[Column 69]

The preparation for the open uprising in Lakhva was not in the realm of final desperation.

From realizing what was coming sooner or later, the idea of an uprising was accompanied by a basic, underlying plan. Even the harsh and dangerous conditions of the underground did not for a moment prevent the careful weighing of every low–probability possibility that could be discerned, to intensify the tension of the battle when the hour of annihilation arrived.

The idea of an open uprising was hatched in the heart of Yitzchak Rochczyn. His eyes tirelessly followed the chain of atrocities. In his soul he joined detail to detail, and came to the conclusion alone that the continuous and deliberate weakening of the tormented Jews was leading unfailingly to the valley of slaughter. So long as he had not yet set the day's grim sight before his eyes, he revealed to no one what lay in his heart.

Yitzchak, who was the first one to think of the idea of an uprising, saw from the outset what was awaiting, with a very cruel perspective, without ever letting himself be taken in by the delusions that were shared by the majority of the ghetto population.

He considered and meticulously joined together the “small” and great atrocities that were perpetrated on his people, and saw the intentions of the enemy with wondrous clarity.

He saw the darkest of visions, as one who bore the community's great hope – a hope awaited in fear and trembling by the masses of Jews bereft of recourse.

When he concluded the structure of his cruel deductions to the end, he began to search for a cadre of faithful assistance to contribute to the yoke of action, in advance preparations at the twilight of the lives of the Jews of Lakhva – to ignite the fire of revolt and heroism.

His revolutionary plans fused with his strong will:

1. To annihilate the enemy's brutal soldiers and executioners before they could carry out their murderous design, and thereby prevent the disgrace of mass slaughter;
2. To restore the national pride humiliated to the

dust, by giving the despairing masses, at the right moment, the opportunity to take an active part in the struggle to free themselves from the nightmare of annihilation.

The clandestine cell that consolidated after that under the command of Yitzchak Rochczyn included a restricted number of active members.

Each new member was examined sevenfold until it was decided to take them into the clandestine organization. All of them as one were unflinching in spirit and soul, with a deep national understanding of the sacred purpose of their mission.

After a day of backbreaking work, accompanied by abuse of body and soul, the cell would enter one of the dark cellars in the ghetto, to the light of a flickering candle, and plan the methodologies of the mass uprising when the bitter, impetuous day would arrive.

The vital tasks for the organization were:

1. To destroy the remnants of delusion that were implanted in the hearts of the ghetto inmates, that the hand of the murderers would not touch the Jews of Lakhva.
2. To broaden the ranks of the fighting pioneers by attracting the forces of additional youths for preparatory activities for the final battle.
3. To make efforts to obtain a small amount of weapons that would serve the needs of training the fighters, and for battle action against the enemy on the day of mass murder.

Even that was not a deterrent for continuing the precise planning of the uprising. Making use of the few crude tools available, including out-of-date work tools, was also a very serious problem in the ghetto that had been emptied of everything.

The plans for the revolt were, therefore, adapted to the limited possibilities that were available to the organization. In the absence of

[Column 71]

redeeming weapons, they concentrated primarily on raising the morale of the fighters.

In the preparation for action, they also took into account the prevention of letting property fall into the hands of the local hooligans. For that purpose, a few members of the organization were given the task of setting the ghetto houses on fire from several directions – an action that one could see from the outset would increase the panic in the ranks of the executioners, and would render useless “organized action” as they were used to.

Much thought was given to the element of surprise; the creation of “organized panic” that would serve as the first deterrent to the band of murderers who were carrying out the annihilation aktion.

The aim was “to keep them busy” – even for a brief time – in calming the spirits while the attack force of the organization would take advantage of the fortuitous time to break through one of the killing places to enable a mass escape of the inmates.

On the other hand, internal consultations and discussions specified an alternative course of action, should it prove impossible to implement the main plan: to provoke a fracas, to initiate a provocation, and to enter into “local skirmishes” with the murderers at pre-designated points along the barbed wire fences surrounding the ghetto.

In the general disarray that would arise in the enemy camp, there would be an organized storming of the masses upon the gates of the ghetto, and an escape to the marshes of the Pripyat.

The primary aim of the underground organization was to prevent the hauling of the Jews of Lakhva to be slaughtered like sheep, and to pave a path for escape for the ghetto inmates through battle with the murderous enemy.

Every member of the underground organization knew that the fate of the lives of hundreds of ghetto inmates depended on their strong behavior during the decisive confrontation with the gang of murderers, and it is nothing other than voluntary sacrifice so that others who come after can live.

The terrible straits that grew more severe from day to day as the time of annihilation drew near, and the incessant tortures by the German murderers and their drunken assistants from among the local gentiles, made the idea of an organized uprising into a decision that permitted no second thoughts. Yitzchak Rochczyn gave this a clear ideological basis: “The death of heroes, face to face in battle with the murderers, would scour away the terrible degradation in which we had wallowed during that life–that–was–no–life. In this way our national

[Column 72]

human pride will find expression, for its proud strength will not have been broken. On the contrary: in the crucible of those inhuman torments, we forged ourselves sevenfold.”

Today, from the perspective of fourteen years, it is possible to state with complete certainty that the Jewish uprising in Lakhva did not receive any support from even one of the partisan bodies that operated in the area. Despite this, the uprising could have become a mighty, sweeping operation for the rescue of the Jews of Lakhva – and even beyond it.

The bridge over the river in Lakhva

There is certainly no reason to reawaken the fateful question, “What would the fate of the Jewish uprising in Lakhva have been had active help come from one of the partisan brigades that were camped in the nearby area during the critical moments of the final battle?!”

It was easy for the partisan commanders to soothe their troubled conscience, in order to preserve their good name during that period. However, they do not have the power to obscure the tragic truth that, by refusing to offer assistance to the fighters lacking in arms, they indirectly had a role in reducing the number of survivors from the fighting ghetto, caught up in flames and blood.

Even the “good ones” from among the gentiles were not shaken by the terror of the tragedy. Myriads of gentiles, pious on the outside yet hypocritical, waited

[Column 73]

with Satanic eagerness for the day of our final annihilation so that they could inherit the money of the unfortunates.

Like beasts of prey, they hovered on all sides of the burning ghetto, youths and elderly, to pillage the loot, and to ensure their share in the booty after the mass murder.

Those who stood at the helm of the local council saw from the outset the problems of collaboration between the two partners in the aim of annihilating us from the land of the living.

The handful of fighters stood in a battle that stretched along two lines of the front, with forces coming from two opposite directions and striking like waves – separate in theory, yet coordinated in practice – in carrying out the terrible crime of our annihilation.

The primary wave consisted of the units of executioners of the S.S. army, well armed with weapons of annihilation; and the second wave, a hundredfold worse, the gentiles of the place and the area, who were mobilized to offer their help to the German “masters” in carrying out the mass slaughter of the ghetto inmates.

The recognition of the grim reality, confirming it as the true state of affairs, cast fearful weight upon the tendencies of the combat planning, and within them it prevented any further hesitation in the final battle with the enemy.

The commander of the uprising, Yitzchak, fell as the first victim in the killing field. However, not only did his death, the death of a hero, not arouse any disarray in the ranks of the fighters; rather the spirit of battle increased sevenfold.

The aim was achieved. Complete panic was aroused within the two flanks of the enemy. The gates of the ghetto were broken open in the storm of the battle, and the inmates began to escape for their lives to the marshes of the Pripyat.

By the time the executioners had recovered from the force of the blow, the vast majority of the ghetto inmates had already moved on routes that were not real routes with the anchor of salvation that appeared in their imaginations.

However, then something worse than anything took place. The success of the escape from the burning ghetto did not yet assure the chances of surviving.

Hundreds of frustrated gentiles from whom the opportunity to satisfy their cravings

[Column 74]

with deeds of pillage and cruelty had been thwarted because of the sudden resistance from the brave fighters pursued the weakened people, sealed off the routes of escape, and murdered them in cold blood.

That which the Satan himself did not do was done by his faithful emissaries…

From among the hundreds who had succeeded in breaking through the region of death, approximately six hundred people gathered in the marshes of the Pripyat. However, most of them as well were hunted down with the cunning acts and wickedness of the local thieves, and met their tragic deaths before they succeeded in reaching “secure” places or being accepted into the partisan brigades.

The revolt of the Jews of Lakhva, in its ideological essence and in its brilliant combat execution, went beyond the bounds of being merely a local phenomenon. From the scale of the battle and from the lofty acts of valor revealed by the members of the organization in their war against the enemy – there emerged a path for the tormented survivors through the death traps of the murderous foe. In this glorious uprising, there was a form of historical lesson that changed the foundations of the paths of the spirit within the ranks of the survivors who were persecuted up to their necks, and a form of strong warning to the enemy in the face of the surges of hatred and revenge that would, sooner or later, shake up their steps and drown them in their impure blood.

Might and self-sacrifice are not material that can be weighed on a scale. Their value is embedded in the coins of the future, over which time and its changes have no rule.

Yitzchak Rochczyn, the brothers Asher and Moshe Leib Cheifetz, Dov Lopatin, and many, many others have united with eternity through their heroic deeds.

Their deaths reignited the flame of life in the hearts of the desperate ones. In the light of their personal, wonderful example, brothers in arms went to battle with songs on their lips, broke through the ranks of the enemy with the fire of revenge, and actualized with their bodies and souls the last command of the martyrs, “Revenge”!

Yitgadal Veyitkadash [magnified and sanctified] shall be the names of the heroes of the uprising, and may their memories endure forever in the memory of the nation.

[Column 75]

The account of the uprising in the Lakhva ghetto was written in full detail in this book. We need to emphasize the military factors of this battle, which were: the military power of the Nazis, its strategic errors, its military advantages, and the aims of the ghetto fighters.

The annihilation of Jewish settlements by the Nazis throughout the occupied areas and the rampaging in the ghettos without actual opposition became usual for the murderers, with nothing to disturb them. During the period of the autumn of 1942, European Jewry was stricken with shock, and it was before there was an uprising in any place. In Lakhva, we also preceded the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and the revolts in other cities where Jews rebelled and did not go like sheep to the slaughter.

Therefore, there was no basis for the Nazis to use strong force and security measures when they came to liquidate us. It seems that they felt that the Jews of Lakhva had not yet lost heart, and that something might erupt here; or they simply followed their usual tradition and prepared as though for a battle against an actual military force. The Nazi assault force in Lakhva included about one hundred men of the S.D. (the S.S. military police), the Wehrmacht garrison force, soldiers of the Todt – a guard corps stationed at the railway station, the Gebietskomissar of Pinsk and those who guarded him, as well as hundreds of White Russian and Ukrainian police who arrived from far away and near police stations within about a hundred-kilometer range of Lakhva. The Nazi forces were armed with the best Nazi technology, and numbered more than five hundred people. In addition, there were the local riffraff, bloodthirsty and coveting booty. Everything was prepared for the liquidation aktion of the defenceless and helpless group of Jews.

I saw them as they were taking their positions in the full military sense of the term. Three heavy machine guns were stationed across the river, at the border of the ghetto. One was next to Simcha Zeltzer's house on Szkolna Street in the ghetto. The second was next to the “Rodkins”. The third was next to the home of Yisrael Lichtsein, which faced Rinkowa street, where most of the residents of the ghetto

[Column 76]

were concentrated, as well as all the youth. That is where the uprising took place. Light Spandau machine guns were stationed around the ghetto gates. For the most part, the Germans and police were armed with automatic weapons. The command center was in the house of Shlomo Zalman Moravchik – the Wehrmacht house – where the Gebietskomissar of Pinsk stood in the yard and oversaw the aktion.

After the masses retreated from breaking through the fence near the dairy business on Malinowa Street, the S.D. soldiers entered the ghetto and attempted to arrange its residents in rows to march them off to slaughter. The uprising was no longer a surprise for the murderers. The tongues of flames that were bursting forth from the ghetto houses, and the attack by our lads upon the Germans in the area, found the Nazis in a state of preparedness. A rain of shots from every type of weapon of destruction rained upon the ghetto from all sides. The machine guns operated incessantly along the road and hit the masses, without considering the fact that there were Germans among us. After the first shots of our lads from the weapons that were seized from the Germans in the ghetto, they began to retreat in confusion from the ghetto to the other side of the market, or find a defensive stand in the corners of the houses. From the house of Zelig Dolgopiti, which was set on fire after burning the house of Zalman Cheifetz, smoke rose and covered the entire street forming a screen for the machine-gun shooters across the river.

We did not have an operations command. Everyone acted through their own decisions. We did not have the aim of fighting a defensive or offensive war against the Nazis. Our one and only aim was to avoid going like sheep to slaughter, to destroy and break through the fences and ghetto gates, to go outside the area of reach of the bullets of the murderers, or to fall like heroes. In an instinctive manner, we searched for shelter in the houses before they were overtaken by fire, and we advanced into the yards between the houses; from the house of Shlomo Moravchik to the house of Shalom Romanovski, and from there to the house of Shlomo Mordechai Moravchik, through the windows and doors of the rooms. Hundreds of us advanced to the gate that had been breached

[Column 77]

in the interim. We passed through it until the market, and then outside of the town.

The Nazis were surprised and perplexed without any basis, given their superior power. The flames of fire that overtook the houses outside the ghetto area due to the destructive actions of our lads, drove them into confusion, and they shot without pause and without aim.

As has been noted, the breakout was in the direction of the market, the place where the Nazis were at least anticipating such a possibility. Reinforcements reached them, and they organized along the length of the houses of Yitzchak and Aryeh Cheifetz, Yaakov Rabinowitz, and Aba Sogenski on one side, and Yaakov Levin, inside the house of Aharon Moravchik, and Yehuda Moravchik from the second side. Hundreds of escapees literally passed before their eyes in the directions of Kozangorodok and Davydgorodok streets. They shot while standing and many victims fell. Young lads, children and youth

[Column 78]

between the ages of five and twenty were the majority of those who succeeded in getting away by running and escaping. It is difficult to determine the number of Jews who succeeded in exiting the ghetto. We can estimate that they numbered between six hundred and seven hundred men, women, and children. The rest fell as heroes. They did not go to the mass graves.

In summing up the battleground, we held the upper hand in that battle. We overcame the enemy through the strength of spirit and military abilities of our youth, to whom fighting methodology was not a foreign thing. At every opportunity, they had learned to use weapons: when they served in the Polish Army (POW) in Lakhva, in the Zionist youth movements, and in Beitar. Indeed, most of them fell as they were resisting the Nazis, but they delivered a heavy blow to the feelings of the murderers, against whom a group of Jews fought and even prevailed.

[Column 79]

The S.S. unit stationed itself in the new public school in Lakhva. It was headed by Obersturmführer Schmidt. He was a wild beast of a man. When he entered the areas of the school, no Jew was allowed to appear there. Notices and proclamations appeared in the city: for Jews to affix a yellow patch to their clothes; for the Jews to bring furs, to give over all their vehicles and bicycles; a prohibition for the Jews to leave their houses from evening until morning; that it was forbidden to greet a Jew and respond to his greeting. Every morning, the S.S. soldiers would capture Jews for work, cleaning, and servicing the horses. I, my father and about twenty other men worked in the school in cleaning the area, in which not a match or a piece of paper were allowed to be found. We brought water to the kitchen, washed the dishes, and polished the shoes. Every task had to be done quickly and accurately. If a soldier was not happy with a pot of food, he would use it to beat the chief cleaner. If shoes were not polished properly, he would kick the face of the cleaner.

One morning, I was commanded, along with Yaakov Chertok, to bring water to the kitchen. We worked in a row, each of us brought two pails of water. We placed the pails and sat down for a moment. When the Nazi saw that there was no water in one of the pails, he took us to the barn, and, along with the fat cook, beat me. I stifled my scream, because I did not want Father to hear from outside. This continued until someone opened up the door by chance, and took us out.

Once, an S.S. man finished his meal, did not take advantage of the Schlufstunde [rest period], and went out for a stroll. He found me, Teibl Korovocka, Fania Gozenpod, Yaakov Chinitz, and Chaim Slutsky. The question was, “Why are you sitting?” We responded that, “We were free during the afternoon until you would finish your meal.” He immediately stood us in a row and ordered us to run. At his command, we brought ladders. We were commanded to ascend them and sing. Other than Chaim, we fulfilled his command. He was stubborn, and did not

[Column 80]

want to sing. He suffered beatings until he fell. After the singing and the running, he made us lie on the ground and ordered us to do exercises: to stand up and raise our hands one hundred times. One of them, Otropchik, saved us by reducing the exercise to twenty. At the end of the performance, we returned to our usual work.

In order to make it easier for the murderers to draft workers, they commanded [us] to select a committee of five Jews who would be responsible for carrying out all orders. Dov Lopatin was the chairman, and the rest were Yaakov Mester, Eliyahu Shechtman, Yosef Gozowitz, and Yisrael Drebski. The rabbis, Rabbi Eliezer Arye Lichtstein and Rabbi Avraham Zalman Osherovitz served as advisors.

The S.S. murderers spent about two weeks in Lakhva. We breathed easily when they left the city. However, they were followed by the engineering corps and the Wehrmacht. The committee would receive orders every day to send workers to work. They began to set up the railway bridges in Darfsk [Darevsk] and Lakhva. The work was gruelling. We had to work from 7:00 a.m. until 8:00 p.m. with short breaks, and we endured beatings from every side. When the building of the bridge was completed, they made a holiday, but for us, that was the difficult and terrible day. We were ordered to decorate the bridge with trees. We uprooted trees, and a group of eight or ten people had to drag the tree with its foliage, while running. A Nazi followed us on a bicycle and beat us with his stick. The work ended after the first locomotive crossed the bridge. They organized us all into one line, and told us that we must escape by the time they count to three, and anyone who remains and cannot run would be shot with a machine gun. We ran with all our might without looking backwards.

We worked at unloading coal in Luninets and at leveling roads, and in a farm. It was all backbreaking work. After work, the person responsible for the work would bring a report on the behavior of the responsible Nazi or local police to the committee. In the event of excess cruelty

[Column 81]

the committee would appease the oppressor with a gift, and he “behaved” better the next day. The work of the committee was not easy. Arranging hungry and barefoot people for work was an extremely difficult task. The relationship between the residents and the committee was generally proper. They attempted to be fair, and not to take opportunities to evade responsibility. Whether the matter involved work or taxes (contributions), the committee, for its part, did everything to make it easier for the residents. There was not one case where a Jew was left to spend the night in prison, since it was known what his fate would be during the night. One case occurred where a gentile slandered Aharon Mitvoch, stating that he said, “The Germans will lose the war.” He was imprisoned in Lakhva for three days, and his fate was almost sealed. Through the intercession of Lopatin, who did not close his eyes during those three days, Aharon Mitvoch was returned to his house.

The food situation in the city declined from day to day. The portion allocated by the authorities was two hundred grams of bread per person. During the first period, when not all residents required portions, they would distribute the bread to the workers and the needy. Every worker who went out to a day of work would receive a loaf or two of bread. The refugees who were in Lakhva at the time the Russians entered especially suffered. They did not have anything to barter for bread. The situation was not too bad as long as we were free to go into the city. Every group that returned from work brought in hundreds of kilograms of food. The police conducted searches in the sacks at times and would confiscate the food, but the next day, the police officer would behave more properly after receiving his usual gift from the committee. The relations between the Kommandantur [commandant headquarters] and the committee were proper, and more than one edict issued by the civic authorities would be annulled by the German Wehrmacht. Every undisciplined police officer would receive serious beatings from the commandant if requests and gifts were not effective.

The tool of bribery helped greatly to annul provisional decrees. The collection of merchandise and money was conducted by the committee through the imposition of “taxes” on people of means, and by a “collection drive”. The local authorities imposed a large financial contribution, which was collected with precision by the Jewish residents. After a time, the murderers ordered that all the gold and furs be brought to them. They decreed that searches would take place after a certain date, and if anybody is found with gold or a fur, they would be killed. The murderers took the rabbis and honorable people of the city as

[Column 82]

human guarantees for the success of the effort. On the designated day, jewelry and gold were collected and given over to the murderers. It seems that the weight was 1.5 kilograms.

Many Jews gave over gold, silver, and furs, which remained with them after the deaths of their husbands, to local residents for safekeeping. Each day brought new atrocities, and each night was a sleepless night. Fear fell upon all the Jews when they found out that the Commissar in Pinsk was expected to arrive. That murderer never came without a reason. The visit was costly in gold and gifts of valuables.

There were no cases of killing in Lakhva yet, other than the murder of a Jew from Kozangorodok who came to Lakhva on the eve of Rosh Hashanah to have a fowl slaughtered by the shochet. When the committee found out about this, it was already too late. The Jew was murdered because it was forbidden for Jews to be found outside the city without a permit.

On the eve of Passover of 1942, the Gebietskommissar and his assistants came to Lakhva. Their visit was for the purpose of determining the location of the ghetto. The designated place was the streets of the synagogue, except for the synagogue and the house of Shlomo-Zalman which were expropriated by the Germans – Rinkowa Street until the middle of Malinowa Street. The movement to the ghetto lasted for two days. The police were drafted to maintain order. Despite the restrictions on goods, they brought everything into the ghetto due to the bribes paid to the council of murderers. The goods were greatly beneficial during the period of our existence in the ghetto. We bartered clothing and utensils for bread, and we could have maintained ourselves for an entire year, were it not for the summer of the bitter end.

The police chief at that time was the father-in-law of the Pravoslavic priest. He would take out elderly Jews in the middle of the night, bring them to the police station, and order them to dance with trash cans on their heads. However, the Ortkommandant put an end to his brutality through the influence of Lopatin, who was present when a serious beating was administered to the police chief.

The food situation in the ghetto declined drastically. When contact with gentiles was forbidden, hunger would await a family that could not exchange the rest of their belongings. The rations of the authorities shrank from day to day. Slowly, we began to see people bloated from hunger. The situation of the refugees who came from Poland was even worse. Every family wanted to ensure that their sons or daughters would go out to work to be able to earn their daily kilo of bread. There were also people of means who permitted themselves to hire workers to go to work in their stead, while they received the emissary of the committee,

[Column 83]

as well as the half kilogram of bread from the emissary. There were also incidents between the director of the work division of the committee, my father of blessed memory, and those who had to go out to work. His policy was to send out healthy people or hired workers rather than the hungry or barefoot. This policy caused my father of blessed memory to receive a proper slap on the cheek by Dov Katz (Eshke's). His family's urging, and the crying of my mother and sister to leave his position had no effect. He responded to the urging of the rabbis and committee who threatened to resign were he to leave them. None of us could imagine the leadership of the committee without Lopatin and several of his assistants. It was unclear whether we would be able to survive were it not

[Column 84]

for Lopatin. Work continued without upheavals until October 27.^{[1 ]} Then we found out about five people who were murdered, Chaya Shulman among them, on Luban Road, while carrying a bit of food to their families. When Lopatin asked the police, they told him that this was a portent of bad things. A few days later, news reached us that they were digging pits next to the railway lines. The committee began to bustle about to find out the meaning of the pits. We wanted to believe the response, that this was a defense against the partisans. However, on the third day of the digging, we felt that the police were roaming around next to the ghetto. Then it became clear to us that the end of the Jews of Lakhva was at hand.

Translator's footnote

1. Milman's account in this chapter is intentionally topical rather than chronological. His focus is the brutality of the SS, the police, and the local authorities, and the daily functioning of the Jewish committee. For that reason, he does not describe the Lakhva ghetto uprising of 3 September 1942, which is treated at length elsewhere in the memorial volume. The events mentioned here – particularly the murders on 27 October and the digging of pits near the railway line – refer to the small group of Jews who remained alive after the uprising and were kept for forced labor. Their liquidation took place several weeks after the destruction of the ghetto itself. The pits mentioned here were newly dug for the final liquidation of that group; the large pits prepared before the uprising were never used for their original purpose. Return

[Column 85]

The author was ten years old when she escaped from the ghetto.

During the summer vacation, the days of summer and sunshine, I played with my friends next to our house on Kozangorodok Street. This was the play of children who were happy with life in the homes of dear parents, who were struggling with the education of their children despite the difficulties of livelihood caused by the change of regime.

Suddenly, we heard the noise of armed vehicles and motorcycles. Our parents explained the war to us, and told us that the Germans were approaching the city. Refugee girls of my age who had escaped from Poland and already knew the Germans from 1939 explained to us that they murder people and torment Jews. A fear fell upon us, and we closed ourselves into our homes.

The main entrance to the city was on Kozangorodok Street, the street on which we lived. I saw how the gentile residents of the town went out to greet the Germans with floral wreaths, bread, and salt in their hands. Their joy had no bounds: the German army had come to free them from the yoke of the Jews and Communists. Our parents and entire family sat in the house overtaken by fear, and they talked quietly so that we would not hear their voices.

The first day passed quietly. In the evening, the Germans began to knock on the doors of the Jews. I lay in bed and trembled from fear. Several Germans entered our house and asked my mother if there were any young women or men at home? Mother responded firmly that there were none, aside from two young girls. (Father and my other sister hid that night, as well as during the following days and nights.)

I will not recount life during the period of German rule, because I was a [young] girl and my parents tried to give us their last morsel of bread, so we would not know want and distress. But I will never forget the day when the police and the Germans drove us out of the homes in which we were born and educated. Within a few minutes we left

[Column 86]

our houses, and did not have time to take any of our belongings. With beatings, they prodded us, and tens of other families, to the bounds of the ghetto with their meager belongings. On that tragic day, we too, the young children, understood and felt the magnitude of the tragedy which was falling upon us and upon the entire Jewish community of the city.

We lived in the home of Alter Dologpiati in the ghetto. There were about twenty other families there. The place was cramped, and there was a lack of fresh air. The food situation was very bad, and everyone began to look for ways to save morsels of bread. Many people were bloated from hunger. I would always go out of the ghetto through some hole in the fence, so that they would not notice me, and go to the nearby villages to beg for a morsel of bread, for they would not recognize that I was a Jewish girl.

We had to go to work every day. I would dress in Mother's dresses so that I would appear older, and go out to work instead of my father, for the men would receive beatings during work. I worked with my remaining young but weakening energy, half starved, on roads and railway lines, and I attempted to fill the quota assigned to me.

One evening, as we were going to sleep as usual and dreaming about liberation from the ghetto, we suddenly heard knocking on the door. This was my uncle Yisrael Drobski who was a member of the Judenrat. He came to bring us the tidings of Job that we were surrounded on all sides, and the Germans were going to take us out to be murdered the next day.

All the residents of the ghetto were already on their feet. I saw how Mother was looking at her children, prepared to defend with her body her little ones, who were going to greet death without anyone to save them, before they saw good in their lives.

In the morning, we wandered around as whole families, arm in arm, so as to die together. The street was full of people weeping, praying, and begging that a miracle would come down from Heaven. No miracle from Heaven took place. The Germans were already among us and chasing us to line up in rows. I saw Basha-Lea Cheifetz jumping

[Column 87]

into the river, and then my uncle Yisrael Drobski went out from the house of Zelig Dologpiati, which had been set on fire. He was called out by a local police officer who stood him next to the river and shot him in the back. The Jews began to fight with the Germans. The fire grew stronger from minute to minute, and I do not know how I left the hands of my mother and sister. I began to run and jumped into the Bochkin's yard, as I saw heaps of bodies and bullets flying from the windows. I went out again and continued to run with all of them to the marketplace, to Kozangorodok Street. Next to the police, in the house of Chasia-Perl Slutsky, I saw my sister Tzipora lying dead. From there, I ran to the yard of Wolochinski and to the field. I saw before me masses of dead people and hundreds of people still continuing to escape from the ghetto. Along the route, I saw my sister Gitel, two years older than me. She was injured from a bullet in her right hand and in the back, and she was bleeding heavily. I told her that I no longer have the energy to run. She encouraged me to continue running, and to try with all my might to advance and continue the journey. I continued to run. I cast off my excess clothing, until I reached the Pripyat River. However, I did not find my sister there. Thus, two years passed, until the liberation. We sisters did not know of each other.

My sister Gitel told me that she reached the Pripyat and met Lea Romanowski, who made her first bandage from her shirt that was ripped to pieces. She advanced with a group of people from Lakhva to the Chobot area, a place where the ghetto survivors gathered. There, a partisan doctor made her a bandage at the request of Ivon Skripka, a gentile who was a friend of our father. Gitel continued to suffer greatly until her wounds healed. She reached an eastward area along with several Lakhva people, and entered a partisan brigade named after the brigade commander (Nikolaevich), which was camped near Lyuban. She remained there until the liberation of the area by the Red Army.

We, a group of about one hundred people, sat there on the banks of the Pripyat, hungry and wounded. Most of us were young women and children. We met Moshe Fishman, who was in a boat on the way to Lakhva. We told him about everything that had taken place in the city. He transferred us to the other bank of the Pripyat. We sat down to rest among the willow trees. The men began to talk among themselves, and wanted to leave the young women and children. In the middle of the debate, I saw a gentile, as I was told his name was Polin, standing on a heap of fodder with a machine gun, and he opened fire on the group.

[Column 88]

I jumped into deep mud and sat there until the shooting quieted. As I tried to get out of the mud, I could not remove my shoe. With difficulty I got out barefoot. We, the rest of the survivors of Polin the murderer, about thirty people, gathered together. The rest had been murdered by him. Shivering from cold, we lay down in the water and slept a bit. When we woke up, we found that the men, Sima Kaplanski, and several of the older young women had left us to our own devices, and escaped. We, the remaining ones, were fifteen children, and several men who had young children, including: Moshe-Zeev Romanowski, Sender and Bila Shklar, and Zelig Cheifetz. We hid among the shrubs toward morning. We saw Germans and police passing by us, and local gentiles leading them in the tracks of people. To our good fortune, they did not notice us. They saw footprints going in the other direction, and turned there.

We remained for about four days without food or water. We drank the mud water. On the fifth day, we went out to the Pripyat River to ask for directions. We sensed a gentile on the riverbank. Moshe-Zeev Romanowski cloaked himself with bravery and called out, “Who is there?” The gentile responded to us, approached us, and recognized Romanowski. He had mercy on us, and took us close to his house. He gave us bread to eat, and rags with which to bandage our wounds. He promised to find us a guide who would bring us to the partisans. He came to us every night, brought us food, and told us about Germans scurrying through the area searching for Jews on the banks of the Pripyat.

Several days later, he came with a guide and gave us sticks. He instructed the gentile to be good to us, and we set out on the journey. We walked in water and mud all night. We crossed the railway tracks quietly. In the morning, we arrived at the partisan area in Sitnitser-hof, the estate of the former poretz [landowner]. We met several Jews, and this made us happier. We scattered among the houses to beg for bread, and marched into the partisan camp toward evening. Several people came out of the camp and ordered us to leave the area. They directed us to Bostok (eastern White Russia).

We set out on our journey. In the village of Ininchich [Inince], we met an additional group, including Dov Gitelman, Moshe Yaakov Dologpiati, and others. We walked through forests, marshes, and dangerous paths for about a month. We entered villages to beg for bread, and were responded to generously. Winter was coming, and we were barefoot and naked. We slept in forests until we reached the village of Sonovitz [Sosnovichi], near Kozmichi-Sardibir. A German garrison and police officers were stationed there. This was the most dangerous spot on our route to the partisans. The gentiles told us that, every day, they murdered Jews who were passing through those places.

[Column 89]

We knew that they were people who had escaped from the Lakhva ghetto. We sat in the forest and decided to divide into several groups. The first to go out was a group of girls, including Sima Katz and Dina Wiener, Leibman's sister. After they went out we heard shots, and a gentile came and told us that the Germans captured the Jewish women, stood them on their knees, and murdered them on the road. We decided to escape to the forest and return westward, to the Lakhva area. The cold was very great. We were all sick. We lay on the snow and could not move at all for about a week. I do not know at all how we managed to remain alive.

We continued on our route after we recovered a bit. We reached the village of Breznik [Brezniki], where the Mishka brigade was stationed. We erected tents from tree branches and remained there until the German attack against the brigade. The partisans dispersed in all directions, and did not want to take us young girls along with them. We wandered around for a month. We were four girls: Sara Friedland (daughter of Truchki the smith), Sima Kravchik, nine-year-old Esterke who was a daughter of one of the refugees, and I. We did not meet Jews the entire time, and suffered from hunger and cold. We wanted to go to the Sluch River to drown ourselves, until suddenly we met a group of Jews, including Romanowski, Leibel Slutsky, and Sara Shlipak. They took us with them, and we were happy about this. We remained in the forest

[Column 90]

and began to dig to make ourselves a place to live. We would go out at night to steal potatoes from the pits of the gentiles. We would go from tree to tree so as not to leave footprints.

Later, a Jew from Lenin, Yisrael Slutsky took me with him. He worked as a shoemaker in the Voroshilov brigade. Our fate was bitter during the German attacks: the partisans would leave the place, and we would be left to our fate. We sat on the trees or in hiding places with mud up to our necks. Once, we saw Germans who spoke Russian to us, telling us that they were partisans. We escaped from them, but they murdered Hershel Migdalovich and Moshe Fishman. Dov Lopatin came to visit us and encourage us.

In that manner, with tribulations and troubles, we waited for the arrival of the Red Army. We left the forest and went to Lakhva on foot. We did not recognize our town. It was almost completely burnt down during the ghetto uprising. After a week, I found out that my sister Gitel had also survived. She too came to Lakhva, and our joy was boundless.

We traveled from Lakhva to Poland. We crossed to Germany with the Bricha. We joined the Habonim Kibbutz, and I made aliyah with eight hundred children on the Champollion ship during the Youth Aliyah.

I reached the Land after so much suffering. I was on Kibbutz Usha. I studied there and felt good. I moved to Tel Aviv. Today, I have two lovely daughters.

  Lakhva, Belarus     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page

Copyright © 1999-2026 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 04 Aug 2026 by JH