[Page 333]

In 1901, Dr. Zvi Hirsch Bruk (Grigory Yakovlevitsch) was chosen as the “governmental rabbi” for Vitebsk. But at the same time he was very active in the Zionist movement. His public sermons always drew a large audience. Among his listeners were many young people. Dr. Grigory Yakovlevitsch Bruk was by character a Folkist (Narodnik), loved the wider Jewish masses, and was in general a great lover of Israel and a very honest man. Dr. Bruk was quite attentive to Jewish young people, and they gathered around him. He was also a Yiddishist and loved the Yiddish language. He helped to found in Vitebsk the Yiddish faction “Dorshey-Tzion” [Seekers of Zion], which consisted entirely of young people.

In 1902, Hirsch Zackheim returned to Vitebsk from Warsaw, where he had studied. (He was born in Vitebsk. His father, Hoshea Zackheim, had a large iron business in Vitebsk.). He joined the “Dorshey-Tzion,” but he soon began to agitate for “Poalei Tzion.” Zackheim's talks about Marxism, socialism, and nationalism aroused great interest among us. For some of us his listeners, this was a new thing, for nationalism–as Zackheim stressed in his talks–was neither an obstacle nor a contradiction to socialism, as the Zionist workers separated off into their own party, “Poalei Tzion,” which in addition to its Zionist activities, also dealt with socialist tasks like seeking to improve the economic situation of Jewish workers and leading class warfare in the Jewish streets, when even the employers were Zionists. Zackheim's talks

[Page 334]

attracted many students who were in schoo0l as well as the intelligentsia among workers.

In the summer of 1902, the Poalei Tzion organization was established in Vitebsk. For the founding, comrade Y. Berger came from Minsk as an envoy from the Minsk Poalei Tzion. There was a large gathering of a couple hundred people, where Comrade Berger gave an invited speech. The meeting took place on Zaharia in a wedding hall near the large city theater. Zackheim also naturally attended this gathering. Among the comrades at this gathering, I remember: Yudel Vilenkin, Yoel-Duvid Peskin, Shmerl Khasin, Yeled Chaviv, Moyshe Galasker (the younger), Etzem Chasak (Baynfest), Notke Levintov and his brother Yisroel-Meir from Zaduneve. These are the names of comrades who were later active in the Poalei-Tzion organization and were leaders of its whole theoretical and practical efforts.

The Poalei-Tzion organization over the course of three years (until the end of 1905) grew to some 700 members, perhaps more. Their work was divided into two parts: theoretical and practical. The theoretical section revolved around the following major issues:

1. Political battle–Should Poalei-Tzion participate in political battles in Russia and fight against the autocracy or not, because the Jewish question–some held–could solve only the issue of territorialism,
2. Palestinism or territorialism–The Jewish issue can be resolved only through concentration on a specific territory. The question was whether we should fight for just any territory, wherever it is, like, for example, Uganda, or only for Eretz Yisroel.
3. The language Issue–Which language should we favor, Hebrew or Yiddish?
4. The non-proletarians in the Jewish masses in the Diaspora, and the issue was whether Jewish workers could take part in mass production.

[Page 335]

labor organization in Vitebsk. But the “Bund” did not want to unite with us in Poalei-Tzion, holding that it was the only representative of the Jewish proletariat. This required a lot of time and effort before we could coordinate things.

The theoretical work was done with the same vigor. Small circles of 15-20 people were organized and speakers would be sent to them. People in those circles considered all of the issues that I have mentioned. The speakers were: Yudel Vilenkin, Yoel-Duvid Peskin, Yeled Chaviv, Notke and Yisroel-Meir Levintov, Bar-Levav Ginzburg, and others. A committee was in charge of this project.

The practical efforts were led by: Shmerl Khasin, Bera the shoemaker (Lapidus), Etzem Chazak, and several others. The meeting spot was chiefly at Bera the shoemaker's home, where he also had a workshop for making shoes. At Chanukah in 1904 there was a meeting at his home. A guest from Yekaterinoslav came to this meeting–Mattes Levkovsky (the “Batko” [father], as he was referred to among the Poalei-Tzion). The “Batko” was a brilliant orator and would captivate audiences. For the Poalei-Tzion, there was an outstanding issue: Eretz Yisroel or some other territory? At that time, people debated about the issue of Uganda. The organizations were divided between Palestinists and Territorialists. Minsk took the Territorialist standpoint. The active people there later founded the Zionist-Socialist Party. Among those founders were: Shmuel Niger, V. Latzki-Bertholdi, Danieli-Tchernikhov, Yakov Leshtzinsky, and others. Yekaterinoslav, on the other hand, was a bastion of Palestinists. Vitebsk was in touch with both cities–both with Minsk and with Yekaterinoslav. And that is why Yekaterinoslav, as I mentioned earlier, sent us Mattes Levkovsky to agitate for Eretz Yisroel, and we did remain Palestinists. Yekaterinoslav also sent to Vitebsk the comrade Duvid (Michal Leviton), a student, a kind young man. At that time he spoke only Russian. Later on he came over to Yiddish. He himself was from a colony in the Yekaterinoslav

[Page 336]

Gubernia. He was a fine speaker and accomplished a great deal during his time in Vitebsk in the winter of 1904-1905.

At the same time, others came to Vitebsk: Bruchzon (Tzvi Averbach, later known by the name Alexander Khashin), Bogod and Zelik Melamed from Glokhov (died in New York). They came right from yeshiva to us in Vitebsk, and they laid the foundation for the work in our organization, especially Bruchzon, who was a fine speaker. Inscribed in my memory is a large folk gathering in the summer of 1904 when Vitebsk's Jews bade farewell to their beloved leader, Dr. Bruk, who had been drafted into the army. He was being sent to the Far East where the “happy” war with Japan was going on. This gathering was on Offitzerker Street in the inexpensive Jewish kitchen, and the chief speaker was our Bruchzon (Khashin). He had the courage to speak at a public meeting in Yiddish, which was strictly forbidden by the police. The impression made by the speech and the applause of the crowd, who frequently interrupted the speaker, so confused the police superintendent that he offered no protest and allowed him to speak Yiddish. People spoke about this gathering for a long time in the city. Dr. Bruk's response and his departure from the city made a great impression on the crowd. He was a divinely gifted speaker. I should note that Bruk was a friend to the Poalei Tzion and helped us a great deal, and his office often hosted our meetings. We employed him in every which way. He did not go to the Far East. He was stationed in Vilna, where he served as a military doctor, and at the beginning of 1905 he was already back in Vitebsk and we were already taking advantage of him.

On Pesach of 1905 we conducted a large general meeting of all the members of our organization, the Poalei Tzion. This meeting took place on Prasmushke in an empty house. Several hundred people gathered. The speaker was Hirsch Zackheim, who spoke for a couple of hours. After him, to our great surprise, Dr. Bruk stepped out. He came to our illegal gathering late at night…He spoke very warmly to us, with pathos. We greatly admired his courage in joining us at an illegal meeting and risking his

[Page 337]

career. After that he took the position as rabbi and could be arrested along with us if the meeting fell through.

We also marked the First of May in 1905 with a large celebration in the big Lubavitcher Shul. We gathered at 10 in the morning, a crowd of several hundred people. The featured speaker was Yeled Khaviv. Also there were Bar-Levav and others. This celebration went on without arrests.

During the whole summer of 1905, through the fall, we exerted great efforts to enlist new members. The leaders and speakers of our circle were: Yeled Khaviv, Bar-Levav, Yudel Mitlanski, Shimon Altschuler, Yisroel-Yosef Abramis, Notke and Yisroel-Meir Levintov, and others. The practical work in the summer of 1905 was strongly led by: Bera the shoemaker, Bar-Levav, Yakov Altzitzer (Toshav), Shmerl Khasin, Hirshl Kurnov (Patish), Baynfest (Etzem Chazak), and others. At that time we were joined by a student, Motilyov, who later was a lawyer in Moscow and a Jewish activist there. A good speaker with a good analytical mind.

That summer we planned a large strike of all the business personnel in the city. The strike was led by all the socialist parties, but mostly by Poalei-Tzion and the “Bund.” The strike ended with great success. It was 3 or 4 months before we got in touch with the “Bund.” I was on the strike committee of our organization, and I got to lead our negotiations with the “Bund.” I remember well that in that summer I never got to sleep before 3 or 4 in the morning while people rotated between the parties, the Poalei-Tzion and the “Bund,” and both of them gave their blessing to the strike. The strike was conducted with great idealism, and in three or four days we won.

The theoretical work in that summer of 1905 was weaker, especially at summer's end, when our intellectuals were traveling. Many of them went to Basel the Seventh Zionist Congress, where there was a strong battle for Uganda. At the same Congress, Zangwill created a Territorialist party, and the Zionist Party divided. At this Zionist Congress in Basel we had several other members: Duvid (Michal Leviton), Levkovsky, Shimon Dobin, and several others

[Page 338]

This Congress was used by the “Vozrozhdenists,” who during Chol Ha-Moed Succos in 1903 had held a conference in Kiev. Those who took part in that conference were: Zalmen Abramson (Zalmen of Dvinsk), Ben-Adir, Shimon Dobin, Shmuel Vaynzweig, Moyshe Zilberfarb (Bazin) whom we called Comrade Ezra, Alter Yaffa, V. Latzki-Bertholdy, L. Mandelberg, Volodya Fabricant, Benny Friedland, M.B. Ratner, and Nachum Shiff (Baal-Dimion) whom we called Comrade Mark.

At this conference was laid out the basis of the future grounding principles of the Jeiwsh Socialists Workers Party, which stood against the pessimistic theory of the Poalei-Tzion and the later S.S., and stood for the conception of rebirth (from which comes the name “Vozrozhdenists” [from the Russian word for “rebirth”]). At the same conference it was decided to put out a theoretical publication called “Vorozhdenya.” Elected as editors were Ben-Adir, M.B. Ratner, and V. Fabricant.

The main participants in this journal were Ben-Adir, Moyshe Zilberfarb, Chaim Zhitlovski, V. Fabricant, and M.B. Ratner. An article by Moyshe Litvakov (under the pseudonym M. Siemenson) and a letter from Minsk by Sh. Niger were also published in “Vorozhdenya.” The Vorozhdenists continually fought against the “negation of the exile,” both in writing and orally. A total of 4 issues of the journal appeared.

The “Vorozhdenists” was always composed of intellectuals. At first it was difficult to attract workers to their new theory. For example, for purposes of agitation, Yisroel Yefroikin and M. Raskin settled in Minsk, and occasionally V. Fabricant came there. But in several months of strenuous work, they attracted only a single worker–Hirshl the stitcher (Hirshl Halpern), who was called “Hirshl the Mass.” This implied that the whole mass consisted of one Hirshl.

The “Vozrozhdenits” were a bit late coming to the Jewish streets, for the Jewish workers were already organized in various parties, like the S.S., Poalei-Tzion, “Bund.” In addition, Jewish workers at that time were organized in the Russian parties–Social-Democrats, Socialist-Revolutionaries, and many others, like the Polish, Lithuanian, and Lettish socialist parties. When the

[Page 339]

“Vozrozhdenists” were ready to go out to the Jewish streets to spread their doctrine and their outlook to on Jewish reality, there were no neutral Jewish workers, because at that time there were already foreshadowings of the First Russian Revolution in 1905, which captured the broader masses and drew them into various revolutionary parties. The “Vozrozhdenists” took another path, a truly original one: they took to studying with the intelligentsia, with the leaders of the S.S. and Poalei-Tzion. They hoped thereby to persuade these party leaders of their principles. If they did so, it would be easy to attract the party masses. So they went to work. They quickly began to attract some of the intelligentsia, like Michal Leviton and Yuda Novakovsky, who until then had worked for the S.S., Mattes Levikovsky, Yisroel Yefroikin, Z. Kalmanovitsch, and others.

At the Basel Congress in 1905, as I mentioned earlier, were several Vitebsk members of Poalei-Tzion. We awaited other members who would come to give us a report from the Congress, but no one came. At the end of the summer, as the High Holidays were approaching, we did not know the situation, why none of our leaders were in town.

A little while later, Yudel Vilenkin arrived. He was at the Poalei-Tzion conference in Yekaterinoslav at the end of September, 1905. He did not mention that this Poalei-Tzion conference had adopted the program of the “Vozrodzhenists.” He only said that for the anniversary of the founding of our Vitebsk Poalei-Tzion organization, Michal Leviton (Duvid) would come, and he asked us to arrange for an location for celebrating this anniversary with a large gathering of five or six hundred people. At that time, when such things were illegal, it was no easy task. But we got to work, and we succeeded. We hired a large hall that was used for celebrating the weddings of the wealthy. This was Models wedding hall on Kanatner Street. On the last day of Succos, the end of Simchas Torah, six hundred members gathered for the anniversary of the founding of the Poalei-Tzion organization.

[Page 340]

All the big shots from our organization attended: Yudel Vilenkin, Yeled Chaviv, Yudel Mitlyansky, the Levitov brothers, the Khalpin brothers, Pessia Zackheim, Hirsch Zackheim's sister (Hirsch himself was not in town), Yankel Toshav, the Morinsons, Bar-Levav, and others.

Michal Levitan came to this gathering with a guest who was visiting Vitebsk for the first time–a Jew with a nice beard. He looked like a rabbi and not a leader of a revolutionary party. He introduced him as Comrade Meir. Comrade Meir was the first speaker, but he did not speak for long, only a half hour, not more. He told us in a very nice way that we had to fight for national autonomy, under the name Sejm, the opposite of the Bundist cultural autonomy–that is, that we should fight a political battle that demanded a more complete national autonomy than the “Bund.” Not only cultural, but fuller autonomy in all issues that were relevant and affected the Jewish people. His speech enthralled us. He spoke beautifully, quietly, calmly, and with fine language, and in eloquent Yiddish he laid out the whole theory of the Sejmists. He was succeeded by Michal Leviton, who laid out the theory of the “Vozrozhdenists” and spoke strongly against the S.S. with their theory of not proletarianizing. He reduced to ashes the idea of “negation of the exile,” and in a few words he reminded us that our final goal was Territorialism.

No one else spoke at this meeting. Yudel Vilenkin opened and closed the meeting, which lasted well into the night. The crowd was amazed at the new theory that Yudel Vilenkin and Michal Levitan had brought via their guest with the rabbinical beard–Yuda Novakovsky (Comrade Meir). In the morning, everyone sobered up and started asking what had happened. Where were we in the world? What kind of new theory is this Sejm? People went to Yudel Vilenkin and asked him to explain what had happened.

Discussions began between us and Michal Levitan and Yuda Novakovsky. Among our heimish members, those who argued most strongly were Yeled Chaviv, Yudel Mitlyansky, and

[Page 341]

others. In the end, Levitan and Novakovsky won, and they “converted” us: we adopted the theory of the “Vozdrodzhenists” and the program of the Sejm. Then the work among the masses began.

Meanwhile, in October of 1905 the great strikes began throughout Russia. There were the railroad and the telegraph strikes. People could not travel from one city to another. There were arrests openly in the streets as well as in other public areas. Levitan and Novakovsky almost always represented our organization. We had nothing to be ashamed of.

Comrade Meir Novakovsky immediately took to reorganizing our party's organization–instead of the small circles, he divided the whole organization into four groups according to their level of consciousness. In each group there were not fewer than a hundred members, but there were one or two groups of more than two hundred. I remember that the youngest group, for beginners was called “The Future,” and the rest were called “Battle.” Our party grew larger every day.

Novakovsky, who was generally a theoretical person, was a good writer and a good speaker. He had had rabbinic ordination for 18 years. In 1913, when the Beilis trial was underway in Kiev, he was the right hand to the Moscow rabbi Y. Mazeh for establishing the defense. He was as proficient in the Talmud and its commentaries as a religious Jew is in Ashrei [Psalm 145]. It is surprising that he took part in the founding in Vitebsk of the organization of the Jewish Socialist Workers Party (the Sejmists) and in the practical questions. He cared for every detail, gave us advice that was always spot on, and was always useful to us. Over the course of three or four months when he was in Vitebsk he knew no rest. He worked day and night for our organization. Every evening he appeared in public or at a gathering, or he gave a lecture or took part in a meeting.

When the railroad strike ended and we began to receive letters again, we learned that the Poalei-Tzion organizations in other cities–Yekaterinaslav, Berdichev, Vilna, Dvinsk, Polotzk–had adopted the platform of the “Vozrozhdenists.” Later on, as we talked about the new platform

[Page 342]

the “Vozrozhdenists” would say that in no other city was it as difficult to win over the crowd to the new theory as it was in Vitebsk. They expended more effort in Vitebsk than in any other city. Not incorrectly, Moyshe Zilberfarb writes in his memoirs that “the work in the Vitebsk groups was not quite right. On the contrary, it ran up against logical and psychological resistance from the masses” (“Socialist Territorialism” p. 75).

And truthfully, Vitebsk was not so easily taken. At the end of 1905 and the start of 1906, almost all of the leaders of the Sejmists visited our Vitebsk organization. Comrade Ezra (Moyshe Zilberfarb-Bazin) came to us. He stayed with us for a long time and taught us well. He appeared at public meetings, where he was a hit, with his still, quiet voice, but with his talks he persuaded those in the auditorium. When Zilberfarb came to us, he had not yet spoken Yiddish at public meetings. I remember how, at a closed meeting of the group “Kampf” [Battle], he asked if he would be permitted to appear in Yiddish instead of Russian, as he had previously done. But he also asked people not to laugh at his Volhynian pronunciation; and if he said anything incorrectly, he asked to be corrected. It was not long before he began to speak in Yiddish–and really in a beautiful Yiddish–at public meetings. Zilberfarb himself tells about this: “I said that if I spoke in Yiddish, I would not be word for word correct. In addition, I was afraid that my Volhynian dialect in Yiddish would make the Vitebsk crowd laugh…If I just spoke in Russian without preparing beforehand, I would actually be building a wall between me and the masses” (“Socialist Territorialism,” p. 76).

Yisroel Yefroikin (Alexander) came to us in October of 1905. He delivered his first talk in the Zarutsheyer Shul about self-defense. People immediately began to organize a self-defense system in the city. They gathered a large sum of money. We made a list of the rich Jews and laid a tax upon them, and, with few exceptions, they all ponied up the designated

[Page 343]

sum. With the money we bought Brownings (revolvers). Alexander helped a lot in organizing the self-defense and in collecting the money.

At the end of 1905, Misha Raskin and Zelik Kalmanovitch (known as The Turk) came to us from Moscow. Why was he called The Turk? Once after a meeting that ended, as usual, late at night, they were hungry and on their way they went into a Turkish bakery to get something, like a couple of rolls. Kalmanovitch began to speak with the owner of the bakery–a Turk–about the Koran, and therefore people called him “The Turk.”

Misha Raskin and Yisroel Yefroikin would come every Friday evening to appear at our public meetings, which were mostly held in the large Lubavitsch shul. But once, at the end of February in 1906, the police came to the meeting “as guests.” They interrupted the meeting and arrested everyone. We succeeded in getting Yefroikin out a back door and he was not arrested. Morinson put up a guarantee for everyone with the police chief, and after a couple of days in jail, almost everyone was released.

That same winter, Ben-Adir and Nachum Shtief (Comrade Mark) came to us. Ben-Adir, however, did not appear at public meetings. Nachum Shtief appeared with lectures before the party members. At almost the same time, the theoretician of the Poalei-Tzion, Ber Borochov, came to Vitebsk. He came to us in Vitebsk with a special message to maintain the old organization Poalei-Tzion, or, to say it more properly, to rescue the organization. But he did not succeed. Nachum Shtief opposed him. Ber Borochov left emptyhanded.

That same winter, V. Latzki-Bertholdy came to us with Danieli-Tchernikov. They led the S.S. party (the Zionist Territorialists). They wanted to take us into their party. They were countered by members Meir (Yuda Novakovsky) and Ezra (Moyshe Zilberfarb). Tchernikov and Latzki-Bertholdy were with us for a couple of weeks. But they did not organize an S.S. party. I will never forget all of these discussions. They were so interesting, as well as beautiful in form and content, that they captivated the

[Page 344]

the audience. All four of these members are now in the World to Come, may their memories be a blessing. Danieli-Tchernikov died as a martyr. He was shot by the Bolsheviks at the beginning of the Second World War.

In April of 1906, there was a founding conference for our party in Kiev. At the conference, a central committee was chosen. Nachum Shtief gave us a report about the conference that quickly made its way to Vitebsk.

Around Shavuos, Shimon Dobin came to us. His beautiful speaking and his sincerity made a profound impression on us. In the same year, 1906, our party journal began to appear, “The Voice of the People.” In the first issue, (December 1, 1906) a long article by Zhitlovsky appeared–“Letter from a Jewish Socialist”, which made a deep impression on all of us. And in December of 1906, Zhitlovsky himself came to Vitebsk. But he could not appear in public gatherings, because the reactionaries were raging in Russia. He spoke only to the active members of the party and to a select group of the intelligentsia. People were already preparing for the elections to the Second Duma.

Our party participated in the elections for the Second Duma. In Vitebsk we proposed the candidacy of Dr. Chaim Zhitlovsky. We conducted a strong campaign for his candidacy, but Zhitlovsky himself could not participate in the campaign. An order came from Petersburg that he should be arrested. Yisroel Yefroikin conducted the whole campaign. Also Dr. Grigory Bruk and Sh. An-ski, who already then lived in Vitebsk, worked hard for his candidacy. Zhitlovsky won a majority of votes and was chosen as an elector, but his candidacy was nullified on orders from Petersburg.

In the summer of 1906, M.B. Ratner came to us and held a public lecture about the main principles of our party. His lecture interested almost the whole Jewish intelligentsia. He read the lecture from a previously prepared text. Each word was carefully crafted. M.B. Ratner made a strong impression on everyone.

In 1907 was held the conference of the nationalist socialist parties and it addressed

[Page 345]

the national question. The conference was supposed to consider the issues of national and territorial autonomy in Russia and, if possible, to fashion a general national program and to create the necessary organizational forms for uniting the parties. Our party participated in the conference. Yisroel Yefroikin gave us in Vitebsk a report on the conference.

Yisroel Yefroikin spent the whole summer of 1907 with us in Vitebsk. The reactionaries at that time ruled with an iron hand. Party work in the city was nearly paralyzed. The student Shimon Altschuler was active at that time. The other leaders of the organization at that time were either traveling or passive.

In the winter of 1908, Comrade Benedict (Berz) came to us. He came from Kurland (Latvia). He spoke half Yiddish and half German. His job was to prepare and organize the conference for our party. At that conference, the workers from our party participated with the members of the central committee. We had discussions with Dr. Bruk, and he allowed us to hold meetings in his office in the Zarutshayer Shul. Comrade Benedict met those members coming from abroad at the train station and took them to their appointed accommodations. Most of them had been in Vitebsk before and knew the city. Only a few were newcomers. Among the newcomers were Volodya Fabrikant and another person from Yekaterinoslav, a dentist (Abram Appelboym). Others who came to the conference were Moyshe Zilberfarb, Ben-Adir (Avraham Rozin), Yuda Novakovsky, Shimon Dobin, Misha Raskin, Michal Levitan, and others. But Shtief and Yefroikin did not come. Also participating in the conference was Sasha Rosenberg, the later well-known provocateur. He was all dressed up in his student uniform from the Petersburg Military-Medical Academy and looked indeed like a military man. He looked a lot more like a Gentile than a Jew. The first meeting, as I recall, was on a Friday afternoon. At 7 or 8 in the evening, we all went to our rooms. I thought that everything had gone peacefully, just fine. We believed that the conference would end without any struggles. But on Shabbos morning, the police arrived at my house, made a search, and arrested me.

When

[Page 346]

I was brought to the prison, it was already 7 o'clock. By the time I had gone through the procedures in the prison office, it was eight in the morning. At the same time, Ben-Adir was brought in. When I saw him, my eyes “lit up.” Understand, we did not say anything. We stood there as if we knew nothing. The officer from the Okhrana who questioned us at our arrest wanted to know if we knew each other.

When I was taken into a cell, I met my whole central committee there: Moyshe Zilberfarb, Shimon Dabin, Misha Raskin, Michal Levitan, Volodya Fabricant, Benedict. The last one brought in was Novakovsky. I was standing by the door when he was brought into the cell. Novakovsky said to me loudly in Russian so that the guard could hear: “Nu, they brought the rabbi himself here.”

The cell was terribly crowded. Seventy people were in that one cell. In addition to the group of us, there were already important members of the Social-Revolutionaries, the Social-Democrats, and a few Bundists. There, too, was our old Shachnovitsch, who was caught with an illegal press from the Social-Revolutionary Party.

Abram Appelboym, the member from Yekaterinoslav, had gone away for Shabbos and thereby escaped arrest. Sasha Rosenberg stayed in the city, but he was still not arrested. A couple of years later we learned why he remained free. The whole time, he was walking around the city in his student uniform. He had no fear, you understand. We only learned about this situation later.

Our cell soon became a university. After the first day of our arrest, we held a meeting and devised a series of lectures by the Socialist-Revolutionaries, the Social-Democrats, the Bundists, and others. We had with us the banker Moyshe-Leib Ginzburg's son, a student from Moscow University, a Socialist-Revolutionary, an important worker in the party, a Maximilist. He discussed with us the national question. It was then the 25^th anniversary of Karl Marx's death,

[Page 347]

so everyone spoke about Marx. They were all engraved in my memory, and I will never forg4t them.

We were released after a couple of months. As soon as I stepped over the threshold of my apartment, Sasha Rosenberg arrived and questioned me about all the details of what we heard in prison and how we responded. After that, no one failed to think that he had betrayed us.

Some of our members were exiled. Others were forbidden to have contacts abroad, but they went to Vienna, Austria. At that time, Mark B. Ratner lived in Vienna. He had to leave Russia for various reasons. There, too, lived members of the Socialist-Territorialists, like Latzki-Bertholdy, Shatz-Anyan, and others. Our friends there urged us on in our efforts so that we could continue with our party work. But this was impossible to carry out. The reactionaries and the Black Hundred had begun to smash heads. Many of our members were worn out; others were just passive. Disappointment was not lacking.

In 1909, Yisroel Yefroikin came again to Vitebsk. It was summer. He tried to accomplish some things, but he could not. Our organization in Vitebsk was collapsing. Of the old activists, only about 20-30 remained, and they did not hold together. We still maintained a connection in Yekaterinoslav with Khmielke (Khmelnitzky) the tailor. With us for all of 1909-1910 was Abram Apppelboym, whom the police had exiled from Yekaterinoslav. He had succeeded in having the police send him to Vitebsk. Every three days he had to report to the police.

In the summer of 1909 or 1910 our friend Leyzer Khalfin came to me and brought a newspaper with the bad news that Burtzev had discovered that Sasha Rosenberg had betrayed Gershon to the Okhrana. The newpaper described this in detail. This raised the question with us of whether in 1908 he had sold out our conference to the Okhrana. As we began to analyze all the facts of our arrest, we came to the decision that there could be no doubt that it was his doing. If he, Rosenberg, cursed be his name and his memory, had not betrayed us,

[Page 348]

our conference would not have failed and our best members would not have been exiled and had to leave Russia. The only member who had not been sent away was Moyshe Zilberfarb. We were able to tear him from their hands. He was hidden away in the city hospital. He was there for five months until he was released. I would go to him every Shabbos afternoon and talk with him for a couple of hours. Then I first recognized his greatness, his generosity, and his interest in our national and political issues. He left Vitebsk at the end of 1908, and he never came back to us in Vitebsk.

In 1908-1909, when a central Jewish literary society was founded in Vitebsk, the remaining members in Vitebsk–Bar-Levav, Leyzer Khalfin, Nachum Lipshitz, and several others–with the help of Dr Bruk opened a chapter of the society, which was the beginning of a large cultural project. The leaders of this society were our members. The best of our intellectuals then visited us and delivered lectures. The first to come was Avraham Reyzen. In 1910, Nachum Shtief came. He spent four or five weeks with us. He spoke about the language issue at the literary society. Shtief was then a fervent Yiddishist. In a small circle–at Dr. Bruk's house–he read his written work, “The National Idea.” He also read about another theme, but I do not remember the exact title, but it was also about the national issue. From us he went to Vilna. He spent several months there at the Strashun Library, where he was occupied in different studies.

In 1911 I was in Ravna, which I visited several times. There, too, he was studying Yiddish philology. In Ravna I also met with Moyshe Zilberfarb. That same year I was also in Kiev. There I met with Michal Levitan and Shimon Dobin. They were leading the illegal Jewish children's school for girls in Demyevka, a suburb of Kiev. It is difficult for me to describe the impression that the school made on me. It was around the First of May. Shimon Dobin had taught the children the significance of this international holiday and its significance for workers.

In Kiev I also met with Novakovsky. He was

[Page 349]

then a manager in the office of a sugar factory. In the evenings he would write about community issues. There were no party activities in Kiev.

In the fall of 1912 I lived in Riga. There was then a great culture war in the Jewish streets over the issue of Yiddish and Hebrew. This battle began in 1908 after the Czernowitz Conference where Yiddish was proclaimed as a national language.

After the Czernowitz Conference, our members threw themselves into the cultural work and into the battle for Yiddish. In Riga at that time there were two cultural societies: one a Hebrew one, favored by the Zionist intelligentsia. This society was called “Ivriah.” The other society was called “Carmel,” and it had a Yiddishist bent. The Sejmists, the Bundists, and the radicals tended toward “Carmel” and fought for Yiddish. According to my proposal, the “Carmel” society invited Michal Levitan to give a lecture about language teaching in the schools. It was not so easy then to come to Riga, because Riga lay outside the Pale of Settlement and ordinary Jews had no right to settle there. The week that he spent in Riga, he stayed at my home. His lecture at “Carmel” drew an enormously large audience. He spoke beautifully. Everyone listened with the greatest attention. Next to me sat Anokhi [Zalman Anokhi], the master of “Rabbi Abba” [a fictional protagonist identified with Anokhi]; he repeated several times, “How beautifully he speaks and how well-founded are his theses.”

At the end of 1916, in the fervor of the First World War, I was on my way to Harbin in the Far East. I stopped for several days in Petersburg. Our friends lived there: Moyshe Zilberfarb, Nachum Shtief, Yisroel Yefroikin, and Bera the shoemaker (Bera Lapidus). I saw all of them. The worked then in the literary society. Also working there were the literary historians Yisroel Zinberg and Shmuel Niger. Nachum Shtief had then written a great deal on the language issue. Moyshe Zilberfarb were occupied with the J.C.A. [the Jewish Colonization Association]; Nachum Shtief was occupied with “Yekopo” (the committee to aid Jews who suffered from the war, and also refugees driven out of the front lines). We spoke about the persecutions of Jews in Russia,

[Page 350]

about prohibitions to write in Yiddish–even to write letters in Yiddish was forbidden in war time. Also people dared not put out newspapers in Yiddish. The painful themes of the war were not missing from our conversations. It is interesting to note what Nachum Shtief said then: “We must ask God for Russia to win the war and not Germany.” He had foreseen what would happen to the Jewish people if Germany would win the war. Zilberfarb agreed with Shtief. Our friends said this at the time when the Yiddish press in America and in other countries wanted Germany to win the war and wished a plague upon Russia.

The February Revolution came while I was in Harbin. I was mobilized into the army and sent to the “Zemstvo Union” [an organization to support wounded soldiers] in the interests of the war. I was accounted as a specialist in raw hides. From Harbin I sent the hides to factories in Russia for making boots for the army.

From Harbin I corresponded with Bera the shoemaker and thus learned all that was going on with our friends. Major preparations were then underway in Petersburg for the “All-Russian Jewish Conference.” Our friends played a large role in these preparations, especially Yefroikin. But the conference was never announced–the Bolsheviks had seized power.

In the summer of 1917 I received a letter from Moyshe Zilberfarb. He wrote that in Moscow a conference was held by our party, and it considered unification with the S.S. party. He also asked for material help for our party. I sent him two thousand rubles. At that time that was a lot. That same summer I received a letter from Shtief. He wrote that he had started the Jewish People's Party. The founders of the party were Yisroel Yefroikin, Nachum Shtief, Latzki-Bertholdy, Danieli-Tchernikov, Kalmanovitch, and others. He informed me of the party's principles and of the conditions of its founding.

Leyzer Khalfin also wrote to me about what happened at our conference in Moscow. He informed me that Shimon Dobin had left our party and joined the “Bund.” And our Vitebsk member Bar-Levav had joined the “Bund.”

From the Yiddish press I learned about the

[Page 351]

unification of our party with the S.S. and that the whole work of the unified party had moved to Kiev. And in Kiev they had created a large party newspaper and a publishing house.

From the press I also became aware that Moyshe Zilberfarb was named as Minister of Jewish Affairs in Ukraine.

For a certain time I maintained a correspondence with several friends. But soon after the Bolshevik overthrow in October I was cut off from Russia and my ties with my friends were severed.

When Yefroikin came to Paris and worked on the committee of the Jewish delegation, I learned about this from the American Jewish press. I made a connection with him. From that time on we maintained an occasional correspondence on Jewish communal matters. In the Far East I dealt with the emigration of refugees, victims of the First World War. I am the chair of the Harbin “HIAS” for the fifth year. And when I had to turn to Yefroikin about an important community matter, he always helped. His help was very useful in my work in the Far East.

  Vitsyebsk, Belarus     Yizkor Book Project     JewishGen Home Page

Copyright © 1999-2025 by JewishGen, Inc.
Updated 04 Sep 2025 by JH