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[Page 176]
by Zev Feller
Translated by Monica Devens
The town lies on the Dniester on the Russian side, on the other side of which is the beginning of Bessarabia. The source of the town's livelihood was, mainly, the timber trade on the Dniester, which was the only sea transport from Galicia-Austria on a fairly long route to Odesa through many intermediate stations. The town is also close to the Austrian border, a walk of only a few kilometers. The border line is quite long and is inhabited by villages, where Jews were forbidden to live. This border developed another livelihood of “stealing the border.” Many different people needed this theft and benefited from it, including gentile and Jewish revolutionaries, Jewish refugees from the riots, and deserters from military duty and the like. These two sources of livelihood developed two types of trade and, in any case, two types of traders, the one on the Dniester, official and proper trade, and the one on the border - clandestine trade accompanied by robbery and exploitation and even mortal danger.
With every trouble that befell the Jews in Tsarist Russia, after an attempted revolution, the assassination of rulers, and especially after the riots in general and the Kishinev pogrom in particular, the town of Zhvanets was full of refugees and fugitives who were heading towards the border. Every evening a crowd could be seen - men, women, and children, their possessions with them, loaded on carts. The horses make their way to one village or another, led by a hired “goy” for whom the border paths are clear “precisely” on dark nights and the fate of these refugees is in his hands, for good or bad, life or death, literally. Admittedly, it is not this gentile who determines the fate of the refugees who “steal the border,” but rather the trade relations of the “border smugglers” with the gentile himself and with the officials of the Authority,
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| “Pirchei Tsiyon” in 1909 |
[Page 177]
which is charged with guarding the border, they are the ones who determine their fate: Is everything in order, is everything paid for? Which means is the road safe on this night of the border theft or not. And more than once, these refugees and defectors were seen who were caught on their way to the border and their end was bitter. And more than once you saw in the early hours of the morning loaded carts bringing back refugees who were killed on their way due to one reason or another. And there were heart-rending sights. But there was no one who could warn about it and no one to warn. Unbridled lawlessness and without any degree of responsibility or justice. Because a “cadre” of border smugglers developed from among the town's Jews who made a fortune, robbed, and plundered, and they were one with the authority on the border and with the gentiles who were doing this. This “cadre” of individuals and entire families took over the town and instilled fear in it.
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| The Library Committee |
But despite all this, Zhvanets was a town of the Enlightenment generation. It had two schools for Hebrew studies and general studies using the “Hebrew in Hebrew” method. It had an organized Zionist circle, which did its work almost openly and without any fear. Boys and girls mastered the Hebrew language and immersed themselves in studying Hebrew literature. Arguments between Zionists and non-Zionists were conducted openly in public meetings. There was organized self-defense in the town in case of riots or attacks and many times these attacks were thwarted, thanks to the defense. Wrong incidents were known and even the officials of the Authority lent their hand to protect the Jews or helped them. The program of the Hebrew school in Zhvanets was brought up as a sample curriculum at the Zionist Congress, which discussed cultural matters. It was a Hebrew town in its full meaning, in which even the non-Zionists, for example, the Bundists, were proud of it.
Nevertheless, these educated leaders, the “intelligentsia” in the foreign language, were attacked by border smugglers. This intelligentsia of the town wanted to establish some order and responsibility in the border trade that developed due to the persecutions of the Tsar, to protect the property and lives of the refugees, and to prevent extortion and robbery. It was necessary to speak openly and publicly. One intelligent gentile helped in this matter. Highly educated and wealthy, who participated in the life of the town, with a sharp and a witty pen, and he published a series of articles in a Russian newspaper severely admonishing the tsar's government over what was happening in the town.
[Page 178]
And then Jews started beating each other. The border smugglers, whose sons and daughters were also educated in the schools and were cultured youth, did not sit idly by and began an attack by informing on the Zionist intelligentsia and their actions. The fight between the two sides increased in the presence of the government authority. Whistleblowers' writings from one and intelligence memos from another. And the result? - The leaders of the intelligentsia were deported to Siberia and in the circle of border smugglers, there was joy and happiness. The “pillars” in the corrupt Russian regime had defeated the “angels.”
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