My father Haim Zatkovetskiy was born in 1889, I don’t know the exact date of his birth. My father got an elementary Jewish education. He studied in cheder till the age of 13 and then he followed into grandfather Benyum steps taking to farming. This is all I know about his childhood. I know that shortly after he married my mother, and they had a traditional wedding under a chuppah at the synagogue, my father was recruited to the army during WWI.
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Yelizaveta Zatkovetskaya
During pogroms, when gangs broke into Sagaydak, Yelizaveta grabbed me telling them I was her daughter. Bandits used to rape young girls, but they didn’t touch those who were married and had children. Pogroms stayed in my memory as one of my first childhood memories. I remember that my father’s brother Duvid was ill, when a pogrom began, and my father took him to the attic fearing that bandits might kill him. Then my father grabbed me and ran into a field where we were hiding in high sunflower plants. I remember that I was thirsty, and he went to pick a watermelon in the adjoining field and there bandits captured him. My father begged them to allow him take me from the field or I would get lost in the field of sunflowers that were 3 times higher than me. They ordered him to take off his boots, and made him run across the fields holding me to the village. At home bandits turned our wardrobes upside down looking for good clothes, but we were poor and there was nothing to take. My father often hid me and other children in a haystack during pogroms and at times we spent few days there. My father brought us water and food and ordered to be quiet. I remember some military staying in our house. They made my grandfather unharness horses, water and feed their horses and told grandmother to bake bread for them. I have this vivid picture before: my grandmother Etah kneading dough in a big kneading trough with her sleeves rolled up, and tears falling from her eyes into the trough.
Our family was very religious, and celebrated Sabbath even in those hard years. My grandfather, father and his brothers went to the synagogue on Friday. There was a big beautiful two-storied synagogue from red bricks in the town. When they returned, the family sat down to dinner. There was challah bread, salt in a salt-cellar covered with a clean napkin and at least some wine on the table. My grandmother lit candles, and my grandfather said a prayer. Then he took a piece of challah, dipped it into salt, and the meal began. In those hungry years there was nothing, but challah baked from potato peels on the table. I remember celebration of Sabbath after the famine was over and life improved. The family was big: Feiga and her children also lived with my grandparents after Feiga’s husband was killed during a pogrom. There were 13 of us sitting at the table. All adults worked in the field. On Friday Feiga stayed at home to help grandmother prepare for Sabbath. My grandmother cooked in the Russian oven [8], and needed help with handling heavy casseroles and frying pans. My grandmother and Feiga always covered their heads: with either a plain kerchief on weekdays or a lace shawl on holidays. Men also covered their heads and always had a kippah on sitting at the table. They followed kashrut, and grandfather even forbade his sons to smoke inside.
I remember preparations to Jewish holidays. Before Pesach kosher crockery was taken down from the attic. As a rule, there was more needed and grandmother koshered everyday utensils in a big trough. The walls were whitewashed and the floors clayed and painted on edges to imitate carpeting. All children had new clothes made for them before Pesach. I remember dresses made for Yelizaveta and Manya from gray sack cloth with colorful edging, and grandmother made a dress from the remaining pieces for me. My grandfather usually conducted seder reclining at the head of the table: with his big beard, tallit and fancy kippah, posing questions and one of the older boys answering them. I also liked Sukkoth, when the family had meals in the sukkah near the house installed by grandfather and his sons. Chanukkah was my favorite holiday since it was my birthday. On Chanukkah every day another candle was lit in a special chanukkiyah candle stand. My grandmother made delicious dough nuts and potato pancakes. The children were given some money. The family bought another dress for me and there was a birthday cake made.
There was a 4-year Jewish school in Sagaydak. I studied very well.
I studied in the 6th and 7th forms in Ingulets. I studied well and was a pioneer and an activist. I was usually responsible for helping pupils who were not so good with their studies. I liked it and decided to become a teacher.
In 1932 I finished this 7-year school. Two of my friends also wanted to become teachers and convinced me to go to the Pedagogical College in Kiev. Uncle Zalman tried to talk me out of traveling so far, but I was eager to see a big town, live and study in it. Besides, I had never seen a train before. Everything seemed interesting to me, and I was not afraid of anything. In Kiev we accommodated with a distant relative of one of the girls. Her husband was a Party official, and they lived in a big apartment in the center of the city. There were rabfak schools [10] in colleges – faculties preparing workers for colleges. The girls and I submitted our documents to this school. There were interviews and exams, and I was the only one of the three of us who was admitted. The girls left home ad I stayed in Kiev. I became a student of the Jewish Faculty of Kiev Pedagogical College. This faculty trained teachers of the Jewish literature and language for Jewish schools. There were many Jewish schools in Ukraine at that time. We studied in Yiddish. I lived in a hostel. There were huge rooms. There were 16 tenants in my room. We got along well and had a lot of fun together.
Then the period of famine [11] began. Our stipends of 24 rubles were only enough to buy tea and sugar plums. So we had sugarplums with boiled water. In the college canteen we got thin soup with a bit of cabbage or beetroots. Many girls quit their studies. There were military schools in Kiev where cadets received rationed food.
I also became a Komsomol member [12], when I was the first-year student and took an active part in public activities. Again I was responsible for helping other students with their studies. We were to study four years, but there was a need in teachers, and they reduced our course to three years. After the second year of studies this Jewish Faculty moved to Odessa to be farther from the capital. We didn’t understand then that it was a beginning of a slow attack on the Jewish culture and education. I lived in a hostel in Odessa. We celebrated all Soviet holidays, went to parades and festivals, but I also remembered the Jewish traditions. Being a Komsomol member, I couldn’t openly celebrate holidays or go to the synagogue, but I tried to observe traditions quietly. I tried to do no hard work on Saturday and fasted on Yom Kippur without mentioning it to anyone. Of course, following the kashrut was out of the question since we were always hungry and ate whatever we could get.
In the late 1920s – early 1930s new Jewish settlements were established in the south of Ukraine with the help of AgroJoint [13]. Some villages had names and some – Numbers: 16th, 17th, 23rd sites. AgroJoint helped poor Jews with moving to new locations and built houses and schools for them. There was also a need in Jewish teachers, and I received a job assignment [14] to a 7-year school in the 17th site in Kherson region. I am sure that this village is no longer there. It probably became a part of the nearest town. I rented an apartment from the logistic manager of school.
Fira dated a zootechnician from the farm. Once we invited him to our home. That evening we made macaroni for dinner and the moment we served the table there was a knock on the door. We put our dinner under the table, just in case, having no intention to share our dinner with anybody and opened the door. There was Fira’s friend and an interesting young man with him. It was his friend, senior zootechnician. Fira’s friend wanted us to meet. They stayed for quite a while, and we were only concerned that one of them didn’t turn our dinner upside down. When the guys left we burst into laughter, but I didn’t really feel like laughing. I liked the guy very much. We began to see each other and few months later he proposed to me. I wrote my father (my grandmother Etah and grandfather Benyum had passed away by then) that I was planning to get married, described my fiancé and he gave me his blessing. Then my father and uncle Zalman visited us to meet my husband to be. In late 1936 we got married. We just had a civil ceremony in a registry office. Traditional Jewish weddings were not practiced at that time. We were both Komsomol members and might be expelled from Komsomol or even fired from work. Besides, there was no synagogue in our village.
My husband Peretz Freidkin was born in 1910 in Kalinindorf, a Jewish colony in Kherson region. His parents Zalman Berl and Rasia Freidkins also dealt in farming. Besides, my father-in-law was a shoemaker and it made his additional earnings. My husband’s family was a traditional Jewish family. He studied in cheder and then finished a Jewish elementary school. He also finished the Agricultural College in Kherson and became a zootechnician.
Then we moved to the Jewish colony of Seidemenucha where I got a job assignment from the regional department of education half a year later. My husband worked as a zootechnician there as well.
After our son was born we moved to my husband’s parents in Kalinindorf. We had a good life together. My husband’s parents had a nice big house and a garden. I worked at school. We hired a baby sitter for my son and my mother-in-law was helping me. She observed Jewish traditions. On Saturday our Ukrainian neighbor came to set the table for our family and feed our livestock. My mother-in-law made matzah and we celebrated Pesach. We usually spent vacations with my husband’s sister Tsylia in Kherson where she lived with her husband and two daughters: Yenia and Genia. Tsylia and I became friends, though she was significantly older than me.
My husband was a zootechnician in the kolkhoz [15] ‘The way to communism’. It was a very rich Jewish kolkhoz, a ‘millionaire’, adjoining to Kalinindorf. It was an advanced kolkhoz in the district, and in the late 1930s my husband and his crew were invited to the Exhibition of Achievements of Public Economy in Moscow. He took his pedigree cows and bulls to the exhibition and received a diploma for participation in the exhibition. I still keep this diploma and the photograph of my husband’s crew at the Exhibition in the fair memory of Peretz.
This was a concerning period. In 1939 Jewish refugees from Poland appeared in our area escaping from fascists. At that same time my husband’s older brother on his father’s side Moishe Freidkin, his wife Kleina and their five-year-old daughter and little son Mosia arrived at Kalinindorf from Bessarabia [16]. We began to receive letters and photographs from him after Bessarabia was annexed to the USSR. Of course, we knew about Hitler and fascism, but we didn’t have thoughts about a war: it all seemed to be so far away. The Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact [17] made people think that there was going to be no war.
I shall always remember the day of 22 June 1941, when the Great Patriotic War began. It was a warm sunny day, Sunday, and we were at home. My husband was cutting wood in the yard and I was playing with my son nearby. It was about noontime and we were going to rest in the garden after lunch, when our neighbor ran in screaming ‘It’s the war!’ We ran into the house: we were the only owners of a radio. We listened to Molotov [18] who spoke about the war and perfidious attack of fascists on our country. Mobilization began. My husband obtained a military service release certificate. He was responsible for evacuation of the livestock. He went to Lvovo colony with his crew where they arranged transfer of the cattle. He stayed there few weeks. I and other residents were digging an anti-tank trench. If only we had known how easily Hitler’s tanks overcame those funny obstacles for them while we believed that this trench would stop fascists and they would not invade our home town.
On our way a wheel broke and while the men were fixing it, local boys were running around shouting ‘zhydy [kike] are running away!’ It was the first time in my life that I heard an abuse of this kind. I had always lived among Jews before and I don’t think I even suspected existence of anti-Semitism.
While we were there waiting we heard that my husband’s sister Tsylia and her younger daughter Genia came to our home and were looking for us. My husband and father-in-law took one horse and rode back home to pick her up. They were also concerned about the older brother. It turned out that Moishe and his family also made an effort to evacuate, but the crossing was closed and they were told to go back home. This family perished in the occupation.
When we crossed the river my husband said that thought he was released from military service he could not be an outside observer in this blood shedding war and that he had to fight fascists. Peretz hugged and kissed me and said he understood that I would have a hard time having to take care of our son and old folks. He gave me his watch to sell it for money. I begged my husband to stay, but he was inexorable. In the morning he left with the accountant’s son. I never saw my husband again. There was no military registry office in Kalinindorf and the accountant’s son returned, but Peretz went on looking for our troops. He must have perished on his way: there were violent battles in this area at that time.
We reached Rostov region having covered over 250 km. We spent the nights in the woods. Local villagers gave us some food on the way. We stayed in a kolkhoz. There was an order issued to kolkhozes to accommodate the newcomers and give them jobs. We rented a room in a house. Tsylia and I worked in the kolkhoz. My father-in-law was a shoemaker and my mother-in-law looked after the children. Tsylia and I went to the railroad after work every day: there were trains passing to the front or to the rear with the wounded.
In late November we reached Elista town, the capital of Kalmyk ASSR in 900 km from home. It was a small town. There were mostly private houses in it. There were bigger houses in the center of the town: the Supreme Soviet, Party Central Committee, central post office and a theater. There was a kolkhoz in the suburb where we left our hardworking bulls. A Kalmyk family gave us shelter. We slept on the floor in a big room. I was sleeping near the door and every morning I found a piece of bread or a lump of sugar by my side. The host of the house left them feeling sorry for us, but keeping it a secret from his wife. His wife also sympathized with us. She gave food to the children till I went to work. I began to work at the post office and Tsylia got a job of a cloakroom attendant at the theater. We received bread coupons for us and the children. My father-in-law worked as a shoemaker and his customers paid him with food: milk, eggs or read.
We took a freight train to Begovat station near Tashkent where we met a Russian woman from Nikolaev. We started talking to her at the station. She helped us a lot. She found accommodation and paid for us, lent us some money and helped me to find a job. She also helped us to obtain a residential permit [19] through her Uzbek acquaintance working in the militia. We lived in a small room in the basement. Tsylia and I went to work at a shop manufacturing ropes for the front. Mikhail and Yenia went to a kindergarten and Genia went to school and helped her grandmother about the house. Tsylia received letters from her husband. I wrote many requests searching for him, but it was in vain. One of commanders wrote me that my husband may have perished never reaching our troops. I was ready to do any work to support my family. After work I made jam from cherry plums or apples – whatever I could pick in the streets, and ran to the market to sell it. I sold jam in glasses and then bought food for the money I got. I was surprised that locals didn’t make jam, but willingly bought it from me. My father-in-law fixed shoes sitting and working on his box outside. He earned a little, when a financial inspector [state officer responsible for identification of illegal businesses], a young and strong Uzbek man demanded that we paid him 10 rubles per day. My father-in-law didn’t have this much. Once this inspector pushed his box throwing his tools about the street and told the old man to stay away from the street, if he didn’t have money for him. When we came back from work, my mother-in-law and father-in-law were crying. I wrote a letter to the Ministry of defense in Moscow. I wrote about our life, about having to escape from our home leaving all our belongings behind, and that our husbands had perished and the old man was trying to earn some money to support the family and we didn’t beg the state to help us, while this young strong inspector was not at the front for some reason. Two weeks later a commission came from the executive committee. They inspected our room, saw drying bread on the stove and allowed my father-in-law to do his work without fearing anyone.
On 14 March 1944 Kalinindorf was liberated. I submitted a request for going back. We received permission for reevacuation only in November. I wrote to the village council that we were returning and asked them to inform me on what happened to our relatives. They wrote me back that Moishe and Kreina Freidkins and their children were shot by fascists in Kalinindorf. I received the same notification for my father and stepmother in Sagaydak. I was eager to go back to my home place. Our return trip lasted for about a month. The trains were passing by without stopping, so overcrowded they were and we had to wait at stations for a long time before getting on another train. Finally in late December 1944 we arrived at Kalinindorf. I hired a wagon to take us home. Our house was there, but the door was locked. A Ukrainian woman and her son had moved into our house. She came back in the evening with a friend of hers and chairman of the village council. They allowed us to live in half of the house, but we were happy about it. Hungry and exhausted, we fell asleep on the floor. In the morning we found out that there was nothing left in the house: this woman had taken our belongings away.
In January 1945 the Supreme Soviet issued an order about opening children’s homes for all homeless children. In Kalinindorf a children’s home was opened in the building of the Jewish school built before the war. The executive committee [20] authorized me to take the responsibility for restoration of the building and opening of the children’s home. We gathered bricks to make a stove and washed and cleaned the walls and windows, bought beds, desks, blankets and bed sheets. The villagers also donated whatever they could. On 16 March 1945 I conducted the opening ceremony. At first there were six children in the home. Four of them were German children, whose parents had been deported from the colony before fascists came to the village. The children stayed in a Ukrainian family. At first I was acting director of this home till they appointed a nice man for this position. He returned from the front where he had lost his arms. I became a teacher. I assisted director with everything.
We celebrated 9 May 1945 – Victory Day, in the children’s home. God, it was happiness!
. Some time later Abram and I felt that there was more to our relationship than just the memories: our late and much suffered for love came to us. I moved in with Abram and we got married in 1947.
I worked in the children’s home and my husband worked as a storekeeper in the military registry office.
My older son Mikhail finished school in 1956 and went to take exams to a military college in Tambov. It was his dream to become a military. They didn’t admit him without explaining the reasons, though it clearly had to do with his nationality. He went to work at the mechanic plant of Perovskiy in Kherson. He lived with Tsylia’s family. Then he went to his mandatory service in Azerbaijan and then in Moscow region. Mikhail’s dream was to study in college. He wanted to become a doctor and he studied a lot when in the army. After the term of his service was over Mikhail entered Moscow Medical College and after finishing it he became a physician.
My middle son Alexandr was very fond of history. After his service in the army he submitted his documents to the Historical Faculty of Simferopol University. They didn’t admit him explaining that there was a quota for Jews. He returned home and went to work as a mechanic. He finished Machine Building College in Kherson.