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As the years go by since the tragic Holocaust, my heart leans towards sailing in memories and, despite the fact that they are tied to great emotional tension, they exist, they are squeezed into the depths of the soul, imprisoned, but existing and alive, and when a propitious time comes, a light touch is sufficient to awaken them and they take shape; and, in the appropriate circumstances, the floodgate of memories opens and things flow fluidly, in detail, as if they had just happened yesterday, and in front of my eyes, the people who were cruelly murdered arise and, once again, I am in the atmosphere of the days of the Holocaust.

Tovah (Gitele) Steinberg-Reuveni

I want to tell - and not just in short - about the suffering that befell the Jews of Ostroh. Only a small handful of our city remained alive, those that managed to flee to Russia at the outbreak of the war and those who fought with the partisans in the forests, with the Red Army, and a small handful who were saved thanks to the righteous of the nations of the world who, although sunk in an atmosphere and in a society of murderers, did not take on Jew hatred and they extended their supportive hands at the ugliest period of our lives.

I am one of those who were saved. I must tell the story so that future generations will know what happened to me during the days of the terrible Holocaust.

The Polish-German war that broke out on September 1, 1939 was short, only 16 days. These were days full of tension and threat and, at daybreak of September 17, Russian tanks entered Ostroh due to the alliance between Germany and the USSR (the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact). The Red Army streamed in masses day and night in the direction of the city of Brisk [=Brest, Belarus] and, after a short time, took control of all of western Ukraine and Belarus.

Very quickly the new regime was established over all its offices. The disinheritance of the middle class from its economic positions began. The wealthy among the Jews of the city received instructions to leave their apartments, and the government offices

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and the clerks with their families, sent to us from the east, were housed in these apartments. In place of stores and private companies, government companies, co-operatives, government stores, etc. were organized. The local population and the Jews had no choice but to accept this ruling, but principally they worried as to what this new regime would bring to them?

The elimination of Jewish national life naturally ended. The authorities didn't even have to take special measures to bring that about. The Jews understood that they had to abandon public activity, which was not acceptable to the Soviet regime. All the Zionist organizations and the others ceased to exist. Then arrests and investigations by the offices of the NKVD began and several Jews who headed the Zionist movements were imprisoned and sentenced to long confinements and sent to various prisons in distant Siberia.

Among those imprisoned were friend of our family, the lawyer, Baruch (Buzi) Chasid, of whom all trace disappeared, Gedaliah Gedalivsky, head of Ha-Tzohar [=Revisionist Zionist party] in Ostroh, Yosef Kleinman and his son-in-law, Feivel Bernstein, and some from among the wealthy of the city.

My brother, Moshe Steinberg, who was active in the “Ha-No'ar Ha-Tziyoni” movement was afraid that he, too, was on the NKVD's “Black List” and he decided to flee from the city while it was still not too late. Together with a group of Polish acquaintances, who also feared that they were likely to be imprisoned, he crossed the border between the USSR and the General-Government and got to Kharkov [=Kharkiv]. The Poles got Polish documents for my brother in the name of Ludvik Rodenitsky and this is how he was registered in the registry of Kharkov residents.

In this city, he met a young Polish woman named Visia and they fell in love, but she didn't know that her fiance was Jewish, but when my brother told her about his Jewish background, it didn't bother her in the least. They married and over five years, during all the years of the Nazi occupation, she took care of him devotedly in order to save him from death while putting herself and her family in mortal danger.

She and her family overcame their fear and offered a helping hand to my brother, knowing that if they did not do that, my brother's death would weigh on their consciences for the rest of their lives. They rescued him from Nazi clutches and they live a happy life now in Europe.

At dawn on June 22, 1941, Germany attacked the USSR with great force and, in a short period of time, the German army advanced deep into the USSR. The atmosphere was intense and full of terror. The Red Army fled and left the defense lines around Ostroh.

The Russians fled by vehicle or on foot, all fleeing in panic, it was a terrifying flight and still we didn't know why they were all fleeing. We heard shooting from all sides, the sound of airplanes flying over the skies of the city and dropping bombs. Dead people were lying in the streets, fires, and complete chaos reigned in the city.

Immediately after the conquest of the city by the Germans, the Jewish population began to feel the heavy boot of the German enemy. The lives of the Jews had no value. With the occupation of the city, the Germans published various restrictions and decrees against the Jews. They were commanded to wear a white band with a blue Jewish star on the sleeves of their garments. Jews were forbidden to walk on the sidewalks, permitted only to walk in the road. A curfew was laid upon the entire population beginning at 9 p.m., but Jews were forbidden to go out beginning at 7 p.m. The local Ukrainian police took upon itself the task of checking compliance to the decrees.

So that the Jews of Ostroh could not escape extermination, the German command set up a ghetto in the “Garbela” quarter of the city. The Jews were ordered to leave their homes and move to houses in the ghetto. Every Jew between the ages of 16 and 60 was directed to present himself for work. Severe punishment was expected if one did not present oneself for work. The Ukrainian police were appointed to carry out this instruction.

The situation got much worse, hunger oppressed us and the situation became unbearable. We turned into oppressed and depressed slaves. After awhile, I found work as a waitress in the restaurant of the Ukrainian police and my sister found work as a clerk in the Judenrat offices. Due to my work at the restaurant, I was able to bring a little food home for my parents and sister.

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As fate would have it, I met a Ukrainian policeman by the name of Borchakovsky at the restaurant, a cobbler who, before the war, had worked for the Jewish Lolki family who had a shoe factory in Ostroh. This man knew my family, too, and he would endanger himself to bring us food from time to time and he would come every once in a while to the fence of the ghetto in order to maintain contact with us. He also promised me that he would help in the event that I needed it.

When I heard these words, I didn't know what to think: who is this man who is prepared to lend a helping hand to a persecuted Jew at this time? Events chased events and daily we experienced new things. The cordon around the ghetto was tightening daily. But no one with common sense was able to imagine that, in fact, the Germans were prepared to murder thousands of people.

One after the other, bad news began to reach us from all corner of Volhynia about the annihilation of masses everywhere in every city and town. And then, one day when I was returning from work, I met a Christian acquaintance by the name of Volodya Polishchuk. He told me that there were rumors that the Germans were preparing to liquidate the Jews and he suggested to me that I flee from the ghetto. He offered to help me should I need it. I did not agree to his suggestion, I didn't want to leave my parents and my young sister in the ghetto by themselves.

And then, on August 4, 1941, the ghetto was surrounded by a large number of German forces and Ukrainian policemen. In the ghetto, it felt like a pogrom. The action began at dawn. The Germans and the Ukrainians broke into the houses of the Jews, taking people out of bed. They took the ill out of the hospital on stretchers, wailing and bitter crying all around. They drove everyone out of their homes, no one remained at home. The Germans and the Ukrainian policemen carried out their operation with speed and cruelty, with blows and brutal prods.

They made us stand in the new city and there we stood until 4 in the afternoon and with a trembling heart. Jews came up with hypotheses, maybe the murderers were only preparing to loot the houses of the Jews and with the end of the “work” they would be freed, but at the same moment, a rumor spread about the decision of the Germans to liquidate the sick and the elderly.

The selection began. The Germans divided the people into two groups. No one knew what the Germans intended to do with the Jews in the two groups. We stood and waited with terror for what awaited us. We were surrounded on all sides and the Germans and the Ukrainian policemen ran around keeping order.

The parents of Gitele Steinberg Chaim and Mala (slaughtered in Ostroh)

Mourning, we returned to the ghetto without my father. Waiting for disaster, perhaps we are waiting for our end? Now there was no doubt that any hope of remaining alive had run out, all the dreams that the Germans would let us live had disappeared. But life went on and we were hungry and despondent, moving around like shadows between the walls of the ghetto, which closed in on us after the terrible slaughter. Many houses were empty of Jews. Life

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in the ghetto got harder by the day. The Nazis sought to eliminate the Jews of the ghetto not just physically through unceasing terror, but also to strangle any living thought and attempt to awaken opposition from this quarter before they succeeded in executing them.

Day by day, the cordon around the ghetto tightened. No one with common sense was able to accept that, in fact, the Germans were prepared to murder thousands of people. Events happened one after the other and daily we experienced new things. We became apathetic and equally indifferent to the troubles of the whole and of the individual. Tragedies visited us one after the other, one worse than the other, and all together they piled up like a mountain of trouble, a procession of horrors. But in those difficult days, the people in the ghetto took pity on one another, that perhaps despite everything there was hope of life, that perhaps despite everything the Germans would not carry out the murder of masses.

On September 1 at 6 a.m., we again had to present ourselves for forced labor, but through the windows we saw that the Germans, dressed in raincoats and metal helmets, were running around the streets of the ghetto, something that aroused suspicion. Ukrainian policemen followed them, they entered houses and began to force the Jews out of their homes with the deception that they had to present themselves for work. The heart foretold evil. I didn't leave the house so as not to present myself for work.

One could already here incessant automatic fire outside. In the streets, the sounds of great explosions that shocked the entire ghetto could be heard. I sat and looked with trepidation at what was happening outside. I had one prayer in my heart, that the Germans would not start to murder. I see people gripped with fear and trembling gathering outside, and the Germans and the Ukrainian police searching every house, every courtyard, looking for Jews who had not come outside.

At that moment, Roza, the wife of Lova Kornblit who had been executed on August 4, came to us. I told Roza that I had decided not to present myself for work because I worried that the Germans were about to carry out an action in the ghetto today. I suggested to her that we go up into the attic and hide, perhaps the Germans wouldn't find us.

I wasn't wrong. The Germans decided to execute all the young people and, in fact, they chose all the young people from among the group that stood outside and they transported them outside of the ghetto under the pretext of sending them to work. My sister, Chasia, still managed to leave early in the morning for her workplace at the Judenrat offices before the Germans gathered all the young people and she was saved from death on that day.

The two of us sat in the attic the entire day and luckily they didn't search for us and we, too, were saved from death on that day. These were days of death and destruction before the final extermination of the Jews of Ostroh. After the murder of the young people, life in the ghetto somehow went on. We went out daily in groups of Jews for work accompanied by Ukrainian “overseers” equipped with rifles and batons.

That day, October 25 [typo?], was cold and rainy. A command came to be ready to leave the ghetto. Terror gripped everyone, each person searching for a way to be saved, but to no avail. The ghetto had become a closed cage, surrounded by enlarged forces of Germans and Ukrainian policemen who were equipped with much weaponry. The Germans drove the Jews out of their homes. My mother, terror-stricken, went out of the house to see what was happening outside, my sister, Chasia, went to her workplace at the Judenrat offices seeking there a place of rescue.

I remained at home alone. You could hear shouts, crying, aggressive curses of the murderers outside. The shots grew with great vigor, wailing and shouting filling the airspace, and at that moment, I remembered my Christian friends who had promised to help me at a tight time. This was the only hope that perhaps I could get help from them and stay alive. I saw that the Ukrainian police had surrounded the ghetto on all sides so that we wouldn't be able to escape from it. Among the Ukrainian police was also my friend, Borchakovsky. I decided

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to crawl out of the ghetto and, by chance, I happened upon Borchakovsky who was looking for me in order to save me and, when he saw that I was crawling among the ranks of the policemen, he engaged them in conversation so that they wouldn't pay attention to me, but to no avail: one of the policemen saw me, shot me, and hit me in the ankle. I lay on the ground, wounded, showing no signs of life. At midnight, under cover of darkness, I managed to evade the eyes of the policemen and, crawling, managed to leave the walls of the ghetto. I arrived wounded and hungry at Borchakovsky's house.

Chasia Steinberg (sister of Gitele Steinberg-Reuveni) killed in Ostroh

When I arrived at Borchakovsky's, he calmed me, took pity on me, and said to me, there is no reason to be afraid, he and his family would help me, they would share my fate. He was a good-hearted man who revealed willingness to do whatever he could to save me from death. He understood the seriousness of the situation, that he was endangering his own life and those of his family, but he was prepared to help me in this difficult situation.

The next morning, I asked Borchakovsky to go to my house in the ghetto and see whether any of my family were hiding in the attic. And, in fact, he found my mother and my sister in the attic. He promised them that he would come at midnight to bring them to him. Unfortunately, when he returned to the ghetto to get them, there were no longer there. He only found photos scattered over the floor. He collected them and brought them to me instead of my mother and my sister. After a few days, I learned that my sister, Chasia, too, had been caught by the Germans together with her friend and that the two of them had been executed.

The deaths of my mother and sister brought me to depression. I felt as though limbs had been cut off my body. For many days, I mourned them, but with this I reached the conclusion that I had to be strong despite the loss of my mother and sister. I was in a state of shock, but the will to live overcame me.

The Borchakovsky family was poor, but, despite the trouble, they tried to save me from hunger. His wife, a friendly peasant and honest, showed that she, too, was prepared to save me from death. She even influenced her husband not to withdraw in the face of the difficulties. Besides me, they were also hiding a relative of the Trachtman family, Irena was her name, the two of us hid at the Borchakovskys for several months while switching hiding places.

During those days, a Polish woman named Kasia visited the Borchakovskys and said that she, too, was hiding Trachtman at her house and was taking care of him. This was a woman who put her life in danger through her efforts to help Jews in that awful time as much as she could. During those long evenings, we spoke a lot about the situation of the Jews. Irena, too, was full of confidence that the war would end with the defeat of the Germans. It was this confidence that filled us with hope that we would overcome the calamities and remain alive.

Once Kasia told us that a rumor was going around that the Borchakovsky family was hiding two Jewish women while the Ukrainian police, and even the local population, started searching for Jews hidden among the Christians. The danger that they would catch us

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at the Borchakovsky house was felt. It was clear that we had to leave his house before it was too late.

Borchakovsky was very embarrassed because he wanted to save us, but was also afraid of the serious consequences. If Jews were found in his house, it was a death sentence for himself and his family. At this time, the authorities announced that a Christian who hid a Jew in his house was sentenced to death. This threat terrified many good people who had been prepared to help.

I asked Borchakovsky to go to Volodya Polishchuk and tell him to hide us in his house and about the foreseeable danger should the Germans or the police catch me at his house. And he did go to Polishchuk and that one came immediately with a cart full of hay. At my request, he also agreed to take Irena because I didn't want to part from her. He hid us under a pile of hay and we arrived safely at his house in the village of Moshchanytsya [?]. The German guards stopped the cart on the way to the village and began to search in the hay to see if he was bringing forbidden things. But luckily, they didn't find us and we were saved from certain death.

On the third day after we left Borchakovsky's house, the Gestapo surrounded the house. They searched the entire house, but they didn't find us. We remained at Polishchuk's house for 3 months. Once in a while, his brothers, who were part of the infamous Bandera gangs, would visit him. These were gangs who murdered Jews and also Poles. Every time he knew that they would visit, Polishchuk took care to move us to hide in his windmill where we suffered from cold and hunger.

When his brothers' visits became more frequent and the situation became catastrophic, we had to leave Polishchuk's house and return to Borchakovsky. We always knew that in times of mortal danger, the certain address was his. He always understood the severity of the situation, was always ready to help and to come to our aid at every opportunity. And so he received us with open arms. He saw immediately what our condition was. We could tell that he was very moved and he expressed his desire to take care of us during this terrible time. When we heard these words, we didn't know how to evaluate this good heartedness of a non-Jew, who served in the Ukrainian police, despite liable to mortal danger. We hid at Borchakovsky's house until the Red Army liberation on February 5, 1944.

These descriptions that I have put down on paper, they are nothing compared to the bitter reality and nothing that I went through will be erased from my memory and I always see before me my loved ones, my parents, my sisters, who were annihilated by the cursed Nazis and their Ukrainian helpers. I have never forgotten my rescuers, the families of Borchakovsky and Polishchuk to whom I owe my life, who endangered their own in order to save me from death. My ethical responsibility is to express my thanks to those righteous of the nations of the world who never accepted anti-semitism and who put out a supporting hand at the most difficult time of my life, during the terrible Holocaust.

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The Steinberg Family in Ostroh Sitting from right to left: the father, Chaim Steinberg, the daughter, Gitele, the mother, Mala Standing: the daughter, Chasia, and the son, Moshe

Moshe Steinberg

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