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Uncovering Jewish Heritage

Uncovering Jewish Heritage

Monthly Archives: November 2014

Rosh Hashanah, Poznan, September 26, 2014

30 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Jewish Culture, Poznan, Synagogues

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contemporary Jewish practice in Poland

It seems fitting that I would celebrate Rosh Hashanah for the first time in Poland, considering that generations of my family lived and worshiped here. It’s our removal that is bizarre, not our presence on Polish territory.

I have been told there are only about sixty Jews in Poznan today. Most Jews in this part of Poland left when the region was under Prussian rule in the 19th century. The story contained in a number of sources is that they left because larger German cities farther west offered them more economic opportunity. I can’t help wondering, though, if they were also seeking a place with greater freedom and less persecution (a subject for further research). Over 20% of the city’s population was Jewish in 1837, but by 1922 only 1.2% were, about 2000 residents (Rafał Witkowski, 2012, The Jews of Poznań, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Miejskie Posnania). By contrast, 30% of Warsaw’s citizens at the time were Jewish.

I met the head of the Poznan Jewish Community (Gmina Żydowska), Pani Alicja Kobus, shortly before Rosh Hashanah. She has the energy and charm I remember in my grandmother and her sister, my Auntie Nunia. Pani Alicja established the Jewish Community about 15 years ago. She said nothing was happening in Poznan related to Jewish culture and heritage so she had to start from scratch. All the momentum was in Krakow and Warsaw, and much of worth in and around Poznan was being forgotten. So she negotiated with the city, and got permission to begin operations in a space the city gave her in a rough part of town. Through persistence and a lot of work, she managed to reclaim the former Jewish Community Headquarters, the building that houses the Jewish Community offices today. She said that she has had to fight for everything. She is a bulldozer. She only goes forward; she doesn’t give up. She doesn’t let obstacles stand in her way, even when people refuse her or tell her what she is trying to do is impossible. She attributes her success to this level of effort, along with the unfailing encouragement of others, as well as divine intervention. She often refers to God and miracles.

I asked pani Alicja if I could attend the events she was planning for Rosh Hashanah. She said I could, adding, “We’re such a small community, we have to be open.

I really didn’t know what to expect when I arrived at the Jewish Community Headquarters the evening of Rosh Hashanah. The building is unmarked. Last time, I had to be buzzed in. This time a few people were standing outside. One greeted me as I arrived and told me the door was open. As I climbed the wide wooden staircase to the first floor, I heard the sound of many voices. The main room was packed with people standing and sitting around two long tables laid out with tablecloths, candles, and all kinds of dishes. Two large, round challah were placed at the head of one table, and each plate had a large challah roll on it.

Pani Alicja greeted me from across the room and invited me to sit near the head of a table already full of people. She introduced me to several of the people around her. The atmosphere was warm, and the conversations friendly.

Pani Alicja got the attention of the crowd. She expressed her joy at seeing so many people (I counted over fifty, but there were more; I never saw everyone at once). She called our presence there a miracle (cud). “Just look around you,” she said, noting there were guests from the US, Germany and Israel. She lit the candles at the head of the table. It was a moving moment for me.

The synagogue is one floor up, in a smaller room with high ceilings and windows. Pews fill the back, with room to seat about 30 people. The men sit behind a partition on the side by the windows and the women sit on the side by the door. A table with a lectern faces the pews. A cabinet in the corner behind the table holds the Torah and the crown, gifts from international donors. Along the wall by the door is an old synagogue pew with faded Hebrew lettering. Pani Alicja told me it dates back to the 1800s. Someone had it in his attic, and she convinced him to donate it to the synagogue.

Rabbi Jaakov has the long ringlets (peyot), black coat and hat characteristic of Hassidic Jews. He spoke to us in Polish, explaining a little about the ceremony, how it differs from a typical Shabbat, and how to read the prayer books, which contain a combination of Hebrew, transliterated and in Hebrew lettering, and I think Polish translations. He promised to guide us through the ceremony, telling us which page to turn to in the prayer books, and explaining the various prayers and songs. In other words, he took on a teaching role as well as leading the service. He read the prayers and songs in Hebrew, with his back to us, swaying forward and back.

Some men were given prayer shawls, and removed the Torah from the cabinet. They took turns carrying it around for everyone to touch. Many also kissed their hand. There was a call for a young male volunteer to blow a horn, the shofar. One said he has tried but couldn’t. Finally someone stepped up. He was supposed to make one long and then three short toots. His first attempts didn’t produce much sound. Eventually, some awkward sounds came out. Pani Alicja remarked it was important “tylko żeby było” (just to make it).

http://www.gloswielkopolski.pl/

Rosh Hashanah, Poznan Jewish Community, September 26, 2014. http://www.gloswielkopolski.pl/

After the service, everyone returned downstairs to the tables, which were covered with a variety of dishes. Besides challah, there was carp in vinegar, beet salad, tsimis (sweet carrot salad), pomegranates, and various meat dishes, which guests identified as kosher. Rabbi Yaakov blessed the bread, which was broken and passed around. There were plates of honey to dip the challah into. Pani Alicja made a toast, and the feast began.

The event was strange and familiar at the same time. My secular upbringing makes any religious service unfamiliar. Here, especially, everything was new to me—the language, the rabbi’s motions, the separation between women and men. But the feeling was not strange—that of solidarity, of connection to something bigger than we are. It felt, oddly like a kind of homecoming.

We’re not in Poland anymore

26 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Family

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Some of the cousins had a reunion in New York last weekend. My genealogical work (along with that of other cousins and relatives) was instrumental in getting everyone in touch in the first place. All totaled, about seventeen people gathered in Manhattan, including descendants of five of my great-grandparents’ children. Until a couple of years ago, I didn’t know most of them existed.

OddBirdz Tziporela.jpg.

My cousin Pini, grandson of my grandmother’s sister Rachel, organized the gathering. He and his wife Pnina came from Israel because their son Omri was appearing in a comedy show in the Village, Odd Birdz: http://youtu.be/GULKr2ST1BE

Missing this reunion really brings home to me that my family is not in Poland anymore. We were uprooted, and in many ways the connection was severed from this place. We’re some of the lucky ones because we have re-rooted and thrived in the US, Israel, Switzerland, and (I’m told) Argentina. But I have to go to those places if I want to meet my cousins. They are not here.

I have to admit to feeling a bit defeated by this. All I am finding in Poland is fragments of Jewish lives, of my ancestors’ stories. I’m bombarded by experiences of loss, hatred, and evil.

20141117PiwkoReunion 20141118KrysiaPiniEldadFortunately, my family has done a lot to help me feel included. My brother Chris skyped me. He held up his phone and scanned the room so I could see everyone sitting in a circle, and hear several conversations going on at once. That’s just like the family gatherings I remember with the aunts and uncles I knew. I got to say “hi” to Pini, Joan (granddaughter of my grandmother’s oldest sister Liba), and Krysia (daughter of my mother’s brother George and the person who embarked on this genealogical adventure together with me three years ago). Since then, I’ve talked with/written with each of them to get their impressions of the meeting. They’ve sent me photos. Another cousin, Eldad, has promised to organize another reunion the next time I’m in New York.

Attachment to place has fascinated me, I think in part because of my mother’s longing for Poland, but also because of my own sense of dis-placement on Long Island where I grew up. Although my home was there, I never really felt “at home.” I moved away as soon as I could, when I went to college, and I never moved back. Each of my brothers returned home at some point (and Chris has even stayed), but I haven’t. I’ve found places that feel more like home elsewhere—in Alabama and in Krakow. But what is lacking in these other places is family.

Growing up, I knew my first cousins, aunts and uncles. We had big family reunions in Connecticut at Auntie Nunia’s (the one sibling of my grandmother I knew) and her daughter Teresa’s. Later, my mom spent more time with her cousins Stanley and Pauline, the children of my grandmother’s sister Sarah, so I got to know them, too. I knew my grandmother had other siblings, but we were never told much about them. I wasn’t told about the family plot in a cemetery just fifteen miles from where I grew up, or that other cousins live throughout the New York metropolitan area. In effect, I was cut off from a significant part of my family, and even more significantly, cut off from their culture, religion, and history.

Learning about my family’s heritage is complicated because I’m delving into things my mother invested a tremendous amount of energy into hiding. I think it took me so long to ask these questions about the past out of loyalty and respect for her. But I don’t believe it helped her to keep things secret. Quite the opposite. By denying or hiding her Jewish heritage, she never could come to terms with the trauma she experienced. And she alienated herself from the support system that might have helped her come to terms with it.

For me, recognizing and embracing all the branches of my family helps to root me, if not in a particular place, at least within a particular history. I’m proud to be part of this large extended family. It feels like a tremendous gift. That we survived, that we thrived. I don’t take for granted how fortunate we are for that. For so many families, there is no one left, just the scattered fragments of lives lost.

Mom grew up at Dębinki

23 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Bereda, Family

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The time my mother recalls as the happiest part of her childhood was from ages six through twelve, when she lived on an estate outside of Warsaw called Dębinki. Originally built in the 18th century, it was named after the many oak trees in the park surrounding it (dębi means “oaks” in Polish). It was a big house with several annex buildings including the kitchen and stables. There were three lakes on the property, and agricultural fields her father (actually, her stepfather) rented out to farmers from the nearby village.

The front of Dębinki

Dębinki

My mother had a lot of freedom to explore the neighboring countryside; sometimes she would hide from her German governess, who would call for her, “Marysien, Marysien,” but she would stay quiet in the tall grass. Other times, she would kick off her shoes and stockings and climb a tree, also refusing to heed her caretaker’s pleas to come down. She didn’t like this governess, who would try and get her to eat by demanding in imperfect Polish that she “swallow” (połknij). She and her brothers didn’t go to school. Rather a tutor gave them their lessons at home.

One time, Mom was picking strawberries in one of her father’s fields when a farmer came out and told her he had leased the land and the strawberries were his. My mom hadn’t known, but was so embarrassed she picked a whole basket of beans from their garden and gave them to the farmer. Another time, while still very young, she was caught in the storeroom eating fresh butter directly out of the pot.

As a child, mom loved to ride horses, and had a pony called “Daisy.” There were three ponies—Drips, Drops, and Daisy; Drips and Drops belonged to each of her brothers. I asked her why the ponies had English names. She just shrugged and answered that’s what they named them. After coming to the US, my mom rarely had the opportunity to ride horses, though one day I came home from school (or maybe from a friend’s house) and our neighbor Mrs. Scimeme (or was it Mrs. Quinlavin?) told me with astonishment that she had seen my mom riding down our suburban street on a horse. If I remember correctly (and my memory of this is very fuzzy, almost as if I dreamed it), she was riding bareback, too. I don’t remember whose horse it was, why its owner came to our house, or why my mother decided to ride it. I do remember that Mrs. Scimeme (or Mrs Quinlavin, though I’m pretty sure it was Mrs. Scimeme) was amazed by how well my mother could ride, even after so many years.

These memories existed out of time, so I did not know until much later when or why my mother and her family left Dębinki. My uncle, for his own reasons, kept alive the idea that somewhere in Poland the family estate still exists, that it was nationalized by the postwar communist government, and that we might someday reclaim ownership.

I learned the truth only after visiting Dębinki in 1992, while I was more than a year into my dissertation fieldwork. Mom had never wanted to return to Poland; she said her country no longer existed. But after the fall of state socialism, and because I was living there, she, my father, and my younger brother came for a visit. It was Mom’s first time back in over 45 years. I’ll say more about our time in Warsaw and Krakow later, but for now, let me describe our trip to Tłuszcz.

Tłuszcz is an inauspicious name for a town—it means “Fat,” and in 1992 it lived up to its name. It was about an hour out of Warsaw by commuter train. The train itself was old and grimy with uncomfortable vinyl seats. We got out in the town center; the place seemed deserted, with grey buildings and abandoned factories. We found a cab to take us to Dębinki, which was several kilometers out of town, past more abandoned factories and then through agricultural fields. The mansion was in the midst of renovation; the plaster exterior was chipped and faded. The building had been a home for wayward boys, and then it became an orphanage, and the large upstairs rooms had been divided with cheap partitions. Nevertheless, the grand fireplace in the entranceway remained, along with a black marble plaque inscribed in Latin with a tribute to the original owner who lived there in the 18th century.

This trip was very sad for my Mom, perhaps the worst part of her whole trip to Poland. Here she felt most strongly that (just as she had always told me) the country she grew up in and loved no longer existed. She had trouble reconciling this broken down building with her romantic memories of childhood. She pointed to the depressions in the ground where the lakes used to be, and said the trees lining the long drive to the house seemed smaller.

When I explained that my mother grew up in the house, the caretaker who showed us around looked confused and said that, according to the historical records he has seen, the house belonged to a different family. Later, my mother explained what had happened. As she described it, her father (actually, stepfather) had a gentleman’s agreement to buy the estate from the owner, a nobleman who had come on hard times. Papa, as my mother called him, had lost his own estate in his divorce settlement, and dreamed of replacing it. However, after several years, he had a falling out with the nobleman and because nothing had been written down, he lost possession of Dębinki.

My brother Chris remembers this better than I do, but during our visit the workers at the orphanage, long term residents of the adjoining village, treated mom with deference. Mom found their regard annoying. She was humble and didn’t like being treated as special. But what we were witnessing was the continuation of the class system that wasn’t even stamped out by Communism. Mom had the manners and refined speech of a lady, and the kitchen workers and custodial staff fell into their roles as servants of the great house.

I still noticed a little of this deference when I went back a few months ago with my brothers. The orphanage staff, and later the people hanging around the village store, were very happy to talk to descendants of former residents of the estate. The older men at the store said they recalled their parents talking about the Beredas. The orphanage staff told me how the former estate workers tried to guard the house against looting during the war. For a while it was used by the Polish Underground Army, and then briefly by the Nazis. The roof sustained some damage from bombs. After the war, the property was nationalized and it was fixed up and converted into a state institution. It became an orphanage in 1991 (the year before I first visited).

I remarked how the building was being renovated when we visited twenty years ago. We were invited to look around. The front facade and the ground floor rooms were all restored to a hint of their earlier grandeur, though they ran out of funds before they could get to the back facade. The floors were restored, though the intricate parquet my mom remembered was at some point before our visit in 1992 replaced by simpler wooden floorboards. Rooms are painted in a range of colors, with ornate crown molding along the high ceilings. One is the dining hall, another a game room. Outside, marshy depressions indicate where the lakes used to be. By one, down a treelined lane from the house, is a madonna statue (or was it a saint? I lost my field notes and my photos when my hard drive died…) There are many large trees on the property, including those along the drives and lanes.

According to the history of the place in a pamphlet given to me by one of the orphanage workers, King August II gave the land to Jan Renard near the end of the 17th century for faithful service. Renard sold it to the Dybowskis who remained in possession until 1841. During this time, the Polish poet Cyprian Norwid spent time there with his mother and her stepfather. The property passed through several owners before being sold to Helena Osowska in the 1920s, who lived there during World War II.

If that is the case, who was the nobleman my step-grandfather got the property from? Why is there no record of the Beredas living there? For everything I uncover, it seems more mysteries are also revealed.

My brother’s thoughts during his first trip to Poland

22 Saturday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Bereda, Family, World War II

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My brother Wiley wrote some other moving posts about our Mom’s experiences in Poland.

About Warsaw: “Growing up my Mom shared chilling accounts of her experience during WWII as a courier in the Polish Underground Army and a medic during the Polish uprising. The German response was to level Warsaw destroying / leveling over 85% of the city. My mom survived, not without physical injuries and she required over 22 plastic surgeries to piece her scull and face back together. She was forever changed by the war. She was always concerned about how her face looked. I never noticed anything wrong, she was just my mom. In retrospect she suffered from what today is called PTSD and I am convinced passed the trauma of war on to her four kids. Visiting Warsaw, seeing the images of the leveled city and walking through the Old City (that was rebuilt and recreated after the war), makes these memories and stories become very much more real.”

A fragment of the old wall surrounding Warsaw's Old City. All of it has been reconstructed.

A fragment of the old wall surrounding Warsaw’s Old City. All of it has been reconstructed.

About Dębinki, the estate Mom lived on as a child. It’s about an hour outside of Warsaw, near a town with the regrettable name Tłuszcz (Fat):

“Mom spoke to me about her Pony, yes like the Seinfeld episode, but mostly about the wonderful gardens, meadows and trees of her childhood. Visiting this estate located in a small town about an hour by train outside of Warsaw was a very emotional experience. The town is Tluszcz, and the estate is Debinki, please don’t ask me to say these words.

“The house was taken by the German’s during the war and did sustain some bomb damage. Never returned to its original state, it is currently used as an orphanage.

“Mom lived here from the age of six to 12 and than moved with her family to a villa in Warsaw along the Vistula river.

The villa was destroyed by German bombs during the war and today the land is a park and roadway.”

The drive from the road to Dębinki

The drive from the road to Dębinki

The front of Dębinki

The front of Dębinki

The back of Dębinki

The back of Dębinki

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That’s me walking in the back lawn, as we imagined our Mama would have as a child.

More about Lesko

22 Saturday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Heritage work, Lesko, Synagogues, World War II

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While he was in Poland in August, my older brother Wiley had some valuable insights about Jewish heritage and about our family. This was his first time in Poland and his fresh perspective gave me a lot to think about.

This is what he posted on Facebook about Lesko:

“The largest structure in Lesko, Poland is a synagogue yet there are no Jews. Larger than the church. Not only are there no Jews there is no memory that there were any Jews. Let’s remember that 3,000 human beings, Jews, were murdered from this town, half the population, and there are those that care.”

The interior of the Lesko Synagogue. It is used as an art gallery. During my last trip to Lesko, I learned that the gallery is closed from fall to spring because the building has no heat.

The interior of the Lesko Synagogue.

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Inside the synagogue: List of 3000 residents of Lesko and surroundings murdered by Nazis during the years 1939-1944.

About this photo, my brother’s commented, “Someone took the time to list the names. Thank you.” About me he remarked, “Taking the time to read the names and remember.”

Today, the synagogue belongs to the county (gmina) and is used as an art gallery. Just this month, I learned that the gallery is closed from fall to spring because the building has no heat. The Dom Kultury (Community Center) which manages the building wants to apply for funds to renovate the synagogue. The most pressing problem is moisture issues. Water creeps through the old stone walls and plaster, weakening the structure and even damaging the art housed within it.

Only a few survived in Lesko

17 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Lesko, Polish-Jewish relations, Survival, World War II

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I have often remarked how the synagogue in Lesko is larger than the Catholic Church. It stands as a silent reminder of the prewar Jewish majority. Lesko is a small town of about 6000 residents on the edge of the Bieszczady Mountains in the southeast corner of Poland, and the site of my ethnographic fieldwork since 1992. The Bieszczady region was home to a multicultural population until the devastation of the mid-20th century turned it into Poland’s underpopulated, ethnically homogenous “wild east.” The Jews became victims of the Holocaust, while many Ukrainians and Poles escaped the German-Soviet front during the war. After the war most of the remaining Ukrainians were removed to the Soviet Union or the land acquired from Germany by the postwar Polish state, and Poles were resettled from across the Soviet border or emigrated voluntarily from overpopulated communities in western Poland.

Lesko Synagogue, 1992

Lesko Synagogue, 1992

While in Lesko last week, I asked some of my friends what they know about the town’s Jews—is there anyone who can tell me what happened before and during the war? Did any Jews survive? Are there any Jewish descendants left in the area? Ever since embarking on this investigation of Jews in Poland, I have wanted to find out why the topic of Jews has come up so rarely during my frequent visits to Lesko over the past twenty years. Sure, I was shown the synagogue and the Jewish Cemetery on my first tour of the town, and rarely, someone mentioned that certain buildings used to belong to Jews, but that’s where it ended. Unlike in Krakow, where having a Jewish ancestor became for some a badge of distinction, in Bieszczady no one ever mentioned their own or anyone else’s Jewish heritage. It simply was not talked about. Or maybe I never asked?

Based on my initial conversations last week, there is still a lot of reluctance to think about, let alone talk about Lesko’s Jews. But a few people gladly engaged with the topic.

First the reluctance. Often there is a pause, and then the response, “No, there is nobody left. Or at least they don’t admit it (nie przyznają się).” I got the same response in places like Lutowiska, which was over 60% Jewish before World War II. In Lutowiska, nearly all the contemporary residents have roots in other parts of Poland or in the former Soviet Union (borders were not fixed there until the 1950s), which might explain the general ignorance about the village’s history. Many of Lesko’s residents arrived after the war, but there is also a good number of autochthonous families who remain in the town.

The one person several people suggested might be willing to talk to me was Romuald Zwonarz, whose father Józef saved the lives of several Jews by helping them hide from the Nazis for nearly two years. Fortunately, pan Romuald agreed to meet me. Over a long conversation, he told me his father’s story, mostly by sharing published accounts with me, annotated with marginal comments and sticky notes that correct errors and point out inconsistencies. He did not want to be recorded because he aspires toward a perfect historical record and is too painfully aware of the false starts and misremembered details that taint spoken language. Still, he is proud of what his father did.

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Rena, Jafa, and Natan Wallach 1947

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Józef Zwonarz and his wife Franciszka

The story is told in rich detail in Bitter Freedom, written by one of the survivors, Jafa Wallach shortly after she settled in the United States. Jafa wrote it to her daughter Rena to explain their wartime experiences and why they left Rena with strangers from the age of four to six. It’s an amazing account of an awful story. Basically, Jafa along with her husband Natan, who was a doctor, her two brothers, and toward the very end her sister, all hid under Józef’s mechanic workshop in a crawl space they dug themselves. It had earthen walls and was barely tall enough to kneel in with your head against the ceiling. Even more extraordinarily, the workshop was situated between Gestapo headquarters and the Ukrainian police offices in the center of town. Józef worked long hours repairing the occupiers’ vehicles, and then would sneak water and food to the hidden Jews at night. He also helped to find a safe place for Rena with a forest guard in a remote hut several kilometers from Lesko. Józef was recognized in 1967 as one of the Righteous among Nations, though he could not receive his medal until 1980.

From Romuald and his family’s story, I learned there was a work camp for Jews across the river from Zagórz. Lesko’s Jews were taken there before being killed on the spot or at the concentration camp at Belzec. Jafa only knew of a few who survived in hiding or with false (Aryan) papers. Romuald mentioned a few more he is aware of. Out of 30,000 Jews in the region before the war, only eighty survivors gathered in nearby Sanok after it ended. Those who came out of hiding were not made to feel welcome. As Jafa explains, some asked them “What are you doing among the living?” while others just looked with expressions of indifference.

I count on it that on future visits, I will learn of other people who remember Lesko’s Jews and are willing to talk about them.

Żychlin, part 3

10 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Synagogues, Żychlin

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Promised photos of the Żychlin synagogue before the roof fell in:

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Sketch of the Żychlin synagogue, with well in front and mikvah on right. From “Memorial Book of Zychlin” Ami Shamir . The Zychliner Organization of Israel and America”. Tel Aviv 1974. Posted on “Zychlin-Historia.com.pl

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Żychlin synagogue during the Interwar Period. From Zychlin-Historia.com.pl

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Around 2008, roof still intact. From H. Olszewski

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Żychlin, part 2

02 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Jewish Culture, World War II, Żychlin

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The Jewish cemetery is on a hillside on the outskirts of Żychlin, surrounded by a metal fence. The place is overgrown, though not too long ago someone cleared out some of the underbrush, leaving cut branches in piles. The tombstones were decimated during World War II. The remaining fragments were assembled into roughly formed monuments, which are disturbing for several reasons. For one, there are so few remnants relative to the size of the cemetery. Second, most are just pieces of the original stones. Third, the monuments have a haphazard quality. I wished for something better able to display the details of the remaining tombstones, and more visually compelling. Three such piles (I don’t really know what to call them) are near the entrance gate. A fourth is behind a monument with the inscription in Polish and Hebrew, “In memory of our brothers buried in this cemetery as well as for those murdered by Hitler’s criminals at Chełm [Concentration Camp] 1942.” The plaques are covered with graffiti—mostly peoples’ names, though “Wisła,” the name of a soccer team, is also inscribed. The only grave in what seems like its full form is that of a rabbi. The upright rectangular stone has a plaque inscribed in Hebrew, and domed stones cover the gravesite.

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Monument made of fragments of tombstones

Commemorative monument

Commemorative monument

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Grave of the tzadik Szmuel Abba, son of Zelig (sztetl.org.pl)

No one remembered for sure, but pani Agnieszka said she thinks a foundation paid for the renovation of the cemetery in the early 1990s. Later, pan Józef at the local government offices recalled the work was done during the first term of the postcommunist local government, which would put it about 22 years ago.

Other events directly associated with the destruction of Jewish life and lives occurred in Żychlin. Nazi occupiers marched 200 Jews to the cemetery and shot them. Pan Józef recalls his father and two other neighbors were awakened by the Nazis and told to dig graves for murdered Jews. There were also two Jewish ghettos in town. The smaller one was on the grounds of an old factory. A long, low workers’ residence (which remains occupied today) was also where Jews lived in the ghetto. The larger ghetto was nearer the center of town. One side of it ran along Budzyńska Street, which was the most common address for Jews in the early 20th century (see Tomasz Kawski, Gminy zydowskie pogranicza Wielkopolski Mazowsza i Pomorza w latach 1918-1942, 2007, pp. 270-77). Pan Henryk explained that the area used to contain smaller, older homes. All the Jews were moved to the area on one side of Budzińska Street, and all the Poles were moved to the area on the other side. Jews were only allowed to walk on the side of street that was in the ghetto. The Jews were removed in 1942 to death camps in other parts of Poland. All the buildings in the ghetto were burned. Pan Henryk gave me a photo of Jews’ possessions stacked in piles in a barren field that had been the ghetto, and a thriving neighborhood before that. In total about 4000 people lived in both ghettos. Most were from Żychlin, though some came from the surrounding area. No one returned after the war.

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The former ghetto area is now filled with block apartments dating from the 1970s. Some older homes survived along Budzyńska Street. Pani Agnieszka pointed out typical characteristics of Jewish buildings. They tend to be shallow with windows on just the front and sides, and a flat windowless back as if the owners anticipated adding on another home that would share the back wall. She pointed out one house where after the war bedding and other valuables were found above a false ceiling in the attic. There was mention of other places where hidden treasures were found or where former residents returned to dig up the valuables they left behind, but the details were fuzzy. So maybe they really happened, though maybe they are stories built out of the stereotype of rich Jews.

A former Jewish home with characteristic flat back

A former Jewish home with characteristic flat back

Żychlin, part 1

01 Saturday Nov 2014

Posted by Marysia Galbraith in Synagogues, Żychlin

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My great-grandmother Hinda Walfisz was born in 1854 in Żychlin, a town near Kutno and perhaps 100km from Warsaw. Before World War II, its Jewish residents (the first of whom settled in the 16th century) comprised as much as 60% of the population. None returned after the war. Many were shot by the Nazis; others were moved into ghettos and then to the death camps. Today, Żychlin has about 10,000 residents, including descendents of prewar Catholic families and others who migrated to the town after the war.

My guides where local historians Henryk and Agnieszka Olszynski. Pan Henryk emphasized to me that local history is his passion, but that he is an amateur (his word). I found him through his blog http://zychlin-historia.com.pl/ in which he documents his ongoing discovery of historical information about the town. Henryk’s wife Agnieszka said she couldn’t avoid becoming interested in history through her husband. She took the lead when describing the places we visited, while pan Henryk talked more about the supporting documents he has found through the people he has met, in Polish archives, and online.

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Henryk and Agnieszka, Żychlin historians

From the very beginning, pan Henryk stressed to me that Jews and Christians lived well together. There were no pogroms in Żychlin. He drove us through former Jewish neighborhoods to the synagogue, Jewish cemetery, and World War II ghettos.

Former Jewish homes

Former Jewish homes

The synagogue is in a neglected part of town, surrounded on two sides by the backs of buildings. The roads here have not been resurfaced in a long time. They have ruts and holes, and one paved with rounded stones probably dates back a hundred years. Pani Agnieszka explained that all the buildings around there used to be owned and occupied by Jews. Now they belong to the town and are rented. It doesn’t look like anyone bothers to maintain them. For instance, the wall of one house has a wide crack, windows are old, and plaster is falling off walls. Residents looked out at us from behind curtains and doorways.

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Żychlin synagogue

The synagogue was used by the Nazis as a warehouse. They bricked up all but the tops of the long arched windows. For many years after the war, a state cooperative continued to use the building as a warehouse, but now it stands abandoned. The roof fell in five or six years ago. Pan Henryk said one day there was a loud crash as it just collapsed. Until recently, the wooden babiniec (2nd floor where women sat) was still held up by metal beams, and the wall paintings were still intact in places. But only a few fragments of paint survive today, barely visible through the gaps where the windows used to be.

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Little is left of the interior paintings

The salvageable metal and wood were carted away. “You know how it is,” pan Henryk explained. The fate of the remaining walls is uncertain. Pan Henryk says the Jewish Community gave it to the local government after the roof fell in, but they have no money to renovate it, nor can they tear it down because it’s protected as a historic site. For now, it seems fated to continue to deteriorate along with the homes and roads around it.

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