Minsk-Mazowiecki Memorial Book, Poland

Memorial Book in Memory
of the destroyed Jewish Community of
Minsk-Mazowiecki
(Mińsk Mazowiecki, Poland)

52°11' / 21°34'

Translation of
Sefer Minsk-Mazowiecki

Edited by Ephraim Shedletzky

Published in Jerusalem, 1977

Acknowledgments

Project Coordinator

Our sincere appreciation to Miriam Carmi
for permission to put this material on the JewishGen web site.

This is a translation from: Sefer Minsk-Mazowiecki (Memorial Book in Memory of the destroyed Jewish Community of Minsk-Mazowiecki),
ed. Ephraim Shedletzky, Jerusalem, 1977 (H, Y 633 pages);
The organization of former inhabitants of Minsk-Mazowiecki in Israel with the help of Jews from Minsk-Mazowiecki from all over the world.

Note: The original book can be seen online at the NY Public Library site: Minsk-Mazowiecki

This material is made available by JewishGen, Inc. and the Yizkor Book Project for the purpose of
fulfilling our mission of disseminating information about the Holocaust and destroyed Jewish communities.
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Table of Contents

Introduction to the book

Marble plaque in the Holocaust Cellar on Mt. Zion in Jerusalem		9
Editorial (Hebrew)		11
Editorial (Yiddish)		12
Our city	Lejb Rochman	13
Connections and roots	Moshe Carmel	15
In the eyes of the “Sabra”	Rivka Miriam	20

Our town and its history

Chroniclers relate	A. Ber-Moshe	24
Chronicle of a family – History of a town	Lejbl Farbman	30
The city as I remember it	Moshe Meiri-Theblum	39
The beginnings of the Zionist movement in our city	Ya'akov Eliav z”l	46
The Zionist activity in the twenties	Pinchas Tajblum	74
Pages from the “Tarbut” school bulletin-board newspaper	S. Ephraim	84
My life in Minsk up until the thirties	Lejbl Grinberg	88
Amongst religious youth in the nineteen twenties	Yoshua Boneh (Budwicki)	91
The community life and the divisions amongst the rabbis	Moshe Zisserman	93
My learning years	Yaffe Margolis-Shnitzer	99
My youth in the communist party	Moshe Bornstejn	107
“Minsker Stimme” [“The voice of Minsk”] – Details of our own weekly paper	Yechiel Kirshenbaum	124
Minsk's Zionist youth paper	A. Shedletzky	128

The Rabbi's court

The “Admors” from New-Minsk	Rabbi Avraham-Yitzhak Bromberg z”l	132
New-Minsker people with rabbinical ancestry	Menashe Unger z”l	147
Rabins' estate	A. Shedletzky	157

The Pogrom

The murder of my friend Israel Zilich	Avraham Shladszarsz	162
The burial	S. Shwerdsharf	165
The pogrom and the trial	A. Shedletzky	167
A visit with Jewish parliamentarians	B. Kilinowicz	170
The laughter	Yoshua Perle	177
The entreaty to heaven	A. Grafman	181
My journey to Eretz Israel	Yisrael Gutgold	184

Literary chapters

“Between the chestnut and the lilac” (selections)	Yoshuron Keshet z”l	188
First World War years	Yosef Be'er Popowski z”l	198
People and pictures	Lejb Rochman	217
About Ephraim Mishmish and his son, Moshe Shedletzky	Ya'akov Eliav z”l	228
Vanished like a dream…	A. Shedletzky	229
A cup of coffee at Froim Baker's	A. Shedletzky	259

Chapters from the past – Memories

My inlaw's house	Yitzhak Klugman	294
In memory of my family	Ya'akov Kaufman	295
My father's house in Ban Street	Mordechai Weisbrot	298
When parting	Pola Tajblum	303
The Guberek-Kaluski family	Melech Guberek	305
From Shenitzer Street to Marienki	Ya'akov Kaufman	308
The “Latowitsher”	Esther Rochman	314
Streets and people	Yisraelke Himmelfarb	328
More than a hometown	Avraham Feldman-Sadeh	334
My father, Lajbke	Miriam Berman-Okshendler	338
The cotton factory in Rabins' house	Esther Goldberg	341
In memory of the Talmud family	Asher Enshel Goldberg	343
My grandfather Mordechai Wassermacher	Ya'akov Fejgenbaum	344
My father, Avraham-Lajzer Shochet	Rachel Kaufman	346
My father, the ritual slaughterer	Pesach Moshe Neuman	348
My family and my youth in Minsk	Fajge Gowortshik-Erlich	349
My father, Josef Trojne	Eliak Trojne	352
Rabbi Shlomo Miadowski	Ya'akov Kaufman	354
My good grandfather Israel-Hersz Gerszkowicz	Rachel Arbisser-Margolies	355
Our family	Peretz Wolff	358
The redheaded horse dealer and my friend, Josef-Ber	Avraham Meretek	359
Our farm in the Rabines Street	Pinchas Korman	361
My family in Minsk	Rochtshe Warszawski	364
Only one remains	Betzalel Yagodowicz	365
Our home in Church Street	Feijge Guntrishik-Sherman	367
The Sztajnboks	Meir Sztajnbok	368
I haven't seen them again	Meir Gradman	370
On the Yoske Katzav's farm	Chaja Wiszkop Goldstein	372
My father, the city's cantor	Chava Kafka Brochstejn	373
The only one of a whole line	Chaja Himmelfarb-Glickman	374
The Aronsohn family	Rotshke Aronsohn-Stanislav	375
Our house opposite the “Gerer Shtibl”	Meir Steinmagen z”l	377
What I remember	Oskar Rak	378
With a smile	Ya'akov Rak	379

Destruction and Holocaust

Our important dates		382
Leaves of fire	A. Shedletzky	383
Death of the rabbi	Lejb Rochman	412
The “Black Shabbat” in Minsk with the Germans	Moshe David Goldman	416
The Judenrat	Yitzhak Lipszinski	419
Moshe Kramaresz		430
During those days	Lejb Rochman	432
8^th of Elul 5702 [21 August 1942]	Lejb Rochman	452
The Portion	A. Shedletzky	460
The “Kopernik” (school) in flames	A. Shedletzky	465
Woods, camp, hiding-place	Yechiel Kirszenbaum	469
In the woods with partisans	Shmuel Roszanski	475
In pursuit of the living	Miriam Carmi Formajnski	487
We were seven	Bajle Ostszega-Jagodowicz	492
Two sisters remain	Idel Frojman-Popowski	493
Run, at least one of you can save himself	Yisrael Aharon-Frojman	494
We were nine	Moshe Zisserman	500
A small episode	Tova Zisserman	503
My battles in Spain and the war years in Russia	Moshe Bornstejn	505
In uniform during the war years	Gedalia Tajblum	512
From the East Prussian front to the ship “Exodus”	Yakov Rodzinski	515
Survived in Russia	Zisha Goldbard	521
Childhood in days of terror	Irit Romano	524
I was a 12 year old signal woman	Bracha Wizotski-Lipshicz	532
Deported from Paris, fled and reached Minsk – but there are no longer any Jews there	Alia Rotsztajn-Rottman	537
Survived in Germany	Malka Pianka-Nir	540
With Minsker Jews to Russia	Pinchas Korman	542
With Minskers from Paris in Auschwitz	Lejbl Grinberg	544
From Jawiszowitz to Buchenwald	Melech Guberek	550
Our family	Chavtshe Salomon-Kominkowski	552
From the Rodzki camp to the Warsaw Ghetto	Malka Markowicz-Greszkowicz	554
Our heroes	Lejbl Grinberg	555
The murderers of the “Black Sabine” have gone unpunished	Moshe Bornstejn	565
I have fulfilled my fathers' heritage	Shaja Openheim	569
The city without Jews	Yekhiel Kirshnbaum	573

Magnified and Glorified – List of Martyrs

A partial list of martyrs and innocents		585
These were their names		603
Immortalized Names on a monument in Paris		605
Avinoam Miodowski – in his memory		608

Minskers in the Diaspora – in Israel and other countries

Minsk-Mazowiecki and France	Lejbl Grinberg	611
The national Landsmannschaft		616
Our journey to Minsk to see our fathers' graves	Melech Guberek	617
Avraham Itshe Baranes	Lejbl Grinberg	621
Max Oszliak – the friend and mensch	Yosef Margolies	623
The Minsk association in Israel	Sara Obfire	625
The meeting	Lejb Rochman	630
Finished but not completed – Epilogue of the editorial staff		632

English section		III

Photographs from Minsk-Mazowiecki Memorial Book

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