FROM THE WEDDING, A BIOGRAPHY by JOSEPH LEVINE
Chapter 3
The Biography of my father and the settlers.
My dear readers, now that you know what my town looks like, I can write the biography of my dear, respected father.
You should know, that my father, may he rest in peace, came from a small town near Gradna, Amdur. From this you can gather that he was a Litvak and he could learn Torah well. He studied in the Yeshiva until the age of 18. Since he had been orphaned at a young age and his mother had remarried and had more children, he could no longer live with his mother. Neither was there any place to eat. Just like Alexander I, over one hundred years ago, wanted to bring the Jews closer to the Russian people, he founded schools for the Jewish students so they could study, but the teachers wouldn't graduate them, unless they would convert. Also in the year 1804 Jews were being chased from their towns. In the year 1825 Nikolai the First was crowned. He reigned until the year 1855. These 30 years that Nikolai ruled were the worst era for the Jews. Also in Lithuania there was a big famine and bread was very dear. Czar Nikolai however did not want Jews to be settlers.
It took plenty of time and effort before the Jewish philanthropist, Sir Moshe Montefiore, persuaded, that Czar Nikolai permitted the Jews to be given land so they should be enabled to become settlers.
That's when hundreds of Jews from all the Lithuanian towns dispersed throughout the world. Some remained in Wolen, some in Poland, and the younger --my father among them-- were not lazy and went even further and came to the Hersoner, Paltaver, and Yekaterinslaver districts.
This is how one journeyed until he arrived at a settlement. Many immediately took to working the land and the land was divided as much as was necessary. They were given cows, horses, and tools. They were given an adequate supply of everything, so that there would be no complaints, and there actually were no complaints.
The settlers worked vigorously. They plowed and sowed. The work burned up under their hands. They wanted to work. They loved that land.
What happiness, what joy presided over the land, when they saw the first sprouts, when the fields started turning green, when the settlers saw that their work was crowned with good results!
The settlers stood on the green fields and looked with hope and satisfaction. These green fields were the product of human beings who were, not long before, tailors, shoemakers, and bums!
However, not only in farm work did these tailors and shoemakers prove their talents. They also became heroes, rich men and everything. They became sportsmen. They became excellent riders, and among the women emerged the best riders who were admired also by non-Jews. They settled on this land and conducted the nicest settlement-type businesses in all of the districts in which they had settled.
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Did you know, the city of Grodno is located 80 km northeast of Bialystok. It was the second largest city in the Bialystok district, an area approximately the size of Belgium, and on the eve WW2 had a population of approximately 50,000, of whom 42%, or 21,159 were Jewish. A part of Poland between 1921 and 1939, and from 1944 to 1991 included in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Byelorussia, the city is today situated in the Republic of Belarus. The Bialystok district, of which Grodno became part, experienced a turbulent history. As a border region between Poles, Lithuanians, Russians and Ukrainians, it was often subject to military attack. In 1939, it was conquered by German troops. These troops later withdrew and the region was occupied by the Soviet Union, only for German troops to reoccupy it immediately following the commencement of hostilities between Germany and the Soviet Union in June 1941. On the night of 22-23 June 1941 the city fell to the German army. At first Grodno was not included in the Bialystok district but remained part of the Generalkommissariat Weissrussland. Then, on 18 September 1941, it was attached to the Bialystok district.
Hrodna (Belarusian: Гро́дна; Russian: Гро́дно; Polish: Grodno; Lithuanian: Gardinas, German: Garten) is a city in Belarus. It is located on the Neman River, close to the borders of Poland and Lithuania (about 15 km and 30 km away respectively). It has 317,366 inhabitants (2005 estimate). It is the capital of Hrodna voblast (province) and Hrodna raion (district).
During certain periods, the Jews of Grodno comprised 80% of the total population, and even more. At one point, there were approximately 40 Synagogues in the city, three Jewish cemeteries, Jewish educational institutions, and enterprises owned by Jews. During the Holocaust, the city was occupied by the Nazis. The Jews of the city were concentrated in ghettoes, and later sent to the death camps of Auschwitz and Treblinka. Almost the entire Jewish population was murdered. Records indicate it has been in existence for at least 900 years. Not surprisingly given its location, Hrodna has a significant Polish and Lithuanian heritage and lay for a time within these realms historically. The modern city of Grodno originated as a small fortress and a fortified trading outpost. Its name derives from the Old East Slavic verb gorodit', i.e., to enclose, to fence.
Mentioned for the first time in the Primary Chronicle under 1127 as Goroden' and located at a crossing of numerous trading routes, this Slavic settlement, possibly originating as far as the late 10th century, became the capital of a poorly attested but separate principality, ruled by Yaroslav the Wise's grandson and his descendants.
Along with Navahradak, Hrodna was regarded as the main city on the far west of Black Rus, that was neighbouring original Lithuania. It was often attacked by various invaders, especially the Teutonic Knights. In the 1250s the Hrodna area was overrun by the pagan Lithuanians, who later formed the Grand Duchy of Lithuania on these territories. The New Castle in Hrodno used to be a summer residence of Polish monarchs.To aid the reconstruction of trade and commerce, the grand dukes allowed the creation of a Jewish commune in 1389. It was one of the first Jewish communities in the grand duchy. In the late 1920s the city became one of the biggest Polish Army garrisons. This brought the local economy back on track. Also, the city was a notable centre of Jewish culture, with roughly 37% of the city's population being Jewish.
In accordance with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact the city was transferred to the Soviet Union to the Belarusian SSR, and several thousand of the city's Polish inhabitants were deported to remote areas of the Soviet Union. In 1941, the city came under German occupation, which lasted until July 1944. In the course of the World War II, the majority of Hrodna's remaining Jews were exterminated in German concentration camps.
Documents Concerning The Murder of 29000 Jews of Grodno By the Germans, 1941-1943.
Grodno was one of the oldest Jewish communities in Greater Lithuania. It appears that Jews already resided there at the end of the twelfth century - refugees from the Kingdom of Kiev and from western Europe who fled from the Crusades - but this cannot be confirmed. The first reliable evidence of a Jewish community at the site is a charter of privileges (a settlement permit specifying rights and obligations) from 1389, granted to the Jews by Grand Duke Vitold of Lithuania. The document suggests that the Grodno Jews had already established a synagogue and a cemetery and also owned real estate in and around the town; they made a living from commerce, crafts, agriculture, and leasing land. The charter, which was intended primarily to regularize the Jews' rights vis-a-vis the Christian townspeople, permitted their use of public grazing fields, forests, and meadows. The synagogue and cemetery were exempted from all taxation. Grodno's Jews were not harmed during the calamitous events of 1648. They were even able to serve as a haven to refugees who fled from Chmielnicki's forces and to extend financial assistance to their brethren in other communities.
From 1616, the city's Jews suffered from persecutions at the hands of Christian zealots (the Jesuits), who kidnapped Jewish children and baptized them as Christians. The Jews were forced to raise funds to meet the high ransom payments demanded for the children. In 1906, following a pogrom against the Jews of nearby Bialystok, a wave of refugees streamed into Grodno, where they found relief and shelter. The pogrom, together with the antisemitic mood that prevailed in the region from 1903 to 1907, spurred Grodno's Jews to take measures of self-defense.
In 1859, Grodno merchants still constituted 15.8 percent of all the merchants in the province, but, by 1886, this had fallen to 12.3 percent. On May 29, 1885, much of the city was consumed in a blaze that also gutted six synagogues and the Jewish orphanage. Rebuilding was undertaken with the aid of generous outside contributions, including 25,000 rubles from the Tsar and 5,000 from the Crown Prince. Another fire, in July 1900, laid waste the entire city, this time destroying twelve synagogues, some of them centuries old. Nevertheless, the Jews remained a central factor in the city's economy. In 1886, 65 percent of the real estate in Grodno was owned by Jews; Jews owned 1,165 businesses (88 percent of the total); 103 of the 129 registered merchants were Jews; 76 percent of the city's industry was in Jewish hands; and Jews also accounted for 70 percent of the craftsmen, a constantly rising proportion. In 1897, there were 13,147 Jewish providers in Grodno.
The Jews maintained their dominant place in the city's economy until World War I. In 1921, Jews owned 1,273 industrial plants and workshops, which employed 3,719 workers (including 2,341 salaried workers, of whom 83 percent were Jews); of these, 34.6 percent were in the food industry, and 29 percent manufactured clothing. By 1937, Grodno's Jews owned sixty-five large and medium-sized plants, employing 2,181 salaried workers (41 percent of them Jews), as compared with 51 government and non-Jewish plants, which employed 2,262 salaried workers. Grodno also served as the Jewish spiritual center for the entire region. Eminent rabbis and Torah sages resided there, and the city boasted a famous yeshivah.
The Council of Lithuanian Jewry (Va'ad Medinat Lita), which was founded in the early sixteenth century and existed until 1764, usually met in Grodno or in towns in the Grodno region - Miesteczki, Zabludow, Krynki, and Amdur. The Council consisted of heads of the Kehillah and the rabbis of the three major communities - Brest-Litovsk (Brisk), Grodno and Pinsk (according to their order of importance).
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