only one to choose that road.

By then, the Red Army had reached the gates of Warsaw in its conquests. Here a historical turn took place. The Polish army, with the help of France, rallied and forced the Red Army to retreat from all the areas it had conquered, Kremenets included. All those who had joined the Communists left the town with the army.

After the ceasefire, with peace signed, the borders between the Soviets and Poland were finalized and set. According to this agreement, Kremenets and its surroundings were within the Polish borders. Those who had been born in the areas conquered by Poland were permitted to return if they had documents to prove it, and thousands of people – most of them Jews – started to flow back there. Polish rule continued there until World War II, when the Red Army returned to Kremenets, which is now part of communist Ukraine.

[Page 36]

Early in the 19th century (1805), the cultural and educational focal point of eastern Poland was developed in Kremenets under the initiative of Tadeusz Czacki with the establishment of the school known as the Lyceum. From the beginning of educational activity there, it attracted many young people from the children of estate owners and the aristocracy in the Kremenets area, the Vohlin and Podolia regions, and even from faraway Vilna. That school produced famous scientists, writers, and journalists who rose to important positions and status in the annals of Poland, particularly during the November 1830 rebellion among Polish exiles who established their center in Paris. Among them was Yuliush Slovatski, a great poet of Poland, Joachim Lelewel, Karol Sienkiewicz, Prince Adam Czartoryski, and many other personalities. Thanks to that school, Kremenets was privileged to be called the “Athens of Vohlin” (Ateny Wolynskie) during the flourishing of the Enlightenment in Poland. After the November rebellion was suppressed, a sizable group of Lyceum graduates among the Polish exiles in Paris decided to hold occasional cultural meetings called “Kremenets feasts.” Among the participants were graduates from different years as well as other Polish emigrants, whose cultural and national tradition, the heritage of the school in Kremenets, was close to their hearts and gave them moral support in that foreign land.

Those parties and their contents were later printed and published in booklet form. In the booklet named “May 3” from 1847, we read about a meeting dedicated to the memory of Tadeusz Czacki, who passed away at that time, and a letter from Prince Adam Czartoryski, ruler of the Vohlin and Podolia lands, an exile now, too. One of the participants in that “feast,” Tomas Oligorovski, recited a poem about Kremenets, a portion of which was printed in the booklet. We present it here to our readers in Polish^[15]:

[Page 37]

Kremenets, 1869

About 100 years later, Polish exiles in London, England, revived the “Kremenets feasts.” They continue to be held each year.

Now the book reviewing all those feasts – from then until today – has been published. In this book, we also read about our own organization here in the Land.

[Page 38]

Kremenets, 1869

In London's “Kremenets Feast,” they emphasize the productive activity of the Organization of Kremenets Emigrants in Israel: Israeli emigrants from our town who visit them in London, the activities and death of David Katz, and the booklets – translated into Polish – that they receive from us. It is worth noting that we sometimes receive reports of their meetings and that each year they send us a congratulatory telegram on our Independence Day.

Teaching staff of the High School of Commerce (Komercheskiya Uchilishche) at the turn of the century, wearing teachers' uniforms, as was the custom in czarist Russia. In civilian clothes are Yisrael Margolis (standing) and Mikhael Shumski, of blessed memory (sitting). Both were founders and patrons of this school.

Translator's and Editor's Notes:

1. Dubno is at 50°25' N 25°45' E, 21.9 miles N of Kremenets, and Vishnevets is at 49°54' N 25°45' E, 13.9 miles S of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
2. The year 5681 corresponds to 1920-1921 [Ed.] Return
3. This quotation is from Psalms 126:1 [Ed.] Return
4. These song titles are “God Will Rebuild Galilee,” “Those Who Praise Justice Will Gain,” “Mama Is Cooking Dumplings, and “Song without Words,” respectively. [Ed.] Return
5. The Watchman (Hashomer in Hebrew) was a Jewish defense organization in Palestine from 1909 until the founding of the Haganah in 1920. [Ed.] Return
6. An ulpan is a school for intensive study of Hebrew. [Trans.] Return
7. Mizvoch, now known as Mizoch, is at 50°24' N 26°09' E, 28.2 miles NE of Kremenets. Rovno, now known as Rivne, is at 50°37' N 26°15' E, 42.7 miles NNE of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
8. Banderovtsis refer to members of the Ukrainian militia headed by Bandara. Zahaytsi, now known as Velikiye Zagaytsy, is at 50°00' N 26°02' E, 15.6 miles ESE of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
9. Shumsk is at 50°07' N 26°07' E, 17.8 miles E of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
10. Ternopol, now known as Ternopil', is at 49°33' N 25°35' E, 38.4 miles S of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
11. Lvov, now known as L'viv, is at 49°50' N 24°00' E, 78.4 miles WSW of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
12. The following letter is in English in the original booklet. It has not been edited. [Ed.] Return
13. Proskurov, now known as Khmel'nyts'kyy, is at 49°25' N 27°00' E, 74.2 miles SE of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
14. Brody is at 50°05' N 25°09' E, 25.1 miles W of Kremenets. [Ed.] Return
15. The Polish text appearing here has not been translated. [Ed.] Return

Table of Contents Next Page »

  Kremenets, Ukraine     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page

Copyright © 1999-2024 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 22 May 2023 by JH