We didn't know anything about the situation. We took some rest and then decided to go to the Soviet army. We wanted the fascists to pay their price for what they had done. We hoped to liberate our relatives. We went to a registry office to volunteer to the army. When officers there looked at us they said we needed to go to a hospital rather than to the army. I was as thin as a rake and my companions looked no better. The officer that talked to us refused to accept Voita, but Aron and I kept begging him to recruit us. We were sent to a training battalion in Poland. At that time the war was over. So I happened to serve in the army, but not at the front. Subcarpathia belonged to the Soviet Union and I was subject to mandatory military service. I served in Poland for about a year and then I was sent to Khmelnitskiy, Vinnitsa region, Ukraine. I demobilized in 1947.
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Displaying 14221 - 14250 of 50826 results
Ernest Galpert
In 1944 Tilda and her family were sent to Auschwitz where younger Jews were sent to work and older Jews and children were exterminated. The Germans needed workforce. Tilda's family perished in Auschwitz. Her older sister Margarita and her son were also there. Margarita had the choice of not going with her son, but she decided to stay with him and they went to the gas chamber together. Tilda's parents and her younger brother, Shmil, also perished in the gas chamber. David and Hugo perished in forced labor and her brother Aron crossed the border of the USSR and perished in the Gulag [14]. Tilda, her sister Serena, who was in the USSR during World War II, and her brother Philip were the only survivors in the family.
,
During WW2
See text in interview
In the early 1900s my father's family moved to Mukachevo. My father actually grew up in Mukachevo. After moving to Mukachevo my grandfather went to work at the Jewish burial society [the Chevra Kaddisha]. My father's younger brother Idl was his assistant. Idl lived with his parents before he got married. My grandfather was a Hasid [3]. I remember him when he was an old man. He had a gray beard and payes. On weekdays he wore a black suit and a big black hat, and on Saturday he wore a long black caftan and a yarmulka with 13 squirrel tails that Hasidim used to wear on Saturday and Jewish holidays. [Editor's note: The hat that Hasidim usually wore on holidays is called a streimel.] My grandmother was a housewife. She wore black gowns and a black kerchief.
My father's family was very religious. It couldn't have been otherwise in a Hasidic family. My grandfather went to the synagogue every day and so did his sons after having their bar mitzvah. They observed Sabbath and Jewish holidays at home and spoke Yiddish.
My father and then his younger brother Idl finished cheder and went to study in a yeshivah in the town of Nitra in Slovakia.
During World War I my father was recruited to the Austro-Hungarian army [the so-called KuK army] [4]. At that time religion played an important role in the army and in life in general. The military could go to the religious establishments of their confessions when time permitted it, of course. Jews went to the synagogue on Saturday and Christians could got to their church on Sunday. Occasionally local Jewish families invited Jewish soldiers to Sabbath or other Jewish holidays. In their military units they had an opportunity to have kosher food cooked for them. My father was captured by the Russians and taken to Tver region in Russia. He told me about his captivity. He spoke of the Russians kindly. The landlords took prisoners of war to work for them. They kept the prisoners in good conditions and provided good food for them. My father was working for a landlord when in 1917 the Russian Revolution [5] took place. Then there was the Civil War [6]. When the war was over in 1918 the Bolsheviks released all prisoner of war captured by the tsarist army and my father returned home to Mukachevo. Shortly after he returned he married my mother.
My mother's family wasn't as religious as Hasidic families, but they went to the synagogue on Sabbath and Jewish holidays, the men prayed every day at home and they, of course, observed the kashrut. All children were raised Jewish. The family spoke Yiddish at home and Hungarian to their non-Jewish neighbors.
My grandmother visited us several times for a few days. I remember that she was an old woman wearing a black dress and a black kerchief.
My grandmother and her husband perished in 1941 during World War II. Jews from Slovakia were taken to Auschwitz. In 1939 the fascists [Germany] attacked Poland and built concentration camps there. There were only rumors that Jews were taken to Auschwitz from Slovakia. My parents knew that my grandmother and her husband were taken to a concentration camp, but they didn't share this knowledge with us. However, we, kids, understood that something bad had happened. My mother kept crying repeating, 'How is Mother? How is Mother?' In 1944, when the Jews from Subcarpathia were taken to Auschwitz, we didn't have any idea what was happening there. We thought it was an ordinary labor camp, although in labor camps inmates also died from diseases or starvation. Nobody knew that it was a death camp. My mother kept writing letters addressed to grandmother, but we never heard from her and my mother was deeply concerned. Finally she received a letter from my grandmother's neighbors. They wrote that my grandmother and her husband perished in Auschwitz.
I think my parents had a prearranged marriage since it was common practice with Jewish families to address matchmakers - shadkhanim, regarding this issue. My parents had a traditional Jewish wedding in 1919 when Subcarpathia belonged to Czechoslovakia. My mother told me how many geese were slaughtered and who their guests were, but I can't remember any details. I was a boy then and took no interest in such things. They had a chuppah at home in the yard and the rabbi from the synagogue that my father attended. The rabbi conducted a traditional wedding ceremony and then the newly-weds had to drop a plate and step on it with their feet to break it. Now they break a glass, but in the past it was a plate. When the plate broke the guests shouted 'Mazel Tov!' and sang wedding songs. Then they danced. The newly-weds danced the first dance and then there were mitzvah dances where guests took turns to dance with the bride. Every guest paid for the right to dance with the bride. The rich always demonstrated how much they were putting on a plate and the poor quickly dropped money so that nobody could tell how much they put down. That's what my mother told me.
My father had a small store in the biggest room in our house with an entrance from the front door. There were three rooms and a kitchen in the house. We entered the living quarters through the store. My father sold all common goods in his store. He worked in the store alone, there were no other employees. He opened the store early in the morning. In the early afternoon he closed it to go to the synagogue and when he returned he opened his store again to work until evening. Occasionally, even when the store was closed some customers asked my father to sell them what they needed and my father didn't refuse to serve them. He had Jewish and non- Jewish customers living in our street. We, children, also helped him in the store. My father earned enough for the family to make ends meet. We were neither rich nor poor. We didn't starve and could afford to support the poor on Thursday so that they could have a decent Sabbath. To help the poor was considered to be a holy duty, a mitzvah. On Thursday contributions for the needy were collected at the synagogue and my father always gave some money to the collectors.
Tilda and her friend Frieda were sent to a work camp in the town of Reichenbach from Auschwitz. My sisters Olga and Toby were there, too. This camp was located near a military plant of radio equipment. The inmates of the camp assembled radio equipment. Tilda and my sisters were in this camp until they were liberated. My sisters told Tilda that my relatives had perished in Auschwitz. After they were liberated from the camp Tilda and her friend Frieda went to Mukachevo.
My sisters stayed in Czechoslovakia and some time later, in the 1950s, they moved to Israel.
Tilda stayed in Uzhgorod with her sister Serena. She went to work. I demobilized in 1947 and came to Uzhgorod. Tilda worked at the town trade department. When we met I was wearing a faded soldier shirt and soldier boots. Tilda and Serena gave me their coupons to buy clothes since all goods were sold per coupons. I went to work as a mechanic in a small shop. We all lived in Serena's apartment.
On 30th April 1948 Tilda and I decided to go for a walk. It was a lovely day. By that time I had obtained a passport. We went outside and then one of us said, 'Let's go to the registry office'. Things were simple at that time. There were no best friends or advance applications required. We went to the registry office, showed them our documents and the director of the registry office put down our names and issued us a marriage certificate. It was like any other ordinary day. I bought a bottle of champagne and chocolates and invited the director of the registry office to drink to our happiness. He gave us a few glasses and we opened the bottle of champagne. Then we were photographed in the photo shop in the same building as the registry office. We went outside and Tilda said she had to go to work since her colleagues were going to prepare for the celebrations on 1st May. My colleagues were also going to have a celebration and invited me to come. So we parted and each went to his work. This was our wedding day.
I didn't face any anti-Semitism or prejudices towards me at work. On the contrary, my management began to promote me since I could speak Russian. I learned it in the army. Only few people could understand Russian in Subcarpathia at that time. Later children studied in Russian schools and learned Russian, but at that time I was one of the few that could speak Russian. My friend and I opened a small equipment repair shop. There were many Jewish employees in this shop. Its chairman was Mr. Tamper, a Jew. I earned good money since I was already a skilled mechanic. Once Tamper offered me to go to Kiev where I was to attend a course of training of quality assurance managers. I was the only employee who knew Russian. I talked with Tilda and we decided that it was good for me to go there. I stayed there for a month and finished this course with excellent results.
When I returned home it turned out that the chairman liquidated the shop where I was working. He had the intention of appointing me to the position of manager of the metal-ware shop. The manager's salary was much lower than what I had received previously, but I had no choice since the shop where I had worked was closed. This shop was converted into the Bolshevik Plant where I was the manager of a shop. I did my work well and began to implement modifications. I liked new developments and I also received bonuses for them that compensated my loss of salary. The management appreciated my performance and began to talk to me about going to study in a college. To enter a college I had to finish secondary school. Neither Tilda nor I had a secondary education. She and I decided to go to an extramural secondary school.
We hired a babysitter for Pyotr to be able to attend school. My wife and I studied in a Sunday school. We had classes the whole day on Sunday and had homework to do on weekdays. We finished this school and obtained secondary education certificates. Now we could continue our studies. I finished the extramural department of the Machine Building Faculty of Odessa Machine Building College and defended my diploma thesis with honors. The plant kept expanding. When I started work there were about 30 employees in my shop, but when I finished college there were already 80 employees. I became technical manager of the plant. I was content with this position. I wasn't a career-oriented man and was content with what I had.
When I was appointed as technical manager the management convinced me to join the Communist Party telling me that it would help me to make a career. Only members of the Party could have key positions in the former USSR. I obtained recommendations and was to be approved by the bureau of the town party committee. Everybody knew that I had the reputation of a skilled engineer and there were no objections to my membership in the Party.
My wife also joined the Communist Party. We had no idea about communism. We really didn't know what was happening in the USSR before the Great Patriotic War [15]. Besides, this country did nothing evil to us. We were grateful for a good life and an opportunity to study and work. To join the Party we had to fill in application forms where we wrote that we had been in a concentration camp. Those that had lived in the USSR since 1917 concealed the fact of their imprisonment in concentration camps. There was a suspicious attitude toward those that were there. They might have even been asked 'If you were in a concentration camp, how come you didn't perish?' Tilda and I were also concerned about indicating this fact, but then we decided: if we are joining the Party we want to tell the truth and we shall write the truth about ourselves. Actually, nothing came out of it.
My wife also joined the Communist Party. We had no idea about communism. We really didn't know what was happening in the USSR before the Great Patriotic War [15]. Besides, this country did nothing evil to us. We were grateful for a good life and an opportunity to study and work. To join the Party we had to fill in application forms where we wrote that we had been in a concentration camp. Those that had lived in the USSR since 1917 concealed the fact of their imprisonment in concentration camps. There was a suspicious attitude toward those that were there. They might have even been asked 'If you were in a concentration camp, how come you didn't perish?' Tilda and I were also concerned about indicating this fact, but then we decided: if we are joining the Party we want to tell the truth and we shall write the truth about ourselves. Actually, nothing came out of it.
I've never faced any anti-Semitism. My colleagues knew I was a Jew. Tilda and I always wrote in all forms that we were Jews and that our mother tongue was Yiddish and I was never ashamed of saying this. I have a Jewish soul. My colleagues treated me well. There were only a few Jewish employees at the plant. I spoke Yiddish to them. There were gypsies since the plant was located in an area with many gypsy residents. There were Hungarians, Slovaks and Ukrainians at the plant. I got along well with all of them. It's simple: you treat every individual with respect and he will try to justify your expectations of him.
Only once in my life did I face anti-Semitism. It was probably a minor incident. Besides, I got to know about it much later. Our director was transferred to a new plant under construction. I remained chief engineer and became acting director. I didn't intend to become the director since I was content with my position. When the new director came to the plant I helped and supported him introducing the state of things to him and he was grateful to me for that. Many years later my Jewish acquaintance told me that when the subject of appointing a new director was discussed at the bureau of the town party committee somebody said, 'Why looking for new director when we have Galpert?' and the secretary of the regional party committee, my good acquaintance, said, 'But he is a Jew'. That's the only case I know of when my Jewish identity interfered with my career. When I meet my former colleagues in the street they feel happy to see me and we kiss.
Tilda was doing well. She finished a nine-month party course. She was good at languages and picked up Russian promptly. She worked at the trade department of the town executive committee [Ispolkom] [16]. She must have been doing well and was promoted to the position of assistant deputy chairman of the regional executive committee where she worked for many years. Tilda never concealed the fact that she was a Jew. Tilda also picked up Ukrainian since all documents were in Ukrainian. She became the manager of the protocol department, which is a rather high position.
My wife and I didn't live under the Soviet rule for a long time - the area where we resided was annexed to the USSR in 1945 - and we didn't have a clear understanding of what was truly happening around us. We believed everything the Communist Party said. We belonged to the proletariat when we were young working for the owner of a factory. He exploited us. We truly believed that we were building a bright future and a nice international society where all people would be equal. This was a wonderful idea! We read books by Marx, Lenin and Stalin. We also read works by utopian socialists. It sounded beautiful what they wrote in those books. It was interesting and we lived believing it. When Stalin died in 1953 we were in grief. Of course, we saw that the reality was different from its description in books, but we thought it was due to the transition period and that the higher authorities weren't aware of the real status of things, but we had a feeling that something was wrong and that words were different from what they were doing.
We lived through the campaign against cosmopolitans [17] in 1948. It didn't have any impact on us and we couldn't understand the situation. It seemed to be a falsification. Same with the Doctors' Plot [18] in January 1953, it was all lousy and was a preparation to strengthen anti-Semitism. We tried not go too deep into it.
When Khrushchev [19] spoke about Stalin and about the Soviet system disclosing Stalin's crimes on Twentieth Party Congress [20], we understood what it was all about. We realized that we had to give up the idea of communism and socialism.
Since I was a party member and a manager I had to propagate to engineers at the plant. I was responsible for regular political classes with them. I can say one thing frankly: I never spoke my mind. I only said, 'Here is what Khrushchev says...', or 'This is what Brezhnev said ...'. I always referred to them since after the Twentieth Party Congress Tilda and I understood that the idea of communism was false. However, we remained party members until the last day in 1991, the breakup of the Soviet Union [21]. Some time in the late 1980s I stopped conducting the political training of my colleagues and at that period my party membership was a mere formality.
Since I was a party member and a manager I had to propagate to engineers at the plant. I was responsible for regular political classes with them. I can say one thing frankly: I never spoke my mind. I only said, 'Here is what Khrushchev says...', or 'This is what Brezhnev said ...'. I always referred to them since after the Twentieth Party Congress Tilda and I understood that the idea of communism was false. However, we remained party members until the last day in 1991, the breakup of the Soviet Union [21]. Some time in the late 1980s I stopped conducting the political training of my colleagues and at that period my party membership was a mere formality.
Pyotr finished the school with honors. We didn't want him to continue his education in Ukraine fearing that he would face anti-Semitism. Ukraine was a part of the USSR. Anti-Semitism in Russia wasn't as strong as in Ukraine. He went to Leningrad where he passed successfully his entrance exams to the Optical Mechanical College. He studied there for five and a half years. He had his pre-diploma practical training at the military plant in Izhevsk and they sent wonderful references for his performance back to the college.
When it was time for the issuing of his mandatory job assignment [22] we had the chief engineer of the device manufacturing plant in Uzhgorod send a letter of request to the college in Leningrad, and Pyotr received a job assignment to this plant. He worked at this plant as a designer before perestroika [23]. When perestroika began this plant was shut down like many other enterprises. Our son went to work for an Internet provider.
When it was time for the issuing of his mandatory job assignment [22] we had the chief engineer of the device manufacturing plant in Uzhgorod send a letter of request to the college in Leningrad, and Pyotr received a job assignment to this plant. He worked at this plant as a designer before perestroika [23]. When perestroika began this plant was shut down like many other enterprises. Our son went to work for an Internet provider.
Our younger son went to take entrance exams to the same college in Leningrad where Pyotr studied after finishing school. Regretfully, he fell ill and couldn't take the exams. He was recruited to the army. He served in a military unit that dealt with radar units. Yuri was the assistant to an officer who worked with electronics. After demobilization he returned to Uzhgorod and went to work at a plant as a mechanic. He also entered the Electric Engineering Faculty of Lvov Polytechnic University and finished it. After finishing his studies Yuri became an engineer at the plant where he had worked as a mechanic before. He worked there until the plant was shut down during perestroika. Yuri and his friend opened a café. Yuri didn't quite like it, but he had to earn his living. He worked there for three years. When Hesed was organized in Uzhgorod its director invited Yuri to work. Yuri is regional director of the Hesed and is happy with this job.
I cannot say that my wife and I kept our religiosity after World War II. We didn't pray or go to the synagogue and it wasn't possible to follow the kashrut. I gave up religion after my family perished. I cannot believe in a God who allowed the mass extermination of Jews only because they were Jews. If this happened and God didn't prevent it this means that He either doesn't exist or isn't as powerful and just as I was told in my childhood.
However, our children were aware that they were Jews. I told them the history of the Jewish people. On every holiday I told them about the history and traditions of this holiday. On Pesach I told them about how the Jews got to Egypt and how Moses saved them. I told them about all customs and traditions to be observed on Pesach and why Jews ate matzah on this holiday. We usually began our story with 'Today is Pesach. Here is how we observed it at home...' Tilda cooked traditional Jewish food. On Pesach Tilda had a barrel of beetroot kvass made. She made hamantashen on Purim and put honey and apples on the table on Rosh Hashanah.
I told my sons about my childhood and cheder, how my father and I went to the synagogue and about my bar mitzvah: everything that I've told you in this interview. I told them how I began to give up religion and how I became a worker. I also told them about how I hurt my mother and that I still feel guilty about it and that I can only ask her forgiveness in my thoughts since I never saw my mother again after the camp. Our sons got all their Jewish knowledge when they were children. I believed it was our duty to acquaint them with Jewish life and they would know how to use what they've received from us.
I told my sons about my childhood and cheder, how my father and I went to the synagogue and about my bar mitzvah: everything that I've told you in this interview. I told them how I began to give up religion and how I became a worker. I also told them about how I hurt my mother and that I still feel guilty about it and that I can only ask her forgiveness in my thoughts since I never saw my mother again after the camp. Our sons got all their Jewish knowledge when they were children. I believed it was our duty to acquaint them with Jewish life and they would know how to use what they've received from us.
I spent all my free time with my family. On weekends we went for walks and hiking in the mountains. In summer we went hiking and in winter we went skiing in the mountains. We spent vacations at the seaside in the south. In the 1970s I received a plot of land and we began to build a dacha [cottage] and grow fruit trees and flowers. The dacha was our favorite pastime. My sons were helping me to build the house. My wife enjoyed gardening. Tilda and I often went to concerts and theaters. We also liked inviting friends to our home.