Tag #120556 - Interview #89576 (Tobijas Jafetas)

My mother, Bertha Shustoff, was born in 1893, same year as my father. This Jewish surname appears in Jewish archives. According to some information, my ancestors lived in Lisbon in the 13th century. My mother’s parents, David and Genia Shustoff, born in the 1860s, came from the town of Visginas in Lithuania [130 km east of Vilnius]. My great-grandfather, David Doniakhi, grandmother Genia’s father –his name originates from the old Jewish name of Yakhi with the Spanish attachment of Don, which proves that my mother’s parents lived in Spain – was a rabbi. My grandfather, David Shustoff, studied religion under him. He became his best and favorite student and married Genia. When World War I began, the tsarist government deported Jewish residents from the near-the-front areas, seeing potential spies in them. David and Genia Shustoff were deported to Perm [2000 km from Moscow], where shortly after their arrival my grandfather became the rabbi of the town. When Lithuania gained independence [see Lithuanian independence] [8] in 1918, David’s family stayed in Russia. This was the time of World War I, and Perm was in the rear. It was cold and there was lack of food in the town. Grandfather David died of hunger in 1942. Grandmother Genia survived and lived ten years after the war.